At a glance
- Type
- Legendary Lord
- Battlefield role
- Spellcaster and melee army leader
- Content pack
- Nagash – Lords of the End Times
- Race
- Undead Legions
- Faction
- Host of Nagash
Availability
Content pack: Nagash – Lords of the End Times. Immortal Empires ownership
- Requires the Nagash – Lords of the End Times DLC, sold individually or in the complete Lords of the End Times bundle.
- The pack includes Immortal Empires access; Total War: Warhammer III ownership is not required separately.
The Black Pyramid campaign
Nagash leads the Host of Nagash for the Undead Legions. Creative Assembly’s introduction names the Black Pyramid as his starting settlement and the centre of his campaign development. Nodes in the Pyramid upgrade the faction and the units he can recruit. Those upgrades spend Empowered Sigils, drawn from several sources and principally from building and improving Necropolises, so conquest and the Pyramid advance together.
Captured coastal settlements become Pirate Coves. Inland settlements can become Burial Chambers or Mausoleums. Across them he recruits from the Vampire Coast, Tomb Kings and Vampire Counts rosters. Necropolises are the major settlements of the Land of the Dead: each one gathers Necromantic Energy from the regions in its province and from bordering provinces. That energy pays for Necropolis buildings, higher unit capacity, and instant Gravecall recruitment in the province. Ordinary recruitment still spends Dark Energy.
Apex caster and melee lord
Creative Assembly describes Nagash as an apex caster and melee lord. He uses the Lore of Undeath. His staff Alakanash pulses a vortex that repels attackers. His blade Zefet-Nefbar can return damage he deals as health. Arch Necromancer is a finishing ability against enemy lords or heroes who are already seriously wounded. Ryze: Gravecall abilities raise units during the battle.
The same introduction adds Morghast Harbingers and the Khemric Titan to the mixed undead army, and also names Morghast Archai, Spirit Hosts and the Coven Throne. Build the fight around the line and the caster together: magic and a mobile construct need a target the rest of the army can reach. Sending him after a distant character leaves the formation without its caster.
Check the Land of the Dead
Gravecall raises units at once inside a Necropolis province, and it is separate from spending Dark Energy on ordinary recruitment. Patch 9.0.4 added a disabled button and an explanatory tooltip when Grave Call is unavailable. Check that the army is in range of the Land of the Dead before counting on an instant raise.
Mortarchs and the unique agent
Subjugating a Mortarch legendary lord grants immediate ownership of that lord’s empire and forces. Creative Assembly names Arkhan the Black, Neferata, Luthor Harkon, Vlad von Carstein and Mannfred von Carstein. Dieter Helsnicht and Walach Harkon are Mortarch heroes who can also unlock for Vampire Counts factions. The Nameless is a follower who lets an assigned lord possess enemy units before a battle.
Meet Nagash listed Krell with those heroes. Update 9.0 then describes Krell as a unique agent and adjusts Heinrich Kemmler’s skills around that change. Each Mortarch has unlock conditions of their own. Treat them as a campaign goal beside the Pyramid, not as lords who start inside the Host of Nagash.
The Books of Nagash
Meet Nagash, the preview for the pack, said that recovering the Books of Nagash could add spells from the lores of Light, Vampires, Death and Nehekhara. Update 9.0, shipped later, changed how the Books are held. A lord carries a Book, or a settlement stores it. The Book empowers that carrier, and it can move to another of your armies. Other factions can defeat the carrier and send the Book to their capital or dispose of it for a time. The patch notes describe that struggle and do not restate the preview’s spell list, so the two accounts stay separate.
Settra and the other undead lords
Update 9.0’s item notes call Settra the Imperishable Nagash’s greatest nemesis, and they add the Armour of Golden Magnificence and the Scarab Brooch of Usirian to Settra. The older biography names Alcadizzar, not Settra, as the king in the ritual chamber. On the campaign map the Mortarch lords are possible lieutenants. Settra remains a Tomb Kings rival named in the patch, with his own play page.
Books around the Black Pyramid
For the Black Pyramid story off the campaign map, start with Mike Lee’s Nagash trilogy (Nagash the Sorcerer, Nagash the Unbroken, Nagash Immortal) and Josh Reynolds’s The Return of Nagash (The End Times book 5). They cover the rise of Nagash, the Mortarchs, and the Books of Nagash as Black Library tells them.
On the campaign map, Arkhan, Neferata, Luthor Harkon, Vlad, and Mannfred remain the Mortarch lords tied to the Nagash pack. Settra is the nemesis named in the Update 9.0 notes.
Sources
- Lords of the End Times: Meet Nagash — community.creative-assembly.com
- Total War: Warhammer III Update 9.0 — community.creative-assembly.com
- Total War: Warhammer III Patch 9.0.4 — community.creative-assembly.com
- Nagash – Lords of the End Times on Steam — store.steampowered.com