Greetings folks!

Thanks for your feedback in the wake of Patch 5.3's release. We've been keeping a close eye on your comments regarding Magic Items in particular, and today we've rolled out Hotfix 5.3.1 which includes, alongside a number of bug fixes, some rebalancing for some of these items. We'll continue to monitor your feedback regarding these, so do keep letting us know your thoughts once you've got your hands on the changes.

We expect our next release to be 6.0, and though our teams will of course be monitoring for any unexpected errors that require an additional hotfix, our heads are now down for the final stretch on the road to the release of Update 6.0 and the next DLC! In case you missed it, you can watch our latest dev chat video for some more details on what's coming.

Without further ado, let's look at today's changelog:

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We’ve received a lot of feedback on our newly released Magic Items and will continue to monitor it. For now, we’ve made the following changes:

This item was more punishing than necessary, and the positives didn’t fully warrant the burden of the negatives. In particular, the fatigue penalty was quite harsh, so we’ve made the following adjustments:

• Reduced the movement range penalty from -50% to -20%.
  
• Removed the fatigue penalty effect.

This item was always intended to have a strong tradeoff that aligns with its lore. However, we agree with the feedback we've received that the item was skewed too negatively, particularly providing little reason to keep it equipped. We’ve made the following addition to the item:

• Added a 2% chance per end turn for the helm to grant a powerful unique trait, ‘Power of Draesca.’
  
• ‘Power of Draesca’: +20% HP, +20% character experience, +10% ward save, +10% research rate.

One of the smaller ideas we didn’t manage to include in patch 5.3 was the concept that these sister swords would provide an extra benefit when they are together. We’ve now implemented this and added the following to the swords:

• Added a 5% chance per end turn for characters with these swords equipped to gain a unique trait when both are in the same region.
  
• Sister Swords: +10 melee attack, +10 melee defence, charge reflect attribute.

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• Fixed a crash that occurred when attempting to exchange units with a camp that was being abandoned during the campaign.
  
• Fixed a crash that occurred while loading a battle with AI Control selected and Control Large Army toggled off in siege battles with large garrison armies.

• Fixed a rare end-turn prompt for an idle character when that character already has a destination.
  
• Fixed an issue where players using the Orcs & Goblins faction could enter Tunnelling Stance when the army's movement points were below 100% while the Waaagh! Army View was selected.

• ​Fixed an issue where the Daemon Prince could not properly access the Harbour port building when occupying Erengrad.
  
• Fixed an issue in the Orcs & Goblins campaign where players were unable to target discovered Skaven settlements for a Waaagh! unless their capital was also revealed.
  
• Fixed an issue where the Waaagh's target settlement model would disappear after being razed. The model now remains visible without the need for a save reload.

• ​Added 'Fire While Moving' for Gyrocopters and Gyrobombers to the 'Improved Gyrocopter Engines' technology on the Dwarf tech tree.

• Fixed an issue in Drycha's skill tree where the ‘Indoctrinator’ skill displayed an excessive number of character unit card variants.

• ​Fixed an issue where certain effects that increased recruit rank for Nurgle units would not work when playing as the Daemon Prince.

• ​Adjusted how the monetary reward for Bounties is calculated. Previously, the amount was based on the issuer's Treasury, which could fluctuate significantly regardless of their strength and had no relevance to the selected target. The new calculation considers the player's distance to the target, with higher rewards for immortal targets or province capitals. Additionally, distance is now measured from the nearest settlement owned by the player rather than just the faction leader's army. This change should generally result in Bounty targets being closer to the player.
  
• Adjusted the Bounty rewards system to ensure a balanced distribution of additional rewards. Players will now receive a consistent cycle through meat, camp growth, and rare ancillaries, reducing randomness and enhancing reward variety.
  
• Players can now decline a Bounty, triggering a new one to be issued on the following turn.

​ We've fixed an issue causing Zhao Ming's Ogre Mercenary benefits to not apply to the new Mercenaries added in 5.3. Additionally, we've made the following changes to help take Zhao's mercenary play to the next level.

• Faction Trait
  
  • Added +10 Melee Attack and Defense to all Ogre Mercenaries.

• Skill Tree
  
  • Removed -25% recruitment cost for Ogre Mercenaries.
    
  • Added Guardian for all Ogre Mercenaries faction-wide.
    
  • Added +20% Weapon and Missile Damage for all Ogre Mercenaries faction-wide.

• ​Fixed a bug where hovering over the Ogre Bounties panel link in the help pages while the Bounties were open would cause the panel to flash extremely brightly.
  
• Improved the visual quality of the Worldroots Forest Health numbers when playing as the Wood Elves.
  
• Fixed an issue where lords, including Legendary Lords, would lose their last names in the UI when they were wounded. This issue affected both player-controlled and AI-controlled lords.

• ​Fixed an issue where defeating the Nemesis Crown-wielder, Knobber da Bossy Git, did not properly complete the quest objectives, preventing the battle from ending as intended.

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• Resolved an issue where the Empire's Steam Tank would fail to fire its main cannon after engaging in melee combat. Now, after exiting melee, the cannon will resume firing as intended, aligning with expected gameplay.
  
• Fixed an issue where Grave Guard Halberds mistakenly had Expert Charge Defence instead of Charge Defence vs. Large, reinforcing their role as dedicated monster hunters rather than generalist frontline defenders.
  
• Fixed a bug where ranged units were sometimes assigned targets just outside of their range, causing them to sit idle instead of firing.

• Fixed an issue where the "Howl of The Great Beast" ability incorrectly triggered a jumping animation for enemy Marauders.

• ​Fixed a bug where the Zombie Pirate Deckhands Mob was missing an animation.
  
• Resolved a visual issue where Skeleton Archers would snap to different positions and move back and forth excessively during the ‘shoot ready’ and combat idle animations.
  
• Fixed an issue where the weapon of Eternal Guards would disappear while under ranged fire.
  
• Resolved an issue with the twisted left arm of Blessed Kroxigors during their running animation.
  
• Fixed an issue where Skarsnik was missing his death animation in the post-battle screen.

• The Prologue's first Land Battle map had a ludicrous parallax setting on a single decal. The parallax setting has since been adjusted for a more pleasing viewing experience.

• Resolved an issue in multiplayer campaigns where the Ogre Kingdoms could receive bounties that targeted their teammates.

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And that's all for today! Thanks again for your ongoing feedback and suggestions. As always, if you run into any new bugs or issues after updating to 5.3.1 please report them over in our dedicated bug reporting sub-forum[community.totalwar.com]. If you'd like to chat about this update (and all other things Total War related!) then be sure to join the official Total War Discord server[discord.gg], or head over to our CA Community forums[community.creative-assembly.com] to join the discussion there.

See you on the battlefield!

—The Total War Team

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If you experience any issues after downloading the update, please take a moment to Verify the integrity of the game files first to ensure there were no issues when downloading. A step-by-step guide can be found in this article.

If the issues persist, please visit our support site[support.sega.com] for additional troubleshooting steps and assistance.

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Please note that user-generated mods may have compatibility issues with new game updates. If you are encountering performance or stability issues following a release, is recommended that you disable any mods you're running. If you continue to experience issues, please visit our support site[support.sega.com] for additional troubleshooting steps and assistance.