Some notes I want to add about the video that I felt may have not been well explained enough in the video or are just brain bugs that didn't make it into the script. 1. I accidentally skipped the ramifications of Neferata and Aborash in Araby, which basically revolves around that Neferata desired to set up a new nation here after the defeat of Nagash and to subjugate the humans here. She would be thwarted by Aborsash in a dramatic betrayal but the vampiric influence would ultimately be forced out by the Tomb Kings who desired their destruction. There is likely still some minor vampiric influence in the region to this day, though the Arabyans are one of the most sensitive nations to Undead threats. 2. Whether Sultan Jaffar is still actually NAMED Jaffar isn't exactly clear, as the most recent notes about Araby in "Up in Arms" a 4th Edition Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay Book by Cubicle 7, simply refers to him as "The Great Sultan" without ever calling him Jaffar specially. This may mean that Sultan Jaffar will be receiving a new name that isn't literally based on a Disney villain. 3. Arabyan horses are the highest quality/fastest in the world because supposedly they were crossbred with Elven steeds from Ulthuan due to some lucrative trade deals managed by the Sheikhs. 4. Random not-so-fun-fact is that Werner Glook (aka Al Muktar) was incredibly resistant to torture cause in his boarding school he was beaten on the regular by the schoolmaster and literally enslaved by the older boys. The Marienburg education system apparently has some SERIOUS problems. Also according to his lore the Desert Dogs were supposed to ride on Camels, but their artwork and actual tabletop minis had them riding on horses. 5. Stupid random fun fact, the name of Repanse's horse in the Total War Warhammer campaign, Suleman, is named after an Arabyan warrior who joined her band of warriors in their crusade against Kharn the Blighted. 6. I would personally love to see the Lord-level Elementalists wizards of Araby wield a mix of 4 Winds so having one that wields Fire, Metal, Death, & Shadow while the other wields Life, Heavens, Light, and Life. Not necessarily in that mix but you get the idea. 7. Yes my shirt changed during the roster section, I had to make a bunch of edits to the script when discussing the Warmaster units. Very observant of you. 8. Lots of easy Regiments of Renown are also mentioned throughout the video like Al-Muktar's Desert Dogs, the Dread Daughters of Tariq, and the Silent Guard of Eunuch Mountain. Also could have an Incarnate Elemental of Fire RoR called the "Black Harvestman" or maybe a regiment of the Fire Ifrits called "the Charred Ones". 9. Arabyan Jezails only have 1 "z" instead of 2, that's what separates them from those dastardly Skaven. 10. Fun note about the 3 lesser elemental units is that each of the elementals seems to correspond to the 3 different environments that the Arabyans inhabit. For instance the Sea-Nymphs are obviously those encountered by folks that live on or by the sea such as the port cities or the corsairs, the tempestuous Djinns that live out in the deep deserts where the desert tribes roam, and the fiery Ifrits that are encountered more by the mountains or more stable hot regions where the large non-port cities reside. 11. When discussing the Incarnate Elementals I mentioned that they never received tabletop minis, though TECHNICALLY that is contradicted by the Dreadfleet model for the 'Flaming Scimitar' ship as it has the big 3 elementals of Fire, Wind, and Water. In more modern lore writings, thanks mostly to the Winds of Magic book for Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay 4th Edition, these have been lightly retconned into being the Incarnate Elementals of Fire, Light, and Life respectively which I REALLY life.
While the quality of Araby gunpowder might not match the dwarves, they sometimes add Aqshy infused sand to it, to increase the burn of their gunpowder as far as i remember.
I will say, while I like the Golden Magus ideas put forth, maybe Araby could be a minifaction with Two max legendary lords and Fatandira could be included as well. But with a little twist. The idea being, that no matter which one of the two you choose, you will have to fight the other after uniting Araby in a final battle. If you choose to play as the Golden Magus, no matter if you choose to stay good or go Tzeentchian, Fatandira will be convinced that the Golden Magus is Tzeentchian and leading Araby down the same path as the Great Sultan (perhaps convinced by disguised agents of Tzeentch himself) and come with an army of Arabyans, Dogs of War, and Crusaders to try and put an end to such a threat. If you choose to play as Fatandira, after migrating home and uniting Araby by either force or diplomacy you are attacked by a full Tzeentchian Golden Magus leading an army of Tzeentchian Arabyans, Daemons of Tzeentch, Warriors of Chaos, and (if you sided against them) Corsairs. The idea for Fatandira's unique choices (to mirror the Golden Magus having choices) would be how she wants to deal with the states set up by the Brettonian and Imperial crusaders, with options to either either conquer them by force and horribly damaging relations with all Brettonian and Imperial factions, or whether she does quests in order to annex them diplomatically, taking much longer but building up diplomatic relations and gaining boons in the process (like a limited number of Brettonian knights she can recruit, or bonuses to industry and trade income for setting up new trade with the Empire or things like that).
I'm Arab, so I'd love to see Araby finally come to TW, however, they really need to drop the 'caliph' moniker, as it makes no sense in the Warhammer Fantasy universe. The appropriate title would be 'Emir'.
It's sad that such a beautiful region of the world is neglected in fantasy, i understand there's a long list of harmful stereotypes and tropes baked into Araby. But do you suppose it's capable of being adjusted to be respectful to Arab culture? Don't know how much you know about Araby Lore but what really stands out as problematic? One thing i do think they should drop is the slavery aspect, which also means dropping a lot of the unit types.
I have a lot of respect and appreciation for Arab history and cultures and would love to see them included. But shit like this and other white British guy misunderstandings of Islam and Arab society make it hard to have faith GW or CA would get it right.
@@darkagerush3098Considering how many Muslims there are in Britain now, I doubt that they still have no tact 0:36 . Besides, the safest bet is to just stick on pre-Islamic Arabs, and Maghrebis.
@@jameschristophercirujano6650 I know they could do it right, and yeah hiring experts from the culture is the way to do that. But that's also a lot of extra steps and CA is a company about cutting corners.
Good information to have! The words I've found regarding ranks only seem to use the terms of - Fakir - hero level wizard Elementalist - Lord level wizard Emir - Hero level leader/fighter Sheikh - Leaders of the desert tribes/inner cities Sultans - Leaders of the port cities I'm curious to hear if those would be appropriately used terms or if they would need further adjustment? Araby hasn't received much in the way of notable examination since they were originally created in the 1980's/90's and things were VERY POORLY made back then for the non-european lands like Cathay, Nippon, Araby, and Lustria. Lustria and Cathay have improved immensely since then, so Araby would naturally need some updates as well.
I think one area that’s been neglected in writing is Golden Age Arabia’s fascination with Automata. They could fit very nicely with the proficiency of sorcerers in infusing physical objects with elemental spirits; and work as an echo of Araby’s cultural ties to Nehekhara via Ushabti. Also, a totally-not-daemon-engine unit of warrior clockwork automata sounds fun.
Oh that's actually quite a clever idea! Would be fun to see those three aspects be the major branches with perhaps a final core branch that focuses on relations with the foreign nations and trade. Sultan of Flames - techs around battle buffs, aqshy elementals, and garrison buffs, and certain spells/wizards Raging Tempest - techs around campaign buffs for movement, attrition, and such. Buff light elementals and certain spells/wizards Sea Monarch - techs around casualty replenishment, growth, corruption, buffs at sea, and such. Buff life elementals and certain spells/wizards Central/Neutral - techs around trade, diplomacy, construction, etc.
@@loremasterofsotek I'd actually just put trade and diplomacy in the Sea Monarch (in her lore as a caregiver) and construction in Raging Tempest. I 100% agree that the Elementals and Wizards should be buffed by their respective tree. If they used entirely separate trees (like Chaos Dwarfs) for these, they could even have a shrine for each elemental (like you mentioned for the Empire religions) that would give access to their respective elemental unit and wizard, and buff research rate for that tree specifically.
The Golden Magus would be so cool if you could choose to either be good or bad. Like he can follow a human path and gain access to the normal human style units and such. But you could also choose to turn him towards Tzeentch and it changes how he looks and his mechanics and units change. Would be very fun to play that. Also they could have more than one lord but just have you pick which one to play as they wouldn't both have to be on the map at the same time. Maybe when you get to a certain point you can confederate the other into your forces.
As much as it would be nice to have multiple characters, I just don't think the community would tolerate the idea of a Legendary Lord who isn't present on the map anymore. Silly as it sounds that'd be a controversary waiting to happen.
@@loremasterofsotek It is a little silly but i do understand it wouldn't go down greatly XD At least one lord would work well in that space without them altering the map a lot.
Araby is a passion of mine since we first saw the TWW2 map in a trailer. Because it has so many awesome aspects which LoS partly mentioned. Around the anouncment of the Vcoast and CAs statement of only Lordpacks for the future, I made my own Araby concept. It still is on the TW forums. My concept focussed not on corsairs, but rather on the cities and desert tribes. Which to me are the stronger dichtonomy. On one hand massive cities, built around oasis or fertile coastal lands rich, internationaly important, on the other side the regional constantly moving desert tribes. With a system surprisingly like Cathay harmony system that came later. Were certain buildings/actions/characters favour the cities and others the desert tribes. Focussing on one side gives boni but also mali for units from the opposite side. And all units are divided by this as well. E.g. most (but not all) infantry units from the cities and most (but not all) cavalary units from the desert nomads. Otherwise it was about unifying Araby with your LL acting like Gile or Sigmar. Bringing Araby together and defending it against various incursions to bring it down. From Tomb Kings to Druchii invaders and crusades to more. This could work well with LoS proposal of you choosing whether Araby is an order faction or not. I also think Araby has a great potential for units. My personal focus would lie on skirmishing and cavalary. Whith magic through alchemy being another strong focus. And there are so many awesome real world units which would be awesome in Warhammer too. Like Zamburaks, swivel guns on camel back acting as mobile, light artillery. Or Naffatun, medival nalpalm. Overall Araby is awesome and I still question why CA stopped introducing new factions after Vcoast. I would have loved Araby oh so much. And I still want it.
Personally I like the Idea that the Carpet Riders basically get the Poison Wind Globadires like attack where they just throw jars of scorpions on people that deal lots of damage over time and possibly poison units, and having them focus on being light so they're more of an aerial hit and run unit. I think that the skaven being the only ones with that kind of weapon is a real missed opportunity, and having them be light hit and run units make them wildly different from the heavily armored Globe units of the skaven.
Four things I differ from you on: Araby Elephants should be monstrous cavalry. African Forest Elephants (which are what araby elephants are based on) are almost exactly the size of mournfang cavalry of the Ogre Kingdoms. It gives araby access to tools that help differentiate it from other factions this way as well. The handguns wouldn't really replace bows. Like you mentioned, guns are hard for Araby to make so most their soldiers are equipped with the cheap alternative. Also, instead of calling them handguns they could be called Tufenk (pulled from Town Cryer 20 araby rules), featuring that longer range you mentioned while being more expensive. Two unit archetypes that I feel are important are Charmers and Giant Vultures. Snake Charmers are a staple visual of this culture and could make an interesting melee infantry option, while Giant Snake Charmers are said to exist in lore and could make a monstrous cavalry version of the Tomb Kings Necropolis Knights. The Giant Vulture on the other hand is basically a Roc (giant bird), the concept of which originated from this same real life culture and is probably only slightly behind the Djinn in terms of culturally unique concept. These giga-fauna have only gotten a few sentences of lore unfortunately, but are a big deal in terms of fleshing out Araby. This is a lot to read, apologies for that. Loved the video, but wanted to give the feedback as you discussed at the end there. I went in depth on my reddit post "Araby Unit List - Complete Roster with Pictures, Sources and Lore". Viewers can't post links in comments without youtube bots deleting them instantly, so I can't link it for you but a google search of the name should pull it up.
Rocs are part of the High Elf roster, as the Swiftfeather Rocs pull the Lothern Sky Chariots which haven't made it into the game yet. That being said, I do like the idea of the Giant Vultures being that the Vulture Mountains are RIGHT THERE and the Carrion of Nehekharan have living relatives somewhere else in the world. Snake Charmers I am a fair bit more hesitant on, but that has more to do with the serpent motifs are sort of caught in the whirlpool being dragged towards the Naga of Khuresh. Certainly not impossible and the concept of living Necropolis Knights is doable, though I also think its important to avoid giving off the idea that Araby is the "non-undead" version of the Tomb Kings.
@@loremasterofsotek That's actually how I discovered the Giant Vultures existed. Staring at the map I spotted "Vulture Mountain" and googling it I found the Giant Vultures warhammer fandom page. So little about them unfortunately, but glad I could share. Will note their quite a bit bigger than tomb king vultures. Those are valid points about the charmers. While I'm still for them, those are both justified issues and I would hate if it diluted Araby's or those faction's identity.
Love this! Be it as single mini-DLC or as part of a WoC-style Dogs of War/Southern Realms DLC with three other mini-DLC of Tilea, Estalia and Border Princes.
It’s a bit obvious, but a CW Araby pack would definitely need cultural experts and historians of the real Arabian Peninsula to make sure that Araby doesn’t fall too hard into orientalism and other related stuff.
100% agree, it would seem that they brought on the appropriate minds and individuals to craft Grand Cathay while avoiding pitfalls, so hopefully would repeat the process for Araby.
@@loremasterofsotek Ind, Nippon, Khuresh...all these three have potential for becoming really, really fun. Nippon with its samurai and ashigaru could be enhanced with more myth and folklore stuff from Japan like yokai and turning the land into something akin to Athel Loren as in being alive with local kami and said yokai neighbors on top of a shinto-style pantheon...but far more forgiving than Athel Loren. Only with some of them being douches (like in actual Japanese myths and folklore). Ind with their thousands of gods, tiger beastmen and being insanely good smiths that only the Dwarfs could match (I mean when Finunbar gave the Smith Priests of Vaul his cool flame sword he got after saving a Ind princess and these guys threw the towel when they analyzed it and saw how complex it was). Would make for a fun campaign. Bonus if you could manifest not!Kali on the battlefield and turn everyone in your army into not!vampires for that battle. And Khuresh...so much wild potential. That is all.
This is how I want my war elephants. Like in historical Total War games were they were the only "monstrous" cavalary. Because they are just elephants not chaos mutated mammoth. I'd like a naked version, an armoured version with tusk-swords and trunk flails (real elephant weapons), and one with a Howdah and a Jezzail
That would make them significantly unique compared to the vast majority of factions. To be roughly equal in size to Stegadons but still operate as a unit instead of Single Entity Monsters.
Honestly, with everything going on with CA over the last weeks, I really dont want to see the idea of "mini race packs" anywhere near them rn. If SoC is anything to go by, Mini Race Pack will just mean same price for less content and quality.
In my opinion, your ideas are fantastic. I think for elephants, they should belong to only Kingdoms of Ind. Araby has more fantastical potential in my opinion. Sand is the mighty thing you can use for lore of Araby. Araby should be a monarchy and monarch of Araby (aka. Sultan) should be able to shift sands use them as she/he wants. Lords as sandshapers and heroes as sandshifters. The difference, sandshapers can shape them as they want by using sands but sandshifters are only able to shape the sands, they cannot change themselves. And If you make mythology, there is cool stuff. For example, you can make scorpionmen (in myth its name is aqrabuamelu as depicted in Middle East) as well as instead of camels (which this is why this makes Araby so stereotypical) we can use mushussu (another mythological creature in Middle East) as a mount option. Mushussu riders as elite cavalry and so on. You can make as a single big monstrous unit annunakis (In Middle East one of the most spoken alien races by ancestors of Arabic people and you can make Araby related to stars and space so much due to in real world they named most of the stars and were good at astronomy in medieval era. And as an addition you can add sand viper like monstrous unit as well as only belong to Araby itself incarnate elemental of Sands and you can give Araby lore of sands. It would be lovely.
super cool ideas! some things i think would be worth considering is adding a few naval-theemed units if they end up doing the golden magus as a LL just so he can theme his army with cossairs and maybe a non-undead rotting promethians. I know the roster is intentionally not too extensive because of the format of the dlc but some aspects that would be cool to expand upon (me wishlisting) The dessert tribes part of the roster with a few more elite light armored skirmishers, maybe a ranged hero/asassin. another aspect could be the alcemy and scholarly part where they could have their flying carpet riders throw pots of alcemical fire and/or something simmilar to the luminarch of hysh/the solar engine that uses schience and magic to shoot rays at the enemy.
Loved this! I want this faction so bad! Of course my greedy guts mind was thinking immediately of how to expand the roster so please forgive my excitement here and I realize there is no models or even lore for these things but this is fun. I was thinking of adding a Jannisary type hybrid melee gun unit it adds more humans to the range, give them large scimitars/falchions with long guns maybe in the same ballpark as Strelsti? (I forgot the correct spelling) I'd give them longer range but with a slower reload and maybe make them anti infantry fighters. As for things like artillery you could do a great bombard, it not being complex simply being a long metal or stone tube on a platform hurling huge fuck off stone balls long distances. But to help such a thing fire and move a Djinn has either been baragined with or bound to the artillery piece thus reducing the need for complex parts making it survivable and mobile in unforgiving terrain and when it shoots its just a blast of air from the Djinn that launches the shot. Mystical and practical all in one go. Dervishs as you have mentioned have a lot of connections to dancing. They could be a flagellent-esque sword dancing unit with opportunity to have some really cool animations spinning and slashing around. While this might be too much in terms of large show stopper pieces you could add a creature from Arabian Nights known as a Roc. I don't remember if they appear in Warhammer but in the stories they are massive dragon sized birds that could carry off an elephant in it's talons as if it were a small field mouse. A legendary lord idea that I had was a Simbad-esque Prince or Princess, I'm leaning heavily to a Princess who is a very strong melee fighter/duelist. They would have the same Vampire Coast, Golden Magus Ship mechanic and their vibe is that much like Simbad they are out in the world on an adventure. Their faction mechanics could be similar to the Golden Magus in that they have a dilemma of continuing their adventure and acquiring riches, magic items, allies/enemies and so on with the choice to go home and take on the responsibility of rulership which has its own set of benefits and drawbacks but changes the feel of the character's campaign based on what you do with a narrative twist. Regardless of the choice I feel like this character should have many quest type battles akin into Imrik, where they essentially collect traits, items and potential allies on their adventures. You could really have some fun storytelling with it. As for mounts for the character you could do horse/camel, flying carpet then either a Roc if you want to go for an Imrik feel (Sinbad deals with rocs a lot so it's on theme) or maybe have a special looking Djinn carry them into battle. Idea! If they remain adventuring they tame the Roc which is incredible in melee combat and is a beatstick creature killer mount, great for dueling lords on big mounts and wiping out units. But! If they go home they get a Djinn (much more mystical mount) which while not as strong in direct combat as the Roc mount, maybe make it the tankier mount which grants some cool abilities/benefits and is befitting of a Princess or Prince come home to rule. I guess mechanically speaking the adventuring makes your character/characters and army quite strong with its own set of challenges while going home to rule makes the campaign strong with its own set of challenges. I'd have them off on their adventures to begin with, with special events popping up that ask if you want to go home or not. The longer you put it off the better loot you get but the worse off the Kingdom is, making your job harder if you go home. I'd have this go until you reach an ultimatum of go home and rule or be banished forever if you wait till this ultimatum you are inheriting a big mess. (I guess you could always go back if you are banished and conquer home but you would be locked out of the Rulership events/quests/benefits/dilemmas.) Though if you decided to continue adventuring you could encounter and aquire some crazy stuff. Ideally I'd want this lords game to be challenging but rewarding and it has the replay value based on seeing both choices pan out. I could go on with other units or lords but I feel like I have carried on for quite a bit. Unrelated I want a Dwarf Queen Legendary Lord dammit.
Liked the video, fun speculation and brain storming! I would love to see something like an army ability where a desert worm comes up from out of the ground as an AOE. 1/battle or some such thing, maybe even only usable in the Desert regions of araby/the badlands. There should be a mechanic where you can capture elementals and creatures from foreign lands, Ala Rakarth and the Changeling. In fact having them be battles instead of mere events would be fun. Go to Kislev, get a few elementals for your research. Having a RoR Carpet Jezail rider would be cool. If your average carpet rider unit is 5 or 10 models, have the jezails be significantly less and larger models; you need a bigger Rug for those bigger guns. Hell, give them a different Drop ability too; have them drop a cage that summons a unit of large scorpions (shrink and reskin tomb scorpions). You could even add these beastial scorpions to the roster if you felt like it. I would like to see a general caravan system for Araby. Have the resources change depending on your hypothetical branching campaign path: trade slaves for cash, give tzeentch corruption through an upgrade for trading in your tech tree, as well as receiving evil artifacts and RoR if bad (i loved the idea of the crusades). Trade "research notes" in return for order faction RoR/allied units as well as a reductionin corruption via "trade tech". The research notes should slow down research, while going further into the Chaos route would either increase research or keep it as is at the very least. Going Order should give you a wider range of recruitment units, but less artifacts. Inverse should be true for going the slaver route. Also, only have the trade routes become available after taking X city and occupying it. Maybe any of the Araby port cities, and have new routes unlock as you expand your Araby empire? I think having Landmarks in certain port cities would be a good idea. Have one in Sartosa that gives you access to recruiting Sartosan free company as well as a upgradable building to buff them (and your own corsairs, which SHOULD be a unit you can get). With this race, the hire mercenaries dilemma/area should return. Have ogres, goblins, Arabyans, Empiremen, Cathayans, and Dawi be available (throw a few others in for flavor if you'd like). That was a really cool and fun mechanic imo. ALSO! I think 2 playable LLs isn't exactly calling for too much here. Have the other be a more straight forward type, with no "culture split" like the Golden Magus, have your warrior princess, and give her the goal of returning and uniting araby. Make it a straight forward campaign, but it's the players choice if they'll return home on the side of order or not.
I just started a campaign in Araby playing as Ushoran & the Strygos Empire, I also have the Araby mod so I've been helping Jaffar reclaim the whole of Araby (as my vassal).
In general, I don't like the idea of magic items being usable only once. Once per battle, sure fine. But I don't want a too awesome to use situation. Also I think all magic items (except for Ostankya's banners) get more use than once per battle. That even goes for things like potions.
As someone who loves monsters and beasts of all kinds in WH3, I think there should be multiple versions of Elephant units, like the Mammoths for Norsca. So theres the one with the tower and gunners, the one with the cannon, maybe one that's solely melee focused and has more armor, and maybe one thats three/four smaller elephants
I would love to see Araby. The desert just doesn't feel right without them. I just wanna battle TK with Araby and vice versa. Also djinns would be dope, as long as its not a blue will smith. I'd hope to see some elemental forces to be reckoned with.
The Djinns would not be blue genies, haha. I'm actually not entirely sure what the technical definition of Genie would end up being after the restructuring of the lore, personally I imagine it would be a full on Daemon that is bound to some sort of magical artefact and forced to answer the questions/wishes of whoever possesses it to the best of its ability. Or alternatively could be any elemental/spirit/daemon that is simply bound to an artefact? Interesting to think about.
I think araby could totally have a short range unit of naphtha bombers which would be similar to vampire coast zombies that throw bombs, except araby ones are higher tier, more ranged attack damage (ap?) and decent melee combat with dual wielding but low armor and no shields Also elephants with cannons is a great idea and its giving me timurids flashbacks from medieval 2 lol
Would depend on how CA ends up responding to the controversy surrounding Shadows of Change. They don't seem to have a hard-coded pricing system but instead wander a bit. It could be more or less expensive depending on how they view it
@@loremasterofsotek sure, but prices tend to be a bit sticky. That being said, given they “leaked” DoW, I do wonder if they would make Araby a sub faction in that DLC or it’s own race pack. I guess more of a matter of how much DLC we get…
For those who love the idea of this faction and play on the tabletop I would suggest looking into Conquest the Last Argument of kings as in Q1 of 2024 they will release a new faction called the Sorcerer Kings which are pretty much this idea of classic medieval Turkish army with arabinan nights inspired djinn and sorcerers focused on the four elements, fire, earth, wind, and water. They make really good minis and I expect this faction to do just as well.
Hi Sotek! I would be so excited to see Araby in Warhammer, but I also love the whole Arabian Nights/genie aesthetic in general. I'll definitely mark this vid for references for my own (haphazard, irregular) worldbuilding project. In my world it's a region swept through/threatened recently by some Greek/Roman punks or something. I know they're popular, but I have the same reaction to them in TW the way I do for Space Marines and the Imperium in 40k. (Meehhh, Parthia/Aeldari/Tau for life!! 😆)
Playing Araby would be very interesting and when Warmaster was out showing Araby I thought that, Games Workshop would bring them to Fantasy battles...but did not. I think that the Amazons might be a good place for a mini-race pack as there were official modals (and rules) for the in Warhammer.
im not trying to be that guy but, 4:00 if anybody where to draw similarities sigmar vs jesus. Obviously there are some but after sigmars death he became their god. Jesus died and he was the son of god later becoming the holy trinity. the way sigmarite religion is in warhammer is similar to Catholicism in medieval Europe Now sigmar vs talos on the other hand Talos accomplished more and he became a god for the humans.
Even just the name "Araby" is problematic Then the unit roster is also extremely Orientalist It's easy for the Whitest most Western of Gamers to say it's fine, but CA has to consider how customers in India, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Türkiye and so on will react. It's also one of the reasons we may never get Nippon, because Total War Warhammer is really big in China and Korea and guess what common experience they've both had in recent history with Japan, it involves a lot of horrible horrible war crimes. I personally would REALLY like to see Nippon get added, I could take or leave Araby, but keep in mind that Disney's Aladdin is considered extremely offensive to a lot of people in West Asia, I feel like Araby would be a mine field and even Nippon would at best probably be a Cathay special unit tree for Yin Yin if we get it at all.
Thanks for this video, great stuff and well thought of as usual with you. My only concern is I am not comfortable with the *only* hero of the faction being 100% from outside the culture, I don't think it's acceptable anymore.
I would disagree with this take, though I do understand where you're coming from. Al Muktar was essentially a man without a home who found one among the people of Araby and seemed destined to become one of them according to their own prophecies. He didn't claim the name of Al Muktar, it was the name the Arabyans gave to him. In every meaningful way he is a man of Araby, he was simply born somewhere else. He speaks the language, lives among them, fights for them, and is part of their culture rather than anything to do with his native land of Marienburg. I think if anything there's something really interesting there. He's not a White Savior, Al Muktar isn't there to save them from some threat or villain they couldn't handle themselves. He was saved by the Arabyans he met, not the other way around.
Thank you @@loremasterofsotek for your answer. It is better than I thought as it seems the lore is already a bit farther away than the Lawrence of arabia myth. There is maybe even a touch of Dune if there is prophecies behind it, which would suit warhammer very well. But It still rubs me the wrong way than one of the two named character in the whole faction is someone who didn't come from the area (but yeah I understand, mini DLC and so on).
I agre that we should see Araby, but i disagree with the idea of a mini race pack. Though I'm in favour of "hybrid" race packs. Kinda like what they did to the vampire coast (vampire coast + manowar + other undead monsters + stromfells) and Norsca (mortals of chaos + montrum arcanum). I see Ind + Khuresh being one faction While Tilea, Estalia and Araby becoming anotner by themselves, the dogs of war
Imo saying Araby is to offensive or anything like that is silly when we have russia-like nation with winged husars on bears or noble knights fighting for Ze Lady. Like I am from Poland and qnything that reflects our country is thrown to the same nation that clearly has the most in common with power gungry dictatorship that is currently bombing hospitals. So yea, 100% agree, prople should chill and juat enjoy another WFB faction brought to live in TW (if we ever get this DLC of course)
Wish they would have made the pirates of Sartosa a minor faction, with Jaego Wroth and Aranessa Saltspite as the 2 LL Then Vangheist could have been a proper VC2 LL. Maybe replace Cylostra with a cool PotC Calypso looking woman, that uses the lore of the deep and specializes in mourn ghouls and other juju-esq themed units.
@loremasterofsotek I understand your excitement to get Araby into Warhammer Total War. I agree this is something that would be good to do. I do think you play down the difficulties of incorporating them culturally too much. The fact that they are not Islamic does not take away that they are based on the Arab world. This is not a reason to exclude them from Warhammer but should be tackled tactfully since it's STILL very directly referencing a population, not a religion. To me that especially means not making Araby look like moustache-twirling villains from Alladin which. let's be honest, GW has done this in the past. Then again with Cathay GW and CA have shown they can pull off incorporating factions that have similarities with real world (non-western) populations.
I really disagree with the idea that there are no religions or cultures in warhammer fantasy that reflect real life counter parts. For one example the empire is literally just fantasy Holy Roman Empire and their religion is just medieval Christianity but with multiple gods.
I’m not going to *fully* throw myself under the wheels of being in a warhammer fantasy in total war Talking About Race conversation, but there’s quite a bit more wrong with how Araby is handled than just the old stuff around specific references to Islam. I know it’s all still old, but the way the lore allegorizes the crusades as a campaign to respond/strike back to an ‘Arabyian’ of the old world is hella wild lmao. I actually was fairly interested in the dynamic between Araby and Nehekara + undead politics/wars as that doesn’t seem to be trying to badly mirror a real world historical event. It’s actually interesting, at least given the way you presented it. Presenting the crusades as a righteous *defensive* war to shut down Muslim aggression is a wildly silly allegory that brings Araby down to among the worst offenders of “things in warhammer fantasy we don’t talk about anymore.” If they were going to bring Araby out of the dark, they would have to fully restructure much of that history. Honestly, I wouldn’t be against Araby breaking ground (it would honestly be nice to have *any* darker skinned human faction in the game), but Araby would be a far harder thing to modernize than Cathay, given how fraught and uh,,, old fashioned the most recent iteration is.
Just go google the 6th and 8th edition book. You'll realize how copy-paste it all was into the total war engine. They didn't really do much massaging or rework on the armies. Even scaly skin for the dogs was not something that creative assembly came up with to balance dogs. It's directly lifted from 8th edition. "So what tho why is it there?". The idea that you're going to get these minor factions unless they have been 100% laid-out by Games Workshop is a vain hope.
Yas , that sounds like a fun faction....kislev great orthodox that's giving me Christian medieval vibes ...orthadox is actually name of a religion ..google orthadox church lol...that big bear I believe is actually a ancient theology behind I've 🤔 heard..
Thank you very much for making this. You have no idea how many times I've argued about the inclusion of this faction. Both with idiots for who "Arabs = bad/violent/whatever" and think CA/GW should not or would not ever touch anything relating to them because it would be a risk. And also with idiots on the other side of the spectrum who have either never read 1001 Nights and think the parts of it they came into contact with are western made stereotypes/stories or with the other idiots who think you should never tell stories relating to another culture unless you hire 20 "cultural experts" otherwise it's definitely insensitive/cultural appropriation. It's just infuriating and I was very sad when CA said they would not be adding Araby into the game. Hopefully this will be corrected before the series is over.
Here is a pitch for this as a larger DLC: The Southern Realms. For FLC, Sartosa gets a rework, still a pirate faction, but less undead focussed. the area of the map also gets a slight rework to create a touch more space. Araby comes into the desert, Talia and Estalia to their homelands, with Talia and Ikkit starting with a strained truce, where there is a reward and penalty both to them being there. Maybe for Talia it's something like "National Ferver: reduced construction cost for military buildings, and reduced recruitment cost for recruiting them", but at the cost of dealing with the skaven corruption. This would give you an interresting choice both as Ikkit and as Talia, because you're so close to eachother, as to how long you tolerate the irritation. Now, i don't know how lore friendly or unfriendly this is. Dogs of war could then be built on top for relatively cheap, as a larger faction because many of its troops are already made
After Tomb Kings (yay)... after Chaos Dwarves (yay/meh)... after the flop-that-will-be Pharoh... ur really suggesting ANOTHER desert for an upcoming DLC? =/
Could be somewhere down the road it’s his thoughts on a potential dlc doesn’t mean it’s going to happen I for one am not against these types of videos for playable races/races that haven’t had much tabletop time
Good video, I think the main reason why folks are iffy about araby is not because of any religious reason but how it may represent middle eastern culture as a whole. The middle east especially in older fantasy settings was never depicted in the best of light, often being full of negative and harmful stereotypes still seen to a small degree today. While I know very little about Araby, I am aware that games workshop doesn't have the cleanest of pasts with miniatures inspired by certain cultures (the pygmies and moneylander). I think Araby can be done but I think it would have to be revised a decent amount. At the moment, Araby currently is a big mishmash of a lot of different African/Middle Eastern/Eastern Cultures to create really a still stereotypical lens of what fantasy middle east would be. While I'm aware that Warhammer Fantasy does lean into some stereotypes (the dragon emperor, Ind and it's pantheon of a thousand supposed gods) I think it would never to find a way to properly justify itself like cathay
I don't think total warhammer has a long enough life span to get all of the southern realms as separate factions. I do think we can get a conglomerate of the southern realms. Where estalia, araby, Tiliea, and the border princes form an uneasy alliance to fight chaos or tomb kings or whatever. That's the only way I see us getting all of them. If they're all in a single faction that has all their highlight units like bull riders, pikemen, camel jaziel, birdmen, Arabian light cav, etc. Also. Araby has alot of cool and unique units, but border prince, Tiliea, and estalia not so much. Besides a couple of flavor units, tiliea, estalia, and princes would have very similar armies and would feel kinda redundant as separate factions.
I'd love Araby, don't get me wrong i love my european fantasy but it tickles me immensely when worlds are fleshed with fantastical/mythological elements from other cultures. Makes it way more immersive imo.
I enjoyed the video, i like most of the ideas, but I had a few nit picks. Scimitar isnt really a useful term when looking at middle eastern arms, as it was a blanket European term for single edge non European weapons. Words like shamshir and pulwar are more accurate names for middle eastern sabres and there and there are a wealth of other Middle Eastern edged weapons to draw upon. There was also the mention of heavy cavalry, Sassanid cataphracts specifically come to mind. Their depictions were quite grand and pretty were much fantasy ready heavy cavalry😂.
I really wish Araby to come back stronger with lore and units and become an acknowledged faction, they got a fascinating units... but they need an amazing commanders like the black lizard who fight with smart strategies and swift action
So my only feedback for these mini packs, I think 2 lords should be the minimum. Just to touch on the two different play styles and locations. Ya know?
Jaffar and that plot arch either need to go or be expanded so that he is taken out not by some weird colonial rehab of the crusades but by someone like Saladin. The brown people being unified, doing evil stuff, then getting owned by the white people and "fading into obscurity" to be sidekicks is still gross.
According to the versions of the story we have now he's more undone by the betrayal of Kairos Fateweaver and the Skaven abandoning him at a critical moment. However there were a LOT of Arabyans who joined the Crusaders once they arrived in Araby and started freeing up communities from the control of the Great Sultan. Interestingly there's no in-depth documents on how exactly Jaffar died or who finally brought him down.
@@loremasterofsotek that's definitely an improvement I'm here for. But it would be really nice if there were some sigmar or just Franz style figures who unite araby under their own power and aren't evil. Maybe there are, they have been updating it since I heard the og story, but I didn't hear about any in that history you did.
@@loremasterofsotek in the araby faction mod the Berber adjacent female warrior leader u mention was very cool. Is she fully canon? Let's get some attention on someone like her and I think the story gets a lot better.
Honestly, given the feedback that shadows of change got, I do not think anyone will respond well to a mini-race pack even if it was at a discounted price.
I would hope that people would evaluate each DLC on its own merit and presentation rather than focusing on saying everything is bad due to one DLC that caused a stir. If anything I think "mini-race packs" would be far more popular than Lord Packs of any caliber as they offer entire unique experiences that you either want or don't.
@@loremasterofsotek Perhaps, but I think most would react badly to the less content approach, just look at the chaos dwarf 4th LL backlash even though we technically got every single relevant chaos dwarf character
I could listen to you talk about warhammer for countless hours. Thank you sir! Would love to listen to more lore dumps on anyone who you would like to talk about.
Would prefer they did something to flesh out the map with all the dead space between the mountains at the bottom of cathay and those elf island refugees, but im not opposed to more choice in game.
I suggest Halflings minor dlc, They definitely wouldn’t have a full race pack to themselves but would be interesting non the less. Love the content sotek.
Hahaha, unfortunately I think I would banish the Halflings and Gnomes into the "Mercenary Only" category. I don't think they'd ever be able to get away with being even minor factions as going into open war just isn't what they do. That being said, I am FULLY in support of adding "Special" Regiment of Renown units that are bound to certain Regions. I know I made a video about this at some point in the past.
@@loremasterofsotek you are completely right about the open war aspect, my idea was just under city like mechanic on human settlements only. Instead of conquest, symbiotic coexistence. I didn’t even know gnomes were in fantasy. I’ll go check out your ror halfling idea video.
I always loved the idea that the people of Araby worship the gods of Nehekhara. Different societies sharing deities makes for some really interesting narrative possibilities and hints of a shared past. Even if the nature of the worship might have shifted from what it was in old Nehekhara, it's still a trace of the past and leads to some interesting thoughts. I can just imagine the sort of philosophical and theocratic talks that a Nehekharan and an Arabyan priest might have.
From a roleplay perspective I would feel quite confidant that there would be desert tribes or certain sects that would worship the Nehekharan pantheon, as some of the desert tribes were subjugated by Settra's Empire WAAAAAAAAY back, though I do think they'd be a minority within Araby itself as most things to do with ancient Nehekhara would probably not be fondly looked upon with how oppressive Nehekhara has been to the Arabyans both in life and undeath.
Araby would be amazing. Choose your own alignment, order or chaos (or more), is definitely something the game could benefit from immensely. Especially for mini race packs and their replayability. Also locations of interest on the game map is way too under utilized, giving your faction or armies a reason to venture out a couple provinces over and risk some diplomacy or combat would be awesome. Otherwise give me djinns and ifrits all day, my fave.
I do think it would help really give them a unique flair in the since that instead of being "Order" or "Destruction" allied the player gets to make an active choice that drives the faction in said direction.
It’s unfortunate that my personal perceptions on Arab have been fairly compromised by the recent mod pack that the Lost Factions team made for them. I’ll hear this video out but it’s just too hard not to look at that mod’s ‘Bedouin’ infantry and similarly just full real-life-rooted linguistic and aesthetic approach and not feel like there’s not much hope of seeing them again
handwaving the really racist past of Araby and telling everyone it's fine is a bit of a stretch. It's good someone fixed it, but it doesn't erase what it was. In fact a lot of those tropes still exist in the wikis
I think when people say this faction can't be a thing is not to do with religion but a racial aspect. Some people are really weird with Warhammer and as you said if you started seeing EVERY race as some sort of allegory for the real world it becomes very messy. Warhammer is clearly INSPIRED by real world cultures and mythology but the Empire is not just Germany. It takes from a lot of cultures in Europe, same with Bretonnia and Cathy, Cathy having a mix of Asian concepts of mythology. We already have seen new stuff for Araby on tabletop so its not out of the question if it will be added to Warhammer 3, which is the largest exposure so far for the fantasy setting. I guess it just depends on if GW wants to put them in or not and if CA thinks its doable
I think hobgoblins would be neat to go into next. I think one thing to mention also is if an entire faction/dlc is built around 1 LL then it can be more curated than normal. Like you mentioned with having the choices of your one Araby LL to either go down the Tzeentch route or the noble path. Or say if Nippon was added in this format, have the DLC be themed around your one LL starting with one city and the end game goal is controlling all of Nippon, with a few roadblocks and outside influences at just the right time. Could even start on one side of the island/archipelego and work your way to the other side for a nice thematic flair.
@CA MAKE 👏THIS 👏 HAPPEN 👏 btw I'm half arab too and would love to see Araby (a race with more impact on lore than others) get their well deserved moment in the sun and I trust CA and GW to do them justice
The lady who has the potential to be the second LL (Im not even going to try to spell her name lol) in my opinion would work well as Araby's LH since CA seems intent on doing those now. A unique assassin hero.
Thank you, and possibly. Though I've very bias because I love middle eastern aesthetics I wouldn't mind this mini race pack idea having 2 LL's instead of one.@@loremasterofsotek Great video like always Sotek, keep it up!
As a Muslim from the Middle East, I am completely sad that CA would exclude the Arabia faction; however, I completely agree with your image of what they can be. Edit: The sorcerers from 29:59 can be named as either "Suher" (meaning bewitched) or "Saher" (meaning bewitcher).
I’m adding my voice here to the others: please Creative Assembly, make this happen. Nehekhara doesn’t make sense at the moment: quite a few settlement of the region have names that don’t have anything in common with the Tomb Kings faction. From day one I always felt something was missing in the region. Made some research and appeared that Araby is missing. I would happily buy such a DLC! Camels and lamp spirits! Yes! :)
Al Muktar: Maybe give him a skill line that boosts relations with the Empire/Brettonia (my memory is holeyer than a sponge) to reflect his upbringing and contacts both old and new. No place is truly safe, everyone has to pull their weight: Honestly that has me thinking more segregated units rather than mixed. After all with all the danger it'd be stupid to have the women not be able to fight, but by the same token if the women are always out fighting a desperate defence then the population is gonna go down hard through attrition. So maybe a unit that is lored more as traditionally staying within the cities rather than being deployed. There if the cities truly come undersiege but not constantly in danger and losing members. Siege weapons: A camel pulled sled or taboggan might also be nice. Particularly for a mortar. Then there are the massive bombards, ala the local equivalent of the queen bess or hellcannons, which realistically would need entire teams of horses/camels to move or maybe some elephants to pull it. Dervishes: The stereotype for that tends to be a guy dual wielding scimitars, ala bladedancers.
At the very most if CA cant do small race packs, hope we at least get heros for hire throw in a Araby sorcerer, Amazon proprietress, halfing ranger/thief, Albion turthslayers, -- and give bel;kor his Dark Emissaries
