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Total War Warhammer 3 DLC modes land for free alongside Chaos Dwarfs

Total War Warhammer 3 DLC Mirror of Madness is a free expansion for the fantasy strategy game adding two modes, arriving with update 3.0 and the Chaos Dwarfs.

Total War Warhammer 3 DLC Mirror of Madness - a blue, bird-headed warrior in golden armour

There’s new, free Total War Warhammer 3 DLC on the way when TWW3 update 3.0 arrives on April 13. The Mirror of Madness DLC for the fantasy strategy game adds two brand new game modes and will be available to all Total War Warhammer 3 players for free. The two modes include an intense survival challenge format, and a “reality-bending” mode that enables players to dramatically alter the way TTW3 plays in dramatic fashion.

When it releases alongside Total War Warhammer 3 update 3.0, you’ll be able to find the Mirror of Madness mode on the Battle tab from the game’s main menu. There, you’ll have access to two modes – Trials of Fate and The Infinite Portal. The former is a struggle for survival through infamous battles from Warhammer history, while the latter puts control directly in your hands with a wealth of gameplay-altering settings to tweak.

The pair of modes arrives alongside the incoming Total War Warhammer 3 Chaos Dwarfs DLC on April 13, but you won’t need to purchase the Chaos Dwarfs to play the two Mirror of Madness modes. They will be freely available to all players of Total War Warhammer 3 when update 3.0 releases.

Total War Warhammer 3 DLC - menu screen for Trials of Fate

Total War Warhammer 3 Trials of Fate mode

The Trials of Fate are “a series of intense survival challenges where players assume the role of a newly ascended Daemon Prince of Tzeentch.” You’ll have to fight against endless waves of enemies that grow ever stronger, defending an object called the Shard across four battles from the past, before taking the fight to Kairos Fateweaver in a climactic showdown.

It’s not all bad news, however – you’ll have “unique spells and abilities” at your disposal to help survive this ultra-challenging mode. You’ll be able to upgrade these using Forbidden Knowledge, which is accumulated as you defend the Shard from attack.

Dealing more damage and bringing down as many enemy units as possible will boost your score, unlocking new Daemon Prince parts that can also be used across both the Realm of Chaos and Immortal Empires campaigns, the latter of which is now available to all TWW3 players.

Total War Warhammer 3 DLC - menu screen for The Infinite Portal

Total War Warhammer 3 The Infinite Portal mode

The Infinite Portal is a “reality-bending” mode that grants you the ability to manually alter the very fundamentals of how Total War Warhammer 3 plays. That’s a pretty dramatic toolkit, letting you change everything from the number of soldiers per unit and the damage dealt by individual attacks and spells to the strength of gravity and even the size of single-unit entities such as Lords and Monsters.

Here are all the modifiers you can change with The Infinite Portal:

  • Unit Size: Increases the number of soldiers per unit and their health.
  • Damage: Increases the damage dealt by attacks, spells, etc.
  • Impact Force: Increases collision impact, attack force and detonation force to send units flying.
  • Leadership: Increases base morale.
  • Winds of Magic: Increases the availability of Winds of Magic for spellcasting.
  • Explosions: Increases the size of explosions and vortex spells, improving their radius and detonation speed.
  • Vigour Cost Reduction: Increases the duration that units stay fresh, lowering the fatigue cost of actions.
  • Reload Time: Reduces the time it takes to reload ranged weapons.
  • Ammunition: Increases the total number of shots per ranged unit.
  • Projectile Penetration: Increases the distance projectiles can travel through enemies.
  • Gravity: Decreases the effect of gravity on units who are knocked into the air.
  • Ability Radius: Increase the effect radius of abilities.
  • Ability Recharge: Reduces ability recharge time.
  • Charge Duration: Increases the duration of the charge bonus.
  • Entity Scale: Increases or decreases the size of single unit entities like Lords and Monsters.
  • Blood Quantity: Increases or decreases the amount of blood emitted by entities emit.

Creative Assembly says that “Mirror of Madness in and of itself makes no difference to Warhammer 3’s performance.” However, it does note that “should you crank up the Infinite Portals more intensive settings (such as entity scale or unit size) you may begin to notice some performance drop-off, depending on the power of your PC.”

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It encourages players to see The Infinite Portal as “an experiment, with the chance… should you so choose… to push your PC’s hardware to the limit.” It adds that while Trials of Fate should also maintain similar performance to the main game, “players who survive for a long time may find that the sheer number of units on screen at once in later waves may stretch their system resources.”

Make sure to browse our guide to all Total War Warhammer 3 races to make sure you’re ready to take on these new modes on April 13. If The Infinite Portal isn’t enough customisation for you, we’ve picked out the best Total War Warhammer 3 mods to take things even further, along with highlighting the best Warhammer games on PC in 2023.