Following a recent, severe bug in Total War: Warhammer 3, a highly committed modder, known as ‘Dead Baron,’ publicly shared his disappointment. After dedicating over 3,800 hours to the game, his negative review garnered significant attention. I reached out to Randall Zaioczkowski, the ‘Dead Baron’ himself and a co-founder of the Skeleton Crew Modding team, to understand his perspective. Despite being an avid fan and contributor of many impressive mods and fixes for the Total War series, especially TWW3, he admitted that recent years have brought “so many issues I just couldn’t ignore.”
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Randall confessed, “This all kind of blew up, to be honest. I didn’t think anyone would even read my review.” The immediate cause for his frustration was the latest in a series of ongoing challenges that Creative Assembly, the developers behind Total War: Warhammer 3, has faced with their campaign AI. Specifically, a persistent recruitment bug prevented some computer-controlled factions from adequately filling their armies. This glitch, understandably, detracts significantly from what is usually considered one of the leading strategy games available on PC.
[YouTube video illustrating the AI recruitment bug]
Randall estimates his combined playtime across the entire Total War franchise at over 7,000 hours, with the majority spent in Three Kingdoms and Warhammer 3. He fondly described Three Kingdoms as “my dream Total War,” citing his love for its story, characters, and the Dynasty Warriors series, owning multiple editions of the related books. It was also within Three Kingdoms that he began his modding journey. He explained, “I was inspired by other modders such as ‘Guvenoren’ and ‘Lily,’ so I tried to copy their style. Unit cards in mods always bothered me, so I aimed to emulate Creative Assembly’s art style, which I believe contributed to the early popularity of my mods.”
More recently, Randall expanded his efforts to creating fixes for visual glitches and other issues, often submitting detailed bug reports to Creative Assembly. After meticulously improving textures for Total War: Empire, he even approached CA, offering his enhanced designs for free use. His offer, however, was declined. “I never expected them to accept the textures in the first place, but I thought it was worth a shot,” he clarified. “I was never mad they said no. I wanted to make the game better for everyone. That is why I offered to sign any agreements or contracts stating I wanted no compensation. I make mods as a hobby.”
Since that time, Randall has diligently worked on updating numerous older textures from previous Total War: Warhammer titles, optimizing them for the latest game. He performs this work himself using Photoshop or Paint.net. “Originally, I experimented with AI upscaling, but the results weren’t satisfactory,” he noted. “So, I reverted to extracting textures from Warhammer 1 and manually combining the Specular and Diffuse maps. I used Warhammer 1 as a benchmark for how they were originally intended to appear.”
[Image: Screenshot showing Dead Baron’s ‘Warhammer 1 Texture Update Project’ mod for Total War: Warhammer 3]
Randall meticulously compared “almost every texture in Warhammer 1” against their Total War: Warhammer 3 counterparts, identifying which ones needed improvement. He observed, “Some textures looked fine and didn’t need to be replaced, others looked downright terrible.” All of his enhanced creations are now publicly available as Total War: Warhammer 3 mods, allowing players to experience the visual upgrades firsthand.
Several of Randall’s mods have previously sparked significant discussion. For instance, Skullmuncha’s distinctive wyvern design from the original Total War: Warhammer was absent in TWW3. When questioned, Creative Assembly stated they no longer had access to the necessary files. Randall recounted, “I simply took the model and textures from Warhammer 1, updated them to function in Warhammer 3, and with community assistance, implemented the animation fixes.” Creative Assembly eventually corrected this in their official patch 4.2. He has also applied similar “quick fixes” in other areas, like restoring the missing lightning spark effects for Kholek Suneater, noting, “I just copied the VFX from Warhammer 1, and they worked perfectly.”
Given his profound affection for the game, I inquired when he first felt the series was heading in the wrong direction. He pinpointed the DLC for Three Kingdoms as the starting point of his frustration, specifically how Creative Assembly ended support after hinting at a “Northern Expansion” DLC. Despite this, he “remained optimistic, overlooked the problems, and even defended them within the Skeleton Crew Modding server I manage.” However, the issues intensified with TWW3’s particularly controversial expansion, “Shadows of Change,” which he described as the moment “I started to feel the shift, and since then there have been so many issues I just couldn’t ignore any more.”
[Image: Screenshot of Dead Baron’s negative Steam review for Total War: Warhammer 3 after 3,831 hours of playtime]
He specifically highlighted the notorious “prices have to rise” statement from former chief product officer Rob Bartholomew (who departed Creative Assembly in 2024) as a pivotal moment. Randall felt it was “insulting, like they were just telling us, ‘Shut up and buy the DLC,'” believing the message revealed the “higher-ups'” perception of the community. He compared it to “former bosses that didn’t care about my safety or concerns and just wanted the job done at any cost.”
While Creative Assembly has increased its outreach through developer videos and diaries detailing future content and patches, Randall remains skeptical. “I see them mostly as just public image recovery. It feels hollow,” he stated. “I want them to make these videos because they genuinely want to, and because they are proud to showcase their work.”
When asked about the DLC rollout, Randall commented, “I don’t play all of them; I don’t have interest in every faction. I do appreciate that they release new content, as other people enjoy it.” While he doesn’t advocate for pausing expansions entirely for fundamental fixes, he conceded that attempting both simultaneously “isn’t realistic, so I understand.” However, he feels the current issue is that “it seems like they are putting a hold on the DLC and not fixing anything either, unless it sparks a massive outcry from the community.”
[Image: Skulltaker leading the Chaos legions of Khorne in Total War: Warhammer 3]
While acknowledging he is “not familiar with the intricacies of game development,” Randall, who has prior experience in quality assurance, identifies QA as a significant weakness for Total War currently. “In the current state of the game, I constantly ask myself, ‘Why wasn’t this caught in QA? This is unacceptable for release,'” he expressed. He noted that Creative Assembly “currently only seem to fix things the community attacks them for.” He cited his own short list of reported bugs on their forum, which CA acknowledged they were “aware of and looking into,” yet multiple subsequent patches have failed to implement any fixes.
Despite his extensive modding contributions, Randall advocates for playing without mods occasionally to “better appreciate the game and the content modders create independently.” For new TWW3 players, he advises against starting until at least the persistent AI issues are resolved. “If the game isn’t running as it’s supposed to right out of the box, without any mods, then it could negatively impact user experience,” he warned, adding, “which is something I feel like I care more about than Creative Assembly does. It’s about having fun; paying a lot of money for a game that is broken isn’t fun.”
Although the Skeleton Crew Modding team has evolved since its inception, Randall expressed his deep affection for his current collaborators and his enjoyment in creating “mods I think would be great additions to the game.” He places significant emphasis on aesthetics, stating, “The visuals are the first thing people will see that will draw someone in. A great screenshot can make someone want to play a game. If you have broken models, textures, VFX, and other errors, it makes your product look bad. Creative Assembly seems not to prioritize visual issues; perhaps they are more concerned with engine-level problems, or maybe they lack the time or manpower. I can’t say for sure. What I can say is that I don’t regret making the mods I did, and I would do it all over again.”
[Image: Artwork depicting Liu Bei from Total War: Three Kingdoms]
“I love the series; I don’t hate the Creative Assembly developers,” Randall stressed. “I don’t want anyone to think I’m doing this out of hatred or spite. I posted my review because I am deeply frustrated. Many of us have been here through every challenge, continuously supporting the game because we genuinely want it to improve. I believe there are numerous dedicated individuals within the company who aspire to make the game perfect and to satisfy the community. Nobody enjoys receiving negative feedback about their work.”
For those interested, we also have comprehensive lists of the finest Warhammer games available and the top grand strategy games for those who prefer epic-scale conflict.
Are you still a passionate Total War player? We invite you to join the PCGamesN community Discord to share your favorite titles from the series. For many long-time fans, the early campaigns of games like Shogun and Rome still hold a unique, magical simplicity that resonates deeply.