Total War: Warhammer 40,000: the Astra Militarum vs Orks Battle, Cover and Multi-Entity Squads

A single battle, shown twice in ten days, says more about Total War: Warhammer 40,000’s combat than the earlier trailers did. Creative Assembly first released a video from Bilibili World on July 13, 2026, then replayed the same clash in an Alpha Strike livestream on July 23. At the centre: the Astra Militarum defending a river crossing against the Orks.

Update, October 26, 2026: there is still no precise release date, but the press points to 2027 on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X|S (Geek Culture). Closed beta registration ended on September 14, an eligibility survey went out, and no test date has been announced (Steam announcement).

Two showcases, one battle

The Bilibili World video runs a little over six minutes. Creative Assembly says it comes from a build still in development, and GamingOnLinux notes visible slowdowns. It is set in the Armageddon theatre, on a civilised planet threatened by an Ork invasion.

The July 23 livestream picks up that scenario. PC Gamer notes the team played it three times, this time from the player’s perspective, on a two-month-old build. So this is not an edited trailer: it shows different choices on the same map.

Cover and lines of fire: the core of the demo

According to Game & Guide, combat rests on cover, line of sight and positioning rather than raw numbers. PC Gamer spells out an important technical point: the line of fire belongs to each entity in a unit, so one unit can aim at different targets at the same time. A visual line-of-sight indicator also appears when you target.

Windows Central sees a fast, chaotic game in which you cover your troops while avoiding enemy flanks. Its writers describe light infantry taking cover and laying down suppressing fire to slow the Orks, while heavy units and Stratagems, here tanks, do the killing.

Multi-entity squads

PC Gamer describes units made of several entities with different stats and weapons. A single unit can combine a commissar, a vox operator and ordinary soldiers. Heroes lead customisable bodyguards instead of walking alone as in Total War: Warhammer.

The demo does not yet show enough situations to measure what losing a specialist costs. Our analysis of the Warcore engine already pointed at this goal. July brings a first concrete demonstration.

The Orks: heavy machinery and an aerial flank

On the Ork side, GamingBolt lists the Killsaw, the Power Klaw and the Kombi-Skorcha. The site also notes Stormboyz charging in on jetpacks and able to catch platoons from behind. It describes tanks placed to discourage the Orks from crossing a bridge that would open a flank.

These observations come from a single sequence and a single scenario, with two factions out of four. They describe the demonstration, not the balance of the finished game.

What to watch

As of July 30, Creative Assembly had announced neither a release date nor a closed beta date, only a beta later in 2026. The Space Marines and the Aeldari, the other two launch factions, have not yet had a demonstration this detailed. PC Gamer says more livestreams on specific mechanics are likely before the beta.

On paper the cover logic is convincing; in practice only the beta will show whether it holds at scale. The open questions remain camera readability on large armies, balance between the four factions and how the turn-based campaign will be presented. On that last point, our June 2026 coverage got little information. For everything else, the Total War: Warhammer 40,000 page gathers our coverage.