You can now upgrade your troops by giving their commander new skills, which ultimately can completely redefine the jobs and abilities of whole armies by spending the experience points earned in battle.

Since the plot is a prologue for Crusaders, everything works brilliantly for newcomers – there’s no need for prior knowledge to understand what’s going on, but for old hands, action wise, a pretty much identical formula remains. You direct your different sets of troops (archers, cavalry, siege weapons and the like) by either selecting them and pointing them in the direction you want to go, or by setting waypoints on the mini-map. Missions are varied and can involve anything from sieges to rescue gambits, but ultimately, it tends to amount to destroying everything on the map. And with 3,000 plus

A few new elements change things though – the combo system is far more accessible than it used to be, so you can get right in the bloody thick of it and do some real damage with your hero from early on. This has a knock-on effect - the morale and aggressiveness of your troops is directly affected by your own behavior, success and failure; a lost fight or a cowardly escape could spell disaster for more than just your hero.