I will continue to grow this Guide once the game servers are back online, the developers have turned the Closed Beta off and are going to use the next two to three months to focus their efforts on development. I am going to halt production of videos because there are a massive amount of changes coming to the game. The videos below are still relevent at this time however. So learn, and learn away!

The User Interface isn't very self explanitory, so here is a quick walkthrough of the entire interface.

The battle interface can be underwhelming but there are hidding goodies that not a lot of people know about, check out the video below to learn more about the interface then you even know existed.

Basic Overview of combat effectiveness and what you need to do to both survive with your units and win the match.

This section will detail every commander in the game. This will include a complete breakdown of their abilities, What Units they compliment the best, what units to avoid all together if there are any. Lastly each Commander will have a couple recommended Unit Configurations.

• Greeks
  Alexander the Great
  
  
  Cynane
  
  
• Miltiades
  
  
• Barbarians
  Arminius
• Vercingetorix
  
  
• Romans
  
  
• Scipio Africanus

**Note These Videos Will be shot after completing the Unit Strengths and Weaknesses Videos

These videos detail the strengths and weaknesses of unit types, not considering their weight or the commander being used. This is also assuming that the opponent your playing against is competent and is playing correctly.

Disclamer: These are not recommendations on how to use these units, instead this is what these units are good and bad at doing or fighting, one of the later chapters will go into detail about the tactics to employ with each type of unit but that is a whole other subject.

• Cavalry
• Bow Cavalry
  **WIP
  
  
• Melee Infantry
  
  
• Ranged Infantry

• Artillery

The Weight and Type of a troop dictates where you are able to fight the enemy on the battlefield effectively. Below is a link to the excel sheets I have used to pull this data, the charts I put together were created using the data from Si.Skiy tutorial on terrain with his permission. Thank you Si.Skiy.

Link to Raw Data[onedrive.live.com]

NOTE: A video will come to existance for this, just not sure when. I am currently working on the Commander Videos.

• Light Infantry -
  The data shows that Light infantry will shine in the forest and light forests, but they are also in the 40th percentile for effectiveness in dry and wet mud. So keep that in mind if you encounter an enemy whilst in wet mud, you have a 60% chance that you are more effective then him there...so take him on! Its just not that favored place to contact the enemy with the light infantry. Stay Away from roads however. You will get a boost on the road as a light infantry, being that you are already faster then both medium and heavy infantry your 104% modifier is nothing in comparison to what the slower heavier units gain while traveling on the road.
  
  
• Medium Infantry
  Medium infantry do not shine any where particularly well. The idea with medium is they are right in the middle in terms of combat effectiveness no matter where they are fighting. They prefer grass but have muted negative and positive effects compared to the other units on all terrain types.
  
  
• Heavy Infantry
  Heavy Infantry receive heavy penalties on all terrain types besides grass and long grass, with the exception being roads where they receive a large buff to speed, acceleration, and melee attack and defense.
  
  
• Light Cavalry
  Light Cavalry is extremely effective against other units in dry mud with the same effects as Light Infantry. They also shine in terms of terrain use in the shallow water areas. They only take a slight hit to speed, whilst all other units take a large hit to speed and lose melee effectiveness.
  
  
• Medium Cavalry
  Medium cavalry have slightly heightened effects when compared to light infantry, all debuffs are increased across the board, making medium cavalry effective only in grass, tall grass, and on roads.
  
  
• Heavy Cavalry
  Heavy Cavalry have the same negative and positive, losses and gains on terrain as medium cavalry except in larger doses. The Heavy Cavalry shine on roads, and in the grasses.
  
  
• Artillery
  Artillery is already very slow and cumbersome, with almost a null melee ability. Add in the effects of terrain and they do even worse, keep these bad boys in grass.

I will not be embedding the videos here as there would be far too many, rather it will be a list of each unit in the game seperated by faction and then by tier, each will have a link to the youtube video.

These videos will go into detail about:

• The Abilities
  
• The upgrades
  
• Consumables
  
• Recommended Commander
  
• Recommended Units Combinations
  
  ***This Will be completed after the Commander Videos

A lot of people tend to think about how a unit will work in a void, meaning they dont consider what they are going to be going up against. In this section I will be breaking down what units you will run into while playing at each tier. In doing so we will discover which units should be avoided all together as they may simply just not be effective within a specific tier due to what they will be matched up against.

Of course this is in a perfect world where we are assuming that matchmaking will pair you up accordingly with opponents within the same tier as your army.

• Tier 1
  
• Tier 2
  
• Tier 3
  
• Tier 4
  
• Tier 5
  
• Tier 6
  
• Tier 7
  
• Tier 8
  
• Tier 9
  
• Tier 10

If you watch the video below, it walks through how to start a vote and then vote for someone after the vote has started. A lot of people it seems vote for themselves just to stop someone else from getting team leader and I do not recommend doing this.

If you are going to vote yourself into a team leader position, try to fill the role properely and keep your units in the defensive areas of your side to make sure you can spend the time needed tagging enemies and asking/giving directions to your team where assistance is needed.

The team leader system is the least understood system in the game in my opinion, I do a complete walkthrough of the system, how to start a vote, how to vote. Finally I end on tools team leaders have to help their team and how to use them.

Note: When looking at the tactical map at the end of the video to the right of the tagging buttons in the bottom right there is a shortcut button to issue notifications instead of typing /notify "message" everytime.

Tactical breakdown of each map in the game.

*** This is probably one of the last things I will be working on to complete the first version of this guide.

• January 5th 2016
  Added Julias Caesers - Commander Guide Direct Link
  
  
• January 3rd 2016
  Added the Germanicus - Commander Guide Direct Link
  
  
• January 1st 2016
  Happy New Year!
  
  
• December 31st 2015
  First of all, Happy New Year!
  Second I added the video Leonidas - Commander Guide Direct Link
  
  
• December 30th 2015
  Finished the Writing potion of the Unit Weight Section
  Added Cynane - Commander Guide Direct Link
  Added Arminius - Commander Guide Direct Link
  
  
• December 29th 2015
  Added the Engineers - Strengths and Weaknesses Video Direct Link
  
  
• December 23rd 2015
  Added Alexander the Great - Commander Guide
  
  
• December 22nd 2015
  Added the Pikemen - Strengths and Weaknesses Video
  
  
• December 21st 2015
  I am porting the guide to masterofpwnage.com for more creative flexability for now its almost a mirror image but the content will be more fluid and readable on my website. Check it out if you are interested. http://masterofpwnage.com/game-guides/total-war-arena-guide/
  
• December 20th 2015
  Added the Javelin Cavalry - Strenghts and Weaknesses Video Direct Link
  Moved the update log to the bottom of the guide
  
  
• December 18th 2015
  Added the Ballista - Strengths and Weaknesses Video Direct Link
  
  
• December 15th 2015
  Added the Onager and Lithobolos - Strenghts and Weaknesses Video
  
  
• December 14th 2015
  Added Javelinmen Units - Strengths and Weaknesses Video
  Note: Changed my capturing software due to many many many corrupt files along the way from what I was previously using.
  
  
• December 11th 2015
  Added Begginer Video on Combat Effectiveness
  Moved the Tutorial on Team Leader out of the beginners section as its not appropriate for a beginner to act as a team leader in the stead of more experienced players.
  
  
• December 9th 2015
  Added Slingers Units - Strengths and Weaknesses Video
  Added Beginners Videos:
  The User Interface
  The Battle Interface
  The Team Leader System
  
  
• December 8th 2015
  Creating the Outline for the entire Guide, this will help guide me as I continue working on the Video Content.
  
  
• December 7th 2015
  Added Archer Units - Strengths and Weaknesses Video
  
  
• December 6th 2015
  Added Spearmen Unit - Strengths and Weaknesses video
  Changed the guides main image
  
  
• December 5th 2015
  Started Formating the Guide
  Added Melee Cavalry - Strengths and Weaknesses Video
  Added Swordsmen - Strengths and Weaknesses Video