Total War: WARHAMMER 40,000 Faction Picker

The faction picker is a short quiz for Total War: WARHAMMER 40,000, not a leaked roster. Creative Assembly is launching four races — Space Marines, Astra Militarum, Orks, and Aeldari — each with two lore sub-factions and a custom warlord. Chaos Space Marines are planned later. Traitor Guard is a Guard reskin. This tool will not invent a fifth launch army because a comment asked for Necrons.

Answer pace, toys, and campaign posture. Then read the matching faction page and a first build. If you already know the race, skip to the army planner and tick cover and sentry instead.

What the quiz is allowed to recommend

Only the four launch factions exist in this picker. That is the list CA, SEGA, and Games Workshop have put on stage since The Game Awards 2025 and through Gamescom 2026.

• Space Marines if you want elite surgical strikes, power armour, and orbital drops. Campaign power lives in fleet upgrades from orbit. Battle power is a tiny Strike Force that must use cover, not a 160-model blob. Named chapter in footage: Ultramarines. The Space Marines start guide is the opening lesson.
• Astra Militarum if you want patient gunlines, artillery, infantry waves, and Baneblades. You live on the dirt. Cadians are the named regiment holding rivers against Orks in public slices. Read how to beat Orks even if you are Guard; the same geometry that saves you kills a WAAAGH!.
• Orks if you want overwhelming melee, mobs, ramshackle walkers, and a WAAAGH!. Campaign power industrialises planets you hold. Bad Moons are a named clan. You still need cover and not arriving as one clump, because the new engine simulates every round that meets your boyz.
• Aeldari if you want speed, psychic strikes, and hit-and-run. They remain the least shown race in 2026 streams. The quiz will still send you there if you asked for that pace. Do not bolt them onto Yarrick’s Armageddon vow until CA does.

Custom warlords exist at launch for all four, so “I want to play myself” is not a fifth answer. It is a paint-and-trait layer described in army customisation.

Why pace is a campaign question

Total War: WARHAMMER 40,000 is not a reskin of WARHAMMER III. CA built a new engine because battles are guns, cover, and sightlines, and because the strategy layer is a galactic sandbox. Nested crusade theaters can run past 600 turns toward Armageddon. Space Marines upgrade in orbit and drop. Orks industrialise dirt. Guard and Aeldari sit between those poles; extra resources for them have not been named, so the picker does not invent any.

If you pick Marines because you loved legendary lords in the fantasy trilogy, read the start guide before you lock. A Librarian is not an immortal solo piece. Bodyguards exist. Four units is the opening Strike Force Gamescom showed, not a doomstack. If you pick Orks because you loved WAAAGH! charges, remember Eurogamer watched those charges hit a firing line and erupt. The picker can match a mood. It cannot save a player who ignores ranged combat.

How to use the result without treating it as a tier list

Early tier lists on this wiki are preview ranks from shown footage, not a 2027 meta. The picker is even less of a ranking. It maps you to a race. After the result:

1. Open the faction hub page for that race and the matching build.
2. Tick the army planner so cover, sentry, strafe, reserves, mixed weapons, bombardment, and warlord protection are habits, not trivia.
3. Learn the loop in how to play.
4. If you play pad, remember this is the first mainline Total War on DualSense and Xbox — console controls — and that exact buttons are not public. Keyboard players get the same honesty on PC keybinds.
5. Wishlist and register via wishlist and beta. Sign-ups opened June 2026; play is later in 2026; the box year around Gamescom is 2027; Steam is still TBA.

Windows 10 64-bit is the published minimum OS and Windows 11 the recommendation. That does not change a faction. It is a reminder not to pick Aeldari because a fake spec sheet said your GPU likes glass armour.

What this tool will never say

It will not say Necrons, Tyranids, T’au, or Chaos Space Marines are launch picks. It will not assign secret DLC races. It will not claim one race is S-tier because a YouTuber shouted after a Gamescom demo. It will not replace the review or the campaign hub. It is three questions and a pointer.

If the quiz sends you somewhere you hate, retake it, then ignore it and read all four faction pages anyway. Commanders who only ever wanted Bad Moons did not need a widget. Commanders who still think this is a cavalry game do.