Cathay is routinely recommended as a first or second Total War: WARHAMMER III campaign: a readable defensive playstyle, a strong economy behind it, and a big wall that tells you exactly where the trouble will arrive. This guide covers the three systems, the Bastion, the three lords, and the deployment rule that makes the roster work.
The three systems
| System | What it does | What it rewards |
|---|---|---|
| Harmony | Every action you take pushes the Harmony meter toward Yin or Yang. Yin leans toward construction benefits, Yang toward recruitment benefits. | Holding the meter near the centre — the balance, not one extreme, pays upkeep, income and movement bonuses. |
| Wu-Xing Compass | You point the compass at one of four regions of your empire and the Winds of Magic follow. | Four distinct effects: the Great Bastion direction (defence, and a meteor-summoning ability), Celestial Lake (growth and income), Warpstone Desert (corruption reduction), and the Dragon Emperor's Wrath (control, plus siege attrition). |
| Ivory Road | Caravans travel west to the Old World and back. | Gold and items — Cathay's main source of trade income, and the reason the economy is forgiving if you keep the caravans alive. |
One consequence surprises new players: Cathay has no growth commandment. If you want settlements to grow, growth comes from building choices and from Harmony, not from a provincial edict. That makes Harmony a building decision as much as a battle one.
Running caravans profitably
- Recruit a Caravan Lord first. Caravan Lords have their own skill tree and are not recruited the way normal generals are.
- Level caravan-exclusive skills early — Hidden Stores first for survivability, then capacity and trade-price skills once the runs are safe.
- Stack the caravan army before it leaves. Caravan units cannot be recruited on the road, so whatever goes out is what you have.
- Upgrade capacity and replenishment as you go; better cargo limits and on-the-move replenishment make each run safer.
- Play the events. Caravan runs throw dilemmas at you: trade cargo for units, or take a risk on avoiding an ambush. Community guides treat these as the main decision points of the system.
Patch 9.0 also fixed a bug where unit rewards from completed Ivory Road caravans were not granted; rewards now arrive every time a caravan reaches its destination, provided it has room and does not already have those units.
Holding the Great Bastion
The Bastion is the wall along Cathay's northern border, and it is a timed problem rather than a static one. Its threat bar fills gradually, and a Chaos incursion attacks when it maxes out. Managing it is mostly about slowing the bar and being ready:
- Slow the fill rate. The compass' Bastion direction and local commandments reduce how fast the bar fills.
- Use the Bastion commandments deliberately: Restored heals garrisons and armies, Enhanced speeds up army levelling, Patrolled slows threat and corruption, and Reinforced increases settlement size faster.
- Keep an army within reach. When the bar fills, the incursion arrives whether your main stack is nearby or not.
- There are three gates to defend, and holding them is worth it: building the Bastion up confers real benefits.
Players who find the Bastion tedious usually lose interest because they treat it as maintenance. Treat it as a second front with its own budget and it becomes the most predictable part of a Cathay campaign.
Which Cathay lord should you pick?
| Lord | Where you start | What they are good at | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Miao Ying, the Storm Dragon | Northern Provinces, holding the Bastion | +20% ammunition for missile infantry, -50% upkeep for missile units in her own army, +10 leadership against Daemons of Chaos, and starts +3 toward Yin. | Learning Cathay. The Bastion job is hers, and she is the cheapest way to field a big ranged army. |
| Zhao Ming, the Iron Dragon | Western Provinces, on the Ivory Road | +20% maximum caravan cargo, an extra caravan, +5 recruit rank for Alchemists, -25% upkeep for Ogre mercenaries, +15 armour for melee units, and -25% melee upkeep in his own army. | Players who want the economy and trade game, and a melee-leaning army beside it. |
| Yuan Bo, the Jade Dragon | Central Provinces, the Jade Court | Matters of State (spending Steel and Stone tokens, where spending one converts capacity to the other over several turns), army movement resets, instant construction and recruitment, +5% research rate per provincial capital and +25 Winds of Magic reserves. | Experienced players. The most complex and the strongest of the three. |
If you are starting Cathay for the first time, Miao Ying first, Zhao Ming second, Yuan Bo once you know the systems. The Yuan Bo campaign guide covers his Matters of State loop in detail.
Harmony in battle: the deployment rule
Cathay units are aligned Yin (ranged and magical) or Yang (melee). A unit standing near an opposite-aligned unit is In Harmony: Yang units gain leadership and melee defence, Yin units gain leadership and reload skill. Two rules follow:
- Recruit in roughly equal halves. A community template for Miao Ying lands on nine Yang and nine Yin — four Jade Warriors, two Halberds, two Celestial Dragon Guard and a Jade Lancer unit on one side; four Crossbowmen, two Iron Hail Gunners, two Grand Cannons and a Sky Lantern or Sky-Junk on the other.
- Deploy in alternating blocks, not in two lines. Harmony is a proximity check. A gun line parked on one flank and an infantry line on the other is an army where nobody is In Harmony, however balanced the recruitment screen looked.
Everything else follows from that: Celestial Dragon Guard push damage through the centre, Grand Cannons remove single entities, Jade Lancers or Great Longma Riders give you a flank, and a Terracotta Sentinel late is worth two infantry slots as an anchor.
A first-20-turns shape
- Turns 1–5: secure the starting province and pick a Compass direction deliberately. Growth early (Celestial Lake) or defence if the Bastion bar is already moving.
- Turns 5–10: send the first caravan with a proper Caravan Lord and a full escort. The income curve of a Cathay campaign is mostly this.
- Turns 10–15: build the ranged core. Constant Jade Crossbow recruitment is a reliable early army plan, and it is also the Yin half of your Harmony balance.
- Turns 15–20: start feeding the Bastion commandments on the northern settlements and keep one army positioned to walk to a gate.
Turn counts are guidelines. The order is: province, caravan, ranged core, Bastion readiness.
Common mistakes
- Recruiting a good list and deploying it badly. Yin and Yang in two separate wings is an army fighting without its faction mechanic.
- Ignoring the Compass and leaving it on one setting all campaign; the four directions are answers to four different problems.
- Sending caravans out half-empty — caravan armies cannot recruit on the road.
- Treating the Bastion as a chore, then losing a gate to an incursion you watched fill up.
- Expecting a growth edict. Cathay's growth comes from buildings and Harmony.
- Overexpanding west into the Mountains of Mourn before the caravan route is stable.
Fact boundary: compiled on 29 October 2026 from the Total War: WARHAMMER wiki entries for Grand Cathay, Court mechanics summaries and post-launch community guides. Faction effects are as published; army templates and opening turn plans come from community play and may differ in your campaign. Warhammer Guide has not tested this campaign in-game.
Next steps: go deeper on one lord in the Yuan Bo campaign guide, compare starts in the faction guide, learn the sandbox with the Immortal Empires guide, or read the Kislev guide for the other Order front on the map.