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This page covers the announced post-launch plans for Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War IV. Everything described here is planned content that has not yet shipped. Dates, contents, and details are pre-release and may change before or after launch. KING Art has outlined both a free Year One content plan and a set of paid expansions.
Year One Free Content
KING Art has announced a Year One plan of free downloadable content. The window first given for it, Fall 2026 through to Spring 2027, has since been superseded: see How the Window Changed below. The plan is set to include the following additions, delivered after the game’s December 2026 launch:
Crusade Mode: a turn-based meta-campaign returning to the series as free post-launch content.
New map packs for additional battlegrounds.
A mission editor for creating custom missions.
New Commanders scenarios.
The order of those additions is now published. The Year 1 Expansion roadmap art pairs each free headline item with a numbered map pack and lays them out along a timeline that begins at 2027 and runs through markers labelled Spring and Summer.
Order | Free Headline Item | Paired Map Pack |
|---|---|---|
1 | Map Pack I | |
2 | Lord Ahmnok, added to Last Stand and Crusade | Map Pack II |
3 | Map Pack III | |
4 | Beastboss Guzcutta, added to Last Stand and Crusade | Map Pack IV |
Two points are worth separating. The Commander entries are not new characters: Lord Ahmnok is already a playable Necrons Commander and Guzcutta is already a playable Orks Commander. What the roadmap adds for them is availability in Last Stand and Crusade. The studio prints its own caveat on the same image, that DLC and release windows are subject to change, so the markers are targets rather than dates.
Paid Expansions
Alongside the free content, KING Art has announced paid downloadable content. Two paid expansions have been named so far, and both are included in the Release Date and Editions:
Blood Ravens Story Prologue: additional story content centered on the Blood Ravens Chapter.
AFTERMATH Campaign Expansion: a campaign expansion that is set to add a new fifth faction to the game after launch.
The fifth faction introduced by AFTERMATH has not been named or shown. The four Factions available at launch are the Space Marines, the Adeptus Mechanicus, the Necrons, and the Orks; the AFTERMATH faction will join them as a planned post-launch addition. Players who buy the Commander Edition receive both paid expansions as part of that bundle, while Standard Edition owners would need to acquire them separately.
Free Versus Paid
It helps to separate what is free from what is paid. The Year One content updates, including the rollout of Crusade Mode, new modes, map packs, the mission editor, and new Commander scenarios, are free for everyone regardless of which edition you buy. The two paid pieces are the Blood Ravens Story Prologue and the AFTERMATH campaign expansion, both of which are bundled into the Commander Edition described in Release Date and Editions.
On the store, this first year of content is also sold together as a single Year 1 Expansion package, which combines the free updates with the two paid additions. A Crusade is available at launch for five Commanders, with additional Crusades added free as part of this post-launch plan.
Roadmap Summary
The table below summarizes the announced post-launch items. All entries are planned and subject to change.
Item | Type | Published Window |
|---|---|---|
Crusade Mode and Map Pack I | Free | First free drop, at the start of the published 2027 timeline |
Lord Ahmnok for Last Stand and Crusade, with Map Pack II | Free | Second free drop, before the Spring marker |
Mission Editor and Map Pack III | Free | Third free drop, around the Spring marker |
Beastboss Guzcutta for Last Stand and Crusade, with Map Pack IV | Free | Fourth free drop, at the Summer marker |
Blood Ravens Story Prologue | Paid | Shown near the Spring marker; included in the Commander Edition |
AFTERMATH Campaign Expansion, adding a fifth faction | Paid | Shown near the Summer marker; included in the Commander Edition; faction unnamed |
How the Window Changed
The original Year One window was published in May 2026, when the game was still dated for September 17, 2026, and read Fall 2026 through to Spring 2027. After the launch moved to December 3, 2026, that wording went unrestated for several months and this page said so.
It has since been restated. The roadmap art republished in September 2026 drops the Fall 2026 framing entirely and runs its timeline from 2027 through Spring to Summer, which pushes the whole free plan later and spreads it across more of the year than the original wording implied. The four free drops above follow that revised timeline. See Release Date and Editions for the launch date change itself.
The Year 1 Expansion Package
The first year of content is also listed on the store as a single product, the Year 1 Expansion, and its official description is the tightest published summary of the whole plan: new modes, map packs, playable Commanders and a Mission Editor added in a series of free updates, while the Blood Ravens Story Prologue and the Aftermath Campaign Expansion deepen the story further and include a new playable faction.
That package is what the Commander Edition bundles on top of the base game. See AFTERMATH Expansion for the paid expansion in detail and Release Date and Editions for the edition comparison.
Related Pages
Release Date and Editions: how the Commander Edition bundles the Blood Ravens Story Prologue and the AFTERMATH expansion.
Crusade Mode: the returning turn-based meta-campaign planned as free content.
Factions: the four launch factions, with AFTERMATH planned to add a fifth.
Commanders: the hero leaders featured in the planned new Commander scenarios.