Does the new story confirm the Changeling?

No. No it does not.

I've seen everybody's concern about me today, and I appreciate it, but let's take an objective look at things. I know how this sub loves to jump to conclusions, and I'm not discounting the possibility that this one could be correct. Sure, there's a possibility that the Changeling is the Tzeentch DLC LL, I have never discounted that. But to say he's confirmed after a single short story is... excessive.

Let's break it down:

• This was not a "Shadows of Change" story. This was a Yuan Bo story. To quote the Total War twitter: "we're thrilled to share the story of Yuan Bo, who joins WHIII as a new Legendary Lord in the upcoming Shadows of Change DLC!" Did you notice what they didn't say? Anything about anyone else joining WHIII as a new Legendary Lord. Furthermore, the story shows off several new possible Cathay units (such as Onyx Crowmen) but not a single new Tzeentch unit, unless you count cultists... who we'll talk more about in a little bit.
• Kislev was not mentioned at all, when they are presumably an integral part of the DLC. If the Changeling is in Cathay, how is he going to threaten Kislev?
• It's possible - but perhaps not likely - that the Changeling isn't included in the DLC at all. This story was created by a Black Library author and was just intended to show off Yuan Bo's personality and intelligence. The Changeling could have just been a useful prop for that; after all, one of those two characters definitely came off looking better than the other one. This hardly established a great rivalry.
• The Changeling could still be a Legendary Hero. Yes, it would be somewhat weird for Tzeentch to get two LHs at the same time (one paid and one free) but weirder things have happened before; and, setting aside the FLC and just focusing on the DLC itself, it would make some amount of sense to give Tzeentch two characters since they're going up against two enemy factions.
• Lastly, the story was constantly mentioning cultists. You can't go two pages in the story without the word cultists popping up somewhere. If anything, they're the bigger threat than the Changeling; the Changeling was just distracting Yuan Bo while the cultists sprang the trap. Which Tzeentch Lord was it again who was all about cults?
• Lastly, Yuan Bo makes way more sense as a rival for Egrimm than he does for the Changeling. I mean, come on, everyone who's currently making fun of me was, until today, absolutely convinced that CA had established a rivalry between the Changeling and the Monkey King. If Yuan Bo had been announced without the short story, I'm pretty sure y'all would be agreeing with me that Egrimm was the more likely candidate.

Copium? Perhaps. I'm not living in an alternate reality, and I'm well aware that next week I could be proven wrong. But everyone is making way too much out of a short story that was just intended to show off one new character.