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For those who want another excuse to give Empire Total War a go, the Imperial Splendour guys have just released their ETW mod covering the Revolutionary Wars era.
SeanBeansShako fucked around with this message at 21:15 on Jan 19, 2014 |
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Jan 19, 2014 20:59
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I made the mistake of buying RTW2 when it was half off and jesus is this imperium system stupid. The only way I can possibly conquer more territories to get more imperium is by leaving half my cities unguarded, when I have so much money in the treasury that I could raise two armies easily. What the gently caress is the point of this when we already have upkeep/treasury to manage?
Aves Maria! fucked around with this message at 03:23 on Jan 20, 2014 |
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Jan 20, 2014 03:16
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Wildlife Analysis posted:I made the mistake of buying RTW2 when it was half off and jesus is this imperium system stupid. The only way I can possibly conquer more territories to get more imperium is by leaving half my cities unguarded, when I have so much money in the treasury that I could raise two armies easily. What the gently caress is the point of this when we already have upkeep/treasury to manage? At least you got it for half off, you lucky bastard.
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Jan 20, 2014 10:18
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Wildlife Analysis posted:I made the mistake of buying RTW2 when it was half off and jesus is this imperium system stupid. The only way I can possibly conquer more territories to get more imperium is by leaving half my cities unguarded, when I have so much money in the treasury that I could raise two armies easily. What the gently caress is the point of this when we already have upkeep/treasury to manage? I think the idea is to cut down on the ridiculous number of single-unit armies you'd have running around in earlier games, and make you think about how you deploy your armies. As long as you pay attention to what your enemies are doing, your garrisons should be enough to guard cities that aren't at the frontier.
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Jan 20, 2014 10:53
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peer posted:I think the idea is to cut down on the ridiculous number of single-unit armies you'd have running around in earlier games, and make you think about how you deploy your armies. As long as you pay attention to what your enemies are doing, your garrisons should be enough to guard cities that aren't at the frontier. You're also meant to use diplomacy or client states/satrapies to cover your flanks. Allies and vassals count for victory purposes, see. Too bad it becomes a crapshoot on the higher difficulty levels.
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Jan 20, 2014 11:02
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Wildlife Analysis posted:I made the mistake of buying RTW2 when it was half off and jesus is this imperium system stupid. The only way I can possibly conquer more territories to get more imperium is by leaving half my cities unguarded, when I have so much money in the treasury that I could raise two armies easily. What the gently caress is the point of this when we already have upkeep/treasury to manage? I didn't have a lot of trouble with the army limits, even in my insane Macedonian game where the AI practically forced me to conquer Egypt before I could unify Greece. You don't need to have armies garrisoned in cities to defend anymore, and in most cases, force marching armies will get them where they need to be in time to defend from an attack. You should try to expand intelligently in order to avoid getting attacked on all sides. The agent limit is far worse.
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Jan 20, 2014 11:32
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The worst thing about the agent limitations is that it never seems to affect the AI. No matter how many you kill or manage to sway to your side, there's always DOZENS more of them swarming your poo poo non-stop.
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Jan 20, 2014 11:41
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You can always use this. There's also a version by the same author that completely cuts the agent action budget. Also, like Slim Jim Pickens said, garrisons are very effective in Rome II, barbarian ones are freaking huge and hellenic factions get pikes/hoplites that can hold down narrow streets forever. You won't kill 20/20 doomstacks with them but they will keep the riff-raff away for free.
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Jan 20, 2014 12:49
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They're pretty good if the AI is dumb. park your spears in a street with a side entrance, park javelins in the side street. Watch as the AI gets cut down by tons of Javelins as they completely ignore them to go for your spears. Its actually quite a nice surprise when the AI goes "gently caress this" and rushes them.
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Jan 20, 2014 18:47
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Slim Jim Pickens posted:I didn't have a lot of trouble with the army limits, even in my insane Macedonian game where the AI practically forced me to conquer Egypt before I could unify Greece. You don't need to have armies garrisoned in cities to defend anymore, and in most cases, force marching armies will get them where they need to be in time to defend from an attack. You should try to expand intelligently in order to avoid getting attacked on all sides. I guess my issue is with Suebi where I don't have navies to help take/defend cities and right off the bat I'm at war with 3 or 4 different barbarian factions due to them randomly declaring on me. The second I move an army away one of my cities gets sacked and it's just annoying. Especially in the early game when AI doesn't even bother encircling so it gives you no time to send reinforcements.
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Jan 20, 2014 19:31
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If you guys are that bothered by it get one of the billion mods that ups the limits.
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Jan 20, 2014 19:49
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I love ROME 2 despite all it's bugs and shortcomings. Yes, they released a game that was at best in beta version, but it is still in better shape than most other total war games upon release. I noticed a few issues with AI, I wander what your experiences are: AI behaves relatively well in open field battle but when AI is besieging OMFG.... even if they outnumber me 3 to 1 they never seem to be able to get the ladders to the wall or to break the gate. And even when AI has ballistae it doesn't try to actually bring down a wall and instead just tries to bombard my units. Sending out unit out of the gate to attack ladder carriers or troops trying to set the gate on fire seems to do the trick every time. It somehow disrupts the AI attack logic to a point where it isn't able to get back to where it left off. Also, AI seems to be aware of my armies even if they aren't supposed to. For example: one city nation that has 2 stacks of units attacks my nearby settlement when it's empty. I reload a bring am army with a couple of units into the city, AI never attacks. Some turns later, I remove an army far enough that they can't reinforce, AI atatcks. Their agents are all accounted for in their province. So, how can AI know what units I have or don't have in the city? This isn't such a big deal since AI could use a little cheating, but it makes it impossible to ambush AI by a hidden army. I have tried an so far haven't succeded. Has anyone succeeded in ambushing AI when they are moving on their turn?
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Jan 20, 2014 20:49
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darkiemond posted:I love ROME 2 despite all it's bugs and shortcomings. Yes, they released a game that was at best in beta version, but it is still in better shape than most other total war games upon release. I wouldn't go as far as to say "in better shape" since the game was a disaster at launch, but if Sega had released Rome II as an Early Access title for the first month or two it would now be regarded as a pretty solid TW title, if not one of the best. TWC would still complain about the game of course but they do that every time so whatever. Anyway, I think the worst thing about R2's release fiasco was giving AngryJoe's YouTube channel almost 2 million views.
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Jan 20, 2014 22:09
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darkiemond posted:I love ROME 2 despite all it's bugs and shortcomings. Yes, they released a game that was at best in beta version, but it is still in better shape than most other total war games upon release. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEHHFsZ19co
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Jan 20, 2014 23:38
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I saw a nice video about the history and context of Shogun 2 narrated by a professor of Asian culture who's fairly familiar with the game. There's a nice selection of recommended readings at the end of the video as well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmPmHj24Cwc
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Jan 20, 2014 23:48
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Shogun 2 may just be the most "fun" version of Total War that I've played. My personal favorite still goes to Medieval 2 and Kingdoms (for the wackiness and massive in-depth family system). But with Shogun 2, it's easily the quickest to pick up and play, it's the only game on the Warscape engine where the combat doesn't look like poo poo, and it's definitely the bloodiest game, even without the blood pack. I like the suicidal nature of combat in Sengoku japan.
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Jan 21, 2014 00:48
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achillesforever6 posted:Plus how can you hate when stuff like this happens gently caress yeah, the sandboat, when it happened for the first time in Chomps stream, the chat went nuts. There were pretty funny bugs in this game, although I still have the zombie soldiers one and it's getting old 
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Jan 21, 2014 00:54
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check this one out, the review is long but I don't want you to miss the best part http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_QK-lcW8a8 forward to 11:58 and you will see soldiers jumping off the siege tower and... missing the wall, lol, but don't worry they aren't suicidal, they get right up and go up the siege tower again this looks hilarious I haven't encountered any of the battle bugs at all though. _________________________ I have a serious question too: in your experience does roman heavy infantry units (legionaries, praetorians, etc) feel a bit overpowered? Or many be all other factions are similar when upgraded? for example: my infantry: max armor/weapons upgrade +bonuses from legion and general so praetorians have over 100 attack and morale. I experimented and sent just 1 unit against enemies' over 20 units. They killed it in about 1 min of swarming around it with big losses. Then I sent 3 more units and they actually defeated the whole army. So, why do even fuss with ballistae, cavalry, dogs? Just send in heavy infantry and it's over. a ballista fireball landed right in the middle of my praetorians ... soldiers flying around, half the area is cleared, I am thinking: no way! my star unit is probably half dead, mouse over, lol, only 1 died. heavy armor and hp calculation vs ballista's damage - only one dies, I get it, I get it... but still feels a bit ridiculous
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Jan 21, 2014 18:47
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darkiemond posted:
Yes, Roman heavy infantry is pretty known for being a bit overpowered, though other armies do have units which can hold up against them somewhat. Rome is basically the easy mode of this game. That said, if you fast tech to any race's heavy infantry while the AI is still screwing around with a lot of levy-esque units, you can destroy them with just a few units. Maybe the best example of this is fast teching to Oathsworn and destroying massive stacks of barbarian units with just a few Oathsworn units.
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Jan 21, 2014 19:17
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In 2007 I started playing Rome: Total Realism because the longer nature of the battles appealed to me, plus the Bactrians were a fantastic nation to play with: all of the advantages of Hellenic and Eastern factions all in one neat little package, with a javelin skirmisher unit that was one of the deadliest units in the game if you could get it behind an enemy. I didn't think I'd ever complete it because the map is huge (about 200 cities in total: modders seem to think that it's not enough to revamp the factions and combat, and that you've got to make the map completely unweildy as well). The East looked a little intimidating what with the massive Seleucid empire, however, so I packed all of my guys off to Rome by marching down to the coast near Jerusalem, capturing a city, holding it (sacrificing half of my units in the process) while I built a single Bireme, and shipping my remaining units to the Italian coast.  7 years later   After reinstalling every year or so and chipping away gradually, I'm finally free.
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Jan 24, 2014 23:36
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So is it the consensus that the Radious Mod for Shogun 2 is worthwhile? I'm getting sick of the bullshit that vanilla pulls to give the AI a chance.
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Jan 25, 2014 04:38
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Uh what bullshit, exactly? The only stuff they can do that we can't is only exacerbated in Radious'. You might as well give the mods a try if you don't like vanilla but they really don't "improve" anything, they just make the game play a bit differently. Some people are into the changes, others are not. Expect long, sluggish and lethal battles and stupid numbers of units.
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Jan 25, 2014 04:55
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The annoying crap where the AI can seemingly pull a giant stack of samurai out of its rear end after I've been waging a major war of attrition and consecutively beat back three of their armies. And they only own two provinces. loving Takeda spam. Or how your army has an immediate hard counter the moment you encounter a new clan. Oh, you're specializing in Spear infantry off the start to get some naginata units? Well screw you, here's a load of bomb throwers and katanas to fight by turn 10. Since I finished my Date campaign, I decided to take another swing at the Uesgugi on Hard difficulty. Made a focused effort to wipe out the Takeda before they become enormous as they usually do in my campaigns. Once I make an uneasy alliance with the Jimbo and kill Shingen, I take North Shinano, only to see another full stack of Yari Ashigaru and Samurai marching my way. The Takeda never took anything more than North Shinano, and I'd just defeated their main army which was already a full stack. I get that there needs to be some challenge, but I'd like it if I break the back of a nation in one battle and not have to fight an immediate second super army the moment the turn ends. Arc Hammer fucked around with this message at 06:21 on Jan 25, 2014 |
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Jan 25, 2014 06:09
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Arcsquad12 posted:The annoying crap where the AI can seemingly pull a giant stack of samurai out of its rear end after I've been waging a major war of attrition and consecutively beat back three of their armies. And they only own two provinces. loving Takeda spam. Or how your army has an immediate hard counter the moment you encounter a new clan. Oh, you're specializing in Spear infantry off the start to get some naginata units? Well screw you, here's a load of bomb throwers and katanas to fight by turn 10. Hahaha, holy poo poo dude. Even if the AI was completely random about its priorities, it's incredibly likely that one clan is going to be going heavy on the units that counter yours if you are rushing. This would make you an incredibly tempting target for reasons that should be obvious. Your complaint can literally only be solved by having the AI know what you are doing and then specifically building units which are not strong against yours. You got this save you can post?
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Jan 25, 2014 06:20
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shalcar posted:Hahaha, holy poo poo dude. Nope. I've given up on three separate starts with the Uesugi. My most recent one ended with the Oda swarming over my one army after the Honma managed to sink the invasion force heading for Sado. Today has just been a really bad day for my gaming. Failure after failure in any game I play. Arc Hammer fucked around with this message at 06:26 on Jan 25, 2014 |
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Jan 25, 2014 06:23
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What difficulty level are you playing on?
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Jan 25, 2014 06:27
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shalcar posted:What difficulty level are you playing on? Hard. I edited my above post to explain a little better. I'm trying to head off a Takeda war machine early, so I've been putting a heavy effort into attacking Shingen's army with ambushes and playing cat and mouse across Shinano. But even if the Takeda only hold N. Shinano and Kai, they still have enough resources to make a doom stack the moment I knock out Shingen's giant force of light cavalry and ashigaru.
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Jan 25, 2014 06:32
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The Uesugi have one of the hardest starts in the game, play someone else. That kind of explains your frustration. But yeah, the clans you fight don't spawn units out of the ether ever (only rebels, ashikaga and wako can). They get some monetary bonuses, depending on difficulty, but on the whole they play by extremely similar rules to us. You're just projecting/ getting unlucky.
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Jan 25, 2014 06:41
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Oh, Uesugi on Hard. Yeah, that's going to be unpleasant. On Hard, the AI gets a bonus recruitment slot as well as some extra money, so with two provinces Takeda can be producing a full stack every 4 turns, sooner if they upgrade their fortifications. With the large distances you need to travel in early game Uesugi, that's going to take almost anyone apart. There is a reason it's listed as Hard and that's why. It's a lot less brutal on Normal as the AI doesn't get the bonus slot, so with 2 provinces they need 7 turns to make a stack, much more manageable.
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Jan 25, 2014 06:52
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Not to mention I think the major clans tend to go heavy on their specialties. At least that'd explain why I just gone done defending against a siege of 12 Bow Ashigaru, 1 Yari Ashigaru, and 4 Bow Samurai from the Chosokabe. That'd explain why Takeda's army is mostly light cavs and ashigaru for support, anyway. EDIT: Also, how exactly does a general betraying you work in Shogun 2? My best general got mad when I stripped him of his commission to give it to someone who'd make better use of it, and even adopting him into my family he's still only at 2 dots. Is that enough for him to stay on my side or should I be worried? Endorph fucked around with this message at 07:04 on Jan 25, 2014 |
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Jan 25, 2014 06:59
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Endorph posted:Not to mention I think the major clans tend to go heavy on their specialties. At least that'd explain why I just gone done defending against a siege of 12 Bow Ashigaru, 1 Yari Ashigaru, and 4 Bow Samurai from the Chosokabe. I think its mainly done on chance. Anyone under 3 dots gets a glorious death if i'm playing.
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Jan 25, 2014 07:30
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Gamefly has a 75% off Total War sale going on at the moment.
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Jan 25, 2014 14:38
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Okay, round four with the Uesugi. This time, I baited the Takeda doomstack into an assault against the Yamanouichi, so our combined forces would take them on. The Yamanouichi had some experienced units after soloing both the Satomi and Hojo doomstacks (while my reinforcements were on the other side of the battle map), so while they were beat up, they lasted a lot longer than i expect AI allies to. So, with the Takeda doomstack dealt with, I send two more Yari Samurai to replace my losses, and Kenshin is currently waiting in ambush along the road into North Shinano. Meanwhile, up at Echigo, Masakage beat back the Jinbo's pathetic siege assault. I've got four Bow Kobayas waiting to take his army to Sado the moment I can build up a decent garrison for Echigo. The Honma landed and wiped out the Mogami, but so far, they're just ignoring me. Plus, if their army landed on the mainland, then Sado is pretty much undefended. If I move fast, I should be able to take the settlement, and then use the extra money to finance better defenses for Echigo. So far, so good.
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Jan 26, 2014 00:05
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I just picked up Napoleon: Total War the other day on a whim and out of a general enthusiasm for that era of history but since my only experience with Total War was a bit of messing around with that Europa Barborum mod for Rome 1 I'm kind of struggling. Like, I get most of the controls and I've done the tutorials, but I have a very bad sense of which of my troop types are good for what, or what kind of army compositions I should be building,or where to position my artillery so that they actually shoot at things instead of sitting around. Are there any basic pointers for Total War neophytes re: NTW?
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Jan 26, 2014 00:59
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Use the group feature and steer your infantry with fire at will instead of point clicking. Position Artillery either at the flanks of your line on in the middle with both groups of line on their flanks defensively. Make sure they aren't firing into the ground or into the backs of your own line. Your armies should consist mostly of line/heavy line, with 2-3 light, skirmisher or cavalry units to give you the best tactical flexibility. Play the tutorial, It is quite informative AND enjoyable.
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Jan 26, 2014 01:02
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Thanks for the advice! What should I be doing with my light/skirmishers/cavalry? I tend to put my cavalry on my flanks out of a dim awareness of reading about historical battles with cavalry on the flanks but I'm not sure if I'm actually meant to be doing that or what.
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Jan 26, 2014 01:08
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Rincewind posted:Thanks for the advice! What should I be doing with my light/skirmishers/cavalry? I tend to put my cavalry on my flanks out of a dim awareness of reading about historical battles with cavalry on the flanks but I'm not sure if I'm actually meant to be doing that or what. Either hold them in reserve nearby your artillery, or place them on your armies flanks and move them to a distant or hidden position away from the fight. Then bring them slowly towards the fight whilst the AI is engaged or raid some artillery/occupied skirmishers. Use dragoons as emergency support for line as they can dismount and bring their own firepower to help. Skirmishers should be on the flanks of the line moving to get a good shot in the sides on rear, or using skirmish and light infantry mode to pull line in a general direction towards more heavier guns. They are also good for guarding static heavier artillery. Use those stakes wisely!
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Jan 26, 2014 01:12
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Rincewind posted:I just picked up Napoleon: Total War the other day on a whim and out of a general enthusiasm for that era of history but since my only experience with Total War was a bit of messing around with that Europa Barborum mod for Rome 1 I'm kind of struggling. Like, I get most of the controls and I've done the tutorials, but I have a very bad sense of which of my troop types are good for what, or what kind of army compositions I should be building,or where to position my artillery so that they actually shoot at things instead of sitting around. Are there any basic pointers for Total War neophytes re: NTW? Zoom in when placing artillery. Make sure there are no hills or whatever in front of them, because they will shoot directly into the dirt. Best positions are on top of a hill slanted towards the enemy, or at the bottom of a gentle slope. Otherwise, just make sure you can't shooting dirt/your soldiers. Cavalry isn't very important in NTW, unless you are a weirdo like me. Keep one or two units of light cav around to swing around and kill artillery, as well as chase down "routing" enemies, to shatter them and sure they don't come back. You can also do some rear charges with them, but cav is very fragile. If you decide to like cav, some of the unique heavies are good in melee, but always have to make sure that nothing gets to shoot at them. Infantry and artillery murder cavalry if they manage to get some shots in. With infantry, you want as much line as you can, and a few lights/skirmishers once your armies are bigger. Lights shoot farther and faster, but are bad in melee, and vice versa for line. You want to move into range, and shoot until the line has weakened, and then you should send some excess infantry in to charge. Attacking is a little difficult in NTW, but the AI is usually eager to charge in. If they camp out somewhere, pound them with artillery. It might be helpful to know which factions are better. France - Good at everything, best artillery, tons of amazing unique units. Best militia in the game. All ships Britain - Best line and has quality units, but is missing a lot of unit types, especially arty. All ships Russia - Infantry all have a crazy charge bonus, but are bad shots. Good cav, and okay arty. Prussia - Infantry shoot good, but are bad in melee. Best lights itg, cav is decent, but artillery is bad. Austria - Best cav, bad infantry but they're decent in melee. Hungarian units are all better. Arty is okay. Ships top out at 74 guns Slim Jim Pickens fucked around with this message at 01:31 on Jan 26, 2014 |
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Jan 26, 2014 01:24
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If CA ever return to the Gun Powder era, I really hope they let us have the ability to set the elevation of artillery pieces because gently caress those tiny little slopes you can't find until your cannon balls awkwardly bounce into the air from them and you discovered you have utterly messed up artillery placement. Also, with the ship battles just use double speed while positioning your fleet and triple speed when you are all satisfied until your ships are in engagement distance with the enemy. It cuts down on the tedious waiting.
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Jan 26, 2014 01:27
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So what are good mods to play Shogun 2 with? assuming base game not Rise/Fall.
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