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Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Slim Jim Pickens posted:

Alexander sacked Thebes for getting to uppity, and never bothered to head down to Sparta. Thebes never recovered. Sparta hung around and made a coalition with Athens to fight the Macedonians as a part of the general slap fight there, before the Romans rolled up and cold-cocked them all.

Sacked is not strong enough. The city was destroyed by Alexander after a revolt and all inhabitants, except priests and some prominent pro-Macedonians were enslaved. A few years before their most famous military unit had been eliminated to a man at the Battle of Chaeronea, though that was only 300 men. Revolt or no, I don't think Thebes could have survived Alexander as he had a nasty habit of making brutal examples of Greeks who had a history of co-operating with the Persians, something the Thebans had done (and supposedly still were quite intent on doing). Especially nasty was an episode where he and his army encountered a settlement of Greeks somewhere in northeastern Iran (probably descended from someone forcibly resettled after being conquered or after some revolt) who feasted him and gave supplies to his army, after which Alexander proceeded to kill all the men and enslave the women and children, as reward for what he viewed as treachery.

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 09:43 on May 11, 2013

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Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Anyone have any recommendations for mods to use for NTW?

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

SeanBeansShako posted:

Ah NTW mods, this is quite tricky as NTW is actually made in such a way you rarely need mods unless you want to spice things up. It was that well designed yeah.

What are you looking for?

Oh well in that case. I've just usually used a few mods for Total War games, so if there was anything out there that improves stuff or whatever. I played it quite a while ago, think I used a mod, but don't remember which or if it was even good. If no mods are neat or useful then that is that.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Sleep of Bronze posted:

Sounds more like the French, while the British were doling out the ripple fire, but not really my field.

I think British infantry in the 18th century had kind of a thing for unleashing volleys at very close range. During the Revolutionary Wars the French made the most out of their conscript armies raised in wartime (who often were quite lacking in musketry skills and had few if no opportunities to practice prior to combat) by forming them into large deep assault columns that could absorb alot of fire and still be able to charge and overwhelm an enemy. I believe they also placed more experience soldiers in the front ranks (who would stand firm) and in the rear (who would keep those in front advancing at a steady rate) to maximise the effectiveness and cohesion of such formations.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

pesty13480 posted:

It's absolutely refreshing to see the AI just run slowly retreat battles it can't win, both on the campaign map and in the actual real battles. It's a bit "whack-a-mole" on the campaign map trying to pin down forces. Battles seem to last longer too. Feels a lot meatier and solid, and takes a little while of fighting for anyone to just rout on the spot. The battles themselves are not exactly pretty to watch, but I find the PC opponent is fairly good at not doing too terribly stupid things. Haven't seen anything egregious like generals charging into walls of spears without reason. I haven't played the latest Rome yet so maybe that has been addressed in recent times - it's not an issue in the first title though.

Ah, gently caress. My fondest memory of MTW was when I fought a battle and basically won it by constantly one-upping the computer in positioning my army. It was a very hilly map and I was attacking with a somewhat larger army, after a while of both me and the AI repositioning or forces to get the highest ground or whatever the AI just ended up going "gently caress it" and leaving the battlefield, not one soldier died and it was tense as hell.

Another cool battle was when I was attacking a small Byzantine army as the Turks, they were positioned on a small hill and with some light woods, but I was confident in my numbers and basically decided to go for the all out attack. But then just after my men reach the lines a unit of cataphracts appeared from some nearby woods and charged down the hill and things basically went to poo poo, especially as their infantry charged down at the same time. Basically my entire army collapsed from the shcok of the charge. It was great.

And also MTW had a great soundtrack. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_pOk5563J2c

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Arcsquad12 posted:

The italian factions had some silly accents as well. You could hear their hand gestures swirling. Crazy people in medieval 2 were the best.

That said, I had a great lunatic in attila governing a province. Poor old Leofric went blind, impotent and senile in three successive turns and lost about 5 cunning and zeal each in the process. I felt bad for him so I kicked him out of office instead of killing him, and made the guy into a general. Some of his pre battle speeches were... Interesting

pretty sure italians had the same accents as the spaniards.

dont shogun 2 and both rome 2 and attila have speeches as well?

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

The Cheshire Cat posted:

Shogun 2 is the best balanced TW game for this reason. Not only is everyone using the same units (except for the unique units per clan in that one DLC, some of which are pretty powerful, but 90% of your army is going to be normal dudes), but all of those units remain useful throughout the whole game. In Warhammer the lower tier units aren't total garbage (except for Undead where they're kind of supposed to be since you can poo poo out a whole stack of them in a turn), but for the most part they still get outclassed by the later ones. I prefer Shogun 2's design because it means that winning battles isn't just a matter of racing to the top of the tech tree and building a single uber-army of high tier units. I mean that will still work pretty well in S2, but you don't HAVE to do it.

Actually a mod that retooled the unit rosters of Warhammer to be more like Shogun's would be pretty cool, the overall design philosphy should be that every unit has a purpose in that army and is not rendered obsolete by elite units.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Triskelli posted:

I don't know how easily you could manage that while maintaining the radical differences between factions. In Shogun 2 it worked because you had two triangles working in tandem to balance units, monk/samurai/ashigaru, and the classic spear/cavalry/archer triangle. In Warhammer in general you'll have factions that leave out an entire third or more of both triangles in order to focus on their strengths.

Just as a mental exercise, consider Dwarfs. How would you make sure that your standard Warriors aren't purely outclassed by Longbeards, and that Longbeards aren't purely outclassed by Hammerers or Ironbreakers?

It'd probably be a challenge of course, but I guess the first thing you'd have to try to do is make all those elite units more specialized in some way, such as weapons and battlefield role and such.

e: Off the top off my head I would probably start by taking out many of the slight unit variations such as Dwarf Warriors (Great Weapons) and such. Dwarf Warriors are now solely axe and shield mainline infantry. Use only the blasting charge version of miners, removing the cheaper one, to make miners servea as a kind of armor-piercing can-opener unit combined as a skirmisher/flanker with the blasting charges. Slayers stay in their role of fast anti-large, though I understand that at the moment they might be a bit too vulnerable to be worth it. Longbeards get a bit tough, but I think you could solve them by using only the great weapon type and reducing their numbers compared to ordinary dwarf warriors, they would be harder hitting and more vulnerable and their role as a morale boosting platform should be further emphasised, they are there to strengthen the line not replace basic warriors. Hammerers should be a dedicated armor piercing, damage dealing melee unit with a focus on charging, but should also be specced to be ill-suited to serve as mainline infantry. Ironbreakers are pretty hard, as they are essentially just souped up Dwarf Warriors, cost would have to be the way to deal with them, in single player they should also perhaps have higher upkeep than is strictly fair and/or require quite a lot of inftrastructure to train and this should perhaps take 3 or 4 turns (so with the investment in time and resources you'd be better off just using basic Dwarf Warriors especially if pressed for time). The role of missile units, artillery and other specialists seems fine to me.

e2: In general I think it would be to the campaign's advantage to remove most of the unit tier progression. Identify most of the roster as a kind of "core" and make all of that basically available for recruitment either through the standard settlement buildings, with the capital perhaps giving a greater variety, and make the military buildings instead focused on providing experience levels and other boosts to locally trained units with some specialized, rare (in the lore) or very powerful units only buildable towards the end of select building chains (and combinations of them). A faction should have access to most of the units that define their playstyle from the beginning I think, rather than have to spend the time to access them and make do with a make-shift cheaper version in the meantime (Empire in the beginning without access to cavalry, artillery and handgunners without spending some time teching seems especially stricken by this I feel).

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 17:27 on Sep 29, 2016

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Both Attila and Rome II are fine games. Rome II was a mess at start but CA were very good about supporting it after launch and actually managing to turn it around and make it a pretty drat good games. There are also some pretty good mods for Rome II, especially DeI is really well done, though for myself I can't really play it without the faster battles submod as I find the pace of the battles to be stupidly glacial without it. I must also be one of the only people in the world who always really liked Attila, though that probably has something to do with my own interest for the period and the peoples it features (yes even the "super boring" Germanics), also I really like the survival horror theme of the game, where you will actually find that as time passes your empire regresses rather than becomes stronger, also there's Huns everywhere.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

I'm pretty sure all cavalry in Attila and Rome 2 can dismount. So yeah, an option is to create a couple of battering rams, dismount some chaff units, break down one or two gates and smash through.

Also, I do seem to remember that from fighting the Huns as the Goths and Romans that the Huns actually have some pretty badass infantry units. Like I remember those fuckers fighting almost to the death (and this was with no mods) killing some 3-4 times their own number before going down.

There is actually an argument made by some historians that the Huns, when they invaded Gaul and northern Italy, actually mostly fought as infantry, due to not having access to as much pastureland as they did on the steppes (a counter-argument is also made that Attila as the head of a confederacy and with considerable prestige and influence probably could summon horsemen from allied and subordinate tribes on the steppes to come join his invasion). Also, if I recall correctly, the Mongols actually learned and even mastered siege warfare relatively quickly. You should take this to heart and become a master of burning cities yourself.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

John Charity Spring posted:

This is a genuinely good idea for how to play as the Huns.

Think of that as the Gothic component of the Hun confederation.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Playing some Rome 2 with DeI again, and my it is actually really engaging (though I do kind of miss the improvements to family trees from Attila and the display of faction leader names from Attila and Warhammer).

At the moment fighting 2 full Epirote armies + a city garrison with the goal of taking and looting Appolonia to gather funds to build a fleet to contest Carthage. I'm in kind of a deadlock war with them at the moment and lost an army on Sardinia because those drat Carthaginian fleets prevented me from being secure that a relief army would make it across (the first one, grabbed both Corsica and Sardinia and held the islands for a while, but I've lost them now).

Roman formations. Pretty cool. I've decided that a Polybian legion is 4 Hastati, 4 Principes, 3 Triari, 2-3 cavalry and 1-2 skirmish infantry. Roughly half being socii.


I really like how the Epiotes have deployed, an unbroken phalanx line basically.


From the centre and to their left left flank its entirely macedonian phalanx, yikes.


Well. I've looked long enough at this battle and the nice soldiers. Tactic is to place my strongest legion on my left to face and destroy the hoplite phalanx on their right and then hopefully envelop and destroy the rest of the army with few enough losses to beat the garrison army as well when it takes the field.

drat.. that was a quite an intense one (did not manage to beat the main armies before the garrison army arrived). Will have to look at the replay sometime to look more closely at the carnage.


It helps that Roman heavy infantry is amazing, but I really like how effective the triplex acies is. Use the lighter and more expendable hastati to engage as much of the enemy as possible when the lines meet, then use the principes to exploit any holes and gaps that appear as well as flank if it's possible without having to move too far. Keep the triarii as a kind of emergency reserve to step onto the line if the hastati start to break and to deal with cavalry threats that your own cavalry couldn't stop.

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 20:00 on Sep 20, 2017

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Carcer posted:

Not to crap on your tactics but you'd probably get more mileage from engaging head on with your triarii and principes while hastati flank to unload javelins in the rear of the phalanx. The triarii will get a bit more damaged but the massive damage javelins hitting people in the back will inflict will shorten overall battle.

Yes. But as the other dude says I'm totally roleplaying as Romans rather than playing completely optimally. And really I find that more fun. Though in more dire circumstances I'll partially or completely throw the RP tactics out (though I think they work pretty well all things considered). As of the last time I played a couple of days ago I have foolishly trapped a veteran legion in Africa (Carthaginian naval supremacy renders me unable to extract them safely) and I've had a series of 3 really desperate battles against Carthage's desert nomad clients. All victories but its not looking good and close to half the Romans have been replaced with local mercenaries.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

I actually really want a 30 Years War game that kind of functions like Shogun, in that most of the Western European factions would be fielding the exact same armies (with different models and skins of course) but with a lot of unit differentiation and every unit having a distinct function and avoiding having (most) stuff be rendered obsolete or just upgraded away at a certain point.

Peripheral factions that might get involved such as the Poles and the Turks should play differently with unique rosters. But yeah, if they do 30 Years War going the Shogun route would be the best I think. Of course also with the different factions having their own bonuses to specific units (recruitment cost, reload time, artillery accuracy, that kind of stuff). That setting would also do well with more involved mechanics for mercenaries, pillaging and the devastation of provinces (all related of course).

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Oh, if they sometime end up doing the 30YW then I sincerly hope they base the loading screens off Les Grandes Misères de la guerre








e: forgot the last three

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 17:44 on Nov 13, 2017

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Kenzie posted:

I disagree, the key word being gameplay here. The unit graphics in Warhammer certainly look a lot different from the other games, but the basic gameplay and tactics are not really that different. Most units are just basic blocks of troops that form line, crash into each other and start hitting each other until hit points and morale go down, just like any other game. The AI is pretty much the same. Flying units are not much more than fast moving cavalry that can go over enemy units. Otherwise they're the same as any other. Giants and monsters are just units with more hit points. The biggest difference would probably be with spell-casting.

Pike and shot warfare though? You start getting really weird looking formations with entirely different dynamics, like the four-cornered tercios:


Pike and shot warfare is about groups of skirmishers who retreat inside of hollow pike squares whenever threatened by cavalry. The pikes were usually not used to fight, but were there as a deterrent, to protect the shooters, with a standard unit being around 2/3rds shot and 1/3rd pike. Swordsmen would also hide inside the pike squares and launch sorties outside of them every now and then. You can do this in Total War, but it involves clicking on every individual gunpowder or sword unit one by one and moving them inside of a separate pike unit manually, and it would be impossible and horribly tedious to keep moving them back and forth inside and outside of their pike protection over and over again in a large battle. And there's no way they could get the AI to do that intelligently.

A traditional Total War battle, including Warhammer, is all about hammer and anvil flanking tactics, with infantry in line and cav on the flanks, but in pike and shot warfare, this was often not the case, as each pike and shot unit could protect its own flanks as a self-contained combined arms unit. Army formations in the pike and shot era got to be very complicated, with deep, staggered checker-board formations with alternating infantry and cavalry instead of lines. The tactics are entirely different from anything in any Total War game.

To make a good pike and shot game at the Total War scale, it would require a pretty big reworking of the battle engine, so that the gunpowder and pike troops can be integrated together into a single mixed unit. And this is in a game series where you're lucky if the AI pikemen can even point their pikes in the right direction at all.

Well, units in the pike and shot era while they operated together weren't really completely mixed together. Pikemen and arquebusiers actually mostly fought in separate detachments that covered each other rather than being mixed together in alternating ranks or anything. Actually a kind of good representation is the whole detachment system that the Empire had in the Warhammer Fantasy tabletop game.

This is perhaps a much better picture of a formation (Maurician I think, that is the style pioneered by the Dutch) typical of pike and shot in the 17th century.


Something like this is actually a pretty fun formation to use as the Empire in Total War Warhammer, though not the most opitmal of plays.

Cavalry was also very important in the pike and shot era, both in the Thirty Years War and in wars such as the English Civil War. Though they required alot of finesse and skill to be truly effective, but were still devastating when used effectively. So the hammer and anvil isn't completely gone.

Some kind of function where you can bind units together in formations and maybe this gives you boosts and special behaviors depending on the makeup of the unit might be interesting and the way to go rather than having straight mixed units. That way the player could experiment with what mix of shot and pike (and cavalry) works well for a given situation rather than just be tied to pre-set mixed unit.

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 23:52 on Nov 15, 2017

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

I suddenly got an itch to play some Shogun 2 again, were there any mods for that one that come recommended (even though the vanilla game is really good)?

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Mr.Morgenstern posted:

They've already made a Pontus meme of this:



Haven't the TWC guys wanted Three Kingdoms China for over a decade at this point? I seem to remember that popping up constantly way back when.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

I'm not super keyed up on Chinese history. Should look into this stuff more I think. Is the obviously evil fat guy supposed to be anyone in particular?

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Playing some Shogun 2 again. Someone remind me, can I recruit generals in this one or do I solely gain them from family members and events?

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

shalcar posted:

Family members and events only, although you have a really high chance of getting one if you win a fight with a regular unit as the general of the stack.

Remember that recruiting more generals will make your other generals less loyal. The game also weights the liklihood of those events firing based on how many generals you already have, so if you only have 1 or 2 it's pretty quick and easy to get another.

Yeah, I figured out as much a little after I posted.

I'm really feeling the improvements to campaign and battle AI since Shogun 2 though (particularly the ones in the Warhammer games), which is a shame. Particularly campaign AI where the AI finds it far too easy to split up their armies and go marching all around the map rather than maintain a strong presence to defend their territory. Far less large battles in general. Which is a shame because the underlying game is still good and really flavorful.

Also a shame that there's no immortality or atleast ability to get wounded a number of times rather than outright dying for important characters, especially as AI carelessness with its general combined with the general lethality of combat means that any battle you fight will usually result in their general dying.



Game still looks great too (though there's some weird distortion effect from the weather or something going on there which became a lot more apparent in the screenshot than ingame). Love those ashigaru uniforms.

e: Speaking of the AI, does Darthmod actually improve the AI as it claims to do? And in what ways?

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 10:09 on Jan 12, 2018

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Greek announcer from Rome 1 was the best.

"VIICTORYYYY!!! ... a bit close perhaps, but VICTORYYYY none the same!"

(with a ridiculous accent)


Actually the best thing was the little video you got in Shogun 2 when you built mangonels. Unless I was dreaming all those years ago it was

"Not even the strongest castle walls can withstand these flaming balls"

Can't find a video of it.

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 12:17 on Jan 13, 2018

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Terrible Opinions posted:

I wish more games used a wider range of American accents, rather than just sticking primarily to new caster/Californian.

I remember the first Company of Heroes having a pretty decent variety of American accents for the unit voiceovers. Though the German voiceovers in that game, both 1 and 2 (US voiceovers in 2 are pretty boring), were the best, just pure camp.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

DKD posted:

Apparently the HBO Rome series really did plan to do a lot with different British accents mapping onto different Roman social classes, but toned it down because, you know, all that effort would be wasted on us.

Also, my favorite medieval 2 mod was one that replaced voice files with the files from the appropriate localization-- so the French now used the files from the French-language version, and so forth.

They did that for Oliver Stone's Alexander movie IIRC, the Macedonians were mostly Irish actors and spoke their accent, the Greeks that showed up I think were English and such. Can't remember how deep it went since it's been ages since I watched that movie, but I'm pretty sure it was a conscious effort.

Anyway the best media thing that's been done that actively uses accents in a good way is the show 'Allo 'Allo!

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

alex314 posted:

I think shield wall medium and heavy infantry should be able to walk to archer only army with low-ish casualties.

Yeah, this seems somewhat reasonable, however a good historical counterpoimnt is surprisingly the battle of Marathon. Basically the Athenian strategy for the battle revolved around exposing them to the Persian archers as little as possible, which they essentially did by forming up in a very thin line in contrast with the usual deep phalanx (this was also done to cover more ground and maximize the frontline that engaged the Persians) and beginning their charge from much further away (beginning somewhat outside the range of the Persian archers essentially). This combined to make them cover ground faster and thus being subjected to fewer volleys, and to make more of the arrows miss the charging Athenian soldiers. Simply marching steadily towards the Persian lines does not seem to have been a possibility (this "maneuver" became a training routine later for Greek citizen soldiers, running several hundred meters full armor and carring their shields and weapons).

It should be noted that the shields of Greek hoplites were very light actually, being designed to cover as much of the body as possible while also being light enough to be effectively used in battle, there are therefore depictions and mentions of shields being pierced by arrows, wounding or killing the wielder on a number of occasions, so a force with more robust shields might not have to perform a marathon maneuver in the same way to protect themselves against archers. There seems to be some hints at this in the battle of Thermopylae as well, the Spartans were not content to stand their ground and sustain the volleys of Xerxes's archers but actually feigned retreat multiple times to goad the Persians into pursuing so they could fight them at close quarters.

/Hoplite warfare derail

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Edgar Allen Ho posted:

Reinforcements seriously need to just start on the map. Or at the very least, make them present in deployment so you can properly group and stance them and give them marching orders so that they show up and move to where you want them instead of waddling on, clogging up the UI, in a random order. Reinforcement mechanics are seriously the worst, by far, game-ruiningest, feature since 40-unit battles became a thing.

Posted this in Hams thread but it belongs here too. The reinforcement feature in every TW since AI generals were a thing is so hilariously bad that I avoid reinforcing myself unless it's a clear autoresolve victory.

Generally I just deploy my army close to the reinforcement point and form up in the beginning, but it can become a problem in battles where you don't have the time to do this for various reasons.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

While I appreciate that generals can die permanently in battle, I relaly hope that there is still the chance of them ending up wounded and unavailable for a number of turns rather than always dying. It always kind of bugged me in the historical TWs where I'd kill an enemy general in every battle, no rivalry with Takeda Shingen in Shogun 2, he'd die in the first battle I fought against him, if he had even survived until then fighting against other AIs.

In short I want generals to be a bit more persistent and able to survive defeats than they were in the old Total War games, I want to face the same dude multiple times and remember him.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

HerpicleOmnicron5 posted:

Nemesis system for Total War when?

Oh, poo poo. That'd be the loving best and I hope someone in CA has already had this idea and is working on doing it for Three Kingdoms at the earliest.

Arcsquad12 posted:

Well that seems to be the case for Three Kingdoms. But really,, Alfred the Great was I'll during most of his reign, so you're kind of expecting him to die off.

Oh, I'm not saying make generals or faction leaders unkillable. Just make it so if they fall in battle there's a chance for them being wounded and escaping, being wounded and captured or being killed, with say being killed having about a 10-20% chance, the two others perhaps dependent on the severity of the defeat and how superior enemy forces were, and everything possibly being modified by traits and followers. For example being strong or something giving less chance of being outright killed, having a loyal bodyguard retainer reducing the chance of being outright killed and making it more likely to be wounded and escaping rather than being captured, and so on.

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 00:16 on Feb 5, 2018

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Edgar Allen Ho posted:

In DeI it's pretty common to see units with the same names and costs but different stats, or the same names and stats but different costs.

Also sometimes lots of variations of "x levy, y levy, z levy" that are identical except graphically if you're somewhere multicultural, but them I don't mind too much cuz the mod is intended to be spergy and it looks cool to see a mixed force on the battlemap if you're a multicultural state.

gently caress the native language thing though. It's not that hard to figure out what a hoplitai athenaioi or a cohors legionari is but I am not so familiar with loving punic or parthian or whatever

DeI has a submod for doing away with that though, so it's not all bad.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Agean90 posted:

the problem is that that requires me to have to dig through all the submods to find it

The submods are all linked to in the main download I think.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Kaal posted:

I honestly don't know why those TW modders insist on including their linguistic work in the main versions of their mods when they're so broadly unpopular and it'd be so easy to include them as a sub-mod.

Well, the answer is probably that it's not the main modder who's doing that, and one or more other dudes whose only real responsibility in the project is coming up with units and names who are doing this, and they want their work in the mod, goddamnit.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Krazyface posted:

???

Anyway, I'm looking forward to ToB, more than I expected to. I've recently been playing Shogun II again and it's really making me appreciate a simplified game the AI can halfway handle.

I recently played Shogun II and the AI can't really handle that game at all in my experience, especially on the campaign map.

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

So I'm at about turn 140 of a DeI campaign as Rome. Is there a bug in that that causes the AI to eventually become completely unwilling to accept a peace treaty? Wondering specifically because I was able to get one without too much difficulty with Epirus after destroying their army and throwing them out of Italy, but ever since I took Syracuse (idiots allied with Epirus against me) and the "Roman Army in Sicily" event triggered I've been in a forever war against Carthage, even though I've taken Sicily, Corsica and Sardinia from them. Now I can kind of understand them not wanting peace because I haven't really dealt a decisive against any of their forces due to their naval superiority, it's what I've done since then which causes me to wonder. You see I needed to expand in order to fund the expansion of my navy (and armies, but mostly my navy, so I could defend against and deal with Carthage) and also because I was seeing Massilia gobbling up territory in Gaul on both sides of the Alps, which annoyed me, also they trespassed on my territory (those effeminate Greeks, who do they think they are!?).

Anyway that eventually led me into a war against not only Massilia but also Insubres (who just opportunistically attacked me when I took Patavium) and the Odrysian Kingdom in the Balkans (also opportunistic on their part, but I think they also liked Massilia and started to hate me when I began destroying Massilian armies and taking their cities). Anyway, I had to destroy the Insubres completely because they never wanted peace even when reduced to no armies and only one settlement. I've taken two settlements from the Odrysians, liberated another two and destroyed alot of their armies, they don't want peace at all, and at the moment I haven't even seen them for about 5 years, apart from some ships loving about near the Pelopponnesos, still they are keen on the forever war and I am not keen on spreading my forces that far and dealing with them when I am still in a forever war with Carthage. Massilia also at no point wanted peace, and at this moment are down to their last settlement beign besieged by the Nervii (who control most of Eastern Gaul and Western Germania). Also haven't seen a single peace treaty between any AI factions at all either, might have been some in the early turns of the campaign when I was able to get peace with Epirus, I'm kind of wondering if it's at all related to the event that forces you into a war with Carthage when take a settlement in Sicily.

I'm still actually having fun though, despite the forever war(s), at the moment I am about to fight what is sure to be a decisive battle against Carthage, which if successful should deliver most of Hispania into my grasp. The odds do seem to be a little against me though. Don't think I have the time to fight this one now though, so will probably have to wait until tomorrow.



(Third Roman army is unreplenished garrison garbage, I'll probably just retreat those idiots right off the field)

e: Yeah, I've definitely played enough today. This battle is going to take a while and is probably not gonna run super great. Really want to win it. AI is also restricted by being allowed max 40 units on the field at a time, right? In which case I reckon my chances as being pretty good.

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 20:06 on Apr 2, 2018

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Electronico6 posted:

A good tip for DeI for new Roman players: Ignore Syracuse, even if they start a war with you they will never attack you, as they usually too busy dealing with Carthage. Carthage also struggles a lot to take Syracuse in good time so you can trigger the Sicily event once you feel stronger in your own terms.


Also 140 turns in and no Roman Super Troops?

Yeah, things have been a little slow. I've had a couple of setbacks, such as a failed invasion of Africa that ended in two lost legions because I couldn't reinforce them due to Carthage's navy. It was pure luck that I got them over there in the first place without them just being sunk. Once there I looted a couple of cities but I was eventually wittled down and destroyed by Carthage's client states' armies, though I did kill a fair amount of them. And I also kind of sat on my rear end for a while trying to eke out enough money to build a fleet to challenge Carthage before I came to my senses and decided to get that money by conquering some other fools on the way to Spain instead and use the proceeds to fuel my warmachine.

Super Troops are Imperium level V right? I think I am IV atm, so shouldn't be that long if I win this battle.

e: Had a look, yeah I'm a IV and Super Troops are at V, I'm over half the way to V, so I think it should literally only be a turn or two after I win this battle, because I think I need 2 or 3 settlements to get there. My fleet can seize the the Baleares, and my armies can just march on and conquer and loot whatever is in their path. There's also a third army up in Narbo. A pretty great place to trigger the reforms too. I love Hispanian Auxiliary horse.

Anyone have any good suggestions for tactics for this battle? As I said I'm doing it tomorrow because I feel that I've played enough for today.
Finding a defensible spot on the map ofcourse is a priority, other than that I'm thinking of trying to hold their frontline in place with Triarii, with gaps so that when I engage them I can send Principes (and some Hastati) through to attack them from the sides and the rear. Keeping other Hastati on the side for flanking together with Velites, also cavalry to deal with their cavalry, probably also have to take some Triarii off the line to deal with their heavy cavalry. If I can pull it off properly and hold up enough off their line with my Triarii I'm hoping this should allow me to envelop and destroy them with relatively light casualties. Skirmishers and cav are probably going to be the biggest hindrance to this strategy.

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 21:05 on Apr 2, 2018

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Won the battle I mentioned



I basically did what I mentioned, found some good ground and held the line with Triarii, pushed Principes through the gaps in column formation, Hastati and Velites aroudn the flanks and destroyed them. I kinda messed up a couple of things though which led to unnecessarily high casualties, namely that my cavalry took a beating taking out (with the help of some infantry) their cavalry, which basically left me without an effective cavalry force at the end of the battle. The end of the battle was also when I had to fight the final wave, that is any units that couldn't make it into the initial army, it turns out this wave got the majority of the skirmish infantry and cavalry, as well as some heavy infantry and 1 or 2 units of melee cavalry.

To put it short I probably ended up suffering hundreds, if not close to a thousand unnecessary (well, as I see it) casualties because I went a bit aggressive with just wanting to push them off the field, however with my cavalry force spent, and my few missile units having used all their ammunition I didn't have that good of a way to deal with skirmishers and being a bit overly aggressive in the end also did me no favors, so those guys dealt punishing damage to many of my infantry units as a result. gently caress Numidians basically, Rome will remember this (whether that means recruiting them or destroying their homeland is currently undecided).

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Seems somehow the Forever War Curse was lifted, I got peace with the Odrysians (and an indemnity of 10 000 gold) after cornering their fleet (led by their king). Wondering if I should get peace with Carthage as well (chance is moderate) and focus on expanding into Greece and gobbling up the native Iberians for a little while until I return to crush them. This will also give me some time to redeploy and and reorganize my forces. I've had many hastily recruited armies with local levies and other poo poo defending coastal cities for a while now, it's time to turn them into proper legions and finish building a proper fleet.



e: Also, lol, Horse Boys, hope that's said with the most Irish of Irish accents.

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 20:37 on Apr 3, 2018

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Also Eastmen Hirdmen. That's kind of a weird name.

Does that mean all the Viking Sea Kings are Eastern Norwegians? I'm guessing that's what Eastmen has to mean, because according to what we have of contemporary accounts, most of Eastern Norway* wasn't really seen as part of Norway until the 11th century or so when it was incorporated into the kingdom, and the inhabitans were known as "Austmenn", Eastmen.

*Well, since these are vikings and hence have to have come from the coast or near the coasts, then we are mostly talking about the Viken area (which at the time probably was the most densely populated area of the country as it is today, though it wasn't really seen as part of Norway yet, and had much closer cultural and economic contact with Denmark and Southern Sweden anyway) and not all of Eastern Norway, especially as the interior largely hadn't been settled or cleared in any substantial way yet.

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 20:44 on Apr 3, 2018

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Electronico6 posted:

Kill Carthage for faster turns.

Too late I negotiated peace with them, got a few thousand gold out of it even. However I failed to get peace with their African clients, they were at first Moderate then switched to Low when I tried to weasel some gold out of them, now they don't want peace (I may have been cursed with Forever War again, who knows). Anyway, that means I'm gonna deal with them, they have stuff in Spain and just across the Gibraltar strait that I'm keen to take. This will make Carthage hate me and is sure to draw them back into war with me, or I will just move against them when I feel like it.

Also, Jesus, Numidians just loving massacre my poor men. I'm thinking the Romans might be impressed, gonna put up a lot of Auxiliary Barracks in Africa and make them a regular part of later Roman armies I think.

e: Yup they got back in like clockwork after I took Gadir from Masaesyli (Numidia?)

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 22:48 on Apr 3, 2018

Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Roman Super Troops indeed.



Though not super enough to prevent me from losing one and a half legion in Africa when Numidians ganged up on me and butchered one of my most experienced legions led by my best general and accompanied by a maxed out champion, a half-finished legion I was building also went down fighting as well. Had to spend alot of time after that rerouting some legions from Hispania, bringing them up to strength, now advancing much more cautiously, I hope. Never fight a land war in Africa has to have become a saying by now in this timeline. All those javelins, all those horse with javelins.

Also, that Belgian empire (I think Nervii are Belgians) is becoming kind of worrying.



Though I take heart knowing that when I eventually fight them that they are not Numidians.

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Randarkman
Jul 18, 2011

Almost done finishing Carthage in my Rome DeI campaign now. Just have to pick off their last settlement down in the desert and the last town of their remaining Numidian client, then I am going to burn that blighted city to the ground. My progress has been really hurting as my armies aren't rerally tailored to fight those drat Numidians at all, I can beat them, but I nearly always take massive casualties doing so as I just can't catch their cavalry, and if I attempt to do so my cavalry suffer massively because they can throw javelins in any direction, and then they charge in, and they have pretty drat good melee stats if you look away from not being armored (well that's the normal ones, Numidian Noble Cavalry is a different nightmare) and good morale so if I do catch them they stay in the fight for a long while and take quite a few of my troops down with them. It's like I'm the Sardaukar fighting the Fremen, consequently I am not taking prisoners and captured towns are razed (it's very cathartic).



After Carthage is done I am probably gonna pick off the remaining Iberians, they currently love me due to me fighting the Carthaginians, but what can you do. 1 or 2 legions should be more than sufficient for that. At the same time I'm gonna cross into Asia, thinking of just sniping Antioch first, as that's held by a one region faction, Seleucid Usurpers. Then gonna take out the Galatians, hopefully that should earn me some brownie points from the Seleucids and the Greeks, and allow me to secure those fronts for the moment, if I can get nice enough with the Greeks then I should also be able to raise my relations with Egypt as both Sparta and Athens are allied with them (which is why I don't really want to get into the business of fighting and subjugating the Greeks just yet, I want to build up to that). Subsequently fighting the Seleucids (who seem to have no friends) after taking out the Galatians should earn me much love from the Egyptians.

I really don't want to get into a war with the Nervii or the Suebi yet, not until I have secured my position in the Med (if they decided to declare war on me now, I'd be in major trouble), the thought of those Naked Nervii Skirmishers also gives me chills. Fighting the Odrysians whom they have been in a Forever War against for ages should raise their opinion of me. I don't really want to take any land from the Odrysians though, but I guess just sacking their settlements on a regular bases and wrecking their armies should give me decent relationship boosts.

Any one else have personal preferences for "accurate" Roman legions? I really like using a standard army template for when I am playing Rome. Currently I was working with a template that goes 8 legionaries, 3 heavy auxiliaries, 2 spear auxiliaries, 2 cav (preferably auxiliaries), 2 missile infantry. I'm thinking of reducing it down a bit though and instead going with 7 legionaries (preferably 1 first cohort, though the restrictions on them seem kind of bugged), 4 auxiliary infantry (heavy or spear, probably just 50/50), 2 cav and 1 skirmish infantry. That gives me 5 slots to customize each template, for instance if I want siege artillery, more missile infantry or more cavalry. I'm probably going to add archer auxiliary (can recruit Cretan auxiliaries from Macedonia, and there's also some snappy ones to get in Syria) to alot of the armies, as I find them very useful. Might also throw in the baggage train unit as standard, it seems fitting but I don't know how useful it really is.

e: Just had an interesting battle with Carthage. They are down to just Carthage itself which I am blockading and besieging with superior forces, however it seems that this has activated some form of desperate last stand routine for the AI. First they suicided the remnants of their fleet (together with the garrison fleet) into mine, I lost only 2 ships and sunk all of theirs. Then they sallied out and attacked my besieging armies. The map this was played out on was one of those crazy sloping hills maps, and my reinforcing army came in all the way over on their side. So they basically joined up their army and the garrison army together and bumrushed the reinforcement army, charging downhill right into it in a giant mass before I could get it into position, trapping the entire thing in a desperate position. It took long enough to get my other army to the rescue that they basically killed more than half of that army, including the general and had almost pushed it off the field when I charged them in the rear and annihiliated them. So basically one army took almost all the losses and dealt very little casualties, whilst the other took almost no casualties and utterly destroyed the Carthaginians. I did not expect Carthage to go all Imperial Japan on me, it was futile and doomed to failure, and now capturing the city will be a walk in the park as there are only a few hundred of them left (out of 4000 who participated in the battle), but it was interesting and a little bit tense for a while.

Randarkman fucked around with this message at 09:02 on Apr 6, 2018

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