PDA

View Full Version : Some good games yesterday



LadyAnn
11-18-2002, 19:40
http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif

I played my first multi games yesterday. It was fun. Seeing that most STW people still have recognizable names, and new people (that I dont know the names) are friendly, it makes me feel like playing multi more often.

One thing I noticed, people quit the battle field too often when they lose. I also heard that even host quit the battle field. But I was lucky, it didn't happen to me yesterday.

Annie

Mithrandir
11-18-2002, 21:19
Yes I hate it when they do that, quiting before the end... cowards. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/angry.gif .

Now you dont fool us with that name http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif.

-Mithrandir-

LadyAnn
11-18-2002, 21:48
http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif
I thought the gate would open if someone recognize I am just an defenseless person, not a horde of invaders. But I guess I need to be in line as everybody else.

Annie

Puzz3D
11-18-2002, 22:07
Hi LadyAnn,

I'm glad you had a good first experience online with MTW. I saw you give AMP the coup de grace in that last battle we had. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

Some players do quit the battle too soon. It's quite possible for players that are initially routed to rally and come back to win. Most battles have this two phase structure if eveyone sticks with it. Also, I think many new players don't realize that when the host quits, the battle ends for everyone. The MTW host has to keep his battle running for the other to finish the game even if he has been completely routed.

I hope we have enough players setting a good example for newer players, so that the overall online experience is a good one, and both new and older player will decide to keep playing MTW online.

MizuYuuki ~~~
Clan Takiyama ~~~

LadyAnn
11-18-2002, 22:44
MizuYuuki,

It was fun yesterday (actually Saturday). As for the battle with AMP and NC, I must say that the odds were heavily against them after their two allies got routed and I was able to swing back at AMP and NC. It was lucky that I didn't face them in the first place.

In different games, I was routed early because I as confused at chosing army. I didn't know that I could have horses by clicking on the icon on top, so my army was only on foot. Also, I only played one SP campaign as Egyptians, so when chose a French army, I am not sure which units have spears, etc.

The reason I stay behind because sometimes it is fun to watch your ally route or get routeed by other armies. After your game is over, you can go around the battle field freely, as the ghosts, to haunt the opponents or to give tips to your allies. Watch how they play when you don't have to worry about your army also give me tips on how to get my own army better next time. Your ally could be your enemy in the next game, so stick around to watch for their weaknesses or strengths. See what units they have left what kind of valour they gave to these units.

But I think the battle is now more chaotic, and with a lot many more units, it is no longer the boredom of guns on ironboard game.

But I start to see people chose many more Italian or German or English than says Egyptians. Perhaps the Egyptians didn't have enough heavy units and they lose two of their main advantage in single player mode:
1. weather which favor lighter army and camels;
2. cheaper costs (in SP, I can produce 40 camel for about 100 bucks) so I can have more units to hold or attack territories.

Anyways, hope it remains a fun game for a very long time.

Annie

Cheetah
11-18-2002, 23:14
Hi Annie http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

IMHO the Egyptians are pretty strong: they have the suberb abessynian guards (first rate meele troops), the equally superb mameluk horse archers and ghulam cavs (very good horse archers and medium cavs), the trusty saracen infantry (with long pointy spears http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif ), and the muwahid foots with their stellar morale. This makes up a pretty strong army http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

IMHO if you want a good horse army try the turks, if you want a strong infantry try the christian factions. The christian faction also have some good heavy cavs, like chiv.knights and the lancers (only spain has it). Strong spear units are the feud.srg, chiv.srg and orderfoot; strong swords are the feud.man-at-arms and the chiv.man-at-arms. Good light and medium cavs are the alans and the mounted srgts. For range take the pavise arbs.

Good luck and Have fun http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

MonkeyMan
11-19-2002, 02:13
Quote[/b] (Cheetah @ Nov. 18 2002,16:14)]they have the suberb abessynian guards (first rate meele troops)
you jest surely I hate these guys their complete lack of armour and defence makes them completely innefectual against andone but peasants. Granted i havn't played many games as the egyptians but i've never used abessynians effectively or seen them do anything but die and then run away in the face of a few MAA.

If i'm wrong please tell me how to use them effectively, rather than forming my arab armies entirely from arches, archer/fighters, cav and spears.

LadyAnn
11-19-2002, 02:29
I'll try the Egyptians again in MP. The first few MP game, I picked Egyptians because I played SP with them and I know at least which one can do what. Since I didn't pick any horse (due to not knowing to click the horse icon), my army was on foot and it was decimated pretty quickly.

It is right that the Egyptians don't have good armors, making it quite weak, especially facing strong range armies such as the English. Plus, playing on lush western map as
it usually the case on MP, this penalize Egyptians army. Camel is no longer as effective. Those desert archers are not quite good.

The guards are similar to No-Dachi, no armor but fast units.

Annie

Puzz3D
11-19-2002, 04:41
LadyAnn,

I know that UglyRyu has been doing well using the Egyptians on western maps. If you can get a muslim faction to work for you in the west, you'll have a big advantage on the desert terrain. Western armies with their heavy armor do not fare well on desert terrain since they will fatigue quite fast and cannot recover. Also, camels get both a combat and morale advantage over horses in the desert.

Do use the save replay feature to review your battles. CA added morale and fatigue text to every unit in the replay, so you can readily see when a unit is getting close to routing and when they are loosing combat ability and morale due to fatigue. Don't click the continue box if it pops up before you have saved the replay. You may have to drag that box out of the way to finish saving.

The pictures of the units in the army selection screen show the units that have spears. If you hold the cursor over a unit picture, subjective descriptions of the unit's attributes scroll in the text box that pops up. Polearm units and spear units get a combat bonus against cav, and the description indicating that is Defend well vs cav.

Spears and pikes have the advantage of nullifying the charge of cav and they get supporting rank combat bonuses; up to 2 supporting ranks for spears and 4 supporting ranks for pikes. Their combat bonus vs cav is 80% defensive and 20% offensive. In contrast, polearm units get the same magnitude combat bonus vs cav, but their bonus is 80% offensive and 20% defensive. They do not break cav's charge the way spears and pike do. Polearm units also get the armor piercing combat bonus which increases with the armor level of the target, so they get better against more heavily armored units.

Swordsmen would be the prefered unit to use against spears and pikes. Cav against swords, and spears and pikes against cav. However, these distinctions are not as clear cut as they were in STW.

Archers are not very effective against the many well armored units in MTW. However, upgrade costs of ranged units is much less than hth infantry and cav. Upgrades of ranged units can close the hth gap with with regular infantry making them more useful. Unfortunately, the ranged weapon effectiveness does not increase very much as you upgrade which is the reason the upgrade cost was reduced. The eastern factions have some nice hth/ranged combo units which can benefit greatly from this reduced cost of upgrades. For traditional shootout contests, you can't beat the pavise arbalester which has the best penetrating power of non-gun units, longest range (equal to longbows) and heavy armor protection. Their main disadvantage is slow speed. While guns are not particularly effective, don't overlook the handgunner. It has very good hth combat stats for a ranged unit, and can be very tough in hth with some upgrades. Guns inflict -6 morale on any unit they cause casualties in, and archers inflict -2 morale which is the same as in STW. However, there the effect was continuous, but in MTW it has a limited duration of a few seconds but is renewed if more casualties are inflicted. Your unit is feeling this penalty from enemy fire as long as the red arrows are flashing on the unit's icon. Cannonfire also has a negative effect on morale.

You want to give valor upgrades to units with poor morale because that boosts morale 2 points for every 1 point of valor. Unlike STW where units were purchased at honor 2, MTW units are purchased at valor 0 which means you effectively are operating at -4 morale below STW standards. In general, you can operate knights at valor 1 quite effectively whereas non-knight need a boost. There are a few exceptions to this such as fanatics which have high morale at valor 0.

The basic combat system of STW is still in place. Flanking is very important, and since combat takes longer to resolve (except in low florin games where routing is quick) you have time to flank. MTW is more of a hth combat game than a shooting game. Cav is a bit strong right now in MP, and you need 8 good spear units to stop an all out rush by 16 heavy cav units, but you can stop it. Gone is the nice mini rock, paper, scissors of the cav in WE/MI where yari cav could catch cav archers. In MTW, cav archers are as fast as the fastest light cav. Also gone is the strong defensive naginata unit of WE/MI. Halberdiers are the closest thing to it in a generally available unit, but pale in comparison.

It always rains on the lush and temperate western maps.

MizuYuuki ~~~
Clan Takiyama ~~~

Cheetah
11-19-2002, 10:28
Quote[/b] (MonkeyMan @ Nov. 18 2002,19:13)]
Quote[/b] (Cheetah @ Nov. 18 2002,16:14)]they have the suberb abessynian guards (first rate meele troops)
you jest surely I hate these guys their complete lack of armour and defence makes them completely innefectual against andone but peasants. Granted i havn't played many games as the egyptians but i've never used abessynians effectively or seen them do anything but die and then run away in the face of a few MAA.

If i'm wrong please tell me how to use them effectively, rather than forming my arab armies entirely from arches, archer/fighters, cav and spears.
No, I am not kidding http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif Just remember I was talking about MP and that you need high valor for these guys to be effective (v3 or v4). I have never used v0 or v1 guards, I guess they must be indeed crappy. But high valor guards work fine for me http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif I just had a game (4v4) in which I had four of these guys (3 of them v4, 1 of them v3), they have killed 93, 66, 45 and 36 enemy soldiers respectively (and collected some 72 prisoners together).

BTW a spear/archer/horse combo can be very effective as well. I love to play with the turks, they dont have pure shock troops but they have very good cavs and superb hybrid archers (no, I am not kidding http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif )

Vlad The Impaler
11-22-2002, 00:52
I love to play the turks too ; but despite their well balanced army they dont have the best hybrid archer unit: nizaris
http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif smthin that is a must have if u are playin egyptians