Romes Dominance

**A Nerd** · 04-08-2010, 15:28

Is there any way to tone down the domination Rome has on the battlefield in this game? I tinkered with the superfaction stat and reduced the chevrons in their starting armies, but they still seem too powerful. I'm playing as the Julii and faught a few battles with the Gauls and they were pushovers. All I have is a few Hastati and militia. I fought a battle against the SPQR and lost. Though the SPQR had 4 body guard units and little infantry. But the infantry was comperable. Just curious if it was possible or Romes 'military might' was hardcoded. Thanks. Want to try a campaign with the greeks when I get used to RTW again, but memories of my last attempt years ago are unpleasant. The campaign was a disaster and I had to give up. Thanks again!

**gollum** · 04-08-2010, 18:10

In fact if you use the Greeks' phalanxes to good effect you can crush the Romans easily. In sieges phalanxes can dominate too, just leave the walls and wait for the Romans in the city streets where phalanxes are king (both flanks covered!).

I usually tone down the Romans when i play as teh Romans for a more interesting camp. Here's a few things that i do:

1. Make starting Roman towns including Rome a level smaller than they start.
2. Take out all dogs/elephants/siege engines/camels/gladiators/chariots(except general's chariots) from all factions - this gives a decidedly more dense game far closer to say Shogun - the player can abuse these against the AI and the AI misues them against the player and also makes them in large quantities.
3. Make the maintenance cost of barbarian warbands smaller (iirc its something around 500+, make it about 300 and see what happens!)
4. Take out redundant cavalry units; say for example small shield cavalry is redundant - leave Carthage with long shield and golden band and they are far more dangerous
5. Make Iberian infantry a 45 man unit and give them armor piercing attacks - this makes them decent and dangerous, as they are very very crap both in the autocalc and in battles, that makes Carthage a pushover for the Romans
6. Take out archers from all factions other than horse archers - yes i know, i know its a bit extreme, however most of teh western archer units like Roman archers and forester warbands are fantasy units in effect. In addition archers are terribly overpowered in RTW, and adding that the AI can;t really use them en masse like the player this gives another one up to the player. You'll get far more interesting battles (and historically accurate) by setting up javelin units (peltasts, velites etc) with an armor piercing missile attack.
7. Take out chevron bonuses temples from teh Romans - they are way too good for the autoacalc as they are with them they are divine.
8. Make units trainable from temples, trainable from the main military buildings (barracks, stables etc). The AI factions do not plan to make temples for the units that they get through them - and this is a terrible drawback for them. For example the germans will always stick to the Frejia temple, because it gives them the pop growth bonus, however the AI cannot take down the temple and build another one once his cities have grown (like what the player would have done). So the Germans end up with all the screechers and without their tough berserkers or teh gothic cavalry, or the naked fanatics or the nightraiders. many other such examples exist for other factions too, like say AI carthage will rarely make full use of its superb golden band phalanx. When these units are stuck back into teh military buildings the AI factions do far better, by taking the benefit of them.

And one more thing: reduce the unit speed by tinkering the ground textures file. Set all terrain to give about 0.75 to 0.8 speed of teh full unit speed to units. This is what most mods do - including the "big" ones like EB and RTR, and it makes the battles far more inetersting affairs as it enables you to almost be able to control all of your army at teh height of the action. The RTW AI's strength is that it can control all of his units at once - in fact in all probability the developers made the game faster to appeal to younger players and also hide the battle AI's inefficiency since the player is handicapped by the speed. But this has nothing to do with strategy/tactics.

**A Nerd** · 04-08-2010, 20:57

Your advice is very interesting...though I wouldn't know where to begin as far as what files to alter and the like. Perhaps you could provide links and/or how to's. I find looking for the right files, then altering them quite daunting, despite it's ease to others. I'm computer-dumb, the only thing I know about them is how to turn them on and off!

**Madoushi** · 04-08-2010, 21:15

Have you tried the Europa Barbarorum mod?
I find it makes playing as almost any faction more enjoyable.

**A Nerd** · 04-08-2010, 21:29

I'm terrible at EB! I thought brushing up on RTW might improve my EB competance level.

**Centurion1** · 04-09-2010, 01:47

your talking about spqr being too strong? i got rid of almost all of their super chevroned units cut some of the units as well. they never win now. and i play on vh/vh and im talking about when its ai on ai the other factions WILL attack spqr.

what i tihnk is a far more interesting idea is to make egypt weaker and selucids far better.

so far ive given them more units, more chevrons, cut almsot all of egypts populations and buildings to zero and gotten rid of their like 90% of their units.

how do you make chariots not so good in auto calc and or are battle stats hard coded.

also for romans make urban cohorts a hidden resource i make them recruitable in massila rome, carthage, antioch, and like thessalonica so everyone can use them but not over much. and for praetorians i have them harder to recruit. to pump up carthies give them archers, and like greeks give them cretans, narbarians, im not sure but to make vbritian stop steamrolling lower chariot abilities those things are trash in actual battle (hoplites kill them like anything) and they have better auto calac stats than elephants. i hate chariots because the map always ends up britian the three romans and egypt, so annoying,

**IceWolf** · 04-09-2010, 07:45

I'm new to EB as well. I was just going to dive into it as the Romani and see what happens

Icewolf

**Madoushi** · 04-09-2010, 08:02

The Romans are a pretty safe bet in EB.

**gollum** · 04-09-2010, 10:27

Nerd: check the unit_prod file and the building_prod files - these are the two main text files that control unit stats and unit recruitabity/roster. Start from there.

Centurion: chariots can be nerfed by nerfing the hit points of the chariot that are multiple (not those of the rider).

**ReluctantSamurai** · 04-09-2010, 16:55

Nerd

Many of the changes suggested by gollum will slow the Romans down considerably. Reducing the starting population in Roman-held cities to 3000 or less, reducing their starting denari to 3000 or less, allowing only early cohorts (no cohort ii, praetorian, or urban....and no praetorian cavalry either), goes a long ways. I eliminate SPQR fleet-making capabilities, as well.

I started a thread a little while ago in the Modding Questions Forum [A Little Help, Please]. How to make the above changes and others is shown there.