Rome 2 Patches, Hotfixes, Betas and Such (patch 17 live!)

[Bramborough]

IMO the game is getting better wit each patch ! But I've read so many posts on TWC or the official forum claiming the exact opposite that I'm beginning to ask myself if I'm completely blind or just too stupid to see their point...

Anyway, as I have two mods installed (close combat and no HDR) I'm a bit hesitant to install the patch 4 beta. Has anyone here had those CTD on start up caused by mods + patch 4 ?

My theory is that at some point a "critical mass" of negative opinion is sometimes reached, and a vocal minority become intractably hostile. Once this occurs, no matter what positive changes occur, the baying hounds just won't be quieted. Regrettable though it may be, it's normal...commonly seen in politics, sports, pretty much anywhere. Certainly nothing new...we've been doing it for thousands of years, but the internet is a natural medium to facilitate and amplify this tendency.

My own opinion is that each patch has substantially improved the game, and patch4beta is no different. I did have some initial campaign map problems with patch3beta (resolved well before that patch went live). All other patches, including patch4beta, have run just fine for me. I see no rational reason whatsoever to recommend against installing it.

[nearchos]

I played two campaigns with Parthia, with patch 3, legendary which i quit and start a new in very hard.
In both cases i had a dificult time, i had to deal with a lot of enemies, an aggresive AI, invasions and enemy agents all over my lands, some times there were 3 or 4 agents, where my main stacks were operating.

After beta patch 4, i desided to start a new camapign, so i start with Pontus in very hard.

I see most of the changes posted, in diplomacy, in AI army composition, agents, etc, ok.

Now the AI. I currently own 9 settlements, by destroying 4 factions, Cappadocia, Galatia,Armenia and Kartlii( not sure how is writen).
I have defencive alliances with Bythinia and Trapezon and trade aggreements with most of factions.

Until this point, no enemy army, since the start of the campaign, moved from their settlements, i was just murching my armies and attack, the settlement and waiting armies, destroying them and capturing the town.
They just never moved aggresively.

And moreover, Trapezon, was for many turns at war with, Armenia, Kartlii and Colhis, but no army of theirs ever moved to capture their only settlement, which was not heavily guarded and an easy pick esspecialy for Armenia.

I also can see that most of the factions, not only enemies have still problems with food sortages.

Has anyone else same experience with AI aggresivenes with patch 4? should i turn to patch 3 until they fix it again?

[Bramborough]

After beta patch 4, i desided to start a new camapign, so i start with Pontus in very hard.

I see most of the changes posted, in diplomacy, in AI army composition, agents, etc, ok.

Now the AI. I currently own 9 settlements, by destroying 4 factions, Cappadocia, Galatia,Armenia and Kartlii( not sure how is writen).
I have defencive alliances with Bythinia and Trapezon and trade aggreements with most of factions.

Until this point, no enemy army, since the start of the campaign, moved from their settlements, i was just murching my armies and attack, the settlement and waiting armies, destroying them and capturing the town.
They just never moved aggresively.

And moreover, Trapezon, was for many turns at war with, Armenia, Kartlii and Colhis, but no army of theirs ever moved to capture their only settlement, which was not heavily guarded and an easy pick esspecialy for Armenia.

I also can see that most of the factions, not only enemies have still problems with food sortages.

Has anyone else same experience with AI aggresivenes with patch 4? should i turn to patch 3 until they fix it again?

Interesting difference in experience with early Pontus campaign. Galatia, Cappadocia, and Cimmeria have all acted pretty aggressively toward me, I've had to defend starting capital and port vs full-size invading army several times. They've also repeatedly blockaded Sinope...driving me to completely change my near-term strategic plan in order to deal with it. I will agree that Armenia - formally at war with me - was strangely passive while I was preoccupied with these other folks. Other than that, I've got no complaint about AI aggressiveness. I began the campaign on Patch 3, but this kind of spunky AI behavior has continued with patch4beta.

This has been on Normal...counterintuitive that AI would get less aggressive on a higher difficulty level. Maybe I was just lucky.

[Alcibiade]

My own opinion is that each patch has substantially improved the game, and patch4beta is no different.

happy happy joy joy

Seriously, I wonder when CA will correct the problem of major historical factions like Rome, Carthage, Egypt or Seleucid being destroyed so early in the game. Maybe it's not in their priorities and not even on their agenda, but this is something that really annoys me.
At the moment, the only super-powers I see rising in the west are obscure Iberic or Maurish factions. I would be ok if those were Lybia or Nova Carthago (who have an access to the sea), but most of the tiime it's the Garamants , the Massaely or the Gaetuli. SAme with the Turdetani, and Edetani being so powerfull with huge fleets even befor Cathaginian contact.

Anyway, patch after patch, this game reveal its awesome potential. By the way, is there any chance for some major features like a toggable guard mode or family tree to be implemented in a future patch ? Is it a realistic wish ?

[Myth]

So I came back to the game last night for just a bit but I saw no opton to opt-in into patch 4? I just had the option to opt out of all betas... Strange. And it's been out for a while too.

The "main" factions being destroyed too early is an issue for me too. Coming to test the waters around Rome with the Avernii lead me to smearing them because they couldn't even contend with the Etruscan league in 30 turns

I'm contemplating making my Sparta campaign basically a landgrab for the two rich Roman provinces so I can be off to a stellar start (can't make a two-bit 3 settlement province your main recruitment center now...)

[nearchos]

Interesting difference in experience with early Pontus campaign. Galatia, Cappadocia, and Cimmeria have all acted pretty aggressively toward me, I've had to defend starting capital and port vs full-size invading army several times. They've also repeatedly blockaded Sinope...driving me to completely change my near-term strategic plan in order to deal with it. I will agree that Armenia - formally at war with me - was strangely passive while I was preoccupied with these other folks. Other than that, I've got no complaint about AI aggressiveness. I began the campaign on Patch 3, but this kind of spunky AI behavior has continued with patch4beta.

This has been on Normal...counterintuitive that AI would get less aggressive on a higher difficulty level. Maybe I was just lucky.

No such experience for me, but im not sure, if there is something wrong with the patch 4 because i started the campaign just after i instaled the 4 beta.

I started being at war with Cappadocia and an unfriently attitude from Galatia.
So i gather an early army of slings and eastern spears and invade the lands of the Cappadocians, after few turns i have destroyed the faction.
Galatia remains unfriendly but makes no move.Trapezon is at war already with Colhis, Armenia and Karlii and im not sending any troops to assist them since i want them out of the way in order to take Trapezon for me.I assume that sooner or later they will be destroyed, but no, no one is moving away from its settlements.

As i see the time passes, i assept the invitation from Trapezon to join the war with Armenia and i acept for 2000 dinarii, i cupture their western settlement and next turn i acept a peace trety for 3000 dinarii.

Finaly i decide to wipe the Gallatians, so i invade them with 2 armies and destroy them as a faction at turn 25.

And a detail, i only have the starting fleet and 4 armies from the 6 i can have and dont need more.

After i got access to higher level units, level 3 barracks, i declared war to Armenia and destroyed them in 3 turns.

And by watching also other factions behaviour, sending spies around to see what is going on, Seleucids, Media, Media Apopatene, they all standing around their settlements, starving....

Only further west there is movement, Sparta destroyed Athens, Rome is geting strong, Cyrrenaica is expanding.

Oh and other factions agents are passing through a couple of times.

I dont think you were lucky, because as i said, with patch 3 the AI was aggresive and used its armies and agents with efficiency.

By the way your Walkthrough of Pontus campaign is great, im looking forward for the next chapters.

[Bramborough]

I dont think you were lucky, because as i said, with patch 3 the AI was aggresive and used its armies and agents with efficiency.

By the way your Walkthrough of Pontus campaign is great, im looking forward for the next chapters.

Hmm...perhaps because I started with Patch 3, the basic behavior patterns set in place at campaign start continue despite the patch, but if I start another with Patch 4, they'd act more passively? Does that even make sense...could the programming work out that way (as an unintended consequence)?

Thanks for the thumbs up on the AAR. I did it just add a bit more activity. I'd enjoyed Hooah's, thought I'd give back a bit to the forum. As it turns out, it's significantly adding to my enjoyment of the game, imagining the storyline in my head as I play along.

[SwordsMaster]

happy happy joy joy

Seriously, I wonder when CA will correct the problem of major historical factions like Rome, Carthage, Egypt or Seleucid being destroyed so early in the game. Maybe it's not in their priorities and not even on their agenda, but this is something that really annoys me.
At the moment, the only super-powers I see rising in the west are obscure Iberic or Maurish factions. I would be ok if those were Lybia or Nova Carthago (who have an access to the sea), but most of the tiime it's the Garamants , the Massaely or the Gaetuli. SAme with the Turdetani, and Edetani being so powerfull with huge fleets even befor Cathaginian contact.

Anyway, patch after patch, this game reveal its awesome potential. By the way, is there any chance for some major features like a toggable guard mode or family tree to be implemented in a future patch ? Is it a realistic wish ?

The problem with the Gaetulii is that they sit on a purple dye deposit, and desert attrition is so underplayed in this game that they have no problem financing themselves - in my game the control all of mauretania, Carthage, and half of spain... Obviously the lack of options to expand further south pushes them north with likely unintended consequences. Anyhow, IMO any travel through the Sahara should have impossible attrition for armoured units, even on 'roads'. As if there was such a thing in the Sahara. that would add an element to desert warfare where light troops and light cavalry would need to be used. there is a reason Rome didn't settle Dakhla and Timbuktu...

[Alcibiade]

The problem with the Gaetulii is that they sit on a purple dye deposit, and desert attrition is so underplayed in this game that they have no problem financing themselves - in my game the control all of mauretania, Carthage, and half of spain... Obviously the lack of options to expand further south pushes them north with likely unintended consequences. Anyhow, IMO any travel through the Sahara should have impossible attrition for armoured units, even on 'roads'. As if there was such a thing in the Sahara. that would add an element to desert warfare where light troops and light cavalry would need to be used. there is a reason Rome didn't settle Dakhla and Timbuktu...

It's a good idea. Now that CA integrated attrition it might even be possible to mod.

Maybe CA equalised the map for gameplay purpose, but it's not working for me. Some factions should be far more powerfull and rich than others. The campaign map surely needs some (un)balancing. I'd love to fight a powerfull Carthage in my next Rome campaign. And if I ever play a Seleucid campaign, I hope that I won't fight Cyrene or the Nabatea/Axum/etc... occupying Alexandria every time.

[Jacque Schtrapp]

Has anyone else same experience with AI aggresivenes with patch 4? should i turn to patch 3 until they fix it again?

I started a new campaign as VH Pontus after installing the Patch 4 Beta. I spent the very beginning wiping out Cappadocia and Galatia, same as most people do I expect. After that, I inadvertently figured out how to make my campaign extremely interesting. I had been eyeing Armenian lands since they destroyed my ally, Trapezos. I decided to go ahead and seize their two closest towns while they were busy finishing off the Kartlii elsewhere. Shortly thereafter, every Black Sea faction and their landlocked neighbor declared war on me. Things got even more interesting when I accepted an alliance offer from the Seleucid. It seemed that every turn, 2-3 factions went to war with them and, by honoring our alliance, I was soon at war with every non Greek faction in the eastern part of the map.

My lands are swarming with agents. Every turn I get an average of 3 enemy agent actions against my towns/provinces/armies. The makeup of the enemy armies is much better. The issues I'm seeing now are enemies coming in and conquering settlements close to my borders and then leaving them completely undefended while I've got an army sitting in my border province right next door. Also, for some inexplicable reason, Armenia, which has plenty of troops, is sending its armies via the sea even though we share a common border with the province they are attacking.

In short, if you want an interesting campaign, ally with the Seleucid early on and honor the alliance until the bitter end.

There are still issues to improve upon, but I do feel the game is heading in the right direction.

[nearchos]

I started a new campaign as VH Pontus after installing the Patch 4 Beta. I spent the very beginning wiping out Cappadocia and Galatia, same as most people do I expect. After that, I inadvertently figured out how to make my campaign extremely interesting. I had been eyeing Armenian lands since they destroyed my ally, Trapezos. I decided to go ahead and seize their two closest towns while they were busy finishing off the Kartlii elsewhere. Shortly thereafter, every Black Sea faction and their landlocked neighbor declared war on me. Things got even more interesting when I accepted an alliance offer from the Seleucid. It seemed that every turn, 2-3 factions went to war with them and, by honoring our alliance, I was soon at war with every non Greek faction in the eastern part of the map.

My lands are swarming with agents. Every turn I get an average of 3 enemy agent actions against my towns/provinces/armies. The makeup of the enemy armies is much better. The issues I'm seeing now are enemies coming in and conquering settlements close to my borders and then leaving them completely undefended while I've got an army sitting in my border province right next door. Also, for some inexplicable reason, Armenia, which has plenty of troops, is sending its armies via the sea even though we share a common border with the province they are attacking.

In short, if you want an interesting campaign, ally with the Seleucid early on and honor the alliance until the bitter end.

There are still issues to improve upon, but I do feel the game is heading in the right direction.

Well, you have a point here and i thank you very much, this must be the reason since i am very careful with my diplomatic moves.
I only have defencive alliances with Bythinia and Trapezon, and some non aggrecion pacts and a lot of trade aggreements and moreover im very carefull with my moves not to cause non nessecary unfriendly attitude by any other faction.
So perhaps in reality what seemed to me as an extremely passive AI is just a more balanced diplomacy.

Last night, i finished of the Colchis and the Cimerians, the last were hard to fight, i destroyed their main armies with 50% cassualties and then took their last settlement with the help of 3 armies of Royal Schythia.

So now i own 2/3 of the Black Sea coast and will plan my next moves.

I suppose from now on i will have to bleed since my target now is to unite all of Asia minor so i will go to war with Selleucids and their satrapies.

[nearchos]

Hmm...perhaps because I started with Patch 3, the basic behavior patterns set in place at campaign start continue despite the patch, but if I start another with Patch 4, they'd act more passively? Does that even make sense...could the programming work out that way (as an unintended consequence)?

Well, Jacque Schtrapp gave a very interesting tip about diplomacy, since i was till now very carefull with my diplomatic desisions.

I was trying to see as many green or at least yellow faces as i could.

[nearchos]

Seriously, I wonder when CA will correct the problem of major historical factions like Rome, Carthage, Egypt or Seleucid being destroyed so early in the game.

I agree with that, and moreover there must be a time during the campaign, when you have reached a level of power, there must be an other faction close to the players power, so in order to complete the campaign you have to battle an other empire with strong economy and high level units.

A final inevitable clash of empires.

During the only campaign i have completed, at the end, i was just mooving 10 of my 15 armies around conquering in the process and the most powerful faction at the end was some german congederation with 9 settlements. After the CW there was no serious opposition.

[Ituralde]

For those having issues I strongly suggest the following:

- Right click on the Rome TW II icon in the Steam menu
- Select Properties
- Select Local Files
- Select Verify Game Cache

...as I suspect some files were corrupted or failed to d/l. The above will fix those problems.

Just a short update on my situation here. Unfortunately this didn't fix the issues. I still have freeze ups on the Campaign map, just by selecting an action or waiting for tool tips to appear. Maybe this is just a general performance issue that just now crops up, where I'm roughly 100 turns into the Campaign. QuickSave (Ctrl + S) has become my best friend now so I don't loose any progress, but it's still annoying.

[Bramborough]

Just a short update on my situation here. Unfortunately this didn't fix the issues. I still have freeze ups on the Campaign map, just by selecting an action or waiting for tool tips to appear. Maybe this is just a general performance issue that just now crops up, where I'm roughly 100 turns into the Campaign. QuickSave (Ctrl + S) has become my best friend now so I don't loose any progress, but it's still annoying.

Are you still referring to Patch 3? If so...and I hate to say this...your best bet might be to just start a new campaign.

I had problems with Patch3 beta. CTD/freezes, glitchy campaign map camera movement. I validated the cache, played with video quality settings, nothing much helped. Then I started a second campaign. Instantly the game ran smoothly. No problems with Patch 3 afterward, either beta or live.

I did not have this experience with Patches 2 or 4beta, both of which ran perfectly for me on in-progress games upon installation. So I suspect there was something specific to Patch 3 which somehow conflicted with data in save files of prior-existing campaigns.

[Alcibiade]

I don't know if it's a post patch 3 exclusiv feature, but my generals are systematically murdered when they are in the center of the action. Now it's a common combo for the AI to murder a general before attacking his army. It's already very difficult to identify to a general with 1TPY and no family tree thing but with those systematic murders on top of it, it's getting boring.

With Epirus I got Pyrrus wounded at the second turn of the campaign and when he finally came back, well, he won an heroic victory and was murdererd just after .

As a player I don't use this murder thing with generals as I don't think it's quite realistic, (you got almost 80% chances of succes at level 2) but the AI seems to really dig that feature. And when you're at war with 3 different factions you have easily 6,7 agents swirling around your troops and breaking everything. I'm ok with the sabotage, unrest, etc.. but not the automatic murders.

[Slaists]

I played two campaigns with Parthia, with patch 3, legendary which i quit and start a new in very hard.
In both cases i had a dificult time, i had to deal with a lot of enemies, an aggresive AI, invasions and enemy agents all over my lands, some times there were 3 or 4 agents, where my main stacks were operating.

After beta patch 4, i desided to start a new camapign, so i start with Pontus in very hard.

I see most of the changes posted, in diplomacy, in AI army composition, agents, etc, ok.

Now the AI. I currently own 9 settlements, by destroying 4 factions, Cappadocia, Galatia,Armenia and Kartlii( not sure how is writen).
I have defencive alliances with Bythinia and Trapezon and trade aggreements with most of factions.

Until this point, no enemy army, since the start of the campaign, moved from their settlements, i was just murching my armies and attack, the settlement and waiting armies, destroying them and capturing the town.
They just never moved aggresively.

And moreover, Trapezon, was for many turns at war with, Armenia, Kartlii and Colhis, but no army of theirs ever moved to capture their only settlement, which was not heavily guarded and an easy pick esspecialy for Armenia.

I also can see that most of the factions, not only enemies have still problems with food sortages.

Has anyone else same experience with AI aggresivenes with patch 4? should i turn to patch 3 until they fix it again?

When you are at war with the AI, they move aggressively alright if they feel strong enough (this is patch IV beta). The standard AI move is: move an army (or two) close to your army, then attack with the third army dragging the other armies in as reinforcements. Usually, the autoresolve shows my army being annihilated to the man. Of course, playing out the battle gives a different result.

[Jacque Schtrapp]

. And when you're at war with 3 different factions you have easily 6,7 agents swirling around your troops and breaking everything. I'm ok with the sabotage, unrest, etc.. but not the automatic murders.

I'm currently at war with at least a dozen different factions. There are enemy agents everywhere inside my lands. Even provinces that are hundreds of miles away from where I am fighting have agents trying to cause unrest or sabotage. I'm not getting any assassinations of generals yet, though they are hitting my agents pretty hard. I'm beginning to think they have actually gone a little overboard with the agent spam.

I'm also starting to notice that a lot of factions declare war on you and never actually send any troops against your lands. I believe part of this is because many of the factions that have declared war on me are landlocked and unable to ally with my other enemies or secure military access to get troops to my lands. Thus, we sit in a perpetual state of war with neither side actually able to engage the other.

I've got a neat little dance going on with a full stack from Media Atropatene. I hold Antioch and Edessa, which are about one turns movement apart for an army. Media Atropatene has an army just far enough south of those two cities that it would take me two turns to get to them. If I make the attempt, they can hit one city or the other, most likely capturing it. They move towards Edessa, I come out of Antioch to defend Edessa. They move back towards Antioch, I leave Edessa and dash back to Antioch. It's frustrating and amusing at the same time.

Lastly, it seems as if there is some reluctance on the part of my enemies to actually attack me. As Pontus, I control the entire northern coastline of Anatolia. I'm at war with literally every Black Sea faction, yet no one has attempted to land troops even though all but one of my armies are in the east fighting Media Atropatene and assorted others. Cimmeria has two armies sitting well off the coast in fleet form. Neither has moved in many turns now.

[nearchos]

When you are at war with the AI, they move aggressively alright if they feel strong enough (this is patch IV beta). The standard AI move is: move an army (or two) close to your army, then attack with the third army dragging the other armies in as reinforcements. Usually, the autoresolve shows my army being annihilated to the man. Of course, playing out the battle gives a different result.

Interesting, but im not sure if this is something good or bad for the campaign.

[nearchos]

Is patch 4 live?
Im asking because steam is downloading 1.4 GB at this moment.

[Sp4]

Nope.

[Sp4]

I don't know if it's a post patch 3 exclusiv feature, but my generals are systematically murdered when they are in the center of the action. Now it's a common combo for the AI to murder a general before attacking his army. It's already very difficult to identify to a general with 1TPY and no family tree thing but with those systematic murders on top of it, it's getting boring.

With Epirus I got Pyrrus wounded at the second turn of the campaign and when he finally came back, well, he won an heroic victory and was murdererd just after .

As a player I don't use this murder thing with generals as I don't think it's quite realistic, (you got almost 80% chances of succes at level 2) but the AI seems to really dig that feature. And when you're at war with 3 different factions you have easily 6,7 agents swirling around your troops and breaking everything. I'm ok with the sabotage, unrest, etc.. but not the automatic murders.

Yes, agent spam is annoying. It's the one thing that keeps me from putting the difficulty all the way up there... AIs just get more agents.

[Wilbo]

Interestingly, the game has become quite unstable for me since patch 4 beta. I'm consistently getting CTDs enough to end my Parthian campaign - it crashes loading the battle after the auto-save. I've gad no problems at all prior to P4B.

[sassbarman]

Not sure if this is a bug or a feature with this patch but after convincing the Seleucids to give up all their satrapies I couldn't conduct normal diplomacy with the former client states only the basic stuff as if they were still satrapies. Anyone else come across this?

[nearchos]

Is patch 4 live?
Im asking because steam is downloading 1.4 GB at this moment.

Well, after steam completed the instalation, instead 1.4.0. i was running since patch 4 beta, i saw that it was back to 1.3.0.
Not sure what was dounloaded.

[Myth]

Patch 4 improved the framerate for battles for me.

[Ituralde]

Are you still referring to Patch 3? If so...and I hate to say this...your best bet might be to just start a new campaign.

I had problems with Patch3 beta. CTD/freezes, glitchy campaign map camera movement. I validated the cache, played with video quality settings, nothing much helped. Then I started a second campaign. Instantly the game ran smoothly. No problems with Patch 3 afterward, either beta or live.

I did not have this experience with Patches 2 or 4beta, both of which ran perfectly for me on in-progress games upon installation. So I suspect there was something specific to Patch 3 which somehow conflicted with data in save files of prior-existing campaigns.

I started a new campaign with Rome yesterday, as I wanted to try them out finally. This didn't help with the freezes though and twenty turns in already three generals have gone mad! This is patch 3 by the way.

I've also learnt to fear the heavy Slinger focus of the northern Barbarians. I lost a whole legion of 1200 against 2100 Insubres, half of them Slingers. Their barrage was enough to demoralize my units and rout them after a short fight. Playing on Hard has already paid off.

[Myth]

Patch 4 reduces the occurence of madness traits and reduces the number of slingers in AI armies. However, beating slingers with low tier infantry is a pain indeed. If your men are with weak base morale (below 50) they will take heavy casualties. Use cavalry to kill the slingers instead - even two units of equites will be enough.

later on, once your pretorians get to 90+ morale and a ton of defence/armour/shields you will just run them over. And by later I mean 10 turns after the start if you rush to Pretorians (which you should as Rome is one of the richest factions at campaign start)

[Zatoichi]

Anyone else notice that the 'jump to region' button has gone missing from the 'Region xxx population is upset/rebellious/all fluffy' messages in patch 4 beta? It's kinda annoying as I can't remember more than about 4 province names at a time!

[Ituralde]

Patch 4 reduces the occurence of madness traits and reduces the number of slingers in AI armies. However, beating slingers with low tier infantry is a pain indeed. If your men are with weak base morale (below 50) they will take heavy casualties. Use cavalry to kill the slingers instead - even two units of equites will be enough.

later on, once your pretorians get to 90+ morale and a ton of defence/armour/shields you will just run them over. And by later I mean 10 turns after the start if you rush to Pretorians (which you should as Rome is one of the richest factions at campaign start)

The lesson I learned was to take some Equites with me in the future. My army was 4 Hastati, 4 Prinicpes, 2 Triarii and some assorted Leves and Velites. Was nice to see them get slaughtered though, because after reading about Rome on the forums and my first battles against the Etruscan and Carthaginians, I was afraid it would be too easy. That's why I decided against teching Legionnaries right away, I want to roleplay it a bit as well, I think.