Napoleonic Total War 2 (for RTW)

[Ciaran]

Considering that today´s Napoleons birthday (363rd at that), wouldn´t that be a marvellous opportunity for some release?

[Lord Adherbal]

alright, some more screens to celebrate Mr Nappy's birthday then
this time an open field battle, which focuses more on linear tactics and maneuvering

a russian attack on the french right flank, supported by cavalry


the french grenadiers cannot stand the pressure and rout


additional battalions of french grenadiers are engaged


french carabiniers move to support their right flank, and save their officers from a band of russian cossacks


french carabiniers launch a counterattack and smash through the disorganised russian cavalry


french 12 pounder fire into a russian cavalry unit at point blank range, but fail to rout them


a new russian attack on the the french left routs the carabiniers, and nothing can save the french army anymore

[Ciaran]

Amazing. A worthy birthday present (well, maybe not, after all the French got their butts kicked) indeed.
Though I´m not much into the Napoleonic era the team has my deepest respect for this awesome work. What unit size is that, by the way? Has to be Huge, from the numbers.

[Lord Adherbal]

the last battle was fought on Huge. The game is designed for Large size though, other unit sizes will cause imbalances and some other problems.

[Lanfire]

This was a multiplayer battle or against AI. and are you guys still sure about not making a campaign.

[Lord Adherbal]

this is MP. If it was played against the AI you would've seen every french unit placed on top of eachother, blocking eachother's line of fire, and running away from any charge attempt because of the skirmish mode. And that's the reason why we won't waste time on a campaignmap.

The only way to get decent SP battles is by scripting the AI.

[Lord Zimoa of Flanders]

Welcome to our fourth preview for Napoleonic Total War 2, a mod for Rome Total War. We've covered the wide array of French and Russian combat units in the previews, as well as giving some historical background on Napoleonic warfare for all of you who didn't stay awake in school Now it is time to discuss the mod in terms of gameplay and tactics. We hope the Grognards enjoy, and also that the few doubters out there will come to realise that Napoleonic warfare is as much "lining up and shooting at someone" as Roman warfare is "lining up and stabbing at each other."



We're already devoted 3 previews to our unit types, and how given you a brief description about their uses, strengths and weaknesses. This time we will go into some more detail about their actual performance and abilities on the battlefield.

Infantry

Muskets

Muskets are quite inaccurate weapons. At maximum range, regular infantry will only cause a few casualties each volley. But as the target gets closer, the volleys become more destructive.

Unlike what many people may think, extended long range shooting duels between infantry are rare, because on even ground no one really gets an advantage in doing this. Even though elite units may shoot a bit more accurately then lesser units, they are also more important and you generally don't want to waste them in long shooting duels; after all, no matter how "elite" a soldier is, bullets kill them just as easily. Usually the defender will have better ground so a shooting contest would only result in certain defeat for the attacker. Victories are achieved by routing the enemy units as soon as possible. To achieve this one needs to use the more devastating close range volleys, charge the enemy, or a combination of both.



French Chasseurs fires a volley, covered in smoke.

A lot of infantry attacks are executed by grenadiers or other shock units charging the enemy line, while Line infantry follow on their flanks, stopping just a few meters in front of the enemy to deliver close range volleys. The attacker will take a lot of casualties in doing so, but if all goes well the combination of the shock unit's charge and the close range volleys will rout the targeted enemy unit in just a few seconds.



This will create a gap in the enemy line, and cause a morale penalty for the nearby enemy units. The grenadiers can now move in their rear, while the Line units shoot them at close range. The resulting morale penalties will often cause a chain rout, rolling up the entire enemy line.



Of course in reality it's often much more complicated then this. Concentrated artillery fire can weaken a spot in the enemy defence, while close range canister and concentrated musket fire from the defender can rout the attackers before they even reach their target. It all comes down to who is best at creating and exploiting weaknesses or mistakes from the enemy.

The only units who are supposed to be used for long range shooting are the light infantry.

Note: Rifles were much more accurate then muskets, but slower to reload. Neither the French nor the Russians used them to a large extent. They will be introduced to the mod in the Waterloo Pack.

Light Infantry

Light Infantry are the "archers" of the Napoleonic era. They operate independently and in loose formations, making difficult targets for enemy infantry and artillery. They are trained to take accurate shots, have a high range and move quickly.

Light Infantry units are generally smaller then Line and Heavy infantry, but their higher range and quick speed makes them very hard to kill by the latter. If you have no skirmishers of your own, the best way to deal with them is cavalry. Skirmishing Light Infantry are vulnerable to cavalry charges while they are in loose formation.

They are also good at taking out enemy artillery crews, if the enemy has placed these in the front ranks. Their loose formation will result in fewer casualties from roundshot and even canister fire.
Their smaller size makes them weaker then the other infantry units if the latter manage to catch them.

Reload Speeds
Next to range and accuracy, an infantry unit's efficiency also depends on how fast it can reload. Militias will reload slow, while elites can do it quickly. The result is that some units can outshoot others even when they are outnumbered. It also affects how many volleys your men can fire before a charging enemy reaches your lines.


Cavalry

A strong cavalry arm is a requirement for every balanced army. They are generally used for 3 purposes: sweeping up enemy skirmishers, countering enemy cavalry, and exploiting enemy weaknesses. Even though cavalry generally cannot overrun a steady infantry unit, they can quickly run over a weakened unit. Infantry and Artillery can weaken the enemy line enough for a resolute cavalry charge to crush it quickly. If you are on the receiving side, make sure you replace or reinforce weakened units before the enemy exploits it, or keep your own cavalry nearby to counter or disencourage an enemy attack.

Light Cavalry VS Heavy Cavalry

Light cavalry is quite a lot faster then their heavier colleagues, but have a lower shock values. They are especially useful for harassing enemy skirmishers, flanking manoeuvres and any situation were speed is more important then raw power. Heavy cavalry can deliver a harder punch, and can stay in the fight much longer, so they can be used as fast moving infantry. They are best used to lead a frontal charge, proceeding the slower infantry while the lighter cavalry makes flanking manoeuvres.

The Lance VS The Sword

Lancers are equipped with both a lance and a sword. When using alt+right-click to attack, they will charge with their lance, and then switch to swords for close combat. The lance charge can be especially deadly, but switching to swords can take a while, and until then the unit will not be capable of dealing much damage. They also have a slightly worse defence skill then native sword-armed units.

Lancers are especially useful against weakened or wavering units, where their charge alone is enough to break the enemy.



French Lancer and Polish Guard Lancers charging with lances.



Polish Guard Lancers after the charge, using their swords.

Artillery

Line of Fire

12 and 6 Pound artillery pieces fire their projectiles on a virtually flat trajectory. This makes checking their line of sight/fire quite important. It can be useful to lower the camera to ensure that the terrain that looks flat isn't actually a slight hill. The result of this trajectory is that the proper positioning of these artillery pieces is vital to their performance.

Tip: When using round shot, always aim where the enemy formation is the deepest. If you can get an artillery piece on the enemy's flank, don't just aim for the closest unit. Instead, aim for an enemy line that is perpendicular to your artillery. Hitting a Line in the flank has the same effect as hitting a column: the cannonball will cut through several ranks, which can do massive damage when fired down a line.

Howitzers are an exception to the "flat trajectory" thinking; they fire in a very high arc. They have a shorter range and are more inaccurate than the direct fire pieces, but can be deadly against a concentrated enemy who thinks they are safe behind a ridge or inside a village.

Art VS Art

A popular trick in Napoleonic Total War 1 was to destroy the enemy artillery with your own as soon as the battle started. In addition, most games require a "xx art per team" rule to avoid the frame rate drop caused by cannonball explosions. The result was a lot of great NTW1 games started with an artillery duel, with both sides trying to destroy each others' guns.

We wanted to avoid this in NTW2. Artillery "duels" did happen in reality, but there were so many guns on a battlefield that it would be impossible to destroy all enemy artillery in a few volleys. This obviously wasn't possible in NTW1, but is more so in NTW2.

Artillery in NTW2 is more numerous (no artificial limit needed), and they have large crews (60 man per 2 guns). The result is that it takes quite long to disable an entire artillery battery.

Capturing & Abandoning Pieces

If you kill or rout the enemy artillery crews, their guns are left behind. These can be captured by your own artillery crew of the same artillery type. If you can capture them early in battle it can be very useful as additional ammunition for your depleted crews.



Tip: You can detach your artillery crews (press "W" to withdraw the crew, then move the unit). This causes them to leave their guns, but also lets them move a lot faster. This can be very useful to save their lives against a sudden cavalry attack or heavy artillery fire. If you are careful you can retake the guns when things are safe again.





The Napoleonic Total War 2 mod offers a number of predefined group formations, all based on historical formations:



From left to right: Line, Column, Loose Column, Double Line, Loose Double Line, Battalion Square, Left Echelon, Right Echelon

Some are more usefully then others, depending on the circumstances. We'll go into more detail on these and other formations in this section.

Line

The line formation is the standard and most used formation. The default depth of all infantry units is 3 ranks. In reality only the front rank(s) could fire, which was an important feature in Napoleonic tactics, but sadly this feature is not available in the RTW engine. Apparently it will be available in MTW2 so that'll be one of the improvements of NTW3 over NTW2.
The main reason to form lines, and not columns is because the latter is highly vulnerable to artillery fire. Roundshot can easily cut through 5 or more ranks, so in order to minimise casualties you have to deploy in 2 or 3 ranks deep. 2 ranks is ideal when you are facing long range bombardment, but it makes units unwieldy and fragile against cavalry charges.



A thin line minimises casualties from artillery fire.

Another (minor) advantage of a thin line over a deep column is that accuracy decreases over distance (bullets may not reach the target,) and so the men at the rear of a column may be completely out of effective range of the front's target!

Column

A "column" points to a deep formation, but not necessarily one that has more depth then frontage - such deep formations were only used to march, not to attack.

A deep formation (usually 4-6 ranks) is mostly used to attack. It is vulnerable to artillery, so one should only form it right before charging the enemy.



A cannonball cuts through 7 ranks

When multiple units attack in a dense column, they can concentrate a lot of firepower on a single enemy unit. Such a deadly volley can be enough to rout that unit instantly, thus breaking the enemy line. But keep in mind that such a formation can be countered by surrounding it: In such a situation only the flank units are still able to fire, the centre unit(s) will have to manoeuvre in order to get a clear line of sight. If the purpose is to pin down the enemy (preventing them from shooting) then it is better to deploy in a longer formation, charging individual enemy units.

Another minor but possibly life-saving advantage of a deep formation is that when such a unit routs after fighting the enemy in hand-to-hand combat, more soldiers have a chance to escape, while a line can be overrun quickly.

As mentioned before, deep columns can also be useful when marching. Travelling on roads speeds up movement, but roads are narrow and thus require units to move in column to benefit. Line formations often have difficulty manoeuvring around villages, and often find it impossible to move through them. Thus you'll need to switch to a deeper formation in order to move and fight in villages and building complexes and especially to take pesky bridges!

Squares

Square formations can be used against multiple cavalry units. A clever cavalry commander will always attempt to attack from multiple directions, hitting units in the front and backside at the same time. The square formations exist to minimise that effect.
Squares are usually formed only in rare and desperate situations, when terrain features or reserves can not provide the protection needed against enemy cavalry.

The are very vulnerable to artillery fire because of the deep ranks and/or exposed flanks.

Single Company



When a single unit faces multiple cavalry units it can choose to form up in a square formation. This is a weak square because it's flanks and backside are not protected, but it minimises the length of the fragile backside. The result is that the initial cavalry charge will not cause as much casualties compared to when the unit would have been in a Line formation. For elite infantry units this can be enough to repel some of the weaker cavalry units.

Double Company



Two infantry units have a good chance of repelling multiple cavalry units as long as they hold steady: one unit covers the front, the other deploys right behind it, facing the other way. The Flanks are not protected, but these squares are quite reliable.

Battalion Square



The biggest square is a selectable formation that ideally exists out of 4 infantry units and an Officer. The infantry will form up in a square, and the Officers deploys in the middle to boost their morale. These large squares are rarely formed because take up a large part of the army, and are very weak against musket and artillery fire. They're only effective against enemy armies existing almost entirely of cavalry without any effective artillery support.



Tip: To counter this formation with artillery: use canister shot against the front rank, or aim roundshot against the flank units. The latter will allow cannonballs to cut through the flank units, killing 5 or more men with each hit.





All our maps are custom (hand)made, none of them are generated from the campaign map. This is necessary because the have a profound effect on the game play. The featureless maps from RTW - that either contain one or two huge hills (more like mountains actually) or hardly any elevation at all - simple don't work with the scale of Napoleonic battle(field)s.

Many of the maps are designed to be well-balanced in multi-player, giving an equal chance to both attacker and defender. Terrain features are small (no huge mountains) so they only ever offer protection to a small number of units, thus forcing defenders to spread their forces or let the unprotected units take a lot of casualties from artillery fire. The attacker then must look for the weakest spot, and try to concentrate his first attack there.

Terrain Types

Hills & Valleys

Obviously, hills offer a slightly improved range, and a small combat bonus, but units on top of them are exposed to artillery fire. It is often best to deploy in the valley behind, and move the unit up on the hill on the right moment - when the enemy is about to attack. But move too late and you might find yourself fighting uphill, or facing close range artillery and musket fire.



A small ridge is enough to protect your men against artillery fire.

Hills also make ideal positions for artillery, increasing their range. Just make sure you can protect them against enemy skirmishers or cavalry charges.

Tip: If your artillery on the hilltop are being targeted by enemy artillery, detach the crews and let them take cover just behind the hill. When the enemy has found another target you can re-attach them to their cannons.

Creeks & Swamps

Some maps have crossable creeks, swamps or mud pools. This terrain type seriously slow down movement. Avoid crossing such terrain when under fire.



Tip: Deploy units behind creeks when defending. The mud will bog down enemy charges, and you can place your units inside the creek for (some) protection against artillery fire.

Forest

Dense forests are also difficult to move through, and cause a combat penalty for cavalry units. On top of that it's very hard to keep an overview when fighting in a forest - annoying but realistic.
Although trees do not block cannonballs (another flaw in the RTW engine) but they can still be useful to obstruct view and to hide units inside (they can't aim at what they can't see.)
Forests on our maps are usually deliberately kept small, and are often away from the defenders deployment zone. Otherwise the defender could just hide his entire army inside, safe from artillery fire, giving him an unfair advantage.

Roads

As mentioned before in the Formations section, roads greatly speed up unit movement. This allows players to quickly move a part of their army to outflank the enemy, or to reinforce a weakened position. Often commanders will consider roads first and foremost when planning and attack or defence!



Pavlov Grenadiers moving over a road.

The speed bonus only counts for the soldiers actually walking on the road, so you'll have to move in marching column or you'll units will get messed up with stragglers trying to keep up. Forming column takes time, and they are fragile to artillery fire so roads aren't always advisable in the heat of action.

Tip: the Russian Cossacks are fast, cheap little buggers. They are very good at sneaking past the enemy lines and hitting fragile units such as officers and artillery. Roads can be a great help to get them there quickly.

Buildings

All our buildings are destructible. Destroying buildings can expose the unit covering behind. Destroy walls to open a new way into a village.

Villages

Most maps are have lots of small villages and compounds. The houses can provide cover against artillery fire or protect your flank. When attacking, you often have to move from village to village to keep your army protected until you are close enough to launch an attack.



A French battalion has deployed in a village.

Enter-able Buildings

Some of the biggest buildings can be garrisoned by units. The current Borodino pack doesn't have a lot of these buildings yet, but there will be more in future release(s), including hopefully a few Belgian chateaux!
Units inside buildings are relatively safe from musket and artillery fire - at least until the entire building collapses, killing everyone inside. The unit inside will probably not cause the same number of enemy casualties as they would in a standard line, because only a limited amount of men can actually fire through windows and the occassional loophole. However, as long as the building stands, there units can be very difficult to destroy, which can endanger the flank of a prospective attack.



French Infantry garrison a big wooden barn.

Enjoy!

The Lordz

[Lord Adherbal]

the final beta test has started last weekend and we've had some nice games already. Here are some screenshots from last night's 3v3: Lord Zimoa + Wideblade + Lord Adherbal VS Marshal Dury + Lady Meg + Aqualurker, Blenheim map

the french cross the river


Wideblade holds the village of Blenheim


The french attack


and capture several cannons


Dury's Grenadiers à Cheval take out on of my artillery crews


Wideblade's men under heavy fire at the village entry


the russians launch a counter attack


Dury enters the village and fights the remaining defenders


my men try to come to Wideblade's aid while Zimoa fight's off Meg's diversion attack in the distance


counterattack to retake the village


I recapture some cannons while Dury & Aqualurker regroup around the village


the village is now in french hands, but at a heavy cost


surrounded and charged in the back by Zimoa's guard cossacks, panic spread along the remain french units and the battle ends with a russian victory

[Monarch]

Hey,

TBH I've not been following the progress of this mod, but I was talking to a guy from Silent Assassins in the BI lobby last night and he said the first one was awesome and I should really look into this. I've just looked at the latest preview, some screenshots etc and I'm really excited now, especially since this is really geared up for MP which is the only reason I play total war.

Anywho, I know you've probably been asked this a thousand times, but are you guys still running for end of August? (IE. release within the next week or so)

Hope so

[Lord Adherbal]

yes 31 August is our final deadline. The mod is already in a more then acceptable state, we're just doing a last bit of polish. Regardless of what happens, we will consider it "finished" on 31 August.

We'll probably be able to finish and release the British faction in september, and the Dutch faction in October. Whether we'll be able to finish the Prussians before the release of MTW2 is not certain.

[Monarch]

Sounds great mate, who knows, I might see some Britains around my Birthday time :D

Just one question, a pretty big issue on Rome is lag, this is usually combated by putting unit settings on normal. However I just read somwhere (may have been on lordz forums) that if its not on large the game may lose balance.

Kinda worried about that, my pc is capable large and high settings just fine, but when you team it up with some people on 56k, and PCs that run on lower settings/normal unit size I'm guessing they'll be quite a bit of lag. (especially in 3v3s, 4v4s).

So just wondering what the beta testers have reported lag wise?

[Lord Adherbal]

3v3+ games are generally played on 20k to reduce the amount of units instead of reducing the size of units. I have a rather old PC myself (athlon 1800+, GF4 Ti 4200) but it usualy runs fine.

Some people are facing some framerate drop problems, but I think we're on track to solving that problem.

[paullus]

how long do battles seem to last? i mean, that last battle, about how long did it take? is it the sorta thing where you have time to enjoy the beauty of the terrain and the puffs of smoke in the distance without being ripped to shreds by the enemy?

[Lord Zimoa of Flanders]

Yesterday we had some 3v3 Beta test battles, they lasted each about an hour, epic stuff really, especially as we also introduces some nice sound effects like distant cannon sounds and whistling bullet sounds when you zoom in.

We will probably release some replays short after the first release so people can have a look what NTW2 MP is all about. Frankly I look at them myself after the battles as the battlefields are huge and like to know what the others did in battle.

LZoF

[mac89]

yes 31 August is our final deadline. The mod is already in a more then acceptable state, we're just doing a last bit of polish. Regardless of what happens, we will consider it "finished" on 31 August.

We'll probably be able to finish and release the British faction in september, and the Dutch faction in October. Whether we'll be able to finish the Prussians before the release of MTW2 is not certain.

OMG!!!!!!!! Ive always wanted to play with my own country in RTW!

Keep at it, I love you guys!

[Monarch]

Yesterday we had some 3v3 Beta test battles, they lasted each about an hour,

Now, that sounds awesome

Awww, now I really cant wait for this to be released

[Lord Zimoa of Flanders]

This is our last preview for NTW2. But no need to cry, that means the mod will be released in just a few days! If all goes as planned we release NTW2 on Friday the 31th of August CET(Central European Time). Until then, you can find more information here about the single-player part of the mod: the scripted historical battle of Borodino.
At the bottom of the preview we also give some further information about the multiplayer aspect of the mod.

You still can view the older previews here:

1. Infantry Preview
2. Cavalry Preview
3. Artillery & Command
4. Gameplay & Tactics

SINGLEPLAYER

The Concept

At some point the decision was made not to create a campaign-map for this mod. The reason is that the RTW AI is in no way capable of handling Napoleonic armies, so it simply wouldn't be challenging or enjoying to play. Instead, we focus on heavily scripted historical battles. These scripts replace most of the AI, and allow us to let the battle evolve the way we want it to.

It would be impossible to script a flexible AI that can control an entire army, and challenge the player's army. So what we did instead, is give the player a limited amount of units, spread across the battlefield. These units are reinforced by AI controlled allies. As a result, the player cannot concentrate his forces against the AI, and even if he does, he won't have enough men to defeat the enemy on his own. In order to win the battle, you need to support and cooperate with your allies.
An adviser (with actual speech) will inform you of the current situation, telling you when and were to attack.

Phase I: Taking Borodino

The first task is rather easy: You have to take the village of Borodino. You have 2 units available nearby, and your AI teammate sends nothing more then a 6 pounder cannon to help you. The village is lightly defended and should be captured rather easily. But even if you fail and lose both units, the battle will go on to the next phase. However the consequences will be that the enemy has some additional units available for reinforcements, because they are no longer needed to defend the bridge near Borodino village.


Napoléon guides you through the battle.

Phase II: Taking Bagration's Fletches

The next step is quite a lot more challenging: The Russians have dug in behind a redoubt, and have a 12 pounder cannon. Your allies will attack this position, and it is your job to assist them. Act too slow and the Russians may rout your allies with canister and musket fire. When that happens you'll be expected to take the redoubt on your own.


Assault against the fletches involving player and allied units.

Both the Russians and French will send counter-attacks several times, so you'll have to stay cautious.

Phase III: Assault on Semenovskoi

When the Fletches are finally under French control, the French and Russians will redeploy most of their units, preparing for the next attack. Meanwhile the Russian artillery battery will open fire.


Russian defences at the burned village of Semenovskoi

Depending on losses taken in the previous phases, the assault on the village of Semenovskoi may turn out slightly different.
This is by far the most difficult phase of the battle, with both French and Russians throwing almost everything they got into the fray. You'll have to keep your head cool during massive cavalry charges, attacks and counter-attacks and the continuous bombardment of cannonballs and canister shot.

Phase IV: Assault on the Great Redoubt

Before the assault on Semenovskoi has properly started, the French will mount on attack on the Great Redoubt. This is a heavily defended Russian entrenchment, loaded with 12 pounder guns. Again, your performance in the previous phases will determine how many units you and your allies can use in this attack, and how many reserves the Russians can spare in defence.


Charging the Great Redoubt

The Outcome

Depending on circumstances, both sides may decide to commit their Guard into the final attack, and if you manage to break the last stand of the Russian Guard, victory is yours. However, if the French Guard takes too much casualties the battle will be considered as a defeat, no matter how much damage you did to the Russian army.
MULTIPLAYER

For those who are interested in playing the mod in Multi-player, here follows some information to get you prepared. We also advice you to read the Gameplay & Tactics review before entering the fields of MP battle, so you have a better idea of what to do and expect. We certainly hope a lot of you will give this a try, if only out of respect for the immense amount of work we put in this mod. And hey, you might even like it The NTW community is generally polite and mature, so you don't have to fear much rude behaviour.
Setting up Firewall/Router

If you have never played RTW on-line before, and you have a router or firewall, you must make sure it is properly set up. It is very annoying when a game goes out of sync because of someone's router or firewall. If this does occur and/or you need some technical assistance feel free to make a post on the Lordz forum.

You can find information about what ports to open/forward in this topic.
CD key

You can find your CD key on the back of your RTW manual. If you haven't played MP before, go to the Multiplayer menu, then click "Change
CD key" and enter your key. This is case sensitive and you must press enter after inserting your key.
Hosting MP Games

The game is designed to be played on Large unit size, 10k florins, and no additional rules. Of course you do not HAVE to stick to this, but we strongly advice it. If you want to play 3v3 or 4v4 you should limit the amount of florins to 5k or 3k to prevent lag, rather then decrease the unit size. The latter will cause units like artillery to become imbalanced.
Some maps can not be played with more then 4 or 6 players. In the map selection screen there is a small information box that mentions the maximum amount of players for the selected map. Even though these maps are exceptions, you should pay attention to it.

Team I is replaced by "Attacker", team II is "Defender". If you are attacker, you do not have the right to camp (sit still) on the map, while the defender does. However, if the defender has chosen a bad position, and the attacker can deal serious damage with long range artillery fire, it is his right to do so, and he does not have to send additional units to attack until his artillery has ran out of ammo.
You can still play with more then 2 teams, but this may cause weird deployment zones on the maps (or even crash the game) and will certainly lead to imbalanced gameplay.


The new game setup menu, showing a map preview and splitting attacker and defender.

Command Games

In NTW1, "Command Games" have become quite popular. It means each player of a team takes control of one part of the army (cavalry, infantry, guard & artillery) and elects a general. This general decides about the overall strategy and plan, the rest is supposed to listen to him. A bit like the Time Commanders series, but with actual control over the units. Even if your general or allies are useless, this generally leads to epic battles :)

Notes

When the battle starts you must disable all infantry units' skirmish mode manually. If you don't do this you will certainly get in trouble when you try to charge or fire a close range volley, or when an enemy unit gets close to your units.

If you let the NTW2 installer enable Quick Chat, you can use Y to chat to all players and T to talk to your teammates. These hot-keys can be changed in the hot-keys menu. If you did not enable Quickchat you must use Y to open the chat menu, and then use the numeric keys to define who you want to talk to.

You cannot chat while others are still loading the game, or when there are connection problems. This is annoying and confusing, but we'll have to live with that. Pop ups or hitting the windows key can throw you back to windows and this will cause a "connection problem" for the other players. When you re-enter the game the map will be reloaded and this can take a while. So when facing a connection problem players should wait at least 1 or 2 minutes before kicking the player or terminating the game.

You cannot change your video setting when in a MP game, so we suggest using very low setting during your first games. If you still get a good frame rate in 3v3 games you can increase the detail. Or just test out what your PC can handle by running a 3v3 custom battle (against AI).
THE FUTURE

We were planning to make a Waterloo pack next, similar to the current Borodino pack. But considering there are only 2 or 3 months left before the MTW2 release that might not be worth it. We still have to make a final decision, but one option is to finish the British, Dutch and maybe Prussian factions one by one, and release these as multiplayer add-ons in the coming weeks/months.

At the same time great progress is being made in designing a MP campaign around the French 1812 invasion of Russia. We hope to show you the first results soon.




Enjoy!

The Lordz

[Incongruous]

Ho sheesus!

I wan't you're mod sooooooo bad.
Damn it looks good.

sorry I have to remember were not talking about a hot chick, but its hard.
Napoleonic Total War Two is the like the hot chick of RTW MODS.

[Lord Zimoa of Flanders]

The Lordz are very proud and pleased to announce the first release of NTW2: The 1812 Borodino Scenario. As an extra we have added the last trailer, so you can come into the right mood.


Infantry Trailer

All movies require Quicktime to watch:

Apple Quicktime



High quality

(right click > save target as...)

Before downloading, installing and playing NTW2, we strongly advise you to carefully read our previous previews as they hold some vital usefull tips and information.

You still can view the older previews here:

1. Infantry Preview
2. Cavalry Preview
3. Artillery & Command
4. Gameplay & Tactics
5. Singleplayer & Multiplayer


Install Instructions

Make sure you have a clean copy of Rome Total War patched to version 1.5 or Rome Total War + Barbarian Invasion with the 1.6 patch installed, ready on your computer, download the installer and follow the instructions.

Tip: Napoleonic Total war 2 cannot be used with any other modification

Tip: Rome: Total War Gold edition and Total War: Eras already use RTW v1.5 and BI v1.6 so installation using those TW products should give no problems


Download Links

You can find all our products on The Lordz website:

-The Lordz website

All our products and downloads can be found in the download section on that site:

-The Download section


Support

We provide full support on The Lordz forum, we strongly advise to visit and register here first:

-The Lordz forum

For download, install or gameplay problems please post in here:

-The Surgeon`s Room

For your most immediate and most frequently asked questions about Napoleonic Total War 2, go to the NTW2 FAQ section on The Lordz forum:

-The NTW2 FAQ section


Organising Multiplayer Games

For MP games gathering please visit The Lordz Forum, we have a special room for all MP related gameplay:

-The Council of War

Enjoy!

The Lordz

[iberus_generalis]

i can't get acess to the download location..hell i can't even connect to the downloads page...anything wrong? or is it just my connection?

[Duke John]

I fear that too many people are trying to access the pages. The forum also seems down.

Just try these links:
http://rapidshare.de/files/31322874/...lic-v0.1.a.rar
Or
http://www.megaupload.com/?d=EYSXH2M3
They work even when our server fails under lots of traffic.

[iberus_generalis]

tnx man!=)

[Lord Adherbal]

the Borodino pack is completed, but that didn't mean we took a break. We're working hard on the British faction now, and have started on the Northern Europe climate. Here are some teaser screenshots.

We hope to complete and release this update in approximately 2 weeks.

British Unit Cards


British Rocket Artillery


WIP N-Europe Terrain

[Lord Zimoa of Flanders]

The Borodino pack is completed, but that didn't mean we took a break. We're working hard on the British faction now, and have started on the Northern Europe climate. Here are some teaser screenshots. We hope to complete and release this update in approximately 2 weeks.

British Unit Cards


The British unitroster:

General/Officer & Staff

Infantry

British Militia
British Line
British Light
KGL Line
KGL Light
British Rifles
British Highlanders
British Foot Guard

Cavalry

British Light Dragoons
British Hussars
British Dragoons
KGL Light Dragoons
KGL Hussars
British Life Guard
British Horse Guard

Artillery

Rockets
Howitzers
9-pounder
6-pounder

British Rocket Artillery



WIP N-Europe Terrain



New Northern European terrain & buildings



British Dragoons and Rocket Artillery





In other news: A private update is now available to the Lordz members, meaning we can start beta testing the British faction. Hopefully that'll allow me to post some nice action screenshots with the British soon.

More Waterloo stuff





More villages. We will soon be able to start working on new maps, and once we have a hand full of these the update should be ready for release.

[paullus]

beautiful!

[Lord Zimoa of Flanders]

Here some progress on the Prussian infantry:

Prussian Landwehr:


Prussian Musketeer:


Prussian Fusilier:


Prussian Grenadier:


Prussian Schutzen:

[Lord Zimoa of Flanders]

What are those collumns in the distance? Is it Grouchy? No, it's... it's the Prussians!

Prussian Cuirassiers



Prussian cavalry models in production.

Prussian Landwehr Cavalry:



Prussian Hussars:



Prussian Uhlans:



Prussian Dragoons:



PS: No, they won't reach the battlefield yet for atleast a couple of months.

[Lord Adherbal]

United Netherlands (WIP) units:

Dutch Artillery


Dutch-Belgian Flankers (light inf)


Dutch-Belgian Fusiliers (line)


Dutch-Belgian Grenadiers


Dutch-Belgian Karabiniers


Dutch-Belgian Jagers


Dutch Nationale Militie


Nassau Fusiliers


Nassau Grenadiers

[Lord Zimoa of Flanders]

Prussian Guard Hussars:



Prussian Guard Uhlan:

[Lord Zimoa of Flanders]

A Preview on some United Netherlands(Dutch-Belgian-Nassau) units work in progress:



UN Nassau Voltigeurs


UN Nassau Grenadiers


UN Line showing also Officer & Drummer


UN Hussar


UN General & Staff


UN Light Dragoons


UN Grenadiers


UN Carabiniers


Un Jaeger