View Full Version : anybody play hard battles?
Just wondering does anyone use hard battle difficulty? And do the ones who use normal lose an even battle?
Marcus Ulpius
01-17-2009, 11:56
EB team says that the mod is built for VH/M difficulty, and any harder battle difficulty unbalances the units. But there are some players who play VH/VH, although I never tried it myself. I also prefer H/M settings - that way the AI is more reasonable and won't immediately attack your faction just because it's a player faction.
I played VH/H campaign with Rome and it was awesome.....but then I found out that it was awesome becaus the enemy units get a +3 bonus. That saddened me, I thought the fights were really difficult. So is there a way to make that +3 only +1?
Besides is it fun to play normal battles? Isn't it easy? I mean when playing on hard, one had to simply make great tactical moves and deployment to defeat enemy. Even tiring the enemy units was a very crucial thing, it made me calculate everything.
I played VH/N as Pontus and had fair fight with AS.
I use Babylonian spearman as the backbone of my army, with some heavy Persia archers and some Galatian mecenraries and light infantry to surport them. oh, two native spearmans of course, the cheapest the better.
And my enemy send an army with 3 GB(nearly 300 hetori cataphracts) and 2 medium and 2 native phalanx, with some other surport troops.
I successfully defeated those heavy cavarlys but failed to engage with the solid, unbreakable phalanx, because I had already suffered great casuaties thanks to the enemy's cataphracts. And also the equipments and fighting stlye my spearmen used were far more lost behind compared with the phalanx hoplites.
When I realize the victory is impossible, I pulled my units off the battlefeild and retreat to Antioch, which had fallen 3 turns after by the way.
ziegenpeter
01-17-2009, 13:09
I played VH/H campaign with Rome and it was awesome.....but then I found out that it was awesome becaus the enemy units get a +3 bonus. That saddened me, I thought the fights were really difficult. So is there a way to make that +3 only +1?
Besides is it fun to play normal battles? Isn't it easy? I mean when playing on hard, one had to simply make great tactical moves and deployment to defeat enemy. Even tiring the enemy units was a very crucial thing, it made me calculate everything.
Maybe you can get a difficulty level in between M&H when you turn it on H and switch the fatigue on.
Digby Tatham Warter
01-17-2009, 16:43
I play on hard battles for campaigns that will go on for along time, partic as I always try and keep any veterans.
By the time they get silver or gold chevs, the AI often runs away to quickly, so the hard setting helps even things out, although the early years can be tough, partic against large elite pike units that won't break easily.
Novellus
01-17-2009, 23:02
When I started off in EB, I didn't know that the difficulty made the units unbalanced. I actually thought the difficulty change made the AI smarter.
Yeah, I didn't find that one out until later on.
I began seeing Spartiartai Hoplitai take massive casualties in battles, and engulfing phalangites was tough as they died so slowly and never seemed to drop in morale until they were completely surrounded. But it helped with the skill of choosing battles carefully.
But I've played on VH/VH for a while. I even played as Epeiros and nearly conquered Roma until my computer crashed entirely. Careful if you play on VH/VH though. It'll make you seriously have to reconsider the way you deploy soldiers.
I always play on vh/h. Never can bring myself to play on very hard battle difficulty. The bonuses are insane, and I just cant calculate what can beat what once I get on that mode. I dont want to worry that a crappy levy troop can outfight one of my front line troops.
gamerdude873
01-18-2009, 05:37
I love playing on hard battle difficulty. It's always fun for me to have the odds stacked against me then turn it around on the AI. I also play Alex EB so the AI is ramped up some tactically too. Good stuff.
V.T. Marvin
01-19-2009, 11:34
I have played both on H and N battle difficulty (campaign difficulty I always have H) and both have its merits:
- on Hard battle difficulty one has to think more about his pre-battle deployment and tactical manuevres during the battle, but eventually it can get too much repetitive as the absolute condition is to kill enemy general as soon as possible - as long as he is around, his troops just will not rout no matter what.
- on Medium battle difficulty one can fully enjoy how beautifully balanced the game is and you can afford to try various semi-realistic tactics and employ various house-rules to spice it up.
Overall I have played and would recommend to use HARD battles with horse-archer heavy factions like Pahlava and the nomads while NORMAL with infantry heavy factions like successors, Gauls, etc. With Romans you can do both. I am now having amazing H/H campaign (ust after Marian reforms) and it great - it keeps the challenge even this late into the game and even my Empire at its zenith soeties suffers horrible defeats.
For campaign difficulty my preference rests firmly with HARD - it is challenging, yet still reasonable, best ballance overall.
Yup,
playing on hard campaign/ medium battles here and just had my camillan army thrashed in the alpine passes by a hoard of locals from Luvovaetum... 2400 of us, 3000 or so of them... the trick to losing is to field an army that includes rorarii and mercenary celtic spearmen alongside your romans, oh yes and dont take any slingers or archers to wear the enemy down, that helps too !! I should stress that we were on a substantial hill, with fatigue 'on'.... and they still overwhelmed my army and slaughtered us...we lost 1800, they lost 1000.... they just came straight up the hill and straight through my light infantry frontline as if it wasn't there, accepting their losses to pilum and spear without faltering, their heavy swordsmen and spearmen routed my frontline and the celtic mercenaries on the wings followed shortly afterwards, my core of camillan hastati, principes and triarii where then outnumbered and outflanked and went down fighting, particularly the triarii who died almost to a man to slow the pursuit, even my body guard of heavy cavalry was unable to affect the outcome because I couldn't get around the flanks of the host as they kept several units back covering their flanks...
so, if you want to fight and lose, try taking some unreliable troops with you, mercenaries and levy troops are best ... (not that uncommon an event in real life either :)...
cheers,
Pobs
I'm one of those that plays on vh/vh. I currently have a Luso campaign going quite strong - although killing the romans is going to be, erm, a magnificent feat - in 210BC. I don't get what 'the mod is balanced for m difficulty' means. No AI could match my manouvering. So I reason like this: give me an army of sheep (all I can really afford) and give the AI (bleet-bleet) an army of lions, and then lets test that proverb! Also, vh/vh is cool because micromanaging armies on the campaign map is essential and easy to leave you embarrassed. But, when you pull together a bunch of Iovoman and Scortamareva and kick the pants of legionnaires you feel a profound sense of accomplishment and self-validation. What more can you ask for?
I personally play on H/M or M/M.
Balance is everything!
VH/VH It really is very challenging, but that's part of the fun!
Still, you do get incredibly good at beating the AI. I usually get between 5:1 and 10:1 kill:death ratio on evenly matched, medium-sized battles, usually closer to 10:1 when I outnumber the enemy. (I tend to do poorly on large battles because it's more difficult to micro. I even set unit size to medium to make controlling my units easier).
I don't know how well I would do on medium battle difficulty. A balanced battle? The player has brains, so the computer must have bonuses. Or brains. But bonuses are easier to code :laugh4:
DaCrAzYmOfO
01-22-2009, 06:19
VH/VH = Kill the general, charge the rear, wipe and repeat. Gets old quickly....
Ive found that trying to emulate tactical maneuvers and actually fighting one on one and getting casualties on medium is much more rewarding...especially when you lose...oh yes...trixy trixy AI...damn them and their hiding in woods lol
And btw, fighting hordes of extraordinarii on VH is NO FUN AT ALL. even with a full army of slingers or 3 units of gesatae.. :(
Connacht
01-22-2009, 13:10
I really dislike the idea that harder difficulties are so only because they give bonuses to enemy units (and not because they improve AI).
However, on medium difficulty I find the game too easy, I just have to sit and make some movements, the enemy will ALWAYS die.
With H or VH instead there is the possibility that my opponents might crush my soldiers if they have strong enough armies (anyway, sadly the majority of battles still have the usual result with all the enemy soldiers routing or laying on the ground).
I have a question concerning this topic, I started a campaign on vh/m with Rome 3 weeks ago and eventho I roleplay and try to keep my legions relatively small[1 legion army per region,for example] I still tend to defeat stack after stack of ai controlled armys with relative ease. Is there anyway to change a campaign running to hard battle difficulty :(?
I'd hate to capture all those rebel settlements all over again and do so much work again, just because the ai has let me down in difficulty...
(simple example? I've started expanding in gaul; gave a FM a full stack made up of the troops a roman consul would have had back in the days, even afterhe got locked in the mountains by troops and had bad morale traits due to rationing still I defeated full stack after full stack, even taking on stacks with ''naked fanatics'' with releative ease, the troops of Rome seem just too good to provide a challenge without giving the AI +4 on all stats...)
I've still havn't seen a single defeat yet..while in medieval total war 2[on vh/vh,btw, but it uses different ai] I used to get my ass kicked once in a while due to stupid mistakes or an ai actually using the advantages he got[or the ones i gave him] in a nice way...
Starforge
01-22-2009, 13:55
Rootje - no way I know of to change difficulty once started.
Personally I run VH/H playing most of the factions. I found VH/VH requires (from me anyhow) a larger level of exploiting the AI (Kill leader / take greater advantage of the AI's inability to maneuver / Horse Archers / or baiting AI units with high value tagets that they'll blindly follow on the map regardless of where it leaves them tactically.)
I don't rely on historic formations, army composition or tactics, however, making Hard a good fit for my houserules. I don't use retraining - only merged replacements as one of my houserules because typically, 3 chevrons and you've cancelled the hard advantage making the fights all too easy again.
I don't lose a lot of fights but it does happen.
Cambyses
01-22-2009, 23:53
I have tried all the settings and now always play at H difficulty with huge unit size. Yes, casualties are painfully high at times, but personally I find this is needed to combat the AI's incompetence. On M all you need to do is make sure your troops form a proper line of battle and guard your flanks appropriately = victory. In H you need to actually take a more positive tactical approach. I wish I had the patience for VH but I find myself getting too frustrated when my troops start disolving during a fight they *should* statistically win. Then I start shouting at the computer, telling my guys they deserve to die for being so useless etc and it just doesnt enhance the experience for me any more...
Also, as some others have mentioned, on H you dont need to try "gamey" solutions to win - just good tactics. ie hiding troops in forests at start, focus on 3-1 local advantage when attacking etc. On VH I find you are just running units around in a panic all the time.
I know what the team mean when they talk about the balance at M, but its just too easy to win if you have been playing the game for a while.
Just went I wanted to restart my roman campaign switching from medium to hard battle difficulty, my two best generals got assasinated, i got attacked by the gauls,swebosz,carthaginians and lusotanians[and still have a front open with getai] and suddenly noticed carthage had gotten a reform and started massing troops that were way better than my triari and principes, they have pretty awesome looks too,blue and green armor!
Anyhow, this will keep things entertaining still, got my ass kicked hard on a city invasion when his superior troops waltzed tru my lines and I had to fight for my life just to get a win on a time victory :clown:
..too bad the next turn they again laid siege to the city again,ha, my poor general just became a roman hero...
HEY!!!Is there a way to change battle difficulty during campaign?:help:
Mediolanicus
01-23-2009, 19:13
Nope.
Well, there are programs to alter save games, but I doubt they work well with EB and they are more than potentially gamebreaking AFAIK.
NeoSpartan
01-24-2009, 01:46
I've played:
VH/VH fun stuff!!! ~:thumb: With this settings there are no house rules, RUSH the AI, I exploit the AI as much as possible, and exploit ground placement to its fullest.
--this is a fun setting if you just wanna go all out and pull all out all kinds of battle tactics.
VH/VH Fatige OFF. Creazy s**. I did this once with KH back in 8.x. I actually managed to make live and expand into AS. Again fun stuff if you wanna go all out! :charge:
VH/M BORING! :thumbsdown: This setting, even with house rules and all.... killed the fun out of EB. I could beat anything and everything and the AI routed super fast, especially since I had Gaesatae in my armies.
--However, if someone uses extreme house rules with historical expansion, or likes to chill and build up cities, then this setting + Force Diplomacy mod is the best. :yes:
VH/H Fatige OFF. Awesome balance :viking: this works perfect for me. The AI is strong, but not too strong so I can use house rules and take it easy. Also the AI doesn't tire its troops by needless running.
Olaf Blackeyes
01-24-2009, 10:30
Actually i believe M/M is a perfectly good difficulty to play on. This is because historically Nations didn't go to war every ten seconds, because it wasn't feasible. The AI goes nuts on any harder levels of play. As for the battles, it doesn't makes the AI rout uber fast. Honestly ive had PLENTY of close calls on M/M campaigns before
Mediolanicus
01-24-2009, 13:14
Actually i believe M/M is a perfectly good difficulty to play on. This is because historically Nations didn't go to war every ten seconds, because it wasn't feasible. The AI goes nuts on any harder levels of play. As for the battles, it doesn't makes the AI rout uber fast. Honestly ive had PLENTY of close calls on M/M campaigns before
QFT!
Of course you have to have well balanced armies with 12 units or so to have fun. I you go to war with elite fullstacks as many here do.. that kills the fun...
Atraphoenix
01-24-2009, 18:39
my humble observation
on RTW.exe VH/M easy you are the new Alexander!
VH/H still you can defeat the enemy but more realistic just aim your tactics well.
on alex. vh/m my favourite, though I hate to fight endless battles, best fits to me.
vh/h on alex, men there should be more funny games to suicide, even pandadapoi can resist your FMs and kills your king ,
vh/vh,
if you say fighting with your elites with heavy losses, no comment, but to sacrifice even a spartan against a medium phalanx, it is not funny at all :no:
I wish the game have no difficulty settings, just a celever ai and you, I can assure than first MTW and STW had better ais than RTW. I had many battles with MTW that the enemy crushed my army with double envelopments, what RTW does; cavalry charges phalanxes from front!
my favourite is VH/M on alex VH/H on RTW.
I still could not managed to evaluate BI cos it has more different and more comlicated responses than others some very clever some very stupid :laugh4:
NeoSpartan
01-25-2009, 00:04
Actually i believe M/M is a perfectly good difficulty to play on. This is because historically Nations didn't go to war every ten seconds, because it wasn't feasible. The AI goes nuts on any harder levels of play. As for the battles, it doesn't makes the AI rout uber fast. Honestly ive had PLENTY of close calls on M/M campaigns before
suit yourself man, if you like slow expanding games, then go for it.
NeoSpartan
01-25-2009, 00:10
my humble observation
...
vh/vh,
if you say fighting with your elites with heavy losses, no comment, but to sacrifice even a spartan against a medium phalanx, it is not funny at all :no:
...
WHAT! nah bro... vh/vh you gotta do your best, roll out all elite armies that you can at least have a fighting chance!
I remember taking on the Ptolemoi all elite armies with my KH all elites back in .74 (btw back then the cavarly "charge" did not work) and .8x in VH/VH. That was crazy! If the number of troops were even I was in deep s***. Even if I outnumbered them, I was in for one hell of a fight.
Olaf Blackeyes
01-25-2009, 00:10
suit yourself man, if you like slow expanding games, then go for it.
Im a slower kind of guy that's all.:beam:
Really i dont see the point in OMFGWTFPWNING the map in like 10 turns. How can anyone get the enjoyment of the game by doing that.
NeoSpartan
01-25-2009, 00:13
Im a slower kind of guy that's all.:beam:
Really i dont see the point in OMFGWTFPWNING the map in like 10 turns. How can anyone get the enjoyment of the game by doing that.
rushing the AI is only fun in VH/VH
Olaf Blackeyes
01-25-2009, 00:18
That is true.
However the AI get like OMFGWTFPWNING map powers on VH/VH, and that just seems unrealistic to me. It pretty much like this...:wall:
I decided to play H/H...battles are fun now. But I'm thinking if I should have done the campaign map VH :wall:
A Very Super Market
01-25-2009, 23:04
Doesn't VH cause every faction anywhere close to you to go berserk and send every man, woman, child and dolphin in an attempt to destroy you? I can't imagine that on hard battles...
Doesn't VH cause every faction anywhere close to you to go berserk and send every man, woman, child and dolphin in an attempt to destroy you
Yes. And those Dolphin Gaesatae are even crazier than normal ones.
Molinaargh
01-27-2009, 00:04
Doesn't VH cause every faction anywhere close to you to go berserk and send every man, woman, child and dolphin in an attempt to destroy you? I can't imagine that on hard battles...
Not really, try it yourself. On my VH/VH campaign as Epirus, Makedonia still hasn't attacked me (after 20 years of peace or so) even though they have 2 full stacks doing nothing in the peninsula.
As for VH battles I have to rely on Phalanxes against Rome because anything else gets crushed. I've lost 3 battles that I was "supposed" to win (had full stack of phalanx, good general [Pyrrhus!]) and while I get mad at first (:furious3:) I later realize that it makes the game a lot more interesting than always winning.
Losing 3 battles may not sound like much but in the game they meant the destruction of full stacks and death of 2 generals, which are big problems in VH, unlike in lower difficulties where you can slowly rebuild your army.
I don't think I'll switch to H when I lose this campaign! :laugh4:
Well after reading through this thread you all have convinced me to restart my Romani campaign on VH/H rather than VH/M as I am currently playing. And with note on the diplomacy, if you can for "coalitions" of nations the computer almost won't break the alliance from what I have seen. As Romani I had a campaign where I stayed allied with Carthage, Epeiros, and Audei for nearly 50 years (200 turns) without any of them breaking the alliance because everyone was allied with everyone else.
I considered doing the same but the way my roman campaign on Alex.exe has suddenly turned aroudn with lusotanians,carthage and hellenic greeks allying with the arveni and adeai and them all turning on me, made vh/m enough of a challenge by far!
They've bashed me out of everything I conquered from the Getai and beat me out of france too. Took alot of rebuilding and bottleneck fights to keep all the fronts controlled again, had to send 3 legions to control the alps and only the legion of Lucius Cotta survived, who is now a 9 star general and using most of his [greatly diminished] silver chevroned troops to fight stacks of greeks containing several spartans. On alex.exe this is the kind of challenge I dig!
I'm afraid vh/h on alex.exe would require constant bashing of endless triari legions and exploits like that, due to the fact that I like to roleplay and use proper tactics on the battlefield I'm currently having the perfect campaign :beam::beam::beam:
Hmmm, I'm playing RWT.exe so I haven't had the opportunity to play on Alex.exe and I haven't gotten too far into my Romani campaign I have on VH/M because I restarted after installing the Mini-mod pack for 1.2, however, I have changed to money script (thanks to the help from a completely inoffensive name) in order to keep the computer factions at around 300,000 denarii. I'm already seeing stacks of Aedui with 5-6 naked fanatics in them on medium and many stacks of troops in Greece. VH/H may be a bit too much with so many computer armies running around, but I suppose I can always revert to my VH/M if that is the case.
I'm playing with the houserules of 8 units of Roman frontline troops, 2 units of Elite troops, 5 units of support/light infantry, and then the other 5 as either skirmishers (at the beginning of a campaign for a city, they are my travelling garrison) who will be replaced by 5 mercenary/expansion region troops once I take the city I am targetting. Should be an interesting game on VH/H.
I did happen to find a big difference between RWT and alex exe, mainly in the aggressiveness of the ai on the campaign map and their spamming of stacks. Also their battle ai is alot better but they still strugle in sieges =( (but so do i, ctds kill my siege efforts :P).
I'm currently not using a moneyscript myself, is it easy to enable/tweak during a campaign? Most of the factions are on 500.000 mnai or around that I think but some start to quickly lose funds due to my legoins endlessly raping their stacks and my assaults on critical mining cities..
O and, I wish you goodluck on the harsh task of bringing the Romans glory on VH/H! The first time an enemy actually totally slaughters your hastati line and gets your principes real scared is the moment you realise your difficulty settings and houserules are starting to get in shape ;)
It is very easy to tweak during the campaign, literally takes about 5 minutes after I had the process explained to me. Just see the post by a completely inoffensive name in this thread https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=111983 to see how it is done. Basically the nonplayer factions stay around 300,000 permanently.
Cute Wolf
01-29-2009, 10:28
I can't thrown realistic army in any campaign with Hard battle difficulty.... Pantodapoi and hoplitai haploi became useless to pin enemy's elite units, while in the very hard, the AI are capable to screw my cohortes reformata with mere, fresh recruits of tribal levies...... and those naked guys become insane and unbeatable....
Anybody had a good trick to beat gaesatae on veryhard battle without causing 3 of your men die for every gaesatae?
NeoSpartan
01-30-2009, 06:00
Anybody had a good trick to beat gaesatae on veryhard battle without causing 3 of your men die for every gaesatae?
recruit/hire some pezetaroi(sp) to hold them..... recruit really HIGH charging (charge value 30+) cavarly unitS.
Sûlherokhh
03-09-2009, 19:38
Sooner or later it will become too easy, no matter the setting. So self imposed limitations are the real challenge. I always use the 'General Camera'. Any units placed outside my surroundings are placed on 'AI-control' until i can see and direct them again. Now try to fight the Sweboz in the dense germanic woods! :)
Im a slower kind of guy that's all.:beam:
Really i dont see the point in OMFGWTFPWNING the map in like 10 turns. How can anyone get the enjoyment of the game by doing that.
Confirming this.
Play m/m myself, Medium Campaign because I heard that all increasing it is increase the amount of armies get thrown at you. Medium battle difficulty because I like balance and I only ever put like 2 elites in an army anyways.
SirRethcir
03-09-2009, 20:37
VH/VH since Shogun. ;)
Never felt treated unfair in battles. Though I'm playing a Sweboz campaign and only had battles with celts and rebel germanics. Perhaps the armies of East and South prove worthier foes!? :inquisitive:
I'm surprised that everyone suggest to play battles on medium. If I were to dump down the difficult level, I would lower the campaing difficulty level to play a slower and more peaceful game.
I played VH/H campaign with Rome and it was awesome.....but then I found out that it was awesome because the enemy units get a +3 bonus. That saddened me, I thought the fights were really difficult. So is there a way to make that +3 only +1?
Besides is it fun to play normal battles? Isn't it easy? I mean when playing on hard, one had to simply make great tactical moves and deployment to defeat enemy. Even tiring the enemy units was a very crucial thing, it made me calculate everything.
I remember from the 'old days' that somebody from CA came out stating that on HARD battlefield difficulty, the AI gets +3 to its attack (no bonus to defense) whereas on VERY HARD it gets +7 to its attack (no bonus to defense).
So, given the RTW experience mechanics +3 attack bonus is 50% less than +3 experience points (+3 attack, +3 defence) and +7 attack points is 50% less than +7 experience points (+7 attack, +7 defence). In my humble opinion, the RTW AI battlefield bonus is not that big of a deal.
Nonetheless, it does unbalance things tremendously. A spear unit, for example, would not be able to withstand an AI cavalry attack... The disbalance is less noticeable in EB though. In EB defense values are way higher than in vanilla RTW across all units. So, +3/+7 attack has less value 'relative' to the higher default defense values.
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