VikingPower
07-25-2010, 16:34
Before I say anything then I wish to congratulate the Eb team for making the best game there is about the classical era so I will present mine suggestion in a humble way according to mine experience of total war games
1. An option open for players to disable all building management while focusing more upon military decisions and battles:
Mine only real interest in the total war games is the battles themselves and its tactics while everything else serves only purpose for creating enough money for fielding many armies and in having access to better units, so it can somewhat reduce the fun factor of the games when the majority of the time goes to switching between multiple cities in order to build some new bulidings. Like for an example you mostly focus upon building first financial buildings, then military, and then happiness buildings in between, where it is much better to do it manually for more efficieny rather than by using the AI auto-manage feature which is rather slow and inadequate, but you are constrained into doing this while you do personally hate it above everything else. So I wish that there would be options open for the player to choose that there would be no need to govern settlements but each of them would automatically generate a certain income according to its value and size, along with that of providing a maximum number of units to be trained (like for an example that an each settlment would give the player about 8-12 maximum units to be recruited or for an upkeep). So the only thing which one could generally do about settlements would be to recruit some units, garrison or besiege them, and by moving some agents into it for some purpose. If this is not a practible option then I maybe you could rather customize it personally what prioritisation will be when constructing some type of buildings (like first financial, then military, then happiness) rather than by choosing some standardized options in the building menu. So regardless of which option, then its main aim is to spare the player from spending majority of his time in some repeatitive building management while he can focus more upon military decisions and battles, at least for those players which prefer it above all the other factors.
2. An option that players can choose between an two different periods which have a different configuration.
The Early period (272 BC to maybe 190 BC) is supposed to emphasis upon battles with a cheap and low tech units that range from military barracks level 1-3, along with that how the world map will be the same as default when there are a lot of rebel cities and factions have only a small territoriy each ready to expand. But the Later period (190 BC to end game) is supposed to emphasis upon battles with a medium to high tech units that range from military barracks 3-6, along with that how the world map is already divided between factions with their historical territory, but maybe a rebels can still exist in central and eastern europa. So I would suggest that in the years which belong to the Early period then all factions have access to all low and medium tech units which belong to it without any building to be made, when years of Later period do apply then all factions will lose access to early period units but have instead access to all units which are of higher technology without any buildings to be made. However if this is too strict then Later period should also have access to some better units from Early period which are not bound to any specific period of history.
For mine part then I never attempt again to conquer the victory condition settlements in order to win the Grand campaign, since only about 15 settlements are sufficient while everything beyond that reduces the fun factor of the game, but I have made it an habit of mine after some time to build as many balanced armies with a decent units until the economy goes to negative, save the game, and then just let each army travels the map in searching for other full stacked enemy armies in order to get thrill of battle (without besieging any settlements since the piched battles are most fun), and then reload the game and let mine armies go to another factions in other place of the map. But the game freezes and becomes corrupted in the long run when doing this, but I am not sure what causes it or
Hope these suggestions will help
1. An option open for players to disable all building management while focusing more upon military decisions and battles:
Mine only real interest in the total war games is the battles themselves and its tactics while everything else serves only purpose for creating enough money for fielding many armies and in having access to better units, so it can somewhat reduce the fun factor of the games when the majority of the time goes to switching between multiple cities in order to build some new bulidings. Like for an example you mostly focus upon building first financial buildings, then military, and then happiness buildings in between, where it is much better to do it manually for more efficieny rather than by using the AI auto-manage feature which is rather slow and inadequate, but you are constrained into doing this while you do personally hate it above everything else. So I wish that there would be options open for the player to choose that there would be no need to govern settlements but each of them would automatically generate a certain income according to its value and size, along with that of providing a maximum number of units to be trained (like for an example that an each settlment would give the player about 8-12 maximum units to be recruited or for an upkeep). So the only thing which one could generally do about settlements would be to recruit some units, garrison or besiege them, and by moving some agents into it for some purpose. If this is not a practible option then I maybe you could rather customize it personally what prioritisation will be when constructing some type of buildings (like first financial, then military, then happiness) rather than by choosing some standardized options in the building menu. So regardless of which option, then its main aim is to spare the player from spending majority of his time in some repeatitive building management while he can focus more upon military decisions and battles, at least for those players which prefer it above all the other factors.
2. An option that players can choose between an two different periods which have a different configuration.
The Early period (272 BC to maybe 190 BC) is supposed to emphasis upon battles with a cheap and low tech units that range from military barracks level 1-3, along with that how the world map will be the same as default when there are a lot of rebel cities and factions have only a small territoriy each ready to expand. But the Later period (190 BC to end game) is supposed to emphasis upon battles with a medium to high tech units that range from military barracks 3-6, along with that how the world map is already divided between factions with their historical territory, but maybe a rebels can still exist in central and eastern europa. So I would suggest that in the years which belong to the Early period then all factions have access to all low and medium tech units which belong to it without any building to be made, when years of Later period do apply then all factions will lose access to early period units but have instead access to all units which are of higher technology without any buildings to be made. However if this is too strict then Later period should also have access to some better units from Early period which are not bound to any specific period of history.
For mine part then I never attempt again to conquer the victory condition settlements in order to win the Grand campaign, since only about 15 settlements are sufficient while everything beyond that reduces the fun factor of the game, but I have made it an habit of mine after some time to build as many balanced armies with a decent units until the economy goes to negative, save the game, and then just let each army travels the map in searching for other full stacked enemy armies in order to get thrill of battle (without besieging any settlements since the piched battles are most fun), and then reload the game and let mine armies go to another factions in other place of the map. But the game freezes and becomes corrupted in the long run when doing this, but I am not sure what causes it or
Hope these suggestions will help