Identifying with Leader and Generals

[jajknight]

Is it just me or are there way too many leader changes and generals in MTW? This is just a suggestion but why not make the faction leader YOU as the player? You would choose the name, picture and basic attributes of your leader at the start of the game and this leader would never die, unless killed in battle of course. This would eliminate the useless hassle of heirs and princesses. Plus you can truely identify with this leader and nurture him into a great ruler. Much like some popular role playing games where you learn to really appreciate the character you're building. This leader would be actively used for diplomancy and have a wide variety of powers currently in the hands of special units. Imagine another faction leader personally appearing before YOU to offer his daughter's hand in marriage. There are just too many impersonal special units that tend to clutter up the game as has been mentioned in many other posts. Keep in mind it IS a game and doesn't have to be 100% historically accurate, which it never will be anyway.

I also think a similar approach could be taken for generals. Currently there are just to many to keep track of. When you have half the map it can become a micro-management nightmare. Why not limit each faction to a maxium of 5 generals. Each general could rule over multiple provinces. Generals could be managed kinda like a baseball team owner (YOU) and the players (generals) where you can trade, upgrade, and financially wheel and deal them around...even offer them up for trade in some diplomatic mission.

Overall, the game would have a limited number of CONSISTENT leaders and generals so that you would grow to recognize each by name or picture and learn to identify with them in some tangible way. Generals would become the true strategic agents and would vastly influence (far greater than now) the game. Do you really care if one of your generals dies now? Why would you when there are countless others? What I liked about SG was that it seemed almost like a chess game where every move was significant. With so many similar units each move has less meaning. I love MTW but think it is lacking that familiarity factor along with the consistency of character development and association. Just my 2 cents.

[KukriKhan]

First jajknight let me welcome you to theOrg. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif

Secondly: thanks for your ideas. What you've outlined kind of blends or blurs the line between the RPG and RTS genres. MTW does that a little (compared to Shogun:TotalWar) with the Vices and Virtues feature, and I can see more of that blurring or cross-genre stuff in the future. Purists of each genre may whine, wail and gnash their teeth, but I can see a trend of FPS, RPG & RTS merging into uber-games in the near future, as hardware catches up to software (a situation only prevalent in the gaming community).

Keep posting, and soon you'll have the run of the place, putting your ideas all over.

[Gregoshi]

Welcome jajknight.

To address a few of your points, sure there are a lot of generals, but there are only a few that are worth caring about. For me, 5 stars and up and I'm working with those guys every turn. I do feel a loss when they are killed or worse - get branded as a good runner. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/frown.gif I'd rather they die.

As for identity, each new king is a new opportunity to role play. I even role played one of my princes once, Prince Ludwig the Mad. In a battle I had him turn his ballista on a small village on the map and destroy it. After that, I played him ruthless, i.e. burning villages and killing prisoners. Alas, he met his end in northern Italy...I was saddened.

I do agree with you about the significance of each move, or more precisely, each battle. Lost battles, especially large battles, should have a bigger impact in the form of desertions. Your 5000 man army lost the battle but only lost 500 men has little significance, you'll just attack again and wear down the enemy. That won't be the case if that loss translates to 500 casualties and 2500 desertions. Suddenly your invasion has come to a grinding halt.

As an aside, one of the reasons I think online MP campaigns aren't practical is the too many battles problem. If these campaigns were made so that fewer, larger battles with greater impact were fought, the campaigns would be easier to manage and actually complete.

That's my 2 cents. Hey, between us we got 4 cents, or no sense depending upon your view point. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif

[MacGregor]

Personally I like the system of having heirs. It keeps things interesting. Sure it sucks when a great ruler dies, when your heir turns out to be a deadbeat, or when your crappy ruler causes your empire to decay, but it gives you something else to balance and adds an extra element of fun. I'd go nuts if I had the same King, Emperor, or Sultan the whole way through I wouldn't get attached to him, I'd get bored with him. Through planning and a few choice accidents to heirs that don't live up to your standards you can get alot of enjoyment out of creating a strong lasting dynasty.

http://www.tartans.com/clans/MacGregor/g/arms.gif

[Wolf]

Quote[/b] ] This would eliminate the useless hassle of heirs and princesses.

Generals would become the true strategic agents and would vastly influence (far greater than now) the game. Do you really care if one of your generals dies now?

I don't really agree with the term useless, especially as i care for my line of royality, and while i don't identify with it (not shizophrenic enough i guess http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif), i certainly keep an eye on them.

That includes arranging accidents (no i don't suicide unwanted heirs in hopeless battles...), i turn of incest (if the king has low piety http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif ), and other such things (building up a general can be great fun, especially when you watch him grow from lousy 3 stars to 8, while collecting butcher* great leader etc... on the way)

*) I was winning, but i couldn't resist clicking that button...

I don't really see the lack of influence from great generals you mentioned, the influence of an >5-star general on the battlefield is unmissable - so i don't really see what you're complaining about.

[rasoforos]

well i also believe that the general / heirs system is ok. As it was said before you dont need to bother making all your generals into 9 star geniouses , you dont need to even know the names. Just train 4-5 of them until they are really good ( use them in battles , give em ranks that improve command) and use them when you are launcing a large assault.
Concerning the heirs i believe it would become really boring if you would always get perfect heirs and rulers . dont forget that in this game you do not play god. Moreover i believe there is nothing better than getting a chinless wonder, with an odd number of toes , and unsufficient number of grandparents and turning him into an infuencial man with great expertice in military command , and while you were angry he became a rules you end up being sad he dies.

[lordex]

As far as the heir system is concerned, I actually thought CA could go even further with it (in MTW II? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif ). Currently marriages don't seem to have any significant impact on the gameplay except for being a way of reaching alliance. Also, the heir hierarchy is virtually linear. From my limited knowledge on the Medieval history, marriages, and the complex inheritence issues sometime some marriages had caused, played heavy roles in diplomacy. So IMHO adding more details to the marriage/heir system would actually do good to both historical accuracy and gameplay.

[jajknight]

The key phrase is significant impact on the gameplay which is why I used the term useless. I've conquered many a campaign without once bothering to use a princess or look at a single leader or heir's stats. Frankly, the leader changes so often that I don't identify with the leader so I don't care who it is or what their attributes are. 99.9% of the time they simply do not affect the game enough to warrant the attention. The same can be applied to spies, bishops and the like. If you are skilled in training and positioning of your troops then you don't really NEED them. I think they were added in to provide more gameplay experience but I look at them as nothing more than little, insignificant map ornaments. I can see that a lot of players truely use their imaginations and that is where the real enjoyment comes from. My point is that it would be a lot easier to use my imagination and in a way become the leader if they changed the approach around a little.

[A.Saturnus]

But it would distort the atmosphere when rulers were immortal. Immortal generals are bad enough. I would like it if the turns were seasons. Then you had the same ruler for 4 times as long as now. Much more time to identify with him.

[Ueriah]

Actually, the idea of seasons for turns sounds very cool.

Perhaps agriculture could gain some output bonus during the fall season (ie Harvest) while Merchants and Mines and such provide income for the other 3 seasons...

Hmm... fighing a battle on a mountian pass covered with snow... hmmm...

[SmokWawelski]

First post:
I am assuming that changes that you propose cannot be done without scrapping most of the SP game and rewriting it from there, so it looks like even XP cannot do it. Your idea of leaders is implemented in Civilization, and I guess it works there fine, but I like MTW the way it is. What skill level are you playing on (the game changes a lot when you go higher that normal)?

Other posts:
I agree that the diplomacy could use a small overhaul, and the strategic agents could be more influential. Let’s hope that the BIG GUYS are reading this topic… Until then we can role-play on our own.