Legio V Alaudae: Sharper Pointy Things

[amagi]

Having fought an entire 1.2 imperial campaign without autocalc, with countless routs of bandits and an occasional defeat by easterners, I felt that there was still one element missing from Rome: Total War. It wasn't the AI, though the logic that makes cavalry charge the first spear unit they see needs changing. Thanks to CA adding a general's perspective the AI can seem much cleverer, because you can't see as much of the battle. It wasn't strategy, though the AI should wait to attack after it has finished moving its units so that they support each other, and it should disband and replace outdated units, or SPQR will always have mostly early Roman troops. Nor was it the traits, though some of them also need fixing. What I missed was some identification for the units, to create a 'regimental' atmosphere. Wargamers have always had favourite units, and I don't understand why RTS games don't allow their creation.

This could be implemented very simply and without a need for user customisation. All that would be necessary would be an entry on the unit scroll with a unit number based on how many units of that type had been created, and the city and date of origin. If units were merged, either the older or the larger units could remain. I don't see this as being any more difficult to implement than keeping track of the numbers and experience of the individuals in a unit.

Much of the fun of wargames is based on affection for a particular unit: the armour that was rushed to a position where you needed them, the guards infantry that never let you down. Rome: Total War has nameless units whose experience comes mostly from temples, not combat. Yet this would be simple to change. And I want sharper pointy things than them. Oh yes.

[Musashi]

Emperor's Pointy Sticks, advance!

[hoom]

Shogun kindof did this with unique unit flag/standards.

It would be cool to be able to follow the career of the 3rd Thracian Falxmen -Raised in Tylis 256BC.

Great idea ~:cheers:

[drone]

Maybe even apply honors to units based on combat results? That would be nice...

[Akka]

I agree with you. I had some units that were put in horrible conditions, and didn't rout or weaken. I would really have loved to be able to recognize them, and use them as elite units.

For example :

http://zanath.free.fr/RTW/051.JPG

If you look, you can see a single armoured hoplite unit that is surrounded by hordes of macedonians. Alone.

Well, it spent most of the battle like that. I sent reinforcements, but the ennemies were so numerous, they could fight the reinforcements with even other units, so during the meantime (which was a LOOOOONG time), this unit was on its own.

And well, they never gave up, never ran, never even wavered. They stood firmly during the long time the reinforcements needed to hack through the rest of the macedonian army and come to their help.

And they spend this time not only holding, but also slaughtering their foes.

In the end, it gave this :

http://zanath.free.fr/RTW/052.JPG

Damn fine warriors. I would have loved to be able to track them :)

[Wishazu]

very good idea, you could do this in Star Wars force commander. i remember my elite AT-AT, it was called Jim, i remember allmost crying with despair when he was surrounded and destroyed by the rebel scum :( hed been with me for so long. blub

[Aetius the Last Roman]

Grand and great idea,
Quite simple too,
I would have love to call up the new green units of 3rd Auxilia Cohort to the defense of Arrentium and so on...
Maybe you could even name and track armies.
Ave amagi!

[The Stranger]

*sighs* *get's mad on CA* yeah this would be great, the Immortal regiment

[Mikeus Caesar]

I just name my armies and try to remember them. Like my two units of greek cavalry i have running about in the vast provinces of the steppes. They are triple gold chevron, and i call them the 'outback police, first division'.

[The Stranger]

yeah but that's isn't as good, as you can just name them in the game

[katank]

You may have things like only armies with a first cohort can be named a legion. This would yield some benefits but also costs of losing an eagle.

Famous battle markers can include the legion number in the result. Other factions can have other elite units get the leadership/standard bearing duty.

[The Stranger]

yeah but i think this should aply to "civilised cultures" and "elite units" only cause i'm quite sure the barbarians nver named their warbands

[Zalmoxis]

Emperor's Pointy Sticks, advance!

I don't remember, what is that name from?

[AntiochusIII]

I just LOVE to create the names for my troops!

With only a simple function as that and I'll be fond of my "Legio XXI: Stinking Gauls-Killer" and makes the game much more...Role-Playing as we once said in Medieval...

Of course, they will enjoy both the benefits of Roman Baths and Gallic Soap.

[katank]

You may also have other requirements like Legions require leadership of at least a 4 star general or something along the lines.

When you conquer say 75%+ of Gaul with that general and/or legion then they would get Gallicus epithet.

I would surely like a Scipio Africanus or Amulius Macedonicus

[Craterus]

it would be cool to be able to name your troops!
i would call my faction leader's cavalry "The Companions" after Alexander's cavalry

[Musashi]

I don't remember, what is that name from?

Turn Signals On A Land Raider (http://turnsignalsonalandraider.com/)

Nifty little Warhammer 40,000 comic strip :)

[The Stranger]

it would be cool to be able to name your troops!
i would call my faction leader's cavalry "The Companions" after Alexander's cavalry

this is easy, go to Data/export_units and look for the generals bodygaurd you want to rename, but if you play with 1.2 and no other mods the greek, seleucid bodyguards names also changes to The Companions

[Craterus]

ok, thanks for the tip, what if your general is not accompanied by general's bodyguard?

[Craterus]

and can you rename your generals? :charge: :duel:

[AntiochusIII]

Currently : Not manually. You can't name people "Africanus" or something.

They do have "epithets" though. Nicknames gained by gaining specific traits. They range from "scarface" to "the handsome" or "the mighty."

[katank]

These should be an automatic thing along with say a +2 command bonus in Africa for Africanus.

These can be related to the Senate and greatly improve the roleplaying aspect of the game.

[Barbarossa82]

I did once keep track of my legionary forces on a Scipii campaign, naming each of them (in what little Latin I can remember from A-level!) and keeping a log of their succession of commanders. Once the reforms happened and I couldn't reinforce my pre-Marian legions, I'd recombine the depleted elements from a couple of them and call it the "IX Gemina" or whatever number, just because I'm a nerd like that ;-) Seriously though it really does get you a lot more involved in the game when you can trace your military formations through their various trials, tribulations and victories. Nothing like dispatching the veteran II Hispana Legion to deal with a threat too big for the inexperienced IX Neptuno Pater, it really adds to the immersion.

[Craterus]

sounds cool, My amazing general was Kiya The Mighty, Kiya The Conqueror etc. but he died as Kiya The Killer.. shame

[amagi]

One enhancement that can be made once a unit has an identity is not only to track it, but also to adjust its experience based on its activities. Currently units only get experience when created, or as an average of the number of kills made by their individuals. Yet generals would attempt to avoid stationing their troops in cities or leaving them inactive in case they lost their fighting abilities.

Once a unit has an identity, then it can gain experience as a unit when campaigning and lose it when a garrison. Units that have been in the same stack for a long time, or which have fought battles as part of the same army, could gain experience for familiarity- units that are unknown to each other would not a get a bonus. Computers can track these stats without difficulty, given a few simple rules.

Units could also be affected by supply. This has also been neglected in Total War, but can now be introduced using the destruction system. A stack outside a city should cause destruction even on its own territory (except in the province of Rome with its vast organised grain imports). If it remains in place it could lose combat ability and eventually men. Ancient armies were constantly on the move looking for supplies, and RTW could show this, though the existing siege system might have to be changed.

However, the first stage would be to get identities for the units so that they can get these unit-specific bonuses as well as troop type bonuses. The simple method, easy to program, would be to call all the starting units 'Faction Unit' and use them as reserves, always absorbed into new units. Then the first unit created could be Hastati I, with its province name.

Later, a system might be created to force a general to choose whether to risk his elite units to a winter 'in Capua'.

[Browning]

I did once keep track of my legionary forces on a Scipii campaign, naming each of them (in what little Latin I can remember from A-level!) and keeping a log of their succession of commanders. Once the reforms happened and I couldn't reinforce my pre-Marian legions, I'd recombine the depleted elements from a couple of them and call it the "IX Gemina" or whatever number, just because I'm a nerd like that ;-) Seriously though it really does get you a lot more involved in the game when you can trace your military formations through their various trials, tribulations and victories. Nothing like dispatching the veteran II Hispana Legion to deal with a threat too big for the inexperienced IX Neptuno Pater, it really adds to the immersion.
How do you rename the units?

I agree with you that it would add to the immersion.

[Zalmoxis]

Turn Signals On A Land Raider (http://turnsignalsonalandraider.com/)

Nifty little Warhammer 40,000 comic strip :)

What's Warhammer 40,000 like? I know it's tabletop game and all, but how is it?

[Barbarossa82]

How do you rename the units?

I agree with you that it would add to the immersion.

I didn't actually get the names of the units to show up in the game, but once I had named each Legion it was easy to remember and follow it, I just wrote down the names. I only had 10 proper Legions by the time I finished the campaign, the rest were just some local defence forces I didn't bother naming.

[Aetius the Last Roman]

I just named armies based on their locations.
So like my 1st African Legion, My 3rd Spanish Legion, etc...
They were usually under the same commander and used a lot of the mercenary troops from the region as a support.
Even if I moved them all onto one target, I could track them and later, after the victory I would transfer them back to their regions.

[amagi]

Since barbarians named their chariots and their weapons, they probably had names for their warbands as well, though no historians to record them. Perhaps their priests made records in a form that was lost when they became Christian.

[marcus aquila]

I am interested in advanced batttle movements for my troops during battle- such as wheeling while on the march and other such fun stuff. Is there a list of such commands somewhere?

[pezhetairoi]

Firstly, you can rename any unit you like in /Rome Total War/text/export_units. All pikemen units are now Levy/Silver Shield etc Pezhetairoi, my Companions are called Hetairoi (the actual Greek name for the Companions), the Royal pikes are now called Hypaspistoi, which is the correct name since the Hypaspistoi in real like and ingame are not pikemen but hoplite swordsmen. Legionary cohorts post-marian are now named according to their armour type (Lorica Hamata/Lorica Segmentata), etc etc.

I would certainly love to be able to not only give my army regiments etc, but also to name every battle or let the computer give a name to the battle. That way I can see the battle-honours flag of every unit in addition to their stats, like, 'Battles fought at: The stand at Vexillorum, Cuaindaigh Fords, the storming of Alesia, Iuvavum'. But, oh well.

As it is now I name my armies based vaguely on culture--my Roman armies are called Legio, and are numbered in order of formation and designation. African-culture and Greek-culture armies are simply called Army, and barbarian armies are called Hordes.

As it is, though, I doubt the barbarians named their warbands, because in reality they did not organise their army, and no warrior wanted an overarching organisation since it would necessarily detract from the credit and renown he could gain as an individual warrior.

[antisocialmunky]

I liked the naming thing, it would give some personality and encourage people to finish their campaigns. It just gets so tedious when there's no immersion. I have never finished a MTW campaign, though I have finished a couple Mori and Shimazu(SP?) campaigns from STW.

I sitll haven't bought RTW so... I'm just guessing. RTW names all the commanders of units like MTW in the past yes? And only family members and strategic pieces die yes? Well, couldn't someone just make something with a list of unit names instead? I mean, yes there would be weird things like units changing names when their commander gets steamrolled by a bunch of Catanks or units iwth the same names, but still, you get the idea.

[Einherjer]

Can a mod be created for that?

[amagi]

If warband names seem unlikely to some, barbarian unit names could always derive from tribes. Factions like Gaul or Germany comprise many separate tribes. This list is from answers.com (http://www.answers.com/topic/gaul)

'In Roman Gaul it often became customary to call the chief center of a tribe or the country around it by some form of the tribe's name. Many of these names survive today. The principal tribes of Gaul (with the modern survivals or locations) were: Abrincati (Avranches); Aedui; Allobroges; Ambiani (Amiens); Andecavi (Angers, Anjou); Atrebates (Arras); Baiocassi (Bayeux); Bellovaci (Beauvais); Bituriges (Bourges, Berry); Cadurci (Cahors, Quercy); Carnutes (Chartres); Catalauni (Châlons); Cenomani (Le Mans, Maine); Eburovici (Évreux); Helvetii; Lemovices (Limoges, Limousin); Lingones (Langres); Lexovii (Lisieux); Meldae (Meaux); Namnetes (Nantes); Nervii; Parisii (Paris); Petrocorii (Périgueux, Périgord); Pictones or Pictavi (Poitiers, Poitou); Redones (Rennes, Breton Roazon); Remi (Reims); Ruteni (Rodez); Santones (Saintes); Senones (Sens); Sequani, in the Franche-Comté; Silvanecti (Senlis); Suessiones (Soissons); Treveri (Trier, French Trèves); Tricassi (Troyes); Turones (Tours, Touraine); Veneti (Vannes, Breton Gwened).'

[pezhetairoi]

that's certainly more than enough to cover the entire unit roster of Gaul and then some.

[sapi]

This is a great idea that has been discussed multiple times.

Come on CA, it can't be that hard