magnum
11-17-2006, 17:45
Initial impressions so it’s a long post…
Got the game on Wednesday evening on way home from work. Took Thursday off (*cough cough* sick) and played an entire campaign. Decided not to play one of the initial 5 factions but modded the game and played as the Turks (my favorite faction in MTW) on Hard/Hard.
Ended up playing a fairly historical Ottoman empire expansion by accident. Expanded into Asia Minot and down through the Middle East and North Africa and eventually into central Europe (this time Hungary wasn’t able to stop our expansion!) Wasn’t rushing but wasn’t sitting around idle either. Looked to see where I was as far as achieving victory and realized I had 15 more provinces to go and only 45 turns. Cranked up troop production across my empire, making several stacks and threw them at the Hungarians, Polish, and HRE. Got the last province a few turns before the end of the campaign. Victory for Turks!
Some comments.
The simple fact that I completed that campaign, and am about 60 turns into a second campaign shows that overall the game moves along quicker than I’d prefer. That was true of RTW also though so no surprise. Will be a matter of figuring out how to mod it to slow it down some (talking about the campaign speed here.)
Armies - The computer does a lot (a LOT) better job putting together armies. They do tend to go with ranged heavy armies though. Most of the battles I fought, the AI had 80% plus ranged units (archers, catapults, and such.) Almost every army has siege weapons in it. Thinking that eventually I might need to mod those so it takes higher city levels to get them. Would like to see them a little less prevalent. Not sure what to do about the number of archers running around. Overall though much better armies.
Recruiting – Like the idea, and I think what they have is useable. I’d like to see units replenish a little slower and currently it seems you can easily build whatever army composition you want as long as you don’t wait till the last turn to do it. Basically with planning you can full elite unit armies. Again, overall I like it, just would have like to see it tweaked a bit more (modding here I come.)
Battles – Didn’t see the AI do anything stupid, but there wasn’t a lot of tactics either. In almost every battle, whether defending or attacking, the AI came at me straight on, no stopping. It would move within firing range, open up with everything (usually forcing me to assault it or die from a hail of arrows) and once out of ammo, throw the units at me in melee. Battles themselves lasted a little longer that RTW, and the maps feel larger. The loss of cohesion that occurs in units from time to time causing them to disperse over a wide area is annoying but usually something I can live with. Occasionally, like when a unit decides to stop moving right in front of some enemy units because a few guys have wondered to the other side of the map, it gets annoying. Again, improvement over RTW, but still many tweaks I’d like to see. Unfortunately, on these tweaks I’ve got no clue how to do em. =)
Campaign – Several things here. Overall AI does a better job coordinating their forces. Doesn’t seem to have random attacks by a unit/fleet and the Empire acts as a whole. Get less of the random “Your at war with X because he saw a peasant unit of yours moving along a road and felt a need to throw 100 years of alliance out the window to attack the most powerful Empire in the game all just to kill 1 unit of peasants” type of thing. Definite improvement.
Can’t make a lot of comments about diplomacy as I was generally at war with everyone bordering me. Empires not bordering me I was generally able to keep peaceful relations with (when I wasn’t under a Crusade at least.) I like being able to get an idea of what the AI thinks about on offer. Might be nice (if not already being done) to enter a random number in that based upon the diplomats proficiency. The better they are, the more accurate the “AIs opinion of the offer” is.
While Merchants seemed like a good idea, I noticed the AI doesn’t use them much. Basically they crank out only a few. The few it makes never attach themselves to a resource, but run around killing other merchants until they themselves die. Ending up being more of an annoyance (gee, this turn a need to replace 2 merchants…) than anything else. Oh, and make it easier to find resources, some of them are almost impossible to see.
Guild buildings will be neat, soon as I figure out more on how they work. Did figure out that you can only have 1 per city/castle, so you have to pay some attention as to what is where. Not yet sure what triggers their offer though. Not positive of what effect they have either or if they effect generals at all.
Imams ended up being an annoyance. Religious buildings did a better job of converting the population, and you don’t need to worry about them becoming a heretic. Not one Imam of mine died of old age. Every last one (several dozen) eventually became a heretic at some point. Next time I play an Islamic faction I believe I’ll simply forgo building any of them.
Inquisitors (from my new 50 turn old Milan campaign)… something needs to be done about em. Almost lost at turn 40 when the Inquisitors decided they didn’t like my royal family. In 4 turns they wiped out 5 out of 6 family members that I had (in addition to about 6 priests that I had.) Either they are simply to successful or there needs to be fewer of them. Would prefer less successful, with the target getting a bonus to survival vs future inquisitions, but something needs to be done.
Overall, the first campaign was enjoyable. Lot of little things that seem unbalanced or not quite to my liking, but all in all a definite improvement over RTW. I still wish that CA would go for designing a longer/slower game as far as the campaign side of it goes, 16 hours for one full campaign seems quick to me. I’d give it a B+ currently, with a very possible A after a few tweaks.
Got the game on Wednesday evening on way home from work. Took Thursday off (*cough cough* sick) and played an entire campaign. Decided not to play one of the initial 5 factions but modded the game and played as the Turks (my favorite faction in MTW) on Hard/Hard.
Ended up playing a fairly historical Ottoman empire expansion by accident. Expanded into Asia Minot and down through the Middle East and North Africa and eventually into central Europe (this time Hungary wasn’t able to stop our expansion!) Wasn’t rushing but wasn’t sitting around idle either. Looked to see where I was as far as achieving victory and realized I had 15 more provinces to go and only 45 turns. Cranked up troop production across my empire, making several stacks and threw them at the Hungarians, Polish, and HRE. Got the last province a few turns before the end of the campaign. Victory for Turks!
Some comments.
The simple fact that I completed that campaign, and am about 60 turns into a second campaign shows that overall the game moves along quicker than I’d prefer. That was true of RTW also though so no surprise. Will be a matter of figuring out how to mod it to slow it down some (talking about the campaign speed here.)
Armies - The computer does a lot (a LOT) better job putting together armies. They do tend to go with ranged heavy armies though. Most of the battles I fought, the AI had 80% plus ranged units (archers, catapults, and such.) Almost every army has siege weapons in it. Thinking that eventually I might need to mod those so it takes higher city levels to get them. Would like to see them a little less prevalent. Not sure what to do about the number of archers running around. Overall though much better armies.
Recruiting – Like the idea, and I think what they have is useable. I’d like to see units replenish a little slower and currently it seems you can easily build whatever army composition you want as long as you don’t wait till the last turn to do it. Basically with planning you can full elite unit armies. Again, overall I like it, just would have like to see it tweaked a bit more (modding here I come.)
Battles – Didn’t see the AI do anything stupid, but there wasn’t a lot of tactics either. In almost every battle, whether defending or attacking, the AI came at me straight on, no stopping. It would move within firing range, open up with everything (usually forcing me to assault it or die from a hail of arrows) and once out of ammo, throw the units at me in melee. Battles themselves lasted a little longer that RTW, and the maps feel larger. The loss of cohesion that occurs in units from time to time causing them to disperse over a wide area is annoying but usually something I can live with. Occasionally, like when a unit decides to stop moving right in front of some enemy units because a few guys have wondered to the other side of the map, it gets annoying. Again, improvement over RTW, but still many tweaks I’d like to see. Unfortunately, on these tweaks I’ve got no clue how to do em. =)
Campaign – Several things here. Overall AI does a better job coordinating their forces. Doesn’t seem to have random attacks by a unit/fleet and the Empire acts as a whole. Get less of the random “Your at war with X because he saw a peasant unit of yours moving along a road and felt a need to throw 100 years of alliance out the window to attack the most powerful Empire in the game all just to kill 1 unit of peasants” type of thing. Definite improvement.
Can’t make a lot of comments about diplomacy as I was generally at war with everyone bordering me. Empires not bordering me I was generally able to keep peaceful relations with (when I wasn’t under a Crusade at least.) I like being able to get an idea of what the AI thinks about on offer. Might be nice (if not already being done) to enter a random number in that based upon the diplomats proficiency. The better they are, the more accurate the “AIs opinion of the offer” is.
While Merchants seemed like a good idea, I noticed the AI doesn’t use them much. Basically they crank out only a few. The few it makes never attach themselves to a resource, but run around killing other merchants until they themselves die. Ending up being more of an annoyance (gee, this turn a need to replace 2 merchants…) than anything else. Oh, and make it easier to find resources, some of them are almost impossible to see.
Guild buildings will be neat, soon as I figure out more on how they work. Did figure out that you can only have 1 per city/castle, so you have to pay some attention as to what is where. Not yet sure what triggers their offer though. Not positive of what effect they have either or if they effect generals at all.
Imams ended up being an annoyance. Religious buildings did a better job of converting the population, and you don’t need to worry about them becoming a heretic. Not one Imam of mine died of old age. Every last one (several dozen) eventually became a heretic at some point. Next time I play an Islamic faction I believe I’ll simply forgo building any of them.
Inquisitors (from my new 50 turn old Milan campaign)… something needs to be done about em. Almost lost at turn 40 when the Inquisitors decided they didn’t like my royal family. In 4 turns they wiped out 5 out of 6 family members that I had (in addition to about 6 priests that I had.) Either they are simply to successful or there needs to be fewer of them. Would prefer less successful, with the target getting a bonus to survival vs future inquisitions, but something needs to be done.
Overall, the first campaign was enjoyable. Lot of little things that seem unbalanced or not quite to my liking, but all in all a definite improvement over RTW. I still wish that CA would go for designing a longer/slower game as far as the campaign side of it goes, 16 hours for one full campaign seems quick to me. I’d give it a B+ currently, with a very possible A after a few tweaks.