Struggles of the Hai (EB Campaign Chronicles)

https://www.youtube.com/user/TotalWa...9019C3AC39916B

That is the link to the playlist of the Video AAR, or perhaps the "Let's Play" that I started producing on 2 March 2010. My intention for the chronicles was for it to be a 7-episode series encompassing the Pan-Caucasus reforms of Hayastan. Unfortunately, because of time constraints, I was only able to produce the first 5 episodes of the series. I don't have any more time now than I did back then, so don't expect any continuation. Consider it final. I should have posted this thread in early March, but did not even consider doing so until today, when I was looking through my old videos. Enjoy!

P.S. If you guys like this series and wish to see more of this style, let me know by offering suggestions for other campaigns, and I'll do what I can in any time I have. Also, check out my friend Randomer's YouTube page for his chronicles. As of this writing he only has one 10-episode series chronicling a Pontos campaign, but it is a great one. He is pretty much the only other guy I know who has done this video AAR, with the only additional YouTube user I can think of having done this in English being Knubggas (sorry if I misspelled that).

AKA Captain Marley (that guy is funny!)

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Originally Posted by gamegeek2

AKA Captain Marley (that guy is funny!)

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Indeed. He has a lovely accent! LOL!

Vartan....I totally imagined you with a different voice. I'll never be able to read your posts the same way again. =)

EDIT: Wait, I think you asked for feedback too. First thing....I love the fact you don't plan on showing many (any?) battles. Honestly, I know what they look like and far too many aar's and stuff get bogged down in the battles. I love the idea of seeing some campaign development.

As for future campaigns I'd suggest you try smaller factions generally. While it might be fun to see one as the Seleucids I think for anyone who doesn't know the game it would just be a bunch of mess to understand. Whereas a smaller campaign such as Baktria taking india or German invasion of Gaul or even a long, multi-part Roman campaign to establish their traditional borders (victory conditions?) will work better for youtube. Good luck. Watching the vids now.

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Originally Posted by Blxz

Vartan....I totally imagined you with a different voice. I'll never be able to read your posts the same way again. =)

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Is that a good thing?

My English pronunciation has not always been the same, even if I've lived in Southern California my whole life. I've learned about some phonetics as well as how others pronounce certain words and over time I've come to question my own pronunciation! hah!

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Originally Posted by Blxz

As for future campaigns I'd suggest you try smaller factions generally. While it might be fun to see one as the Seleucids I think for anyone who doesn't know the game it would just be a bunch of mess to understand. Whereas a smaller campaign such as Baktria taking india or German invasion of Gaul or even a long, multi-part Roman campaign to establish their traditional borders (victory conditions?) will work better for youtube. Good luck. Watching the vids now.

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I am most knowledgeable in the Ancient Near East, but I'm eager to do exactly that. As you may or may not know, my primary purpose is to encourage Total War game series players to express their creativity by way of film (hence the group Total War Filmmakers, both here at the Org as well as on YouTube). I have many instructional videos. Possibly one of the best ways to teach the game mechanics of Europa Barbarorum to new players (and admittedly there are plenty of newcomers) is to do what you said: start with a small faction and embark on a mini-campaign, focusing on the campaign map as to teach the inner workings of EB (i.e. scripts, governments, and so on). I don't want to do Baktria, but I can't choose between the Sweboz and the Romani. My biggie is that I'm not familiar with their historical constructions of structures as well as their army compositions. Though, that is not a matter because the game is about the player re-writing history, not re-enacting! (though both options are available!)

Sweboz seem to be popular for many people although romans are most likely easiest for new people to get into. I've found the romans are similar to the Hellenes in many ways in regards to buildings. More focused on regional units than the greeks though which could prove to be an excellent video AAR in itself. As well as some of the basics to enacting reforms.

Very important though could be using either faction to teach some new players about budget balancing, etc. Although it really comes down to what your target audience is going to be. Long time players will probably not find a tutorial video very interesting but would jump at the opportunity to see a decent video aar.

Only suggestion I have is to make your voice more engaging. The thing I remember about the video's is that you seemed to ramble on at times about things that didn't really seem relevant. if you have trouble staying on topic maybe keep a dot point list of things on hand for you to refer to about what you want to cover in each vid. Otherwise, keep up the good work. hope to see more vids. You also inspired me to start a Hai game and I am doing well. Keep inspiring!

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Originally Posted by Blxz

Sweboz seem to be popular for many people although romans are most likely easiest for new people to get into. I've found the romans are similar to the Hellenes in many ways in regards to buildings. More focused on regional units than the greeks though which could prove to be an excellent video AAR in itself. As well as some of the basics to enacting reforms.

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Among Sweboz, Romani, and KH, which have reforms and how do those work? Am I correct in remembering that KH only has MoT reform that's automatically triggered? What about Sweboz and Romani?

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Very important though could be using either faction to teach some new players about budget balancing, etc. Although it really comes down to what your target audience is going to be. Long time players will probably not find a tutorial video very interesting but would jump at the opportunity to see a decent video aar.

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True. Video AARs seem great for those who already play the game, while tutorial-like videos introducing the game would be great for those fairly new or brand new to the game, as you said yourself.

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Only suggestion I have is to make your voice more engaging. The thing I remember about the video's is that you seemed to ramble on at times about things that didn't really seem relevant. if you have trouble staying on topic maybe keep a dot point list of things on hand for you to refer to about what you want to cover in each vid. Otherwise, keep up the good work. hope to see more vids. You also inspired me to start a Hai game and I am doing well. Keep inspiring!

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I'll be completely honest with you. Because it was my first (and to date, last) time that I made such a video AAR (or chronicle, or whatnot), I didn't know what to expect, what to do. And at times, I was quite bored. I think it was because it was one of the last times I was going to play that campaign, as I had played Hai many, many times, to thoroughly acquaint myself with it. The problem with lists is that you'll never end up stating anything on your list. If you record live, you'll speak as per your live actions. If post-recorded, you'll speak as per your actions on screen (sounds even worse as there's a mental processing delay). Good luck with your campaign.

You are correct about the KH reforms. They get a (mid range) phalanx unit through MoT only. Not sure about anything else they get.

Both the Sweboz and Romani have reforms. Romans first reform is basically set by date with a slightly earler trigger if you control a few key territories. While Marian is largly based off territory control with an earlier trigger if you can engineer a certain type of leader. The Augustan reforms are purely based off creating the right leader and are the only reforms I have never triggered myself as I am far too lazy to stay with a single campaign that long without winning or giving up.

Sweboz also have a reform, while I have never triggered it I beleive it gives you access to their heavier infantry and cavalry units in their homeland. Not sure what else. Its is not triggered until 190BC and requires some regional development and control, nothing too serious by that date. I have 'won' (read: kicked arse and given up) most campaigns by that stage so have never actually seen what it does.

As for the video's themselves you are right in that your words are limited by your actions and events onscreen, but those are fully under your control and you can edit and shape the video to really show what you want. Not sure I could do it myself, it does take quite some effort to really make a good video.

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Originally Posted by Blxz

As for the video's themselves you are right in that your words are limited by your actions and events onscreen, but those are fully under your control and you can edit and shape the video to really show what you want. Not sure I could do it myself, it does take quite some effort to really make a good video.

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Thanks for the answers Blxz.

Yes, the videos are easy to shape (at least for me), and indeed as an editor you wish to edit your film to portray a story. The thing is, I'm used to editing films such as cinematics in order to portray my story. With commentary, I have to edit my video and correspondingly record commentary. And I can't cut out too much because there would be a chronological gap that people would not be able to follow (the only cuts I can think of in that YouTube series are End Turn events). Did you have anything in mind when you mentioned shaping the video to your desires? What kind of changes are you thinking of? Thanks for your insight again, much appreciated.

The main edits you can do would be to simply direct the video towards the things you want to show. For example you might suggest a course of action such as unifying the italian peninsula (for example) and then cut back once you had done that; continuing your commentary from there. I think you did somehting like that in your Hai video's as you built the Pan-caucasus reform goverments after only a few turns of video time while I took a long time to get the required pop. Clearly some turns that have no video signifigance have been edited out, this is good.

Obviously I have never edited or made a video before so I do not understand what it all entails but you can show somehting once and then imply it from then on and edit it out. Each video then can deal with a new topic or idea that you want to introduce or show. Alternatively you could follow one character in an AAR style while the rest of the empire governs itself and expands, only touching back on it as updates.

Furthermore, the addition of voice overs are a benefit not a hindrance. You can mention yourself that "blah blah" has just been done and this is the end result. Captain Marley (knubbgas) does some of that in his video's when he skips a bunch of turns. Although I do think he goes too slowly in some cases. The main thing with a video of EB is to keep it moving, having down-time watching you check your settlements is counter productive and boring whereas continuously moving along a chain of idea's (building parthian reformed gov for example?) or the conquest of an entire area with just commentary to explain the onscreen result such as garrisons or family member movements is a better use of your limited youtube time.

Be creative. I am looking forward to seeing what you produce. And would be happy to test view some work if you wanted my heavily opinionated and possibly uncalled for advice =).

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Originally Posted by Blxz

Be creative. I am looking forward to seeing what you produce. And would be happy to test view some work if you wanted my heavily opinionated and possibly uncalled for advice =).

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Thanks. I'll sketch out some ideas and see what I can do. If I am able to schedule my schoolwork load appropriately (along with other obligations), I just might have enough time to realize those ideas in video form by or around Halloween (31 October). I don't think your opinions are 'heavy' and I think the more thoughts and feedback, the better the end result!

Sounds good. Send me a PM when you have somehting ready as I am about to head into exams myself soon and this thread may be lost in the mess if I forget about it. Good luck.

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Originally Posted by Blxz

Sounds good. Send me a PM when you have somehting ready as I am about to head into exams myself soon and this thread may be lost in the mess if I forget about it. Good luck.

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Not a problem. If your control panel here on the forum notifies you of updates to auto-subscribed threads, you'll be fine. If not, you'll be fine anyway. I'll have my pawns bump the thread when necessary.

Nope, i gotta manually search out each thread I have posted in. So many times I have asked a question, never checked back for the answer and am too embarressed to ask again and unable to find my original thread....

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Originally Posted by Blxz

Nope, i gotta manually search out each thread I have posted in. So many times I have asked a question, never checked back for the answer and am too embarressed to ask again and unable to find my original thread....

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Go to settings at the top right hand corner of your page. On the left hand side under "My Account" go to General Settings. Then where it says "Default Subscription Mode", open the drop-down list and choose Through my control panel only. On the very bottom of the page choose Save Changes. Now you're set! From now on, whenever you post a new thread, reply to a current one, you automatically become subscribed to those threads. Then, every time you log into the forum, you may visit your control panel by clicking on the Settings button again on the top right hand corner of the forum page. It will have a section entitled "Subscribed threads with new posts (X)", where X will indicate the number of subbed threads with new posts (how straightforward!) So there you go! How easy was that?!

Wow, you are good at this. =)