I'll list here the changes I've made for those interested in adding balance in the east concerning the powerful Egyptians. In every campaign I've played (i've played countless dozens, not finished of course) and Egg always murdered the Seleucids in what seemed a ridiculous short period of time. I don't know if this is what CA intended, but I've never liked it. Byzantium didn't always kill the Turks in MTW, but Egg always kills the Seleucids in RTW unless the player is using them.
With just a few notable changes I believe I've struck justice for the factions of the East. After three test campaigns I am enjoying the results. It still has some unpredictability but when facing three or four other AI factions, the Egg steamroller seems to slow down. In both campaigns Egg rips into the Seleucids as normal and takes several cities including Anticoch but not as quickly as it use to. Eventually it seems to get held up as by that time Pontus and Parthia are fighting Egg as well. This makes more sense, more game fun, adds realism, and just plain overall made my campaign experiences more enjoyable no matter who I'm playing.
Changes made in the export_descr_unit.txt file located in the RTW/Data folder.
After breifly looking over specific Egyptian unit stats, it becomes glaringly obvious some things are just plain wrong. Maybe CA wanted the Roman player to meet a real challenge when they finally got out there. That's fine but its quite overkill IMHO. Egg already has a very diversified roster of units. Something most other factions do not have. This alone is a real advanatge. It allows you to deal with any threat from any faction. Add to this now the richest cities in the world and a wonder or two and you already got a uber nation! So whats the point in giving Superman a 10,000 rpm Gatling Laser gun?
1) Chariot Archers take one turn to produce. Changed to 2. Every one else in the world takes two turns to make, why should it be different for them? Stat wise they are still the best compared to Pontus or the Britons.
2) Desert Cavalry. Here we go again. Here we have a descent cavalry unit, by any nations standards, including Armour bonus attack, fast, and good attack stats. For a light, easy to produce unit, it's beyond me why they get special attention with more horsemen per unit than anyone else. On large unit size they normally get 80. I changed this back to 54 (27), like everyone else’s cav units. I never seen the AI build Nubian cavalry, now it does.
3) Desert Axeman. Make any speculation or historical reference you may, but I just can't grasp for the life of me why these guys should be platemail armored Vikings of desert that they are. The artists rendering of these guys shows them barechested. Imagine the dismay when arrows hit these guys in the back, and all you hear is the "ting" sound of metal like stones hitting a steel bin. After looking their armour stats, I can see why they were immune to arrows. Changed the defense stats as follows. I left the shield at 2, raised defense skill to 7, but lowered the armour from 11 down to 2. The result is, they do well still in melee, but missile fire hurts them now. They are still potent by any standard, but not insane like before.
Ok so thats all I did. Just made what i thought was some sensible changes to a few already super-uber units and now I get this awesome game balance. I didn't expect it all, but hurrah. Thought it was worth sharing.
