General_Sun's Tent Issue 5 Update

The actual Post is here:
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/index...ntry1812018029

General Sun’s Tent
Issue #5
3-19-2005

Preliminaries

This has been an extremely exciting week with lots happening. Come to think of it, so was last week. This may explain the rise in the total number of pages since Issue one. This is good news for the RTW world, more things are happening.
Siblez has kindly provided me with a subforum under Rome: Total War General_Discussion so that I can take full advantage of forum codes and for better discussion on the issues. The old articles place will remain the same, however each issue will contain only a link to their respective threads and will not contain the issue itself in full. The new forum can be found here
Also many thanks to [ROK]CompanionOfficer for moving the comments from articles to the forum.

News and Commentary

Exciting things are happening!

Betrayal?

The developers of the TW series Creative Assembly has found a new publisher. It is really about time that the previous one, Activision was dumped. Activision is really one of those big evil coporations that seeks to leech money out of the consumers any way they can while at the same time “cutting costs”. In Activision speak, it translates into 2 patches only rule, incomplete and rushed games, and none-existent technical support.

Everybody was extremely happy for CA who had finally escaped from Activision’s evil clutches. We were all slightly taken aback by the news that CA just married SEGA. SEGA? This company was one of the fallen, old and senile dinosaurs of the video game industry. Their most recent games are arcane and low scoring, worst of all, they work almost exclusively for the console, with a grand total of 2 PC RTS games in the last twenty years. This is the company that our beloved CA entrusted themselves to? We can only hope for the best and press on.

SEGA managed to alleviate some of our fears slightly by coming to the Creative Assembly forums and giving us some info. They at least showed that they cared about the consumer. They even took the time to answer some questions. Apparently, SEGA is not fully in charge of any patch/expansion issues for RTW, CA is. According to this topic by the CA representative, all CA has to do is to request a patch, and they’ll get it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by SEGARep

Sega genuinely intends to allow CA free rein in determining the future of their products.

Quote:

Originally Posted by SEGARep

As I’ve said before, CA are the best at this and because of that we are in no position to tell CA how to make Total War games

This demonstrates their position quite clearly! Since there is no patch, we can only assume the worst that CA doesn’t want to give us one. This thought is deeply troubling, could our beloved CA possibly abandon so many fans and their own TW series? Only the future can tell….

There is such a thing as too much of a good thing

Incredibly, there are TWO, that’s right, TWO modding schools coming into form right now. There is Total War Moding Academy TWMA and the The Moding Academy, the TMA.

Of course this is great news for the new modders, modderwannabes, and the community as a whole!

Of the two, the TWMA seems more developed, having a website with courses and many teachers. They offer a whole range of options, including meetings, chat rooms, and video tutorials.

Here’s what the admin Amirsan has to say:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Amirsan

Strategic Command Center has just brought you the Grand Opening of our Total War Moding Academy. The goal of this academy is to teach aspiring moders how to modify Rome Total War. Thier main classes revolve around Text Editing, Skinning and Modelling and are taught by some of the most respected artisans of the community.

If you are interested, check it out right here:
www.stratcommandcenter.com/academy

note: “Thier main classes revolve around Text Editing, Skinning and Modelling

While we’re on the topic of spelling, I’m pretty sure that Modding is spelled with 2 ds, not 1. Of course it’s not an actual word, and both The TMA and the TWMA is against me in this case. But then of course, they almost certainly had mutual influence considering the closeness of their unrevealing and the similarity of their name. But getting back on topic, 2 ds is how I’ve seen it frequently spelled.

Really interesting really, and let’s hope that the TMA has something just as good up their sleeves.

Though I’m not quite fond of mergers, in this case 2 schools is really a waste of community resources. This community isn’t that big, and a major split such as this is really draining. I wish that the leaders of both schools can work something out.

Nice E-Zine

To Titus Atius Labienus, that was an extremely nice interview with Gaius Julius on the topic of Punic: Total War.

I just want to plead with you and everybody else involved in the E-Zine not to limit the interviews/reporting to TWC activities only. There are many things outside of TWC that would be of interest to the community.

TTO

I love the TTO, I love what it stands for. In my mind, it’s a unified modding community working towards the common goal of advancing RTW. Its founders have said many times that the TTO is an open community, open to all newbies, and seeks to bring the entire community into its warm and loving arms.

This is why I’m rather angered by the existence of this thread. This thread only goes to prove that the TTO is looking for a certain type of people, namely the elite who has produced works.

I kid you not, the TTO is looking only for elites! Newbies may not get accepted!
I quote Burebista, one of the founding members of TTO:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Burebista

Now if you want to join TTO you have to post here a replly with your skills and past moding work (links)

I’m extremely disappointed that this is the direction that TTO has chosen to take. A community like the Lordz, a closed community that is out of reach of the general public. This goes against everything that I thought the TTO were campaigning for, a community truly representative of the people, by the people, and for the people, a group that would grow to represent the RTW modding community as a whole in the face of developers and publishers. I now see the folly in this thinking, maybe the fate of the TTO is that of the Lordz. The elite wants to preserve their elitist ways, accepting only other elites into their community.

Please remove this extremely silly method of approval in joining the TTO, and make it open for everybody.

/me looks sad

Gameplay Strategies
carousel emailed me with a picture detailing the method of flanking.
http://generals.zclans.com/junkimages/flanktactic.JPG
While nice, it requires you to have 2x the number of units that the enemy has. This basically assures a win in under any circumstances.

There was a thread in this forum stating my views that there is no such thing as military tactics. However, it is horrible, bad, and ugly. I will be further explaining this point in my next issue. I feel that my formation creation guide covers literally everything you need to know about how to win. The rest is up to you, that’s where half of the fun is.

However, I do feel that my guide does do a poor job in explicating my original point and many gets side-tracked and confused by the Legion vs Phalanx section. I think that an update to it is worthy. However, anything you want me to point out you can email me at generalsun@gmail.com.

Thanks to General_Giga and Myddraal for editing. And thanks to Tritio for clearing my head.

Re: General_Sun's Tent Issue 5 Update

Well, I've thought about this long and hard. And, to be perfectly honest, in my opinion, if I recall correctly, as far as I know, modding _is_ spelt with two ds.

laughs out loud... ~D

Re: General_Sun's Tent Issue 5 Update

Imho, Sega may be arcane and senile, but at least it will allow CA more free rein. At least it shows that CA cares about us enough to recognise that Activision is not suited to the TW community.

BTW, What is TTO?

Re: General_Sun's Tent Issue 5 Update

Gah! No patch in the two weks or so since the announcement... Yes, CA obviously has no plans of another patch.

Re: General_Sun's Tent Issue 5 Update

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aetius the Last Roman

BTW, What is TTO?

I always thought TTO stood for The TTO Organsation...

But maybe that would be a little OTT. ~D

Re: General_Sun's Tent Issue 5 Update

I don't see a quick reply button so I don't understand how to post a quick reply...

TTO stands for The Trivium Organization

Their frequent forums:
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/index.php?showforum=56
And website:
http://thetrivium.org/php/

What I thought they were and what they are developing into is stated in my issue.

Yes Kraxis, my thoughts exactly.
And to Epistolary Richard, lol thanks.
To Aetius the Last Roman, yes they switched like they should, but IMHO, it's shows that even with more free rein, they still don't give a crap about us.