First impressions thread

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Originally Posted by Krusader

Although encountered a CTD doing beginner's naval tutorial, which never is fun.

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Me too. CTD during the advanced naval tutorial :(
Other than that I haven't had too many problems and it seems to run very well on my Core2 Duo (3ghz) with an ancient 9600GT.

Have to agree with the general sentiment above, the mood and style of the game is simply awesome. Very immersive and engaging. The campaign map looks great and the battles seem to flow well.
AI hasn't been very surprising in it's creativity, and it does like to throw everything at the nearest yari spear wall, but besides that it hasn't done anything overly dumb either, which I guess is a step up from Empire on release.

One thing I'm not sure about though (and this could be how I set up my first campaign), is the time limit for victory conditions.
I'm playing as Shimazu and I'm in Winter 1547. If I understand correctly I ony have until the end of the year 1600 to capture Kyoto, plus 40 other provinces?
I currently have 3 provinces after killing off the Ito, one large(ish) army and a reasonable profit of 3k or so each turn.
Can't see myself capturing another 35 or so provinces in the next 13 years!

osu!

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Originally Posted by Satsuma

Can't see myself capturing another 35 or so provinces in the next 13 years!

osu!

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That's 53 years. 1600-1547

Just wondering how many start date are there? And is the auto-run problem from the demo fixed yet?

This thread makes me very hopeful. ~:)

After some initial playing last evening.I am also enjoying the game. I adore the atmosphere, artwork, music and after trying the naval battles. I was positively surprised. Also battle map pathfinding seems to be improved as when i ordered my Bow Ashigaru to skirmish. They actually did that, without me having to micromanage them. Playing from the original STW. I think this is the first time ive witnessed that. The unit closed in to a an enemy unit and started shooting when it got inside an arrow range and when the enemy unit started rushing towards my unit. They actually started withdrawing early enough and towards right direction, which is lovely. The main downside to me is that units seem to be moving quite fast, but overall i am enjoying myself very much after some initial playing.

I feel the battles go way too fast, but I attribute most of that to my brilliant strategy. Actually for the autoresolvers among us I'd suggest foregoing that option since battles are so quick, and your results will be better.

So far so good, I haven't lost anything important yet, but due to my own actions my first Mori campaign is about to turn really bad.
I only have 3 complaints:
- no separate difficulty for battles and campaign
- scrolling around map is way too slow, but I can use WASD to fix that.
- ship firing ranges are very hard to see in battles, though this could probably be fixed by adjusting settings.

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Originally Posted by The Black Ship

I feel the battles go way too fast, but I attribute most of that to my brilliant strategy. Actually for the autoresolvers among us I'd suggest foregoing that option since battles are so quick, and your results will be better.

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Well, the AI always charges, regardless of whether it uses sound tactics or not. I find that the multiplayer battles last much longer, as both players spend most of the battle manoevering into position before they commit. Once the actual fighting starts, it can be over very fast, though.

Combat is rather fast, compared to say, MTW 2. Ashigari fold about as fast as peasants against lancers in Empire, I'd say.

It's good. It's harder than previous TW games on equivalent setting - it's making me think.

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Originally Posted by Lemur

Maybe I just need to get used to the new graphics or something like that ...

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I've been having a hard time adjusting my eyes to the graphics as well... lack of AA stains my eyes

Other than that, I've thoroughly enjoyed it. Finally a return to something resembling Total War!

Impressive...

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

http://i54.tinypic.com/2rqyts6.jpg

http://i54.tinypic.com/2rqyts6.jpg

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- no separate difficulty for battles and campaign

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You can change the battle difficulty once in a campaign through the game settings menu.

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Originally Posted by Jack Lusted

You can change the battle difficulty once in a campaign through the game settings menu.

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Thanks for that. So if I wanted a normal campaign and hard battles I would start a campaign on normal and then adjust battle difficulty in game settings?

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Originally Posted by Jack Lusted

You can change the battle difficulty once in a campaign through the game settings menu.

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Hmm, wow, that's interesting! So it is possible to get a VH campaign and normal battle difficulty after all? Although perhaps from my initial failings with Oda at H I should be rethinking where I start.

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Originally Posted by Jack Lusted

You can change the battle difficulty once in a campaign through the game settings menu.

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You sir are awesome.

Also, make it more obvious. I've seen tons of people complaining about wanting easier campaign and even that one reviewer didn't know it.

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...and even that one reviewer didn't know it.

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No surprises there ;)

It sounds as if I should give it a look for the single player experience, but I think for multiplayer I will Stick to RTW.

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Originally Posted by Risasi

It sounds as if I should give it a look for the single player experience, but I think for multiplayer I will Stick to RTW.

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Why so? S2TW is much more improved over RTW, give it a try.

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Originally Posted by xploring

That's 53 years. 1600-1547

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oh yeah.....
That'll teach me to post at 3am....
FML.

Foot archers actually seem to skirmish well now. This means they should work much more effectively with spears and other melee infantry, making a much better combo. In the past, at least against the AI, I was always able to either charge foot archers before melee units could rescue them, or simply keep the foot archers moving. They can't fire on the move, so the practical effect was to remove them as an effective unit.

Notably, there are no missile cavalry that are armed with javelins. Also, there are no true "double duty" missile cavalry that can melee well. Missile cavalry will have to work with melee units now in close coordination. I don't mean to give the impression that bow cavalry have been "nerfed." That's not true at all. An unsupported melee infantry unit will still melt in front of good bow cavalry. It's just that missile cavalry is no longer as untouchable as it was in M2TW.


Very importantly, light cavalry are faster than bow cavalry now. This should give light cavalry a much more useful role than they ever had in M2TW. Earlier, much of the best missile cavalry was at least as fast as light cav. Also, many of the slower missile cavalry units could melee more effectively than light cav.

In Medieval, either a light cavalry unit would never catch a missile cavalry unit and get shot to pieces while trying, or they'd catch the unit only to lose the fight. You might as well build heavy cav because they were almost as good at chasing away horse archers or pursuit and better at everything else. That's apparently not true in Shogun 2.

I don't think that there was javelin cavalry in the period.

It all sounds good for playbalance, especially that mounted missiles aren;t untouchable. They were impossible to counter in M2 and RTW unless you had your own. M2 was particularly bad because of how string charges were on top of it.

In STW and MTW mounted missiles would be caught by light cavs and playbalance was much better because they had a counter.

Personally, I think you're all mental for buying this game considering how atrocious Total War and Creative Assembly have been in the past few years. Nonetheless I'm reading this forum with interest just to see if your faith has been rewarded. I won't buy this game no matter what, but a friend of mine did and on the first siege he had the AI moved one single unit to attack his city and it obviously got annihilated. After that the AI just stood there and took the missile hits. Sounds like the "good old days" of Total War to me. But that's his experience, anyone here had any sieges yet? They were just disasterous in Empire.

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Originally Posted by Quickening

a friend of mine did and on the first siege he had the AI moved one single unit to attack his city and it obviously got annihilated. After that the AI just stood there and took the missile hits. Sounds like the "good old days" of Total War to me. But that's his experience, anyone here had any sieges yet? They were just disasterous in Empire.

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I've been the defender on quite many sieges, there was 1 siege where AI for some reason refused to send its archers to firing range (3 units) when I had 1, so I had to go and get them. Though at another siege AI sent its general to firing range of my archers (6 units this time) and just stood there, but this was late in the siege when enemy only had 1 other unit not routing. Now that you need generals around to keep morale up, AI seems a bit reckless and throws them to combat (not directly charging spear units at least).

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Originally Posted by Quickening

Personally, I think you're all mental for buying this game considering how atrocious Total War and Creative Assembly have been in the past few years. Nonetheless I'm reading this forum with interest just to see if your faith has been rewarded. I won't buy this game no matter what, but a friend of mine did and on the first siege he had the AI moved one single unit to attack his city and it obviously got annihilated. After that the AI just stood there and took the missile hits. Sounds like the "good old days" of Total War to me. But that's his experience, anyone here had any sieges yet? They were just disasterous in Empire.

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defeneded plenty of seiges, the ai is definitely improved. in every siege the ai split its forces and attacked from diff sides. and im yet to see suicidal generals, in every seige the general waits outside missile range then when all other units are routing they dismount and attack on foot.

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Originally Posted by gollum

I don't think that there was javelin cavalry in the period.

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I phrased that badly. I didn't mean to imply criticism of CA for not including jav-cav. I'm just saying that the lack of jinette-type units is a significant difference from M2.

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It all sounds good for playbalance, especially that mounted missiles aren;t untouchable. They were impossible to counter in M2 and RTW unless you had your own. M2 was particularly bad because of how string charges were on top of it.

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Agreed.

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Originally Posted by Quickening

Personally, I think you're all mental for buying this game considering how atrocious Total War and Creative Assembly have been in the past few years. Nonetheless I'm reading this forum with interest just to see if your faith has been rewarded.

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Too early to tell, but your comment is interesting. I never played Empire Total War much and didn't even buy Napoleon Total War. Shogun 2 brought me back. As you can see from checking my profile, I've only just started posting on these forums again after an absence of two and a half years.

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Originally Posted by Doug-Thompson

Too early to tell, but your comment is interesting. I never played Empire Total War much and didn't even buy Napoleon Total War. Shogun 2 brought me back. As you can see from checking my profile, I've only just started posting on these forums again after an absence of two and a half years.

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I loved Rome and Medieval II despite the plethora of bugs that remain to this day, but Empire was just a disaster in every conceivable way, and it still is. It should just be forgotten and never mentioned ever again. Napoleon was improved but by then it was too late and I'd already sworn not to buy another Total War game. If they released a Medieval 3 or a Rome 2 I admit I'd be tempted, but it would have to be unmissable. Deep down I was hoping that Shogun 2 would show that CA have at least learned not to release unfinished games.

Hello Quickening,
i haven' bought the game yet as i am interested to play mp, and i am waiting to see how that will turn out, but i think that the setting is just too good for a TW game from an SP perspective. If i was interested only in that i would have bought the game, it certainly seems good in terms of immersion and atmosphere and the fact that walls can be scaled by infantry shouldhelp the AI a lot. Also the game is not a missile weapon's game which the AI uses badly. I agree with you that Empire was mediocre at best, but i would give it a try if i wanted to play SP only.

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Originally Posted by gollum

I agree with you that Empire was mediocre at best

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This awful Japanese game won't sell as much as Empire.

Plus in Empire, you had loads of factions, with Shogan you can only play Japanese............BOORRRRRIIIIIINNG

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Originally Posted by Quickening

I loved Rome and Medieval II despite the plethora of bugs that remain to this day, but Empire was just a disaster in every conceivable way, and it still is. It should just be forgotten and never mentioned ever again. Napoleon was improved but by then it was too late and I'd already sworn not to buy another Total War game. If they released a Medieval 3 or a Rome 2 I admit I'd be tempted, but it would have to be unmissable. Deep down I was hoping that Shogun 2 would show that CA have at least learned not to release unfinished games.

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Empire is an amazing game, what the hell you talking about...

I'd agree with people when they say that battles go very fast. I've only got as far as the tutorials and I'm already playing things on slow motion. I looked away for a moment and found my bow ashigaru underneath a lot of enemy cavalry, looking very sad.

To compound this, my troops have an incredible desire to run everywhere, unless I keep an iron grip on them. I assume this is some sort of idiocy on my part rather than a bug.