Is RTW really that bad

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Originally Posted by ChaosLord

I don't get these people who play M:TW and say they have a harder game then R:TW, both of them are easy. I mean I was brand new to the Total War series when I started M:TW and I was kicking the AI around on hard and expert in just a couple of days. Does noone remember the vast peasant/archer/spearman armies? How easy it was to lure the enemy into traps? How dumb the AI could be at times(I remember in the Almohad PBEM I was in, I killed the Spanish king with arrow fire while he sat there, unable to figure out what to do).

It took mods to get any sort of real challenge beyond the artificially induced mass rebellion trigger. Jihads and Crusades were a joke since 90% of the time they had no good general and would become rout fests. The Mongol hordes just needed you to kill their leader, then keep up mass routs and you could kill/capture 10,000+ in a single battle. Added to all this was the ease of mass hiring mercs to scare the AI into retreating or to use as expendable troops in sieges.

Don't get me wrong, i'm not saying I didn't like M:TW. I loved it, as I love R:TW. But M:TW was barely and just barely harder then R:TW when it came to battles, and it was brain dead when it came to the strategy map. R:TW like M:TW is slowly getting better as the mods are worked on, mods like R:TR and hopefully EB as well as Senjoku Jidai(sp?) and Zhao Total War in the future. I win a good portion of my battles in R:TR with the same ratios I did in M:TW mods, and often times the battles are harder(fighting phalanx civs with barbarians or such).

Oh and Simon, you should check out the MedMod for M:TW. Although it does focus alot on balancing things it also changes the lineups to be more historical as well as the factions. WesW and the people who have contributed to the mod have done an amazing job on it.

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To go back on my statement, i'd like to say I was wrong. I actually need an advantage to get R:TW kill ratios in M:TW, whereas in R:TW it really doesn't matter. I'm actually having hard fought battles and even defeats after going back to M:TW. So it was my bad memory, and perhaps too many heroic victories in R:TW that had convinced me otherwise. After going back to M:TW i've since unistalled R:TW, no reason to go back now until the expansion. Where i'll optimistically hope they'll make the game somewhat challenging.

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Originally Posted by Coldfish

First of all...i don`t want to argue with anyone

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If you don't want to argue with anyone, you better not post here! :laugh4:

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Originally Posted by Coldfish

.....BUT....for those who think RTW is bad....that`s the problem i think...everyone started criticised RTW because they got bored of it.....how come at the beginning almost no one criticised the game.that`s the truth guys.RTW is a great game...and it always be a great game.peace!

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Sorry old man, but a lot of folks were extremely critical of the game - even BEFORE its release - after they saw the demo. In fact heaps of longtime TW fans never even bothered buying the game, and just walked away...

I *did* buy the game, and was highly critical of it from the get-go. The initial release was so full of severe bugs that after a few days I gave up in frustration. Most of the bugs were eventually ironed out with 1.2, although some substantial ones, like the loadgame bug, the broken group commands, and broken pathfinding in cities still remain.

It was at least playable with 1.2 but that's when I found out about the incredibly lopsided battles and the missing-in-action battle AI. The game was quite frankly a bore and I reconsigned it to the shelf after a few days.

A few months ago I installed the RTR mod and finally managed to squeeze a bit of enjoyment out of it, but it was pretty shortlived as the underlying problems especially with the pitiful battle AI still remain.

I've never really understood the enthusiasm that so many folks had for the game, I can only suppose that most of them are people who never played the earlier games and don't know how much more challenging they were.

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Originally Posted by ChaosLord

To go back on my statement, i'd like to say I was wrong. I actually need an advantage to get R:TW kill ratios in M:TW, whereas in R:TW it really doesn't matter. I'm actually having hard fought battles and even defeats after going back to M:TW. So it was my bad memory, and perhaps too many heroic victories in R:TW that had convinced me otherwise. After going back to M:TW i've since unistalled R:TW, no reason to go back now until the expansion. Where i'll optimistically hope they'll make the game somewhat challenging.

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You will need to reinstall soon because the AI's Revenge Mod is almost done.
Humans should be very afraid.

Some features.
1.You will experience a level playing field
1.You will have consistently challenging battles the best that you have ever had.
2.you will suffer many defeats. (unless you are Alexander reborn )
3.You will experience a free flowing campaign. With the focus being on battles
and not micro management.
4.This is all possible with simple balancing, no cheats and no tricks.
5. I guarantee you will be humbled by the AI.

e.g. In vanilla you see a seemingly suicide cav charge.

Last night while playtesting I witnessed.
Two cav break from their advancing army and charge towards my frontline, The first cav charged one of my infantry, The second cav made a sharp turn before hitting my line and headed towards the first cav.
the first cav then withdrew forcing my unit to persue, The second cav smashed into the flank of my persuing unit. The first cav then charged again. Timed to perfection.
An obviously deliberate opening gambit.

Just one example of what you can expect. From truly the greatest TW game of all.

@ Little Legionaire: I think I read that the team that made RTW actually began working on it before MTW was done. If that's so, then it's certainly possible that two different teams were working independently on the games, which would help explain why the two are so different.

In general, I think that RTW definitely extended the potential of the game because there are more options in RTW (gameplay-wise, not modding-wise unfortunately), but the AI they built is terrible. So, when you compare AI skill with the potential of the game, the two are much closer in MTW (perhaps mostly because there were fewer variables for the AI to get distracted by) than in RTW.

IMO, CA could do nothing better for their game than to improve the AI, because it's the weakest link in the game overall. The next-best thing I think they could do would be to un-hardcode (if that's even possible) many of the variables in the game so that at least the modding community could make more if not all aspects of the game better. Lastly, cities should be less of a hassle to manage, and battlemaps should be more like MTW maps. Right now the hardest (and most annoying) part of the game is micromanaging the cities.

Is RTW really that bad? No. It's just not as good as some people wanted it to be. I still enjoy playing it warts and all (that's the game's warts, obviously. My own warts are another matter entirely.)

https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v...attlemap01.jpg

Just look that battlefield and honestly say it to me. Do you like it? and just remember MTW battlefields.

http://www.totalwar.com/community/images/bat10.jpg

http://www.totalwar.com/community/images/bat16.jpg

Put your hand on your heart say it to me which is better?

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Originally Posted by Little Legioner

https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v...attlemap01.jpg

Just look that battlefield and honestly say it to me. Do you like it? and just remember MTW battlefields.

http://www.totalwar.com/community/images/bat10.jpg

http://www.totalwar.com/community/images/bat16.jpg

Put your hand on your heart say it to me which is better?

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RTW without a doubt.
And is it a deliberate thing that the troop number in RTW shot is fewer and in a forest compared to the MTW one?

Those screenshots remind me just how much CA need to work on the battlefield generator. How bland and featureless EVERY single battle is. Add some variation, and forests that aren't pencil thin or sparsely populated with trees. The historical battles have fantastic maps, because someone's put effort in designing them. These generated maps for RTW are boring as hell. Weee... another gently rolling hillside and 4 trees. The tactical options there are endless!

Absolutely awfull the terrain texture is.

Sorry, but I've looked at those screen shots, and to me certain things are evident.

One, the RTW screenshot is pretty lame as far as screenshots go. For a comparison, the shots s/h been on the same SCALE!!!

Though, it really doesn't matter.

The RTW shoot is rather bland and generic, with absolutely NO 'sense of place'. RTW maps have no sense of place.

Shogun maps felt like Japan!

MTW maps have a feeling of Europe! as well as, the deserts of north Africa. The desert felt like the desert, sandstorms felt like sandstorms; Fatigue in the desert felt like, *fatigue* in the desert!!

Granted, the first MTW shot *could* be either Japan or Europe; but the second, with its hedgrows is----Europe.

Overall, the MTW shots, simply are more REAL.

I look at the first MTW shot, and immediately my trained TW mind's-eye starts to, intuitively, determine the advantage I can take from the **elevations**. Immediately, I determine which side of the line I intend to *press* the attack for maximum advantage.

The second, the first thing I notice is that there is less *immediate* elevation advantage, at least for my foot troops. So, my eye goes to where best to place my Archers, and therefore the center of my line. Also, I note that Cav can play a pivotal role (note, I, ToranagaSama play with Hardcore Rules, limiting Cav units to no more than 4, including the General).

In fact, I REMEMER this map! Due to the rather open rolling nature of the terrain, battles tend to be rather losely structured affairs. Discipline is important. If you have your units running willy nilly all over the battlefield the AI will kick your butt.

A most significant thing to note, is the **distance** between the two armies. It is HUGE! Hardcore-type battles on this map tend, in my experience, to be battles of positioning and opening gambits. IMO, this one of those maps where the AI, with even or better troop strength and quality, has a good chance of victory, unless the Player is on top of his game.

I've had many an epic battle on this map.

Now, let's take a look at the RTW map:

My first thought is that as long as the AI isn't on top of that hill, then no problem. The AI, of course, is NOT going to be on top of the hill, we all know that!

So, at best, the AI will have a **slight** downhill advantage, but even that doesn't really matter much in RTW. So, frankly, the terrain doesn't bother me AT ALL!!!

Truly, there is little to no terrain considerations to consider--NADA! Terrain and the use of it will NOT determine this battle, and there's little remotely interesting either tactically or visually.

Now, thinking about this from a technological point of view, perhaps, the tactical and visual pleasures of STW/MTW maps was sacraficed, in order that we have RTW's *Dynamic* maps. Perhaps, but we haven't heard so from the mysterious ones in Britain.

If so, then, OK, one can understand what CA was shooting for. Though, I believe it s/h stayed in development with the game being released with the normal STW/MTW mapping.

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Originally Posted by ToranagaSama

Sorry, but I've looked at those screen shots, and to me certain things are evident.

One, the RTW screenshot is pretty lame as far as screenshots go. For a comparison, the shots s/h been on the same SCALE!!!

Though, it really doesn't matter.

The RTW shoot is rather bland and generic, with absolutely NO 'sense of place'. RTW maps have no sense of place.

Shogun maps felt like Japan!

MTW maps have a feeling of Europe! as well as, the deserts of north Africa. The desert felt like the desert, sandstorms felt like sandstorms; Fatigue in the desert felt like, *fatigue* in the desert!!

Granted, the first MTW shot *could* be either Japan or Europe; but the second, with its hedgrows is----Europe.

Overall, the MTW shots, simply are more REAL.

I look at the first MTW shot, and immediately my trained TW mind's-eye starts to, intuitively, determine the advantage I can take from the **elevations**. Immediately, I determine which side of the line I intend to *press* the attack for maximum advantage.

The second, the first thing I notice is that there is less *immediate* elevation advantage, at least for my foot troops. So, my eye goes to where best to place my Archers, and therefore the center of my line. Also, I note that Cav can play a pivotal role (note, I, ToranagaSama play with Hardcore Rules, limiting Cav units to no more than 4, including the General).

In fact, I REMEMER this map! Due to the rather open rolling nature of the terrain, battles tend to be rather losely structured affairs. Discipline is important. If you have your units running willy nilly all over the battlefield the AI will kick your butt.

A most significant thing to note, is the **distance** between the two armies. It is HUGE! Hardcore-type battles on this map tend, in my experience, to be battles of positioning and opening gambits. IMO, this one of those maps where the AI, with even or better troop strength and quality, has a good chance of victory, unless the Player is on top of his game.

I've had many an epic battle on this map.

Now, let's take a look at the RTW map:

My first thought is that as long as the AI isn't on top of that hill, then no problem. The AI, of course, is NOT going to be on top of the hill, we all know that!

So, at best, the AI will have a **slight** downhill advantage, but even that doesn't really matter much in RTW. So, frankly, the terrain doesn't bother me AT ALL!!!

Truly, there is little to no terrain considerations to consider--NADA! Terrain and the use of it will NOT determine this battle, and there's little remotely interesting either tactically or visually.

Now, thinking about this from a technological point of view, perhaps, the tactical and visual pleasures of STW/MTW maps was sacraficed, in order that we have RTW's *Dynamic* maps. Perhaps, but we haven't heard so from the mysterious ones in Britain.

If so, then, OK, one can understand what CA was shooting for. Though, I believe it s/h stayed in development with the game being released with the normal STW/MTW mapping.

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Tell me, why is the RTW one is just a
400 men hiding besides a tree.
and
MTW one is
hundreds of men fighting in a open field?
Don't you smell something deliberate?

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Originally Posted by KSEG

Tell me, why is the RTW one is just a
400 men hiding besides a tree.
and
MTW one is
hundreds of men fighting in a open field?
Don't you smell something deliberate?

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tell you what, other than ER's battlefield wonders mod (will be downloadable within the next 12 hours)

show me another RTW battlefield with a sense of "place/presence"

i have yet to find one in SP campaign that even begins to make me feel that i am "there"

now go and drool over ER's Battlefield Wonders
:-)
Cheers,
B.

Well the thing is that RTW battlefileds are autogenerated from campaign map.

That means that there will always be some sacrifices since some location will just neve be interesting. While MTW are manualy made so higher level of detail on every location is expected.


But, I do like that I can see my ships or wonder of the world in vicinity. Or city in far distance. Or farms that are nearby.

That is the advantage of autogenerated maps.


P.S.
When we are at this, I think there is also one disadvantage of these maps. It's called saving battlefiled replays. I guess they are the reasons why you can't save battle in campaign (since replay engine is just saving troop momement and existing custom map).

Hmmm....

player1, I think you are the first that I've read that gives a good speculative explanation for why there are no replays. For the first time, I get it. Why CA hasn't explained it, technically, is beyond reason.

I suppose in order to have replays, the auto-generated map would, first, have to be *saved*, but then there'd need to be code similar to MTW made to locate, load, and incorporate the map and the battle specifics into an environment. The RTW engeine doesn't have this capability, since it created to auto-generate maps and incorporte battle specifics. Similar, but Significantly different in methodology.

You'd think that the RTW engine would be capable of detailing and saving map parameters along with battle specifics, incorporating the two and re(-auto-)generating a previously generated map.

You'd a thunkit, but ONLY if you thought it from day one, apparently they didn't; either that or they had HUGE issues in saving, incorporating and/or re-generating, and scraped it prior to release.

Anyway, enought of that!

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That means that there will always be some sacrifices since some location will just neve be interesting. While MTW are manualy made so higher level of detail on every location is expected.


But, I do like that I can see my ships or wonder of the world in vicinity. Or city in far distance. Or farms that are nearby.

That is the advantage of autogenerated maps.

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Yeah, I get *what* is SUPPOSED to be the advantage.

I ask you, is the supposed advantage a reality, and, is that reality a good trade-off. In comparison, has the Game Atmosphere been enhanced; and/or has Gameplay been been enhanced through *auto-generated* maps?

Sorry, there has to be a value judgment. Let's examine things:

The pre-conceived *value* of "auto-generated" maps would be in bringing greater DEPTH to TW Battles. Is there any other reason? Please articulate. I believe I summed it up.

Presummably, an unpredictable and unfamiliar battlefield will, generally, have a greater *tactical* challenge, again, presumably, as a result of a player unfamiliarity.

A legitmate issue re STW, because it had a smaller Campaign Map equaling fewer provinces, was that for a Player who played alot (note to CA: these people were the Hardcore!!!), battles soon became somewhat predictable as one tended to use the same or similar tactics on specific STW maps.

While STW maps are the most **tactically** challenging of ALL the TW maps, there is a limited number of them; and, once you've mastered the terrain, tactically, then predictability sets in.

To a similar, thouse substantially less degree, the same can be said of MTW. Though, if a Player plays enough, the same may, eventually, be specifically the same. Again, CA, these players are the HARDCORE!

[Why are you ignoring the Hardcore, now?]

So, CA, the great and innovative folks that they are, listened and came up with a solution---auto-generation. Ingenious and the right solution----simply NOT the **right-now** solution. Get it?

"Right-now" solutions, are those that provide a BETTER gameplay experience.

Is auto-generation *better* technology than non-auto-generated maps? Hell yes!!!

But, does auto-generated maps provide a better gameplay experience as yet? Sorry, NO.

ATMOSPHERE. ATMOSPHERE. ATMOSPHERE. ATMOSPHERE. ATMOSPHERE.

Since the announcement of the original Shogun: Total War, atmosphere has been an integral and definning feature of Total War. Crap, the ORIGINAL *Shogun* promotional site had more "atmosphere" than Rome: Total War (possibly excepting the Campaign Map, possibly not). This is Truth; and ONLY the ***true*** Veterans can know (or judge), as the original site, just before or just after the Shogun release the site was revamped to what exist now.

Shogun was ALL about atmosphere! The Creative Assembly went to great lengths to create and ensure a VERY certain level of (?) Atmospherics.... To an extent exceeding the development effort, in this respect, of ANY of game ever made before or since.

An extreme effort deserving of extreme respect and admiration.

Unless one has viewed the original site, and played Shogun you just don't know.

Things started going downhill with MTW. Much of the Atmospherics was dispensed with. Yet the detailed Maps were not.

I want to *feel* like a Damiyo in Japan.
I want to *feel* like a Medieval Lord.
I want to *feel* like a Roman General.

In order to *feel*, extreme Atmospherics are necessary.

In this regard, any *value* judgment in consideration of a Total War game, must succumb to the primacy of Atmospherics. Atmospherics are crucial to Gameplay, and Gameplay and Atmospherics are EQUAL. Neither should succumb to the other (other areas of the game can be sacraficed.

[The above s/b incorporated into the Mission Statement.]

As I've said the *Technology* is great! Kudos to those deserving.

Yet, in the overal scheme of the game, Technology should NEVER have supremecy over Gameplay and Atmospherics.

The auto-generation technology, at its present stage of development, does NOT enhance either Gameplay, nor Atmospherics.

The non-auto-generated maps are superior in both Atmospherics (visuals) and Gameplay (terrain).

Additionally, the fact that the technology does not, as yet, allow for ***Replays*** is a non-starter. No need to expand upon this much further, as CA has admitted their error in comprehending the value of the Replay feature.

The one thing I will say, is that Developers are Gamers, but, Developers aren't ***Players****. The time and effort that Developers put into Developing is equal and equivalent to that which *Players* put into Playing. Players could NEVER be developers and Developers could NEVER be Players. They are both Gamers!

This is WHY, we, the Hardcore, need to be CONSULTED and LISTENED too!

We know what *you* don't, just as you know what *we* don't. [Like why the heck we can't have MP Campaigns!! joking, joking....]

If Technology doesn't meet the Mission Statement criteria, it shouldn't make it into the game; and if the *Players* tell you that the Technology doesn't meet the, needs, wants and/or desires to the extent necessary, then the Mission Statement needs to be revamped---or, a new adherence applied.

I have absolutely no doubt that auto-generated maps will eventually meet and exceed previous standards of both Atmospherics and Gameplay. Just gimme back the original map styles until such time, thank you.

TS

BTW, Wonders and other eye-candy can never be a trade-off for Gameplay.

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Oh yeah,

Quote:

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Tell me, why is the RTW one is just a
400 men hiding besides a tree.
and
MTW one is
hundreds of men fighting in a open field?
Don't you smell something deliberate?

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Show me how it matters?

I wasn't looking at the *men* on-the-field, I was looking at THE FIELD!

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P.S., to ANYONE who thinks *I* am looking through Rose-colored, think AGAIN! Proof is in the Maps, and beyond that, time will tell.

Who knows better, a Player who's invested his personal time in the game PLAYING; or, the Engineer who's spent his business time Engineering?

IMUHO, the Total War Mission Statement should incorporate the Tenets of the Hippocratic Oath-----you know, generally, "do no harm". Here is the last line:

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If I fulfill this Oath and do not violate it, may it be granted to me to enjoy life and art, being honored with fame among all men for all time to come; if I transgress it and swear falsely, may the opposite of all this be my lot.

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:bow:

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Oh well, I understand Chris Taylor is back in the game, so the RTS competition has been--stepped up. Thank goodness.

~D

RTW is quite bad in my opinion.....

RTW is no longer Total War....

The Medieval times were a complete bloodhshed...Ruthless rulers assembled their huge armies and fought on the battlefield..... Thousands of men died.... This is Total War!!!! This is the true meaning of this game series!!!!

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Originally Posted by edyzmedieval

The Medieval times were a complete bloodhshed

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And the Roman times weren't? Caesar killed a million Gauls in his conquests!

Yes but in RTW you don't get the struggle for territory seen in S/MTW but a mere slow slog around the map. The major problems are the pathetically slow movement rate (presumably the turn-based game is the limiting factor here) and an AI that is incapable of playing its own game. The AI was week in MTW (the scissors-paper-stone mechanic was weakened by the unit variety) but it really does appear to be the same AI code in RTW. This can be the only reason why it cannot follow the rules of its own game. Coupled with the diminished importance and effect of elevation and fatigue (try assaulting a hill top army in North Africa in both games and tell me which models the heat etc better) and tactic become unimportant. I stopped playing RTW when I realised I spent more time chasing routers then fighting. Mods bravely attempt to redress the balance, but the underlying flaws are still there. If I could return my copy of RTW then I would.

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Originally Posted by Slyspy

The major problems are the pathetically slow movement rate...

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I'd agree with you there. Armies move around far too slowly.

But I still think that RTW is a pretty decent game, depite some of its flaws.

Regarding the auto generated maps.

I agree that the manually created maps for Shogun were very good & RTW maps are plain, tactically dull & generally uninspiring.
The 1.2 maps are somewhat better I think.
No replays is a bad loss.

But there is some advantage to the autogeneration though; 10,000 different maps on just the base game + the ability to make some comparitively minor alterations to text & graphic files to create a brand new strategy map with a completely different geographical focus.

If 1.2 showed progress & BI/2.0(?) goes further then the future could be bright, particularly since the modders have discovered the ability to place custom tiles within an otherwise auto-generated map.

Come to think of it, clever/well resourced modders should be able to craft good manual maps for certain chokepoints where battles can be expected to occur fairly often & specific areas of note as well as important cities & have them integrate with the autogeneration.
Hopefully we'll get there before China:TW or whatever full sequel comes out...

[edit]

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You will need to reinstall soon because the AI's Revenge Mod is almost done.

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Need linkage! :jawdrop:

BTW, I saw something about BI having a new savegame format & really hope that means AI state + map randomness will be stored for savegame continuity & campiagn gam. replays :balloon2:

Oh man, those MTW screenshots make me want to go play MTW again.

a little confused i am
(having just fixed the battle wonders download - it had a tile missing - ER emailed me detailed instructions on how to make the missing tile, he is away from his own pc for a few days - new version is 30 mins more to finish upload)

anyway that was my first foray into editing maps in rome and something does not add up

the map/tile i edited was centered on a specific co-ordinate on the campaign map

i "made" the map/tile 3 time to ensure i had put the model exactly where ER wanted it to be

and each time the map was the same
the trees and hillocks in the same places...

NOW
battle replays
dont we fight our campaign battles on a specific co-ordinate on the campaign map?
therefore could not the co-ordinate be included in the "campaign battle replay"?
as long as the "viewer" has the same modded/unmodded campaign map the battle should be on the same ground


where is my theory wrong?

barocca
A custom tile has all the geography saved in a (3MB) file. As a result everything is the same time after time.

Non-custom tiles (the ones who are generated from the campaign map) have changes since the engine uses random modifiers/fractal noise/tolerance ranges to calcalute the geography of the land. As a result the tile will be different the next you play it, although the geography on a large scale will look mostly similar.

A possible solution for CA might be to save the tile upon which the campaing/mp/custom battle took place. The replay can then use the geography of the saved non-custom tile to make sure that the geopgraphy is the same as in the original battle. The downside is that replays will be 3MB more, but I guess that is a price most are wiling to pay.

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Originally Posted by Duke John

....... the engine uses random modifiers/fractal noise/tolerance ranges to calcalute the geography of the land. As a result the tile will be different the next you play it, although the geography on a large scale will look mostly similar......

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oki, so these are numbers right?
the numbers are used by the engine to calculate the difference between what has occured in campaign against the base tile and generate an adjusted map

SO
since they are numbers, set values upon which the engine calculates changes,
then
simply save these values (random modifiers/fractal noise/tolerance ranges)
just like seed values in civ maps

B.

Well, that was what I try to say in my 3rd paragraph :uneasy:

One thing to remmber is that autogenerated maps keep track of things like nearby ships, or what buildings exists in some city.

Just having basic map is not enough.

AFAIK its possible to use all the maps in MP by just adding the coordinates to a txt file and the replays for it work too. So replays for campaign battles shouldnt have been that difficult to implement. It appears CA was surprised that people wanted replays ~:confused:


CBR

If you want to see good auto-gen'ed battles, check out Mount and Blade. CA should've made an auto-gen like that were the basic parameters of the map would be set (elevation of the four corners of the map, slope, hillyness, etc. then generated a unique map, so we could actually have some real terrain. The M&B one was designed by one guy, and the maps (still in beta!) are a lot better.

Crazed Rabbit

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It's interesting that you atribute sheild bonuses, flanking and elevation bonuses to a mod when in fact they are features of RTW.
Of course modding units stats, as in RTR may very well have increased the noticeablility of these features and added value to them.

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Hey Intrepid Sidekick, glad you could join the discussion. Perhaps now, 1 year after release, somebody from CA would care to comment on:

- do you feel that all these ideas present in Rome: Total War would have been better justified with a non-deadline, non-hyped game?
- does creating a mood, a flavour, within a game, take time?
- once you have a lot of new ideas, dont you need time, instead of yet another preview/interview or a new idea?
- tell us hardcore fans what went wrong... c'mon you know we still love you.

Perhaps rephrasing:
- When you tried to set the balance the first time (with which some players disagree now), that was of course well intended, but was it rushed in any way?

Never mind you already answered it here:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showt...437#post721437

Oh, and to reply to the discussion: Hand on my heart, Rome looks better than MTW. But MTW feels more like a game, whereas RomeTW feels like a lot of new ideas & hype, and a bit of a game as well...

On a different note, are you excited about the possibilities Windows Graphics Foundation has in store? How will unified shaders benefit (rome) Total War? Does this mean dragons ~:) ?

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Originally Posted by Coldfish

First of all...i don`t want to argue with anyone.....BUT,come on ....for those who think RTW is bad....let`s face it.....don`t tell that just because u got bored of RTW...that`s the problem i think...everyone started criticised RTW because they got bored of it.....how come at the beginning almost no one criticised the game.that`s the truth guys.RTW is a great game...and it always be a great game.peace!

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You don't get bored of great games. You get bored of weak games. I am bored of R:TW. I am not bored of M:TW. One has been out a year, one has been out for four years. You work out which is the weak game.

See I don't think its that bad because I don't get enough time to play it. 2-3 hours a day is the most time I ever get for games and that's split between multiple games so I never really get a chance to get bored of it hehe.

Reading this thread makes me sad, and think I should uninstall it after starting to play it :(

It isn't that bad, it's still a good game, you're just comparing it to a better one. Credit to CA for making games that are so hard to beat.

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Originally Posted by Carth

Credit to CA for making games that are so hard to beat

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My sentiments precisely

It's not so much that it's hard to beat, it's just that it takes forever to control the entire map. Getting 15 provinces with any province isn't very hard, and getting 50 is only a matter of time.

I have been playing RTW for about 2 months now and I think by far its one of the best strategy games I've ever played mainly because theres actually strategy involved much more than people make it out for. I mean when you think about it most real time strategy games are just build up armies then send them to die (COUGH warcraft 3 COUGH). Even Command and COnquer is just a mass and kill game with some strategy involved by what unit to kill first and how to kill it.

So basically if you like the Total War series... get it and check it out besides they are coming out with the Barbarian invasion(an invasion? boy sounds familiar) expansion.

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Originally Posted by Coldfish
First of all...i don`t want to argue with anyone.....BUT,come on ....for those who think RTW is bad....let`s face it.....don`t tell that just because u got bored of RTW...that`s the problem i think...everyone started criticised RTW because they got bored of it.....how come at the beginning almost no one criticised the game.that`s the truth guys.RTW is a great game...and it always be a great game.peace!

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Your kidding right? ~:confused: Many of us veterans complained from the day we bought it. I didnt even keep it a week so you can hardly say I got bored of it. Maybe you didnt hear the critisism but those of us who stayed with VI and MTW sure had plenty ot say about its short comings. Im still in no rush to buy it again after reading this thread.

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Originally Posted by Mr.Giggles

I have been playing RTW for about 2 months now and I think by far its one of the best strategy games I've ever played mainly because theres actually strategy involved much more than people make it out for. I mean when you think about it most real time strategy games are just build up armies then send them to die (COUGH warcraft 3 COUGH). Even Command and COnquer is just a mass and kill game with some strategy involved by what unit to kill first and how to kill it.

So basically if you like the Total War series... get it and check it out besides they are coming out with the Barbarian invasion(an invasion? boy sounds familiar) expansion.

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I think Warcraft III has a good amount of strategy in it. In RTW the AI is so bad you can train one unit and take on full armies without much trouble. Try to do that in Warcraft III, it won't work. Your force has to be a mix of units. Even in battle, you have to be quick about which special skills you want your units to use and make sure to target them right. When it comes to playing with the pros this "micromanaging" means all the difference.

RTW is more realistic than War3 so maybe you could say it has more realistic strategy but as far as the number of ways to go about a battle, War3 wins by far.

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Originally Posted by CMcMahon

It's not so much that it's hard to beat, it's just that it takes forever to control the entire map. Getting 15 provinces with any province isn't very hard, and getting 50 is only a matter of time.

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That's not what I meant lol. I was referring to RTW not being worse than MTW and hence NOT "beating" it. Credit to CA for STW and MTW being so good that it was hard to make a game better than them...

Damn I can't edit my post? I had one too many nots in there, should read "I was referring to RTW being worse".

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Originally Posted by Krauser

I think Warcraft III has a good amount of strategy in it. In RTW the AI is so bad you can train one unit and take on full armies without much trouble. Try to do that in Warcraft III, it won't work. Your force has to be a mix of units. Even in battle, you have to be quick about which special skills you want your units to use and make sure to target them right. When it comes to playing with the pros this "micromanaging" means all the difference.

RTW is more realistic than War3 so maybe you could say it has more realistic strategy but as far as the number of ways to go about a battle, War3 wins by far.

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Strategy in Warcraft 3 (or Starcraft, or CnC, or any game like that) is a lot different though, because of the way the game is setup. Terrain makes a bit of a difference, but it's not a real case of who holds what ground or who's defending or whatnot, it's more of a case of who can click on what unit fast enough to kill their superunit(s) faster and then force him to react to you. In RTW, you can setup ambushes on a tactical scale, by hiding in trees or behind hills where the enemy can't see you, come around from behind and nail them, or divide their troops. It's rare that you see things like that in a traditional RTS, just because of the way the levels are setup.

1. Is there anyone who plays to lose ? I pity them. :duel:

2. Isn't ancient battles are fought on flat terrain because of logistic in
moving large armies basically on foot ?

3. It's just me but I feel like 'Man of the hour' thing is better than simply be
able to appoint Generals according to own feels. I never appoint peasants
as generals in MTW eventhough they somehow were 'born' with 5-6 stars.

4. RTW maps simply better than MTW in term of realism. Well in MTM you
can't simply surprise your opponent right ? :charge:
With the chess board borderline you can always see there's a large stack
of forces (enemy or alies) next to you. Not like RTW if they're in ambush.

5. My personal experience : I have almost same ratio of battlefield and siege
battles. At least in RTW I can choose my battleground.

6. In RTW all are pagans so I don't feel 'miserable' if I'm sending crusades to
Moslem factions while playing as Catholics. ~:cheers:

7. The only thing I feel I like MTW better is that certain units can be built
after certain period has come.

8. I don't mind fantasy units. Haven't you guys paly starcraft ?

~:handball:

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Originally Posted by CMcMahon

Strategy in Warcraft 3 (or Starcraft, or CnC, or any game like that) is a lot different though, because of the way the game is setup. Terrain makes a bit of a difference, but it's not a real case of who holds what ground or who's defending or whatnot, it's more of a case of who can click on what unit fast enough to kill their superunit(s) faster and then force him to react to you. In RTW, you can setup ambushes on a tactical scale, by hiding in trees or behind hills where the enemy can't see you, come around from behind and nail them, or divide their troops. It's rare that you see things like that in a traditional RTS, just because of the way the levels are setup.

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Yeah, but I think War3 requires more of a mix in armies than RTW. There are units in RTW that are strong enough to take on an army by themselves. This comes back to the bad AI. If the AI was really good I think there would be a need for a good mix of units but right now you could just build a bunch of heavy infantry and last easily. I think War3 is more strategic because there are more different types of units and you are forced to have a mix because there is no 'one' unit that can take everything. I agree that RTW is a different kind of strategy. The terrain makes a pretty big difference in RTW but not much at all in War3. As far as units go though, War3 has many different kinds of units each having a few special abilities to think about plus resources are harder to get so there are more factors to think about. Save up for a more powerful unit but possibly be caught off guard or churn out cheap units that die quickly. Through the course of the game one also needs to consider when to upgrade to that more powerful unit lest you get behind technology wise.

Back to the point, he was saying that War3 has almost no strategy. I disagree with this. I believe, if anything, they have equal strategy. RTW has more realistic strategy. How to manuver troops and where to place them. When to charge and when to stay back. War3 just has a lot of varied units where the strengths of each need to be used in order to be successful. Terrain and placement of troops doesn't matter much but there are so many different kinds of units and abilities that a lot of attention is needed to see what units the enemy has, what units would be best to counter them, and how to use those units best in combat(when to use their abilities).

Sorry for long post hehe

That's mainly true, but you have the same problem with a lack of variety in WC3. Let's see, once you get her fully upgraded, and get your archers fully upgraded, you can use just a Priestess of the Moon and a sh1tload of Night Elf archers and wipe out just about anything. The same goes with tons of (semi-)upgraded wyverns for the Orcs.

Now that I think about it, pretty much the only time I ever really used tactics in WC3 was with massed wyvern attacks. Fly in from behind, take out as many people as I can, go to my healers that are in a corner somewhere, heal up, rinse, and repeat. With everything else, it's was always a matter of trying to keep ranged weapons at bay until the enemy infantry is dead.

Look, I'm of the opinion that RTW is still the best of all three games. Graphics aside, many of the features of the game make it significantly better than MTW. I haven't been at the forum for that long, but there was still problems/faults with MTW too! Some annoying/strange things about MTW that in my humble opinion are better in RTW are:

1) arbitrary allocation of vices/virtues - ie, the coward one! Its not that cowardly in my opinion for your general who's army is getting annihilated and has fought to the extent that he's had chevrons increase to retreat, but the moment your general retreats in that game - bang! he's a coward! ANNOYING!
2) one little thing which I'm sure some other people did once or twice in MTW was the naval systems assisted conquest of the eastern world - in one turn!! It was quite easy to build up a massive military force and after destroying every muslim ship in the mediterranean conquer the entire north coast of africa, the middle east and turkey - IN ONE TURN!!!!!!!!!! not that easy in RTW thanks to the better naval system (and don't complain about, boo-hoo, it takes me several turns to get a fleet from england to antioch - deal with it) better than conquering the east in one foul swoop!
3) no diplomacy, whatsoever, and diplomacy didn't mean a damn thing - sure RTW isn't the best, but its still better than MTW, at least you can get squeeze money out of defeated enemies.
4) the whole annoying marriage issue in MTW, either get your heir a foreign princess (which wasn't possible once your powerful), or have the rest of your royal family ever after as drunks, fools and/or inbred!
5) the slow cumbersome battles.
6) not being able to deploy your own troops in attack.
7) sieges being so boring/useless that you autoresolve every single one of them.
8) on characters again, even though you get command stars a little too easy in RTW, at least you can develop someone from 0 stars to 10 stars, not that easy in MTW (unless you owned constantinople).
9) hardly any faction diversity in MTW, especially with the catholics!
10) little things we all exploited like the early period turkish ransoming of the egyptian sultan...... several times.......

As someone who only plays computer games relatively rarely, RTW does offer a challenge (if any computer game is ever reaaaaallllyyyyy challenging.....). As other people here have said, the publishers are making their games for people like me, not the hardcores who have played the TW series far to much and know exactly what nooks and crannies to exploit to make the game easier. In my opinon, if you want a challenge, go and climb mount everest or write a book or whatever, if you want a bit of simple fun, play a computer game, like the noble and fun RTW! so rome total war, is it that bad: I think not! ~D

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Originally Posted by Norxis

Look, I'm of the opinion that RTW is still the best of all three games. Graphics aside, many of the features of the game make it significantly better than MTW. I haven't been at the forum for that long, but there was still problems/faults with MTW too! Some annoying/strange things about MTW that in my humble opinion are better in RTW are:

1) arbitrary allocation of vices/virtues - ie, the coward one! Its not that cowardly in my opinion for your general who's army is getting annihilated and has fought to the extent that he's had chevrons increase to retreat, but the moment your general retreats in that game - bang! he's a coward! ANNOYING!
2) one little thing which I'm sure some other people did once or twice in MTW was the naval systems assisted conquest of the eastern world - in one turn!! It was quite easy to build up a massive military force and after destroying every muslim ship in the mediterranean conquer the entire north coast of africa, the middle east and turkey - IN ONE TURN!!!!!!!!!! not that easy in RTW thanks to the better naval system (and don't complain about, boo-hoo, it takes me several turns to get a fleet from england to antioch - deal with it) better than conquering the east in one foul swoop!
3) no diplomacy, whatsoever, and diplomacy didn't mean a damn thing - sure RTW isn't the best, but its still better than MTW, at least you can get squeeze money out of defeated enemies.
4) the whole annoying marriage issue in MTW, either get your heir a foreign princess (which wasn't possible once your powerful), or have the rest of your royal family ever after as drunks, fools and/or inbred!
5) the slow cumbersome battles.
6) not being able to deploy your own troops in attack.
7) sieges being so boring/useless that you autoresolve every single one of them.
8) on characters again, even though you get command stars a little too easy in RTW, at least you can develop someone from 0 stars to 10 stars, not that easy in MTW (unless you owned constantinople).
9) hardly any faction diversity in MTW, especially with the catholics!
10) little things we all exploited like the early period turkish ransoming of the egyptian sultan...... several times.......

As someone who only plays computer games relatively rarely, RTW does offer a challenge (if any computer game is ever reaaaaallllyyyyy challenging.....). As other people here have said, the publishers are making their games for people like me, not the hardcores who have played the TW series far to much and know exactly what nooks and crannies to exploit to make the game easier. In my opinon, if you want a challenge, go and climb mount everest or write a book or whatever, if you want a bit of simple fun, play a computer game, like the noble and fun RTW! so rome total war, is it that bad: I think not! ~D

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It's interesting to see a post that solely justifies the current game's backsteps and shortcomings by pointing towards supposed past problems. ~:handball:

"...remove the plank from thine own eye...."

As opposed to other people who nit-pick about every fault (no matter how minor) of the game after spending seemingly endless hours of research into the different aspects of the game! Only to then spend further hours expressing their extreme distaste to this game on a rome:total war forum. my advice to all the people that think RTW is REALLY that bad - play tennis, now thats fun and it gets you out into the fresh air!

I rember fondly playing M:TW as the italians and do a "neo-roman empire" (that and i can get rid of the papacy quick) but the risk board just isnt as fun as the board is know in R:TW i rember in syria my huge twothousand (or was it twenty thousand?) army attacking the Muslim army (forgot the faction names) and had them flanked well when battle commenced we all fought head on, resulting in this huge running battle (all generals killed do to stupidity) and units that wouldnt stop pursuing, only to get whacked at the other end.....at least in R:TW you can flank armies on the board...

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Norxis

As opposed to other people who nit-pick about every fault (no matter how minor) of the game after spending seemingly endless hours of research into the different aspects of the game! Only to then spend further hours expressing their extreme distaste to this game on a rome:total war forum. my advice to all the people that think RTW is REALLY that bad - play tennis, now thats fun and it gets you out into the fresh air!

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Haha. You're describing yourself in context with MTW. It's been said; the fact remains that when MTW was hacked by critics - how many people ceased playing the title? Not many. RTW? Take a look at the history of the community and you'll be in for a severe reality check. And no, I don't play RTW, thankyouverymuch - haven't for months.

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Originally Posted by ChaosLord

I don't get these people who play M:TW and say they have a harder game then R:TW, both of them are easy. I mean I was brand new to the Total War series when I started M:TW and I was kicking the AI around on hard and expert in just a couple of days. Does noone remember the vast peasant/archer/spearman armies? How easy it was to lure the enemy into traps? How dumb the AI could be at times(I remember in the Almohad PBEM I was in, I killed the Spanish king with arrow fire while he sat there, unable to figure out what to do).

It took mods to get any sort of real challenge beyond the artificially induced mass rebellion trigger. Jihads and Crusades were a joke since 90% of the time they had no good general and would become rout fests. The Mongol hordes just needed you to kill their leader, then keep up mass routs and you could kill/capture 10,000+ in a single battle. Added to all this was the ease of mass hiring mercs to scare the AI into retreating or to use as expendable troops in sieges.

Don't get me wrong, i'm not saying I didn't like M:TW. I loved it, as I love R:TW. But M:TW was barely and just barely harder then R:TW when it came to battles, and it was brain dead when it came to the strategy map. R:TW like M:TW is slowly getting better as the mods are worked on, mods like R:TR and hopefully EB as well as Senjoku Jidai(sp?) and Zhao Total War in the future. I win a good portion of my battles in R:TR with the same ratios I did in M:TW mods, and often times the battles are harder(fighting phalanx civs with barbarians or such).

Oh and Simon, you should check out the MedMod for M:TW. Although it does focus alot on balancing things it also changes the lineups to be more historical as well as the factions. WesW and the people who have contributed to the mod have done an amazing job on it.

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I agree wholeheartedly.

I played STW and MTW before playing RTW.

I vividly remember the problems of the AI in MTW, such as reshuffling their stack right as I approached, or sitting just out of their range with Pavise Arbalesters, causing them to run back and forth in a small area until they were exhaused. I remember defeating the Mongols with a fraction of their strength even though they just showed up one turn with multiple stacks in each of my Eastern provinces. Oh, and the ever popular 'MTW Parade' where the AI would send units in a long string one-at-a-time.

Oh yes, and I also remember the Peasant Armies. Wow, those were challenging. ~:handball:

I just don't understand the desire to return to the boardgame style map. That's what Risk and checkers are for.

I think RTW is a great game and I will continue to play it. (I also enjoyed STW and MTW) I have now begun playing RTR 6.0 and it is a great mod.

I really don't understand why some people spend so much time on an RTW forum complaining about a game that they don't like. ~:confused:

Boy am I glad that I was right about sitting this incarnation of TW out. It seems most of the vets found the game dissappointing. The demo raised enough doubts for me to wait before purchasing, and after the game was released the fact it got high reviews from gaming sites, and complaints from hard core players just set off more warning bells ringing. When has a serious wargame ever gotten good marks from a mainstream review site? The large number of complaints after so many months is probably enough for me to pass a verdict on this game, although I might pick up the bundled pack in the end if BI fixes the complaints.

Oh and to the original poster. If you found Roman, Ancient Egyptian and Ancient Asian (that's a word I loathe. Asia is too big a place to generalize) history boring and not worth your time, that is most likely due to you not having studied them deeply enough. It is also better not to disparage other people's history, as some people may take offence.

I might have to migrate to Legion Arena and Legion 2 by Slitherine. The funny thing is that there is already a lot of TW vets there already. Now if these low budget games get better gameplay then RTW ......

This is a perfect example of the stagnation, leadership and coordination problems of larger corporations. For example, if IBM was not that closeminded, there will really be no Bill Gates today (may be good or bad according to your POV).

The attraction of the Risk-style map is that the AI actually functions on it. The free space of the RTW map merely highlights the AI's weaknesses.

I too remember those aspects of MTW. In fact I was astonished to find many of the same problems (features?) in RTW as well. That is why I consider the uncluttered simplicity of STW to be superior to both the sequels.

The AI has barely changed since STW while the game itself has changed a fair bit, and that is why RTW is flawed and a waste of potential.

RTW is no longer on my hard drive.

I think that whilst the AI is quite bad, the advent of mods for the game will bring more and more replay value every time one comes out. EB looks like it will be a treat for us, doesn't it?

The way to enjoy RTW is to use your imagination. Imagine being some Macedonian general, and attempt to recreate the Macedonian empire to its fullest. Once you star using your imagination and stop playing the game for the sake of completing it in the smallest time, it will become a fun and enjoyable game.

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Originally Posted by Silver Rusher

I think that whilst the AI is quite bad, the advent of mods for the game will bring more and more replay value every time one comes out. EB looks like it will be a treat for us, doesn't it?

The way to enjoy RTW is to use your imagination. Imagine being some Macedonian general, and attempt to recreate the Macedonian empire to its fullest. Once you star using your imagination and stop playing the game for the sake of completing it in the smallest time, it will become a fun and enjoyable game.

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Deffo!!! i role play this game as much as i can, abiding by certain rules you give yourself, ie, 1 general per army, slows the game down & makes it harder, im actually enjoying this game again, with the aid of rtr 6(gj guys)

I used to be addicted to MTW when my cousin bought it. I fell in love with it and being that he was borderline retarded I got to play it most the time. The megalomania, the sheer scale and depth of the game had me hooked. I had very high expectations for Rome, and they were greatly surpassed. I cannot play MTW anymore no matter how hard I try because RTW made it obsolete. Wonderful game.

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Originally Posted by The Blind King of Bohemia

For me Rome is just not as addictive as medieval was and is. When i first played Shogun and then medieval i just couldn't leave the computer but Rome just didn't have the magic for me.

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agreed.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Silver Rusher

The way to enjoy RTW is to use your imagination. Imagine being some Macedonian general, and attempt to recreate the Macedonian empire to its fullest. Once you star using your imagination and stop playing the game for the sake of completing it in the smallest time, it will become a fun and enjoyable game.

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I agree, but there's a problem because my suspension of disbief is shattered as soon as the battlelines meet. I'm immediately thrown back in front of a keyboard looking at an unbelievable sequence of events as the battle unfolds. At this point, RTW screems at me from the screen, "I'm only a silly game!". The goofball antics happening on the screen seem out of place because I don't play the game to get comedy relief. I've read interviews given by CA where they joke about the comical, unrealistic elements in the game as though they are great features.

Rome: Total War is easily one of the best games to hit the market in the last two years. A little perspective is in order here.

No, it will not make you coffee and massage your feet. Obviously there is room for improvement. But to call it anything less than a fantastic achievement is simply ludicrous.

It's not the best game of all time. Whether it's the best game of the TW series probably depends on your taste. In many ways, it completely blows its predecessors away. However, it's also much more complex than Shogun or Medieval, and that does make the shortcomings of the AI, which has always been the weakest part of the TW series, even more obvious. It has it's share of bugs and quirks, though that was true of all the old ones as well. It's also pushed the TW series into really cool territory that's never been seen before. After Shogun, I thought the castle sieges in Medieval were great. Rome has made all that obsolete in a moment. I can't wait to see where things go from here.

All things considered, you'd have to be crazy to miss out on this game. Not only do you get the vanilla game, which is a pretty phenomenal value for $50, but you get access to more mods and skins and units than you can shake a stick at. CA deserves massive kudos and money for the bang up job they did on this game, and polite reminders of the things they still need to fix. After all, we all want them to make more. ~;)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by LittleRaven

Rome: Total War is easily one of the best games to hit the market in the last two years. A little perspective is in order here.

No, it will not make you coffee and massage your feet. Obviously there is room for improvement. But to call it anything less than a fantastic achievement is simply ludicrous.

It's not the best game of all time. Whether it's the best game of the TW series probably depends on your taste. In many ways, it completely blows its predecessors away. However, it's also much more complex than Shogun or Medieval, and that does make the shortcomings of the AI, which has always been the weakest part of the TW series, even more obvious. It has it's share of bugs and quirks, though that was true of all the old ones as well. It's also pushed the TW series into really cool territory that's never been seen before. After Shogun, I thought the castle sieges in Medieval were great. Rome has made all that obsolete in a moment. I can't wait to see where things go from here.

All things considered, you'd have to be crazy to miss out on this game. Not only do you get the vanilla game, which is a pretty phenomenal value for $50, but you get access to more mods and skins and units than you can shake a stick at. CA deserves massive kudos and money for the bang up job they did on this game, and polite reminders of the things they still need to fix. After all, we all want them to make more. ~;)

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I agree completely. Id played Medieval for a long time and was considering getting rome but was reading so much bad stuff about it. but i gave it ago and it blew me away. Seriously dudes put everything into perspective, rome is a brilliant game, and the variation of mods just blew me away. Ok the AI is worse than in Medieval Total War but so what. The beuty of the game blew me away and the shere effort put in by creative assembly is awesome. I mean you can look at your settlement on the map, your army is placed where it would be on the campaign map, the campaign map is in sync with the battle map ( i.e forests, bridges) and you can use the campaign map to your advantage. The sieges are awesome, you can use ladders rams and siege towers without a special unit for it. I dont care if one unit ever existed, the TW series has taught me more about history then most of my complete book collection.

So please put it into perspective dudes it might not be perfect, but its an awesome game

Quote:

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Originally Posted by LittleRaven

Rome: Total War is easily one of the best games to hit the market in the last two years. A little perspective is in order here.

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I disagree. It's not the sort of game that I will go back and play for kicks/immersion. It is not a game that hooks most of us (historical/strategy gamers--NOT RTS.) It isn't a challenge on the battlefield. The other TW series games are better.

I'm just a fool for almost any game with horse archers in it.

But seriously, folks, the strategic game's movement system and other features are a marvel. I look at R:TW as a very good game that clearly within reach of becoming a great one — which makes its shortcomings harder for many folks to take.

The bad word of mouth from the hard-core base and the massive modding done on the game are sending clear signals to CA. If anything, I think the criticism is much too harsh. I'm going to give Barbarian Invasions a whirl.

How can I not love a game with Huns? (See first sentence.)

If BI messes the Huns up, I'll get the mod.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Red Harvest

I disagree. It's not the sort of game that I will go back and play for kicks/immersion. It is not a game that hooks most of us (historical/strategy gamers--NOT RTS.) It isn't a challenge on the battlefield. The other TW series games are better.

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Maybe. But even if you believe that, Medieval was released in 2002. Shogun in 2000. What games were released in the past two years that were better than Rome? Are you seriously going to maintain that it's not one of the best games since 2003?

I can appreciate that you don't like it as much as its predecessors. I agree that in some ways it is weaker. (I don't think the AI is actually worse, but the system is more complex, so it seems worse.) But the game has its strengths as well. It's a very promising start for a new engine and I'm very hopeful about where the series could go from here. And at $50, it's still a heck of good entertainment value.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Doug-Thompson

But seriously, folks, the strategic game's movement system and other features are a marvel. I look at R:TW as a very good game that clearly within reach of becoming a great one — which makes its shortcomings harder for many folks to take.

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Bingo. Last night I fought a battle on a road near the sea where I had built a guard tower. Not only did I see the road and my guard tower on the battle map, but I could see my fleet in the distance! Holy crap! The potential here is enormous.

For what it's worth, I do think that Rome misses it's full potential. Battles ARE too fast. The AI IS lacking. And the grouping bug is REALLY REALLY annoying.

But even firing at 90% power, Rome is a huge, HUGE step forward for the series and the genre in a lot of ways. There's a lot to like, and very good reason to be excited about the future.

RTW is quite bad.

The AI sucks, tons of bugs but the big plus is the graphics.
MTW is better made, although bad graphics.

At least 5000 Gamespot members disagree with you. Most newbies notice nothing of the AI.

It's only STW and MTW seasoned vets that notice and compare it at all.
I have yet to find the first RTW-owner who thinks it's crap without owning MTW/STW.

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Originally Posted by edyzmedieval

RTW is quite bad.

The AI sucks, tons of bugs but the big plus is the graphics.
MTW is better made, although bad graphics.

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I see why people would think that, edyzmedieval, but I think it's wrong to look at RTW as a prettier, dumbed-down MTW.

I've been a major whiner about graphics wagging the gameplay dog on many forums, including this one. What I like about the strategy map is not the looks, but the mechanics.

For example, just today I sent a Roman general with an all-mercenary cavalry force deep into the steppes. They surrounded an enemy capital city, which was lightly held, and besieged it. The enemy faction leader and his heir are inside, as my agent informed me before the raid.

After the siege began, the Roman general hired some mercenary infantry to build the rams and such. My plan is to take the town next turn, killing the two leading members of the royal family, then exterminate the capitol city population and demolish all the buildings I can, then leave.

You couldn't do those sorts of things in MTW.

Which means that you can beat up on the poor old AI on the strategy map even more than on the battle map. RTW greatest new feature is also the one that most highlights the deficiencies of the AI.

To repeat for emphasis, the MUCH better strategy map with the MUCH wider array of options makes it that much easier to beat up on the poor old AI. RTW's greatest new feature made the game too easy.

I've yet to see the the AI ever launch an amphibious invasion. Come to think of it, does the AI ever hire mercenaries?

The much richer array of strategy options all go to the human player's benefit.

I'd like to see on-line play of the strategy game. Relatively short, limited campaigns. Now that would be tough. And I'm not even an on-line player.

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Originally Posted by Doug-Thompson

I've yet to see the the AI ever launch an amphibious invasion. Come to think of it, does the AI ever hire mercenaries?

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I am re-playing Rome Total Realism v6 as Roman on VH campaign. The Greeks have bought a fair number of mercenaries (Samites, Etruscans etc) early on. They have also landed several large (one full stack) armies in south Italy to try to reclaim their lost cities.

In the previous game, right up to the 50th province (and accompanying CTD :rolleyes:), the Ptolemics and the Seleucids were repeatedly coming at me with powerful stacks, bolstered by mercs, sometimes shipped by sea. I was fighting perpetual to and fro sea battles while Greece, Macedon, Numidia, Carthage and Iberia were also warring against me. It was great fun - best end game of a TW game I've played.

I think some of the apparent AI deficiencies in vanilla are actually just reflections of weak AI starting positions. Aside from the Romans and Egyptians, most factions in vanilla start rather weak. Given them a lot of money (by VH campaign & rich provinces) and some decent starting armies plus good recruitable units, and you get a more competitive game.

Sounds like I'm going to have to go with the Total Realism mod. It sounds great.

I'm going to take advantage of my computer crash though. I'll have a fresh (except for patches) install of RTW. No "no horse jumping" mod. No fix for horse archers post patch. I'll install BI right over RTW and have a pure vanilla sample to work with.

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Originally Posted by LittleRaven

Maybe. But even if you believe that, Medieval was released in 2002. Shogun in 2000. What games were released in the past two years that were better than Rome? Are you seriously going to maintain that it's not one of the best games since 2003?

I can appreciate that you don't like it as much as its predecessors. I agree that in some ways it is weaker. (I don't think the AI is actually worse, but the system is more complex, so it seems worse.) But the game has its strengths as well. It's a very promising start for a new engine and I'm very hopeful about where the series could go from here. And at $50, it's still a heck of good entertainment value.

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Lower the bar enough and squeeze the range enough and you can claim anything you want about it or any other game. I compare RTW to similar style games that I have and its own siblings. As for better games, Civil War Bull Run is much more interesting on the battlefield and at about $20 IIRC when I bought it, soon after release. It is actually an opponent worth playing. Haven't bought many others lately, I wasted a bunch of time on RTW, can't say that the game itself was satisfying. I did expand my knowlege of period warfare and history greatly trying to figure out why the game didn't give the right feel. That's hardly a ringing endorsement of a game...it made me want to acquire more history books instead of playing. In that regards it has been an extremely expensive purchase.

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Originally Posted by Red Harvest

Lower the bar enough and squeeze the range enough and you can claim anything you want about it or any other game. I compare RTW to similar style games that I have and its own siblings.

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I'm lowering the bar by saying Rome is one of the best games in the last two years?

Holy cow. That's one heck of a standard you have. A game can't be a success unless it's what, the best game of all time?

Rome blows away it's siblings in lots of ways. The strategic map opens up options that never existed under the old games. The expanded family tree and traits system is a huge step over the Medieval system. The new engine allows battles on walls and in towns, something we could never do before.

I appreciate that you don't particularly enjoy these advancements, or at least that other problems overshadow your enjoyment of them, and that overall you prefer the old system. That's fine. I quite understand how someone could prefer Shogun or Medieval or Bull Run to Rome. What I can't understand is people saying Rome is a terrible game. It isn't. Not by any reasonable standard whatsoever. And I should know, because I spend entirely too much of my life playing computer games. (and hanging out with people who spent even MORE of their lives playing computer games) MOO 3, now there was a terrible game, and a disappointing sequel to boot. Age of Sail II, yeesh. Or heck, even Black and White, which was a technical marvel and a complete dud as a game. Trust me, in the wide world of computer gaming, Rome is a masterpiece, even considering the footsteps in which it must follow.

My unhapiness with RTW is that it is not challenging. The AI in battle is very easy to beat even with mods! It also has the very bad save/load bug that breaks its strategic game.

At this time I am not sure I want to buy expansion after reading that very little of the game is going to change. I am not talking about added features but instead CA fixing the problems with this engine. I can get a very good mod - Darth mod or RTR for free.

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Originally Posted by LittleRaven

I'm lowering the bar by saying Rome is one of the best games in the last two years?

Holy cow. That's one heck of a standard you have. A game can't be a success unless it's what, the best game of all time?

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It doesn't make my list unless it is something I want to play again; RTW isn't, unlike its siblings. I have many old games that can't hold a candle to RTW based on looks, but they are ones I still like to play (and I'm still doing scenario development on one from 1998.)

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Rome blows away it's siblings in lots of ways. The strategic map opens up options that never existed under the old games. The expanded family tree and traits system is a huge step over the Medieval system. The new engine allows battles on walls and in towns, something we could never do before.

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It has the *potential* to blow them away, but it fails due to sloppy execution. That potential was why I spent time on RTW in the first place. The gameplay isn't as satsifying in RTW for me.

The strategic map looks great, and has potential, but the AI is so weak strategically that it doesn't really carry over into gameplay. The AI doesn't employ its armies well, so it adds an extra dimension of weakness to gameplay. It also results in some weak tactical maps. I could go into some detail here as to why this is so...I'm working on something related at the moment, concept development trying to figure out how to work around this, just back burner project I've been thinking about. MTW handled it by making detailed maps that used the border crossing to determine which ones in a pool could be generated. RTW is using a sort of smoothed surface of the entire strat map as a starting point, and this does not allow as much of a realistic countour/vegetation effect as is really needed. The RTW battlefield terrain doesn't come into play sufficiently when compared to STW or MTW.

Unfortunately, the traits system is so badly bugged that it is a hindrance to the game. It gives you 10 star generals in no time by double counting, etc. It could have been a step forward, but a badly bugged implementation made it a step backward gameplay wise. I would prefer to play without the current RTW traits.

If you don't like RTW so much why are you still here?
No one is pointing a gun at your head and saying "play this game, or else".

Indeed. 'Is RTW really that bad'? Hell no

"...its pretty much common knowledge that the game sucks more than Michael Jackson in a boyscout meeting..."

It's not without its flaws, but I spent 36 hours straight playing it when it first came out, and I am not an eyecandy fan, except in as much as clear graphics helps me see precisely what is going on (troop facings, etc.).

The AI isn't much of a challenge. Some people reckon it's the same AI as MTW, others think it's worse. I suspect that it's the same AI, but put in a more variable tactical situation, where some unit types need to maintain inter-unit cohesion to even survive, it does a worse job. the new freeform nature of the map doesn't do the StratAI any favours either. Casual MP is broken because units can stack one on top of the other and the uber tactic (sans self-imposed restrictions) is the blob-of-all-your-cavalry-charging. The challenge for me is to achieve my conquests with the minimum loss of troops possible, and win battles by the maximum margin.

I dispute the assertions that "you only get siege battles". I've fought over 120 battles in my Julian campaign, and less than 50 of those were sieges. Some of the field battles were reliefs of sieges, but the cities are what the strategy is all about, so this is hardly surprising. Personally, I despise the concept of a province-based map.

If you don't care about history, you won't care about the liberties that have been taken in the name of 'game play'.

As a game, it's better than EU2, my previous addiction and has held my interest far better.

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Originally Posted by KSEG

If you don't like RTW so much why are you still here?
No one is pointing a gun at your head and saying "play this game, or else".

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Yeah very true.
Sure they have the right to express themselfs but most of them have already done that, several times even.
Say how you feel one time and then move on.
Stop beating on a dead horse because CA won't change the game to your liking.
The majority of the buyers like the game(with or without mods) so CA won't do anything.

Me, I love the game.
I bought it the day it got out and I still play it and is having fun still.
I say I got my 40$ worth of fun so I'm very happy with my purchase.

The sad thing is the fact the RTW is the best strategy game (ever?) , but only 8 out of 10 .
Again , it is a good , almost very good game , but the bugs , the bugs , the poor AI , the poor diplomacy system , the Generals storming like idiots...the ...the , well , it was said before .

"...the Generals storming like idiots..."

People have maundered on about 'suicide generals' on the various fora... and I'd never seen it happen, more often finding the General sat idle at the back while I devastate his formations. Then, last night, for the first time, the general came at me on an ill-considered charge. I was a bit worried that the weak (8 men) EL cohort which I'd forgotten to leave out of the fight would crumble before help could arrive in the form of a Legionary Cavalry pincer. Imagine my surprise when, after the enemy's bodyguard disintegrated and the general's blood mingled with that of his failed defenders, there were still 8 men left in the cohort. Tough guys.

The reason people who don't like the game keep posting here is because RTW is just about the only historical strategic simulation game in town. They're hoping the series will veer back. I think some of the criticism is overly harsh, but can see where it's coming from.

First and foremost, RTW lost much hardcore fan support because the attempts to make battles more exciting, cinematic and less time-consuming misfired badly. The "Flying Horse" or "Pegasus" problem is my personal favorite: Horses charge a wall of spears and go flying, landing in the middle of the spear formation and disrupting it, resulting in the spear unit's defeat and rout. It might look cool to somebody who never ridden a horse, I suppose.

The second major reason is, RTW is a strategy game where the strategy is pretty obvious and settled. That's the biggest difference between it and MTW.

I bought RTW. I installed it. I took one look at the map and faction descriptions and realized I wanted to start with the Brutaii, conquer Greece, use that as a base to capture Asia Minor and then sweep down into Egypt before conquering Rome. Within days, I wrote a strategy guide for the Brutaii that still stands with little refinement and tweaking.

I could play the Turks or the Almohads in MTW over and over again, because there was a randomness and variety to the games: Crusades and what-not kept you on your toes. You'd try one strategy, get burned and try another. Opening moves and general strategic direction were known, but less predictable in execution. Furthermore, you discussed that strategy in the forum. Stategy discussion was meatier and more enjoyable. One of my favorite threads on any forum was one on how to defend Naples as the Byzantines. In that one, we came up with the idea of just abandoning Naples, deleting all the buildings and invading Sicily. Nobody had ever posted that, and MTW was years old at that point.

The second time I played a Brutaii campaign, there was a definite "been there, done that" feel that wasn't there in MTW. The game's attempts to introduce some inpredictability ranged from ineffective to annoying. You can ignore many Senate missions, for instance, or just pre-empt them. I routinely wipe out factions rather than negotiate Senate-ordered protectorates, and often conquer cities rather than blockade them.

As for the RTW diplomacy system, it isn't broken so much as over-elaborate for this game situation. It's like having a toolbox when all you need's a hammer.

It was all a Catch 22. The strategic obviousness of the game would have been all right if it gave us great tactical battles. The flashier combat would have been tolerable if all those new strategy tools, including that wonderful map, had more purpose and use.

All this is why I'm very hopeful that "Barbarian Invasions" will add more fluidity and impredictability to the game. The barbarians should provide the creative chaos that RTW lacks.

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Originally Posted by Red Harvest

It doesn't make my list unless it is something I want to play again; RTW isn't, unlike its siblings. I have many old games that can't hold a candle to RTW based on looks, but they are ones I still like to play (and I'm still doing scenario development on one from 1998.)

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And herein lies the source of our disagreement. (which isn't nearly as large as the size of our posts would suggest.) You aren't comparing Rome to computer games as a whole. You're comparing it to a tiny subset of games: your favorites from almost a decade of game development.

I'm quite sure that in that company, Rome may not fare so well. Heck, I don't think Rome would make my top 10 games of all time, and it certainly wouldn't make my top 5. Rome has great potential, but you are correct when you point out that the execution did not quite live up to the promise of the engine. From double-counting victories to charge bugs leading to the 'mob of cavalry WIN,' Rome has been haunted by flaws that prevent it from being a truly great game.

However, go to your local Gamestop, and pick out 9 games at random plus Rome. Come home and play them each for 20 hours. Then tell me that Rome isn't one of the top 2.

I play a LOT of games, from a lot of genres. And believe me when I say that Rome is not a terrible game. Very, very far from it. Even with all of its shortcomings, it's still one of the best games released in recent years. You can, I suppose, view this as more of a statement on the quality of video games in general rather than Rome, but the fact remains regardless.

And finally, for those of us that enjoy historical strategy, I don't think pushing the idea that Rome is a terrible game not worthy of purchase is going to be very productive. If we do a very good job of that, we may just convince the suits at CA that the Total War line is not worth continuing. But that's about as good a result as we're going to get. Something about Pyrrhic comes to mind.

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Originally Posted by KSEG

If you don't like RTW so much why are you still here?
No one is pointing a gun at your head and saying "play this game, or else".

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Who says I'm playing the game? I gave up on it back in March. Doesn't mean I can't come in here and give an honest review of it.

I've pointed out where it needs work. I spent a lot of my own time trying to fix what I could. However, there is NOTHING I can do to fix broken AI.

I've played incredible amounts of video games in my day. Too much, some would say.

I've never come across a game with such high superficial accolades as RTW with so many bugs and so many broken features.

The whole game reeks of mellowdramatic conclusion to a revlotionary change.