What did Vanilla get right?

One of the most popular things to do on these forums, as anyone whose been here for any extended period of time will know, is to joke about the historical innacuracy of RTW Vanilla. Units of flaming pigs, massive war-dogs, and Roman ninjas , as well as Oliphaunts, Egyptians wearing solid gold robes to battle, and Britons throwing heads at you with enough strength to kill ya.
Not to mention, while we're at it, the Marian reforms coming about 100+ years early, the appearance of the 'Barbarian' tribes (Gallic, Briton, Germanic, Eastern European, Iberian, etc) and LS day-glo Roman Legions. Truly, when compared to EB, RTW vanilla almost seems like a cartoon.

And so the point of this thread is to invite people to not point out where Vanilla went wrong in its history, but where it went right. What did it show, either in historical events, uniforms, city-building, etc, that was actually historically correct (even if only to some degree).

And let's never forget that, at the end of the day, if it weren't for RTW, EB probably wouldn't exist. Now THERE'S a scary thought...

I don't think they wanted to be 100% historically correct. They just made a game that's fun to play IMO, using ideas most people probably think are correct, or just wouldn't care about. I personally liked them ninja's :laugh4: I can never go back to vanilla though, thankfully they made the game pretty modable so that I have EB to waste my life too. :beam:

Now theres an interesting thought. I haven't played vanilla in years. I remember never finishing my first and only campaign as the Julii because I got tired of this unrealistic superpower struggle with scipii. I think they had the names of the early legions at least correct (hasati, princepes, triari) and they did implement the macedonian phalanx fairly well I suppose. I suppose it probably did a fine hollywood-worthy effort in terms of historical research and portrayal, maybe even a notch above. As far as commercial games go, it ain't half bad. I got it cause I was tired of the no action grand strategy games and ridiculous micro resource management of RTS's, and it delivered pretty well in terms of gameplay. But now compare it to what EB has done with it and vanilla doesn't even deserve a mention I'm afraid, at least in my book.

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Originally Posted by M to the A

I don't think they wanted to be 100% historically correct. They just made a game that's fun to play IMO, using ideas most people probably think are correct, or just wouldn't care about. I personally liked them ninja's :laugh4: I can never go back to vanilla though, thankfully they made the game pretty modable so that I have EB to waste my life too. :beam:

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I think you are absolutely correct here.

They did quite a bit right considering they made a game that was popular enough--that people thought had enough potential--to mod into a spectacular game like EB.

This day in age, that says a lot. Creative Assembly deserves immeasurable amounts of credit for creating an excellent game like RTW.

I went to play vanilla the other day because I was a little bored. I made the Thracian faction playable and started a campaign as them. That's one thing I kinda liked, Vanilla had the Thracian kingdom: I suppose it was supposed to be like Lysimachus' kingdom and thus should not be there, but the mix of phalanx men and Bastarnae was kind of cool.

I only played a few turns, though. I could not take the silly cartoonish atmosphere and utter lack of units. Plus the map seemed so dull and empty. I can't believe that at one time I not only played Vanilla but enjoyed it and over looked all the errors.

Not to say, RTW isn't a great game, I'm just spoiled by EB.

If you look at RTW vanilla, it's actually quite a good achievement. They made units which were all unique and useful on the battlefield. Every unit had its own unique purpose, it's own niche. In EB, though the research is unsurpassed, the art jaw-dropping, and the level of detail godly, a lot of the units are the same functionally. There are 50 types of javelin-throwing spearmen which all function pretty much the same. That's what made RTW such a good strategy game. Even though you had stupid units like berserkers and flaming pigs, they allowed for more unique armies in battle.

It also provided some of us *ahem* with enough insight on a historical topic to want to research it further. I can't say I ever heard of silver shields or Pontos before RTW, but it gave me some names that I could then read about further in books.

They were correct with the Pilos equipped Spartan helms (well at least what we gather historically). My guess is they would have used those with maybe a couple unornamated greek-attic helms

Oddly enough, CA's only downloadable addition they did for RTW, was a new skin for the Spartan Hoplites in which the helm was replaced with IIRC a Corinthian model with officer plume. Also they took off the robe and made them bare-chested.

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Originally Posted by M to the A

I don't think they wanted to be 100% historically correct. They just made a game that's fun to play IMO, using ideas most people probably think are correct, or just wouldn't care about. I personally liked them ninja's :laugh4: I can never go back to vanilla though, thankfully they made the game pretty modable so that I have EB to waste my life too. :beam:

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I am not too much, or at all, annoyed by the ahistoricity of a game that doesn't claim to be a documentary and vanilla would have been fine had not some of the units been downright silly, like the head hurlers, dogs, pigs, ninjas, screeching women and what have you; my problem with these units is not that they were ahistorical, but that they were ridiculous.

Well vanilla obviously had to get some things right, for me the most unexpected thing they got right would be the correct division of the pre-Marian legions, or even the fact that there were pre-Marian legions, but I guess that's good for gameplay as well.

Well .. CA got the names of the units right .. there were legionaries and phalanx pikemen and velites and so on ...
I love EB but have to say that I still play Vanilla too .. it's fun .. I can't imagine that I conquer 10-15 settlements in 10 turns in EB .. but you can do that in Vanilla .. :beam:

Well, Galatia rebels to the Gauls and have Gallic mercenaries, that´s got to count for something.

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Originally Posted by J.Alco

One of the most popular things to do on these forums, as anyone whose been here for any extended period of time will know, is to joke about the historical innacuracy of RTW Vanilla. Units of flaming pigs, massive war-dogs, and Roman ninjas , as well as Oliphaunts, Egyptians wearing solid gold robes to battle, and Britons throwing heads at you with enough strength to kill ya.
Not to mention, while we're at it, the Marian reforms coming about 100+ years early, the appearance of the 'Barbarian' tribes (Gallic, Briton, Germanic, Eastern European, Iberian, etc) and LS day-glo Roman Legions. Truly, when compared to EB, RTW vanilla almost seems like a cartoon.

And so the point of this thread is to invite people to not point out where Vanilla went wrong in its history, but where it went right. What did it show, either in historical events, uniforms, city-building, etc, that was actually historically correct (even if only to some degree).

And let's never forget that, at the end of the day, if it weren't for RTW, EB probably wouldn't exist. Now THERE'S a scary thought...

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100% true, but wouldnt vanilla´s gameplay have been better if CA would have used something similar (or the same) to the government system and the regional system?

Maybe but consider the amount of questions the EB team used to get about how the governments worked.

We people here surfing forums, downloading mods and discussing historical accuracy are not the average buyers. You'll always find lots of people who want a game more complex, more historically accurate, more challenging, but those who pay the company its money (in numerical relation) don't want that. They are satisfied with a bit of everything and a portion of "cool" stuff like shining LS armour, war dogs and different roman families. There probably never will be a game which has no "need" for modding, not because the developers suck, but because they do the game for those they can earn money with.
Game play is a two edged sword.

The original Shogun doesn't really need modding

They got the engine right, it might be full of stupid hardcodes and mod-unfriendly scripting, but you know what? Its a great engine that, while not used to its full potential , is still (In my humble Opinion) one of the better Strat-game engines.


Also, the senate system(albeit historically innacurate-ish and exclusive to Romans for some reason) is something that for some reason, I liked.

I think they just made a good videogame. Excellent game-playing and history accuracy came with EB.

It got the existence of Dacia, Numidia, Scythia, Thrace and the Seleucid Empire right. As in, it actually noticed that these realms existed and included them. Seriously, I would never have guessed they would make their way into the game in the first place, even in this imperfect form. Unlike Macedonia, Greece, Egypt, Gaul, Germania, Carthage and maybe Parthia, they're hardly household names.

^Actually the Seleucid's are pretty household if you call them the Syrians.


Thank the bible for that.

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Originally Posted by Parallel Pain

The original Shogun doesn't really need modding

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:laugh4: :laugh4: :laugh4:

It couldnt get any, but it had battlefield ninjas, blacksuited ninjas, legendary geishas, kensais, 7 clans among the dozens actually important, Imagawa in Kyushu, Takeda in southern Honshu, only peasant ashigarus and it did have a full mongol invaion... But again it's the best TW so far, with the ilustrations, music and japanese battle formations!

I will have to agree with those who say vanilla was not intended to be 100% accurate historically, just provide players with a game they'll have fun with. And I certainly did, before I came across RTW modifications. You know, there are sometimes I just feel like playing good old vanilla again, only to shake my head in dissapointment and play EB with more passion again...

lol. i thought that too. when i had to re-install all my games b/c i lost my hard drive, i played one battle in RTW. i had 6 units of phalanxmen, and they had a bunch of infantry. i routed them with one loss of my own....
i began to cry, not believing at how easy it was to kill them, and i didnt play again untiol i had EB safely installed.

to the OP- nothing!!!!!!!
jk lol

I dont own a copy anymore but have heard that it is impossible to play Shogun on XP.

Is there a patch/fix available for it?

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Originally Posted by Primative1

I dont own a copy anymore but have heard that it is impossible to play Shogun on XP.

Is there a patch/fix available for it?

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Perhaps with an emulator. Med 1 works fine on XP, by the way.

I've never had any problems with Shogun on XP.

i never played shogun :2thumbsup:
EDIT: post 1,255!!!

lol

post 399 :D

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Originally Posted by Lysimachos

We people here surfing forums, downloading mods and discussing historical accuracy are not the average buyers. You'll always find lots of people who want a game more complex, more historically accurate, more challenging, but those who pay the company its money (in numerical relation) don't want that. They are satisfied with a bit of everything and a portion of "cool" stuff like shining LS armour, war dogs and different roman families. There probably never will be a game which has no "need" for modding, not because the developers suck, but because they do the game for those they can earn money with.
Game play is a two edged sword.

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I honestly doubt CA would have lost any money if they'd made vanilla RTW like EB. IMO EB is a lot easier to get into then some other strategy games *cough*all Paradox games*cough*.

I think the main reason CA didn't go the "EB way" is because it would've taken an excessive amount of time, and since they're a company after all, they need to make as much money in as little time as possible



edit: a path to the dark side spammage is, young padawan

what vanilla rtw did right was that battle field is determined by where the 2 opposing armies meet on the campaign map. that is the single most impressive thing ever! that 3D map is the biggest improvement over the original province 2d blocks of the old, even though, it is also the cause of bad diplomacy in the game.

I think the risk style map of STW and MTW was much better for the AI than the continuous map of RTW, at least then it could concentrate its armies.

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Originally Posted by blank

I honestly doubt CA would have lost any money if they'd made vanilla RTW like EB.

I think the main reason CA didn't go the "EB way" is because it would've taken an excessive amount of time

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These two statements are contradictory, or more precisely the second one kills the first.

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Originally Posted by bovi

These two statements are contradictory, or more precisely the second one kills the first.

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I second to that. :laugh4: :sweatdrop: :dizzy2:

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Originally Posted by Primative1

I dont own a copy anymore but have heard that it is impossible to play Shogun on XP.

Is there a patch/fix available for it?

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It doesn't work for me, crashes at the end of the first AI turn. >_>

*Is furious* :furious3:

Gief working Shogun.

Works for me... Have you tried running it as win98 application? (its in properties iirc)

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Originally Posted by bovi

These two statements are contradictory, or more precisely the second one kills the first.

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No, actually they're not.

What i meant was that CA would've sold roughly the same amount of units if they'd put more work in

:laugh4: :laugh4: :laugh4: :2thumbsup: :whip: :wall: :wall:

RTW is the first computer game I've known to even MENTION Seleucids and Thracians, as well as to include Antigonid Macedonians. Having always had an appetite for the old world, and especially the world of the Diadochi, I always hated how games always went:

Persian Wars -> Peloponessian Wars -> Alexander the Great -> Rome/Caesar... :furious3: :smash:

To actually see a game, which acknowledges the existence of minor states like Pontus, or where Hellenistic states weren't merely cannon-fodder for the Romans but rather a cultures in their own right

I just loved it,,,

But I always hate being at the edge of the map, cos it feels so unrealistic with secure borders there. Thats why I love EB, since then my Seleucids are no longer unrealistically isolated in a corner of the map. EB thus fulfills my dreams. Had I loved the Saka, EB would have irritated me just as much, since they live in this unrealistic corner ;) Until computers get good enough to feature the entire of Eurasia, that'll prolly always be the case. But with EB all my favourite factions are now completely in their own, beautiful surroundings. Lots of thanks !

Does anyone still remember the game Praetorians? It was hailed as a great game, taking out the "dull aspects" of Age of Empires (Cutting Wood, mining gold, etc.) I thought at one time, "wow, this game is very good" with it's 3 factions (Romans, Egyptians and Barbarians or was it Germans?) composed of: Spearmen, Legionaries, Archers and Cavalry. And when saw my friend installing Rome Total War, I thought it'd be something similar. Oh boy, was I wrong. It had dozens of factions, all with it's own different units. I was awed by the depth of the game, and I must say it was really revolutionary. It made Praetorians look like a demo. Teehee!

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Originally Posted by J.Alco

and Britons throwing heads at you with enough strength to kill ya.

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Never underestimate the power of the human cranium!

Well, Shogun was revolutionary for blending real time battles with a strategic campaign map and empire building and diplomacy (sort of) but Rome was really a refinement of already existing concepts, and fairly successful, as refinement goes.

It has to be said though that this kind of blending had already been done, in an extremely rudimentary form in 1992 (I think, or was it '91?) with "Centurion: Defender of Rome".

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Tiberius NeroIt has to be said though that this kind of blending had already been done, in an extremely rudimentary form in 1992 (I think, or was it '91?) with "Centurion: Defender of Rome".

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Well before that was Jeanne d'Arc 1989, on Atari, strategy, tactics, history and some arcade with sieges, really one of my best gaming memories!:yes: