Is RTW really that bad

I am more of a FPS fan myself but I fell in love with MTW because I love the Medieval era of time where battles lie in numbers and you can see your enemy and know who your fighting.

I never bought RTW because to be quite honest, I NEVER FOUND THE ROMAN PERIOD interesting WHATSOEVER. Kinda like how I see ancient Egypt or ancient asian culture, a complete waste of my studying time.

Athough I don't like the period though, I always thought about buying the game and infact lost three bids to it on eBay, outbidded on the last minute or outbidded with more than I wish to pay for it. Now, I read here and its pretty much common knowledge that the game sucks more than Michael Jackson in a boyscout meeting.

Well, is their any redeaming qualitys in RTW. I know that I am posting this in the MTW thread but I want veteran TW players and not ones that focus on eyecandy.

It's not a bad game, in fact, if you can look past the stupid AI and the countless bugs, it's a very good game but with oh so much more potential. I just got very bored of it after one campaign. Its main pitfall for me is the exclusion of the RISK board. I loved this in Medieval and really, really did not latch on to the new Board. Maybe it's the fact that armies are so sparse on the board, and they tend to miss each other alot because there's so much room to move, that I barely have any non-Siege battles. Siege can be fun, but when 70% of my battles are sieges, it gets to be a tedious routine.

Of course, there are many great mods coming out for the game, and I never played the vanilla version of the game (downloaded RTR right after I got the game), but these mods will never fix my main gripe with the game - the Board. And, unfortunately, eye candy really doesn't do it for me. Graphics are not a factor at all when I buy a game.

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. I still love playing it and its a great game but i feel CA went for graphics over gameplay.

For the first 6 months i had it...it was great...now i have to force myself to play it...

I was at the point where i was spending 10 minutes a day on it and i had to force myself to do it...then i stoped. :dizzy2:

Not really sure why it got so boring, though. ~:confused: I think it was the AI. ~:handball:

I don't have MTW but i assume it had a worse AI (Since it's alot older) so i would guess that it was even more boring.

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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. I still love playing it and its a great game but i feel CA went for graphics over gameplay.

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You've pretty much summed up my feelings on all 3 games, although you probably still enjoy Rome a lot more than I do--I barely play it anymore.


To mongoose: The AI in the first two games is actually much better than in Rome, both on the strategic level, and in battle. In both Medieval and Shogun, the other factions are generally better at developing their infrastructure and training their more advanced troops (although both games still could've been better in the latter area). And the combat AI in both previous games is far more competent than in Rome. In Shogun and Medieval, the AI forces me to actually fight for my victories, which makes battles far more enjoyable--what's the fun in fighting a battle where you're virtually guaranteed to win? In Rome, combat was a cakewalk; the only battles I ever lost were ones where I was ridiculously outnumbered (by at least 3-to-1 or worse). Most battles in Rome can be won by a simple frontal assault, whereas in Shogun and Medieval you often have to use actual tactics to beat the AI--which I find to be a most welcome change. ~:cool:

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I never bought RTW because to be quite honest, I NEVER FOUND THE ROMAN PERIOD interesting WHATSOEVER. Kinda like how I see ancient Egypt or ancient asian culture, a complete waste of my studying time.

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Roman history leading into Byzantine history is some of the most interesting and important periods in european history, if you dont like Roman history its hard to see how you could like history at all.

RTW is a massive disappointment alone its a 7/10 at best but due to all the hype it got it doesnt even deserve 5/10 total letdown.

Considering mtw was my favorite game ever i would have to say rtw was a let down. Way to many battles are sieges. But rtw is still a great game, but it doesn't have the replay value. I played mtw of and on for about two years and never got old cause it had a way of making you feel your in history but rtw just doesn't have that. I have stopped playing it and waitng for some good mods to come out. With all of that said i wouldd still buy it. It is certainly worth its money.

And one thing to rember, mtw was a lot worse until its expansion came out. The expansion really added a lot of features that made the 100 times as fun, so if you dont want to buy it now wait and see what people say about the expansion.

~:cheers:

Exactly my thought, i think we should wait for EB before pulling the plug on RTW... Another thing i found quite annoying is the fact that RTW is more difficult to mod on the basic things... The unit management system is just awful, and even properly changing ownerships is a pain compared to MTW.

Other than the AI what i can't really stand is the lack of depth on factions outside the roman ones and its replacement with often fantasy units... Plus the fact that many of the ones in the games are quite redundant and doesn't really add fun to the game (try the MTW mod in my sig to see what i mean).

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Originally Posted by King of Atlantis

And one thing to rember, mtw was a lot worse until its expansion came out. The expansion really added a lot of features that made the 100 times as fun, so if you dont want to buy it now wait and see what people say about the expansion.

~:cheers:

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I have to disagree with you on this. Yes, the Viking Invasion expansion pack improved MTW in a lot of ways, but Medieval was still a fun game even by itself. I honestly doubt Barbarian Invasion will be able to do the same for Rome, as the game has too many fundamental flaws--especially the poor AI and faction imbalance.

And hey, if it turns out I'm wrong about that, I'll be more than happy to admit it, believe me. But until I read the reviews and see what other Org members have to say about it, I won't even consider purchasing Barbarian Invasion. Shogun and Medieval are both superb, but Rome has made me very leery of buying anymore Total War games.

I know mtw was good without the expansion but the expansion really added alot to the game. CA seems to left out a lot of stuff from rtw so that they could make more money on an expansion. The one thing i would like to see in the next total war game is the return of the risk board. It is a lot less realisticc as a feature, but in turn it makes for more realistic gameplay

*faster(realistic) troop movements
*battles in the province instead of constent siege.

~:cheers:

Ah, well than I stand corrected. Sorry for misinterpreting your words; my bad! :oops:

I have mixed feelings about returning to the old Risk-style map, but I know where you're coming from. As you pointed out, it's not as realistic as Rome's 3D map, but you're also right in that Medieval's gameplay was probably better because of the Risk-style map.

I like Rome's map because it offers a lot more possibilites as far as placing armies, forts, watchtowers, etc. Unfortunately, this makes Rome's AI (which of course isn't the brightest to begin with) have an even more difficult time coping than it would otherwise. At least with Shogun and Medieval's maps, the AI has far fewer locales on which it has to form a battleplan. On Rome's map, there are literally thousands of different battlefields the AI has to deal with.

Now I actually prefer Rome's army movement system, although I do believe they should be able to cover a lot more ground per turn than they do now. (An army can only make it a couple hundred miles per season?? Come on!! Unless you're traversing mountainous terrain the whole way, even the slowest army could move 500 miles in a month.). It's always seemed a little silly to me that an army in Medieval can only move one province per turn, no matter how small it is. That said, I also agree I've fought far too many city battles on Rome's 3D map; castles seiges don't happen nearly as often in Medieval, which I think is as it should be.

In the end, while both maps have advantages and drawbacks, I think I'd ultimately prefer the Risk map. It's simpler to manage my provinces and my armies on the 2D map, and it's definitely easier for the AI to manage its provinces and armies! If getting rid of the nice-looking (and strategically open) 3D map improves the gameplay overall, then so be it. ~:cool:

Well, I think the answer to the map issue is pretty simple. Keep the 3D map but have the same response (battle ensues) whenever an army crosses into a province. Thus you can keep the beauty of the Rome campaign map and also have a situation that the AI can handle whereby armies always meet when a province is invaded (and all armies in the province meet the invader).

I can play a battle in RTW and more or less only lose the men killed by friendly fire. This often leads to 10 to 1 or even 100 to 1 kill ratios. In MTW a great battle would have about a 5 to 1 kill ratio (especially if playing with a Mod that turned peasants off). What's more, there are lots of battles that are really close, especially when the AI (which moves last) unexpectedly reinforced. I don't think I ever lost a battle in Rome once I learned how to play. I lose battles all the time in MTW. Also having many different factions to choose from in MTW is really good because it keeps the game fresh. I think that if CA can provide a decent AI and can put speed sliders on both the campaign and battle maps in BI then I would give Rome a second chance. Otherwise I will just wait and see if they can regroup and get it right in the next game because RTW really did miss the mark.

The only problem I see with RTW is that I can send out 2 units of any type of HA and completly destroy a 15 unit army.

RTW completely sucks!!!(sorry for the language, mods... How's about a beer to calm down??? ~D ~:cheers: )

I can kill a whole army with only the general!!!!

Yes, it really is that bad. It's not addictive at all. The only thing that I got a kick out of was naval battles (that's right). For some reason, everything seems tedious. For instance, you move an army, it doesn't go in the right spot, and you're just sort of stuck there w/ all these multicolored lines around you (I suppose if you haven't played it this doesn't make sense). I concur it's just not that fun, and the AI is absurd, not to mention the bugs which expose CA's difficulties. To think I used to admire the British. ~D

I do like population limits, however.

I have a copy of RTW installed. Don't play it. Enough said.

Actually I am more interested in the Medieval Period of History and I blame Age of Kings for that. MTW solidified that interest.

Excuse me, but what the hell does CA stand for? Like I said, I don't play RTW so I don't know the acronyms

CA stands for Creative Assembly, which is the Total War series developer.

@kiwitt: if you liked AOK you might want to try the mod in my signature, it tries to bring a bit of the old gameplay style inside MTW...

Re. the first post, yes, yes R:TW is really that bad. The AI is horrendous, I've given up on my game as Spain. I can't feasibly play more than about five turns at a sitting, so the save/load bug kicks in. I've watched the Julii try to take one settlement from Gaul for the last~35 turns. The gauls are down to about 60 men in there, against maybe a couple of thousand romans. But they never take it and they never will. Whats more, until they take that settlement, I know they aren't going to come for me, which is leaving me free to smack the Scipii around in N. Africa.

This talk of smacking the Scipii around in N. Africa leads me to my second point. I have taken Carthage in my game, but am surrounded on all sides by the Scipii, and their fleet is stopping me from getting reinforcements in. Every turn, they march up, siege Carthage and I go to sally out. Inevitably they have taken ~1000 men to siege my 1200 man army in Carthage, and their army again gets smacked around. I've done this for 10 turns in a row now. It always plays out the same way. You would think they would actually save up their troops, and maybe siege me one time with an overwhelming force.

When I sally out, the AI does a quick calculation and realises it's outnumbered and withdraws away from the walls. Fair enough, let me come to it. It inevitably draws up a battle line, and then as I approach said battle line, it will spontaneously decide that it needs reorganization. This means that my battle line inevitably hits the AI's when it is in the middle of a reshuffle, and it turns into chaos, where my superior numbers always win. If it could just pick a line and stick with it, it might stand a chance. As it is, the legions can't throw their pila because they are usually moving, they get moral penalties because I tend to hit them in the flank (I'm actually hitting them in the front, but since the AI has decided to run it's central troops out to the wide areas, they are running sideways to me) and within about 20 seconds the whole line collapses and I win the battle. A trained monkey could take my job. If it wasn't for Australian quarantine laws, I might get one to do so, it certainly would be more efficient than having to do it myself every time.

The AI breaks the game. It provides no challenge whatsoever.

First of all, many things at RTW are completely upside-down!!!!

1.) AI sucks!
2.)Spain was called Iberia!!!
3.)You can win a battle with only the general!!!
4.)TONS OF BUGS!!!!
5.) AND MANY MANY OTHER ANNOYING THINGS....

Out of the box, RTW has a number of flaws. The basic one for me being that it is just not challenging enough. The combat/movement speeds are also a bit souped up if you are not fond of the pause button.

However, it is still very recognisably the same kind of game as STW and MTW, so I don't understand how people can like those early games and not see redeeming qualities in RTW. The heart is still the battles. You have essentially the same choices about deployment and tactics as in the earlier games. The tactical engine has not been dumbed down in any way in my observation. The strategic level is also similar to the earlier games - the economy may be better than MTWs broken trade model - and the more free form campaign map opens up some interesting possibilities.

Recently, I tried the Rome Total Realism mod and it transmutes RTW into something very close to an ancient MTW. This has renewed my interest in the game and also illustrates my point that RTW is very much the same kind of beast as STW and MTW. I even tried the Roma mod for RTR and saw how someone has transformed an unchallenging SP game into something that most of us MTW vets can't handle.

Of course, RTW improves on a number of features in STW and MTW. I like the Senate better than the Papacy - having missions and rewards is a nice way of giving direction in such a potentially open game. I think the different faction armies are more distinctive and play in more different ways (eg legion, phalanx, barbarian, horse archer), whereas MTW and STW tended to produce clone armies. The graphics are obviously better. With the slowed down combat of RTR, I now really enjoy zooming in combats and watching the clash of arms. The campaign map feels much more like a real wargame than a gamey Risk thing. Sea warfare is better done, while sieges are greatly improved. The balance of arms is potentially more interesting - cavalry and missiles are ahistorically more powerful than in MTW - although I think some modding (such as RTR) is needed to get that right.

I think RTW has the potential to really attract those interested in ancient historical warfare. The EB and RTR v6.0 mods with new units skins and orders of battle are a joy to contemplate - the previews are more informative than most books on the subject. [Strangely, I have not found equivalently rich and ambitious historical mods for MTW]. I guess this is irrelevant to the original poster, but personally, if it is well done, I find military history of any period fascinating.

Roma mod is only hard because it nerfs the romans. Add that to the way that the AI cheats in the first place and the enemy are super soldiers.

If you modded it to let you play as the greeks it would be painfully easy.

*EDIT*

Have you tried the BKB or XL mod for MTW?

Simon Appleton, if you understand that the heart of the Total War games is the battles, then I don't understand why you can't see what is broken in RTW. There is NO CHALLENGE. What is the point of a game that takes no effort to win. Maybe that is ok when you are 8, but soon after it loses all appeal. I would hesitate to suggest that maybe you are a lousy general, but that is the only way RTW would seem ok.

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Originally Posted by edyzmedieval

First of all, many things at RTW are completely upside-down!!!!

1.) AI sucks!
2.)Spain was called Iberia!!!
3.)You can win a battle with only the general!!!
4.)TONS OF BUGS!!!!
5.) AND MANY MANY OTHER ANNOYING THINGS....

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Hmm, I can think of a few other things.....such as all the "fantasy" units in the game (Arcani, Gladiators, etc.)--yes, they're fun to play with, but certainly not historically accurate. And what about the fact that certain factions (especially the Romans and Egyptians) are way overpowered? Or that you can't play as other factions until you've won as the Julii, Brutii, or Scipii?

That last feature really bugs me; I don't think I'll ever understand why Creative Assembly did that. It would have been like forcing Medieval players to win as the Byzantines, Egyptians, or English in order to unlock the other factions.

That said, I still have great respect for CA, and I really do admire what what they were aiming for whey they developed RTW. Unfortunately, that still doesn't change the fact that IMHO, they dropped the ball with Rome. I simply hope they're able to correct their mistakes in the next Total War game.....

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Originally Posted by Satyr

Simon Appleton, if you understand that the heart of the Total War games is the battles, then I don't understand why you can't see what is broken in RTW. There is NO CHALLENGE. What is the point of a game that takes no effort to win. Maybe that is ok when you are 8, but soon after it loses all appeal. I would hesitate to suggest that maybe you are a lousy general, but that is the only way RTW would seem ok.

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You are right (not necessarily about the lousy general bit ...). There is no challenge to a competent general in the battles out of the box. But it is fairly easily corrected by mods. The Rome Total Realism mod makes the battles about as challenging as MTW. The Roma mod makes them insanely challenging IMO (ok, you might be right about the lousy general bit). ~D

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Originally Posted by Satyr

Simon Appleton, if you understand that the heart of the Total War games is the battles, then I don't understand why you can't see what is broken in RTW. There is NO CHALLENGE. What is the point of a game that takes no effort to win. Maybe that is ok when you are 8, but soon after it loses all appeal. I would hesitate to suggest that maybe you are a lousy general, but that is the only way RTW would seem ok.

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Originally Posted by Simon Appleton

The basic one for me being that it is just not challenging enough

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edit: Simon replied while I was typing :dizzy2:

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Originally Posted by Martok

Hmm, I can think of a few other things.....such as all the "fantasy" units in the game (Arcani, Gladiators, etc.)--yes, they're fun to play with, but certainly not historically accurate.

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Well, about most units you're right, but gladiators were actually sometimes deployed on the battlefield historically...

What also disappoints me is a lack of a decent mercenary roster...

For example you should be able to recruit barbarian swordsmen (not scutarii, the gallic ones!) as mercs (Hannibal did!) as well as other things around.

Another thing that pissed me off is the protectorates: you should definitely be able to use (most of) their units, as historically they gave a number of units to the "protector" army!

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Out of the box, RTW has a number of flaws. The basic one for me being that it is just not challenging enough. The combat/movement speeds are also a bit souped up if you are not fond of the pause button.

However, it is still very recognisably the same kind of game as STW and MTW, so I don't understand how people can like those early games and not see redeeming qualities in RTW. The heart is still the battles. You have essentially the same choices about deployment and tactics as in the earlier games. The tactical engine has not been dumbed down in any way in my observation. The strategic level is also similar to the earlier games - the economy may be better than MTWs broken trade model - and the more free form campaign map opens up some interesting possibilities.

Recently, I tried the Rome Total Realism mod and it transmutes RTW into something very close to an ancient MTW. This has renewed my interest in the game and also illustrates my point that RTW is very much the same kind of beast as STW and MTW. I even tried the Roma mod for RTR and saw how someone has transformed an unchallenging SP game into something that most of us MTW vets can't handle.

Of course, RTW improves on a number of features in STW and MTW. I like the Senate better than the Papacy - having missions and rewards is a nice way of giving direction in such a potentially open game. I think the different faction armies are more distinctive and play in more different ways (eg legion, phalanx, barbarian, horse archer), whereas MTW and STW tended to produce clone armies. The graphics are obviously better. With the slowed down combat of RTR, I now really enjoy zooming in combats and watching the clash of arms. The campaign map feels much more like a real wargame than a gamey Risk thing. Sea warfare is better done, while sieges are greatly improved. The balance of arms is potentially more interesting - cavalry and missiles are ahistorically more powerful than in MTW - although I think some modding (such as RTR) is needed to get that right.

I think RTW has the potential to really attract those interested in ancient historical warfare. The EB and RTR v6.0 mods with new units skins and orders of battle are a joy to contemplate - the previews are more informative than most books on the subject. [Strangely, I have not found equivalently rich and ambitious historical mods for MTW]. I guess this is irrelevant to the original poster, but personally, if it is well done, I find military history of any period fascinating.

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Generally your right RTW is an advancement on earlier games and has raised the bar to what future games of this type should strive to meet.

However, RTW was built up with such unbelievable hype that even though we were bound to be let down abit, it feels we were letdown monumentaly, in simple terms I just dont enjoy playing the game. MTW was always fun and interesting ive never seen a game that can be so fresh after such a long time, RTW just didnt catch my interest in the slightest.

Its not just the bugs and glaring errors whatever is missing it seems to be the feeling of accomplishment, it doesnt feel like MTW did, I looked forward to playing MTW whereas RTW the first thing that comes to my head when I think about it is its a chore to enjoy. I never had to make life easier on the AI on MTW to feel abit challenged, but so many players have to do things they shouldnt have to do to make the game even relatively enjoyable on RTW, RTR is a definate improvement that is for sure.

That in itself is a problem though, if modders can make the game relatively tolerable why the heck couldnt the makers? Is it so hard to spot how stupid parts of the game were when it was tested?

The roman period is to me the most interesting part of history with the expansion BI its going into a personally even more interesting period of history to me, so its not the period that didnt interest its the fact the game doesnt do it justice, its hard to pinpoint exactly why Im just not interetsed in RTW but it just doesnt feel right.

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Originally Posted by Simon Appleton

You are right (not necessarily about the lousy general bit ...). There is no challenge to a competent general in the battles out of the box. But it is fairly easily corrected by mods. The Rome Total Realism mod makes the battles about as challenging as MTW. The Roma mod makes them insanely challenging IMO (ok, you might be right about the lousy general bit). ~D

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Like i said before...any game is hard if you nerf your own soldiers badly enough.
Roma mod is good, IMHO, but it's not harder. It's more unbalanced.

And i am not quite sure how the RTR battles are supposed to be harder...the AI is the same.

Maybe your playing as the romans...they are nerfed alot in RTR...

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Originally Posted by mongoose

Like i said before...any game is hard if you nerf your own soldiers badly enough.
Roma mod is good, IMHO, but it's not harder. It's more unbalanced.

And i am not quite sure how the RTR battles are supposed to be harder...the AI is the same.

Maybe your playing as the romans...they are nerfed alot in RTR...

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Yeah, I'm playing the Romans in RTR. In your second paragraph, you seem to be implicitly defining "harder" as "harder because of better AI", whereas "harder because my troops have weaker stats and/or the AI has more troops" would also seem to qualify in my opinion.

Yes, I agree RTR seems harder in part because it tones down the Roman stats a little - or at least boosts the Greek civ. units a lot. The Romans also lose archers and powerful cav, which both were extremely (and ahistorically) potent against the AI in vanilla. Their heavy inf. can still get the job done, but you do have to try a little harder.

Perhaps more importantly, all non-Roman factions seem to have significantly larger armies and capacity to rebuild armies too. In vanilla, as Romans, you tend to have or two big opening battles against an enemy faction, then it's a mopping up operation. In RTR, I'm always pleasantly surprised when I stumble into another full strength army when I thought the faction was on its knees.

In terms of improving the cleverness of the AI, there are clearly limits to what the modders can do. However, I have not found myself so frustrated with the battlefield AI in RTR as I did in vanilla. In fact, I find it no more objectionable than I recall the AI in STW and MTW being (let's face it, it was never that great). Clever modders can make some ingenious compensating adjustments. For example, the powerful Greek type units in RTR nicely compensate for the AIs abysmal handling of the phalanx formation. In the Roma mod, I think the designer changed the starting formations (and maybe build priorities?) of the AI so they are a little harder to fight. I like the way in the Roma mod, your weaker Roman stats mean it pays to worry about things like an elevation advantage[1]. In MTW and STW this was tactics 101 - get on a hill or maneouvre the AI off one - but in vanilla RTW, I started not to bother. In Roma, it really pays and even in the RTR mod, I'm starting to do it.

[1]Or an even more extreme example, one RTR vet even advised me to flank from my left as the enemy units got shielding bonuses from the right!

Well, i agree. Having soldiers with awful stats does make the romans harder to play as.

The point i was trying to make was that the game is not harder, the romans are harder. Play as the gauls in roma mod and you will see what i am talking about. :wink:

Let me move this into Hostile territory...the colloseum.

GAH! Not really sure what the point of this is...looks like an roman-arena style flame war in the making... ~:confused:


Their releasing some thin looking tigers over there... :help:

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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Originally Posted by ChaosLord

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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Yeah, RTR is making me realise this. I parted company with MedMod when it started changing the units in ways that made them not obviously more historical or defensible than those in vanilla MTW. I prefer the philosophy of the RTR and EB mods where I find I can't fault the history (not surprising as they seem to be led by real afficionados of the period). But I know the MedMod vastly improved the challenge.

Hey, I like RTW...but it is the same kind of like you have for those news shoes mom made you get. They are good, they work...but with just a little more time they could have been great!

That is how I feel about RTW anyway. RTR on the other hand...nearly everything is fixed (all that can be fixed is fixed). THAT is what a labor of love can do for you.

Azi

To be honest, I did find MTW harder though.

Shoggy wasn't really harder than either. I fought tons of battles where I just used my faction leader's cav to lead the enemy in circles while my archers rained hell from above.

I kept winning battles of 5:2 odds in Shoggy except it came every turn and became annoying.

Vanilla RTW is even more a joke.

MTW still had some sense of tactics.

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Originally Posted by Simon Appleton

[1]. In MTW and STW this was tactics 101 - get on a hill or maneouvre the AI off one - but in vanilla RTW, I started not to bother. In Roma, it really pays and even in the RTR mod, I'm starting to do it.

[1]Or an even more extreme example, one RTR vet even advised me to flank from my left as the enemy units got shielding bonuses from the right!

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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.

Yes, in RTR the effects are noticeable and have added some value to the product.

Yep, thats right.
The shield effect is largely invisible in the basic game because there are other factors that have a larger effect on who wins.
The modded stats change this so that the shield effect is quite important.

A lot of the great features of the game are hidden like this by weaknesses elsewhere.

A slower battle pace also adds to the effect of said features the game holds. In vanilla it's harder to notice such components to the battle system because the battles are over much faster. When the battles are drawn out longer it makes for a situation where you can really see what works because of the longer timespan to view the battle playing out.

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Originally Posted by Intrepid Sidekick

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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Yes, that was my point. When you quoted from my post, you omitted the preceding line: "I like the way in the Roma mod, your weaker Roman stats mean it pays to worry about things like an elevation advantage". I was not attributing the bonuses to the mods, but the vanilla game means that some factions like the Romans can coast through their battles without needing to pay heed to them.

For the record, I'm not a fan of the Roma mod - I haven't given it a fair go, but from what I've experienced, it is so stacked against the Romans, you have to exploit the AI to win. Consequently, the battles & campaigns seem more "gamey" and ahistorical to me than those in the vanilla game.

But RTR does improve on the experience for the Romans, IMO. I suspect its largely by pumping up the size of enemy armies (boosting their economies?).

Even in the vanilla game, it can be a challenge fighting a faction with a strong economy and decent units like Egypt or a well developed Roman faction (e.g. in a civil war). But some factions such as Gaul and Carthage could do with a little boost in BI if CA can find the time.

I believe my basic point - in response to the thread title "is RTW really that bad?" - was that nearly all the great things about STW and MTW (e.g. the tactical bonuses and modifiers) are still present in RTW. I think it's pretty self-evident, but mods like RTR make it blindingly obvious. The slowed-down battles in RTR feel just like the MTW ones to me (without the tedium of dealing with waves of AI reinforcements).

I can't see how someone can love MTW and not find a lot of value in RTW. I'm still playing it SP and it's been out for the best part of a year. The negativity towards RTW in some threads seems excessive. I fear I may be the closest thing to a fan boy CA has here! ~:grouphug:

What I hate about Rome...

Odds completely in your favour.. 10:2.. You can't be bothered to slug it out at 3 am. You're tired. You need to sleep. You just want to win this one big battle.

You decide to auto-resolve.

You lose half your men.

Average defeat. ~:confused:

It's not a bad game. It has a ton of potential... but, sadly, potential doesn't necessarily make for good gaming. The engine is absolutely fantastic. Massive kudos to CA on that regard.

That being said, however, the biggest detractors to (vanilla) RTW: glitches/bugs and the fact that it's relatively easy. Fixing the former might take care of the latter but, as it stands, there isn't a whole lot of challenge. Contrast that with a typical game of Civ III (for me): there will be games, and occasions within games, where I'm not sure if I'll be able to win, or not. There'll be occassions when I desperately do NOT want to go to war with certain civs, etc. There'll be occassions/games where I'm at the bottom of the leader board, trying desperately to claw my way to the top. In short: games where I'm periodically/perpetually getting my ass kicked.

In RTW.... that really hasn't happened. I've had a couple scares, but, generally speaking, it's not that difficult to obliterate everything in your path (but since I generally only get to play for 1 to 1.5 hours at a time, this might be a symptom of the save/load "feature")

-V

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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 so agree with this. I have a very clear memory of M:TW reshuffling its troops during battles.. I'd normally walk my battle line up to arrow/bolt pusher distance and start wailing on them.. if the enemy army was significantly horse heavy they'd just mill about in range of my troops getting killed. The AI has no concept of certain tactical realities.

I've seen the R:TW AI do precisely the same thing. I think the AI is totally transplanted, with only a few changes to accomodate the new units and wierder maps. Just don't see that much that is different regarding how it organizes/decides what to do next. Both AIs are very susceptible to intelligent play, even in greatly outnumbered situations.

And for the record, I really love both games.. I play them less now than before, but any game which clocks above 40 hours of interest in my book is outstanding (about 40$ for the game against 40 hours.. thats about 1$US per hour of play.. MUCH less $$/hour than going a $$ equivalent number of movies (4).. ). I've played both M:TW and R:TW to the tune of about 100 hours each.. what rockingly good games at a fantastic value.

not taking anything away from your 40 hours of gameplay, but I do not consider 40 hours of gameplay that much man.

the great games of today are having people log hundreds, and at times, thousands (and in some cases tens of thousands) of hours of gameplay.

look at MMO's...some people play those 35-50 hours a week for 5+ years.

sports games...for example, "madden football"...man, people log in THOUSANDS of hours on these games (which cost the exact same as RTW) over the course of the year.

look at online shooters: same thing, hundreds, thousands, even tens of thousands of hours put in on these games over the course of 6-50 months. Look at socom2 for example. Half life 2.

Strategy games? ...starcraft? warcraft? some people played warcraft for 7 years. I'm sure they put in hundreds, if not upper thousands of hours.

sorry, this just isn't the NES days...40 hours on a deep strategy game is peanuts. I personally think any game that can only keep someone's attention for 40 hours in this day and age is a total flop.

I myself have easily spent hundreds of hours playing RTW already and I know the majority of people who bought the game are in the same bought.

perhaps one day mods will realize that an "edit" button would save a tremendous amount of space...

I see now that you say you've spent around 100 hours on both MTW and RTW...ok cool. But that doesn't change your idea of the "benchmark" hours for a great game.

If you look at what kind of titles are hot sellers in this generation of gaming, it's ones with virtually unlimited replay value...obviously the reason online gaming took off the way it did.

Quake, Doom, Unreal...all those shooters were amazing because they were "real" as opposed to scripted 1 player vs AI events. Unlimited replay value.

Look at RPG's...they're almost dead...entirely due to the influx of great MMO's. These games provide infinite replay value.

Although I've already spent hundreds of hours on RTW, i've played in very very small clips lately. The absolutely silly AI just cripples the replay value.

My point is just that there are many many games out there that exist for the purpose to "keep us busy" and I do not consider RTW one of the "classics" in this sense.

Look at Halo2 for the xbox...there are people 40 years old who are traveling the country, paying out of pocket to do so, and playing 50 hours a week in prep for money tournaments. RTW just doesn't draw that kind of following....

(again, look back at sports games...mmo's, etc....even WARCRAFT in the same genre as this...others have accomplished high replay value, I just don't think TW has.)

fix the AI and it will...it has everything else...but the Ai is what separates this game from those others and makes the experience seem "phony" after a period of time. This is exactly why people want a multiplayer campaign: Rome's concept is sound, but the unconvincing AI just bogs it down.

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Originally Posted by Intrepid Sidekick

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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Nobody is saying the mods introduced those effects. Just the standard game is so easy that nobody cares about them.

Why should I bother to try and take a hill? I'm going to slaughter the enemy anyway, and it will just add another ten minutes to the battle.

As for those saying Rome is the same as Medieval in terms of AI, why then does the AI sometimes smack you round in Medieval? I've lost quite a few games with M:TW, and I'm not a particularly bad player, it's just the AI was better. I have never looked close to loosing in R:TW, no matter who I have played with. Armenia, Numidia, Pontus, standard Seleucids, Thrace etc. I've managed to come out on top iwth little difficulty.

Maybe you guys are just gods or something when it comes to strategy games, but Rome to me is stupidly easy, where as Medieval is not.

My advice to you would be to not base your buying decisions on messageboards.

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Originally Posted by Ab Urbe Condita

My advice to you would be to not base your buying decisions on messageboards.

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It is hard to do otherwise, when no demo is released for the strategic game, and the tactical demo is setup so you can't lose...

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Originally Posted by dgb

Nobody is saying the mods introduced those effects. Just the standard game is so easy that nobody cares about them.

Why should I bother to try and take a hill? I'm going to slaughter the enemy anyway, and it will just add another ten minutes to the battle.

As for those saying Rome is the same as Medieval in terms of AI, why then does the AI sometimes smack you round in Medieval? I've lost quite a few games with M:TW, and I'm not a particularly bad player, it's just the AI was better. I have never looked close to loosing in R:TW, no matter who I have played with. Armenia, Numidia, Pontus, standard Seleucids, Thrace etc. I've managed to come out on top iwth little difficulty.

Maybe you guys are just gods or something when it comes to strategy games, but Rome to me is stupidly easy, where as Medieval is not.

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Have you played MTW recently?
Maybe you feel MTW AI is better because you were not so good when playing it, and when playing RTW you were a veteran.

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Originally Posted by KSEG

Have you played MTW recently?
Maybe you feel MTW AI is better because you were not so good when playing it, and when playing RTW you were a veteran.

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About three weeks ago... After giving up on ever seeing a challenge in R:TW

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Originally Posted by KSEG

Have you played MTW recently?
Maybe you feel MTW AI is better because you were not so good when playing it, and when playing RTW you were a veteran.

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I'm not a brilliant player by any stretch of the imagination, but I like to think I still qualify as a TW "veteran". I've had Shogun for over 4 years, which I still play it now and then. I've also had Medieval for over 2 1/2 years, and still play it daily. (No disrespect to the Shoggy players, I'm just more of a Jihad/Crusades kind of guy, that's all. :bow: ) And I've had Rome for almost 9 months (although by now I haven't really touched the game since early spring). So I think I can say with some authority that yes, battles in Medieval are still tougher than in Rome.

I discovered long ago when I first started to play strategy games (and the TW games in particular) that my military skills are very average--not terrible, but certainly not great--and even I steamroll Rome's AI way more often than not. I've stated in other posts that in Rome, the only battles I've ever lost were ones where I was ridiculously outnumbered. (Okay, I've also lost a few while drunk, but that's neither here nor there..... ~D )

I'm not saying the AI in Medieval was perfect; far from it. As other people have pointed out, Medieval's AI doesn't always know what to do with its calvary. It also isn't the greatest at fighting bridge battles or defending castles. But it's still far more competent than Rome's AI. When playing Rome, there have been very few battles where I felt like I was in any real danger of losing, even when playing one of the harder factions. With Medieval, I still get combat jitters if the enemy's forces are even remotely comparable to my own. Why? Because I know Medieval's AI can outsmart me--and it does.

I will credit Rome's combat with at least this much: The battle maps are beautiful with a lot of room to maneuver, and the pre-combat unit placement and battle controls are generally more user-friendly than in Medieval or Shogun. Unfortunately, it still does not make up for the lackluster AI. It honestly gives me no joy to say so, but it's the truth. Rome's AI is simply the weakest out of all three Total War games, and provides no challenge for me.

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Originally Posted by Intrepid Sidekick

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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Nothing new on two of them, never had much trouble flanking RTW's AI or taking away its elevation. However, my understanding is that some of the mods use higher ranges for shields. I've always thought RTW failed to give much credit for shields. And we've also learned that the charge is based on armour (I had it as part of defense, Kraxis ID'ed the armour as the specific contributor), with very little contribution from "charge bonus" or mass. Don't know if that was addressed in later mods.

The AI of both MTW and RTW are essentially the same. In MTW, I just shoot the AI to pieces with my vanilla archers while they walk back and forth in front of my spears.

The battles are just too fast in RTW (due to kill-rates and running speed). That's the main difference.

... and buggy VH battles, giving bonus to attack to both player and AI, making things even more faster.

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Originally Posted by Quietus

The battles are just too fast in RTW (due to kill-rates and running speed). That's the main difference.

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Too fast right but also narrow too... Just try big/huge setting you will understand what i mean. Too fast, too narrow: TW for clickfesters ~:handball:

Battles suck because of poor AI.

I remember being hard pressed in STW and MTW...now it's all formality.

I have first learn of TW series 2 years ago. A friend introduce me the M:TW( :knight: )!. I've stuck with this game, it's realism, the pioneer things that brought in my gaming life, and spend countless hours on LAN battles and SP games. Because of the M:TW, I looked at every other strategy game rather childish (no offence, I still playing EE, AOE2 and Civ series).

I remember myself being impatient and looking forward for R:TW, because that's one of my favorites historic period (Hellenistic Era).

When it was released I even bought an new PC so I can relish my whole new game! :charge:
I call my friend to share our views of the new game. I bought the game 2 months later after it released cause of the local dealers policy :furious3: !
He told me how disappointed was about the R:TW, the unbeatable war elephants, the continuous revolt of some cities, the unvaried flat battlefields, the unchallenging battles, the endless siege battles, the lack of replay campaign battles, even the new strategy map and how exasperating is that you can't call back slip movement etc.

He catch me by surprise! ~:confused: I argue :argue: that R:TW has a lot new features, like much more user friendly interface, a handy diplomacy, great variety of different troops (in M:TW factions was pretty much the same) etc, and for the rest, is matter of being unaccustomed. (but agreed with the annoying repeal thing)

I played the game for a couple of months. I finally get used with the new strategy map-I like it now-but at end find the R:TW far less enjoyable than the M:TW :disappointed: ! What was wrong? Is this because I'm getting older? NO! something else! I search the internet for TW discussing forums.
That how I find out the .org ~:cheers: ! I downloaded the 1.2 patch (until that time, I didn't realise that even exist :stupid: !)

So, farewell to unbeatable elephants, the continuous revolt of some cities, the endless bribing etc. :rtwyes:
But on the other hand I found out some very new to me bugs/issues: the notorious save/load issue, the Seleucid armoured elephants being available everywhere,and many other that player1 tries to handle (BTW player1 mnogu fala! ~:cheers: :bow: ).

Now I share most of my opinion with the majority of people in this community. I found not R:TW is a bad game, I found it simply inferior of its hype. :cry: Don't know what went wrong. Maybe the CA's transition among Activision to Sega. Maybe the CA's budget overrun. Maybe the deadlines. Maybe the whole project was unattainable. :sad2:

I wish all these sad things will change in BI.

This is my little(big) story. Sorry for being tedious. But I think this story could apply to many others besides me. ~:grouphug:

Thank you for time :bow:

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Originally Posted by Quietus

The AI of both MTW and RTW are essentially the same. In MTW, I just shoot the AI to pieces with my vanilla archers while they walk back and forth in front of my spears.

The battles are just too fast in RTW (due to kill-rates and running speed). That's the main difference.

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Jeez, here we go again a gross oversimplification to hide the truth. If the AI were exactly the same (and I don't buy it) then RTW would get far the worst of it because the game changed so much that the AI should have changed too, this blows a hole the size of Texas in the "AI is the same" argument. There is certainly no analog of the phalanx mess we presently have. The scrambling of the the AI line before engagement handicaps RTW many fold with or without phalanx. Plus I found that MTW actually used its long range units rather than charging them into my line. The RTW AI improved a degree in skirmisher tactics, unfortunately, it also has tendency to charge them into infantry--again destroying the skirmish aspect of battle. I also found MTW rarely charged the general headlong into my line--until the main part of the army had engaged.

The MTW AI would not attack at times, true, and would be shot up. Much harder with vanilla archers in MTW, unless you were facing unarmoured rabble. In which case, the AI wouldn't attack because it could see it couldn't win. Once the human won the ranged missile duel it was over for the AI. Arbalesters were deadly, archers weren't worth much.

If on the other hand the AI had a good force it would hurl it at the player and was far more likely to overwhelm the player than in RTW. I've also seen the AI camp quite well on high ground in MTW, something it can't seem to do in RTW.

Every one has such mixed results here...some people say that they are equal and others say that there are huge differences. :dizzy2:

Well alot of the variation depends apon how someone plays the game. The different tactics people use, army compositions, and wether someone will go to great lengths to exploit AI weaknesses. Such as mass HA or something similar. I like to make fairly balanced armies and my strategy is usually about maintaining a strong center so one of my flanks can wrap around theirs. Its the same thing I used in M:TW, pin their units on something with alot of defense while the others do the work.

Since this doesn't use mass archer fire/cavalry(things M:TW was never good at dealing with either) perhaps thats why my experiences aren't as bad as everyone elses. Theres also some people who will pull no punches when fighting the AI and use every exploit, trick, etc.. around to beat them and get mad when the AI loses badly because of this. But, its up to each person to decide for themselves how to play the game. I just don't understand why the people I just mentioned come to post about how its no fun when they do that, I mean what did they expect?

I am willing to not go out of my way to screw the AI, but i am not willing to go out of my way to not to exploit it.

To be forced to use BAD tactics so that the AI doesn't get confused is against everything I want in a game. Obviously we aren't at the point yet where AI programming can build a competent opponent but we should be able to get some sort of challenge. MTW was better at that the RTW is, but hopefully BI will fix a lot of this and make Rome into a good game too. At least I sincerely hope so!

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Originally Posted by mongoose

I am willing to not go out of my way to screw the AI, but i am not willing to go out of my way to not to exploit it.

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True. I just play with the tactics I that seem realistic to me, having fun at that and takind advantage of some weird AI situations. I know that routing on bridges make the unit run into the enemy but that doesnt make me avoid bridge battles. Still I´ll fight the battles to the best of my skill/tactical creativity and have fun while demolishing everything the AI has to throw at me.

To compensate I mod my game giving the AI economic bonuses, larger cities and better starting units making it so much more fun to get through the realtively difficult first part of the game when my armies are always at aa disadvantage forcing me to be tactically better in order to win. Finally this is a game and I find it quite fun and entertaining this way.

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Originally Posted by KSEG

Have you played MTW recently?
Maybe you feel MTW AI is better because you were not so good when playing it, and when playing RTW you were a veteran.

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You don't give the vets enough credit. We have gone back and made some comparisons.

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Originally Posted by Ab Urbe Condita

My advice to you would be to not base your buying decisions on messageboards.

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Actually, the best buying advice I've ever gotten is from messageboards. Doesn't take much reading to see both the beauty and the warts. It is far more reliable than a review.

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Originally Posted by Red Harvest

Actually, the best buying advice I've ever gotten is from messageboards. Doesn't take much reading to see both the beauty and the warts. It is far more reliable than a review.

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Absolutely. I used to regularly read usenet (e.g. comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.strategic) and it was amazing how quickly and accurately you could gauge a game from the posts. By contrast, reviewers tend to get caught up in the hype, focus on how up to date the graphics etc are or hide flaws under diplomatic language. It's a little riskier to rely on message boards dedicated to a particular game, but often you can tell if there is depth and enthusiasm there. I seldom buy a game without trying to get user views on the internet, unless the company has a track record of making games I like.

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Originally Posted by Red Harvest

Actually, the best buying advice I've ever gotten is from messageboards. Doesn't take much reading to see both the beauty and the warts. It is far more reliable than a review.

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Posters on message boards are not influenced by advertising income, unlike gamer mags. As long as you can sort through the flames and obvious fan-boys, you are way more likely to get an unbiased review on a message board.

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Originally Posted by Red Harvest

Actually, the best buying advice I've ever gotten is from messageboards. Doesn't take much reading to see both the beauty and the warts. It is far more reliable than a review.

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I agree :medievalcheers:

Reviewers are too busy sucking up to the developers to see any real flaws.

This is the worst RTW review i have ever seen... 4/5 stars!? for how DIFFICULT the game is!?

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Intelligence & Difficulty:4 Stars - Good AI controlled characters are above the standard fare for the most part, but the AI has some critical failings, mostly when it’s controlling things for you in a battle. When you have other armies around the site of a brawl, these extra forces are considered reinforcements to the fray and they are controlled for you by the computer. That’s great in theory, but since you have no say over how they act, you can easily lose seasoned units or important generals because they run blindly into a conflict seemingly without thought for anything more than brute force. When you’re in control, your men do exactly what you tell them to, even if they do have to pause occasionally to get their ranks realigned in order to feel up to the task. The AI in the turn-based map screen fares much better, and so the computer ultimately seems more adept at civics than it does at combat.

Pathfinding is well above average, mainly because there’s not much to run into on the maps, but the tight doorways of settlements can cause a traffic jam that rivals anything seen on the Los Angeles freeway system. The computer eventually gets itself sorted out, but there are moments during sieges that if someone wanted to start chucking artillery at the settlement doorway, they’d do more than a little damage to your troops.

Rome: Total War has four difficulty settings: easy, medium, hard, and very hard. As a nice feature, map mode and battle mode difficulty settings can be adjusted independently. Moving up the difficulty scale in battle mode increases the strength of your foes, making them harder to take down and harder to scare off. Going from easy to very hard in map mode isn’t as well documented as battle mode, but empirically speaking, enemies are more aggressive about attacking you militarily and diplomatically, and build up their troops more quickly, making everything just that much more challenging.

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Originally Posted by Red Harvest

Actually, the best buying advice I've ever gotten is from messageboards. Doesn't take much reading to see both the beauty and the warts. It is far more reliable than a review.

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Amen. If you want to know what the game is really like, check the message boards. Some reviews are great, of course, but others appear to have been written w/o experiencing the "full" game.

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Originally Posted by Intrepid Sidekick

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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I think, the major difference between RTW and RTR, apart from modded unit stats, is the slower kill speed in RTR... which makes flanking achievable and worth doing... As to height advantage: i do not see much difference between RTW and RTR: it's negligible...

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Originally Posted by drone

Posters on message boards are not influenced by advertising income, unlike gamer mags.

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Your average reviewer doesn't know or care anything about advertising income. It's the execs who do, and except in the shadiest of mags, they aren't going to tell the reviewers to give a good or bad review to a game based on ad revenue. I think you greatly overestimate the corruption of review magazines—most are entirely independent.

In any case, the indisputable problem with reviews is time. An average reviewer, AFAIK, plays the game through once. This isn't enough to formulate an opinion on how well the game will hold up after ten plays through. And if you didn't like RTW the first time through—well, tastes differ, and it's as simple as that. Most people did like RTW their first time.

-Simetrical

In fact without modding vanilla R:TA looking is a 3D war game instead of a strategy game. I think different design teams different design teams made the older series or they decided make a new stage. Unhistoric elements (vanilla egypt proves my point) , lowered reality (jumping horses) and simplified battles (basic frontal attacks without flanking or prepared tactical maneuvers - everybody knows why )some make-up on economic system... Anyway, result did not satisfy the hardcore TW fans.

Just remember guys what was the funniest and realistic core element in any TW game? Epic battles. Frankly, do you love RTW battles?

They made a great financial success and they reached the younger age level but they sacrificed too much things. First victim is they own made serious TW gamers, to us... ~:handball:

RTW is a good game "for me"? I don't think so "but" RTW's potential promises a classic an epic.

Excuse me but many times i pushed myself for play vanilla game. That's my confess. Everytime i missed the old days, so sad but true.

If they want to earn us again they should make very serious job again. It must be beyond a patch or an expansion as a philosophy and structure. I believe miracles. RTW was a miracle but it was a unholy one. If they did a miracle they can do it again. (but a good one ~;) ) There is no obstacle on their way. They have (if we make it simplified) money, experienced team, productive and constructive community and a glorious past...

What are you waiting for? ~:grouphug:

If they did again release time is not a problem money also... I pay easily 100 USD for it. Frankly i swear...

For Epic Battles.
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=49919

Play a short Grogs campaign,
you will change your mind about the game.

And for the really hardcore,
AI's Revenge mod will be here soon. :bow:

Relating to the "forums as a buying tool" debate. I think it depends on which forums you are looking at, yeah, some forums may be populated ith 14 year old fps loving kids, who generally don't like to play long hard involving games.

The best sources will be "fan" sites for a game, as the org is a TW fan site I would listen to what people say, personally I don't think RTW is THAT bad, there have been worse games made, but it is definately not wha I was hoping for either.

IMO, no, there aren't any redeaming factors in RTW, or at least, if there are any, they certainly don't compensate for the failings of the game.

I, like most other posters so far, really liked MTW (and still do). Hell, I started a new campaign a few days ago. Personally, I think the only ways RTW is better than MTW is that the diplomatic options have been expanded, but honestly, that's the only improvement I see.

RTW is worse than MTW in many ways. The battlefields are super-bland. They are either devoid of any tactical land features (hills, woods, two-bridge maps, etc.) or there is one land feature that dominates the entire map (like one HUGE hill that runs the entire length of the map). The AI is terrible at almost everything. It makes semi-varied armies, but breaks them up into puny skirmishing units that just run all over the place and it rarely fields a consolidated army, with a general leading it, and sends it to attack a specific target.

They've also added in a lot of stuff under the guise of improved realism that really just makes the game more annoying. You can't build generals anymore, nor can you award titles or anything like that. The number of generals you have is linked to the number of provinces you have, so there's no realism to the family trees, and they die, which is more realistic but I think makes the game more tedious because you always have to be training new ones.

Basically many hardcoded factors in the game push you to constantly expand or die, but other factors (mainly tied to keeping the damn townsfolk happy) constantly works against your expansion. I find I spent the majority of the time micromanaging my cities, building buildings just to keep people happy over and over, rather than fighting battles. And the battles I did fight were skirmishes or sieges, and both were more boring and tedious than epic and fun.

Lastly, I feel a different customer service mentality with CA. Their attitude, I think, has been really crappy. They treat those of us unhappy with their game like jerks, they won't patch the game, even when they know things are broken, because the publisher won't pay for them to make the patches, and many of the things that have made the game worse are said to be hard-coded, so they cannot be improved upon by the modding community. It's just a bad attitude, a bad design job, and a bad support service. Since they seem to care more about money than quality, the only way to get through to them is to keep sales low until they become more responsive. So with that in mind, please don't buy any RTW stuff.

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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Originally Posted by Servius1234

RTW is worse than MTW in many ways.

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This is the motto of the many TW fans. Still don't understand that how they did RTW such as this bad? They had a great potential and experience for years. They gained many awards and they did a hybrid half TW/3D war game. Really strange. Are they aware from that i really wondering. Are they same people who did MTW and RTW?

Frankly i don't expect nothing beyond night battles (not new :embarassed: ) and swimmable units as a "improvement". They're on the edge. If they don't make a surprise a strong job if they surrender to the clickfester boys.

Amen
R.I.P :bow:

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Originally Posted by Coldfish

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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True to a degree. When a game is fresh, like RTW was, it's often more enjoyable, largely because you aren't expecting all the shortcomings that RTW offers over time. But that said, there were plenty of criticisms at the beginning, but we were mostly more forgiving back then. Sieges and AI were poor - but we believed a few patches or so would fix things nicely. Except they didn't. You'd have to be some kind of masochist to keep talking about a game after so much time if you didn't like it, so it ain't all that bad.