a Lord played MTW2

[Midnight]

Is it really so hard to have decent-length combat, important factors like the power of a charge to the rear, compressed combat penalties, etc, in the game and simply an option to turn them off for the "less hardcore" players? Perhaps make the regular game up to MTW's standard, and dumb down the Arcade Mode to RTW's level?

I loved Medieval, and was disappointed with Rome. I'd also rather make some noises now, before the demo or full game is ready, when there's hopefully still some time to make some changes.

[TB666]

There are probably alot more things to be ironed out before the release. Just because the AI is bad at Agincourt doesn't mean anything.

Indeed especially since it goes against what we have heard in previews and considering that this 753 posted that and was never heard from again.

[L'Impresario]

Player 753 who just played the demo said the game seemed to be about 70% completed and that it crashed a lot because parts were unfinished.

I don't think there's a clause saying that a game must be completed in order to get a release.

[Little Legioner]

They have always a chance. Actually, There are pretty enough time to do this. Solution is simple: Pure Arcade mod and pure Epic mod then everybody is gonna be happy. Why not?

[CBR]

that only counts when they have spears, pikes or bajonets and when it faces cavalry. Squares repelled cavalry because horses would refuse to walk into the hedge of sharp points, and the horsemen would not be able to reach the enemy with their swords..

What does what weapon they used have to do with it? The point is that such a formation does not have a real flank or rear. It is formed up with enough depth and width to be able to deal with attacks from any direction.

The only accounts of squares being broken by cavalry is when they either broke before contact, or when the muskets were disabled by rainy weather and enemy lancers would ride up to the square and stab their way through the line of infantry - whose bajonets could not outreach the lance.

Thats Napoleonic times, and I wont even go into details on that as that would be OT. There are examples of cavalry piercing pike formations only to reform and come back for another attack. That also has nothing to do with what Im saying. Read above.

Remember how the romans were slaughtered at Cannae. If they didn't "receive a combat penalty" from the panic that spread then how would so few carthaginian soldiers with worse equipment ever be able to slaughter so much romans.

We know the pursuing and disordered infantry, that had broken through the center, got hit in both flanks by the African infantry. Apart from the obvious losses taken from such an attack it would most likely have caused a big movement of men retreating towards the center. Men from second and third line might still have been moving forward and it would have caused a compressed mass of confused and desperate men.

As RTW doesnt have any penalties for overlapping units, it is difficult to recreate with this combat engine. It also has a simplistic morale/combat system that doesnt make losing units fall back but either fight or flight.

Aslong as a strong unit can attack the enemy head on they can push forward and grind through the enemy. But when they are suddenly attacked in the back, the rear ranks can nolonger give support to that forward movement. Any attempt to move forward in a certain direction will open up the formation allowing individual men to become surrounded and killed easily.

Yes that is certainly true but units can certainly stand firm and fight hard without attacking much. Hastings is one example.

Add to that the fear from the knowledge that there is no way to retreat to anymore, soldiers will be much less focused on attacking but only about staying alife

Sun Tzu says something like: "To a surrounded enemy, you must leave a way of escape". RTW now has units fighting to the death if they are completely surrounded. Leave a way out and it becomes easier to kill them.


CBR

[doc_bean]

Is it really so hard to have decent-length combat

Well yes, a lot of things TW games do or at least try to do are very hard to pull off. But that's why people give them money in exchange for their product.

[Orda Khan]

I don't like the sound of that DIY if you want a decent game quote. Are CA going to make it easy for modded games to be hosted on MP? Just another reason to allow plenty of time for response before purchase

.......Orda

[Orda Khan]

For multiplayer, I'm putting my effort into Samurai Wars.

Make the most of it, you'll probably find the VI server shut down before too long

......Orda

[Lord Adherbal]

Yes that is certainly true but units can certainly stand firm and fight hard without attacking much. Hastings is one example.

the huscarls at hastings fought defensively. They would've been much more effective at killing when used offensively, but the enemy was too numerous for that. The same reason why a surrounded unit may still be able to hold out for long, but it would lose much of it's offensive capability.

RTW now has units fighting to the death if they are completely surrounded. Leave a way out and it becomes easier to kill them.

yeah, because routing units turn into brainless sugar. And units fighting to death don't do any damage at all, they just take a bit longer to kill (then routing units).

What does what weapon they used have to do with it? The point is that such a formation does not have a real flank or rear. It is formed up with enough depth and width to be able to deal with attacks from any direction.

you used the square formation as an example. I explained why and under what circumstances it is effective.

your example is like 4 units forming a square box. In that situation it has no real flank or back. But a single unit in (R)TW does not represent something that is large enough to hold off an attack from multiple sides and still remain at full combat efficiency, regardless of it's formation depth.

you do agree that when a unit is "uncertain" or "wavering" from being surrounded it should lose offensive efficiency, right? because if even that doesn't make sense to you I shouldn't bother discussing this. Just put yourself in the shoes of a soldier that is part of a 60 men unit and surrounded by the enemy.

[CBR]

the huscarls at hastings fought defensively. They would've been much more effective at killing when used offensively, but the enemy was too numerous for that. The same reason why a surrounded unit may still be able to hold out for long, but it would lose much of it's offensive capability..

That is pure conjecture. We have very little information about the Norman heavy infantry. And that is still not the point. Standing firm and you can repel enemy attacks. Sure they might not be able to advance to push an enemy unit to the breaking point. I never claimed they could do that.

yeah, because routing units turn into brainless sugar. And units fighting to death don't do any damage at all, they just take a bit longer to kill (then routing units).

Well I would like to go back to STW/MTW routing units that takes longer to kill. But in my last campaign I still found I had fewer losses if I didnt completely surround the enemy.

you used the square formation as an example. I explained why and under what circumstances it is effective.

I mentioned both square and column formations. The Swiss used some massive columns which other nations also started to use. A threat or charge on the flank of such a formation would force it stop up but that is still a lot better than when in a line as that could cause a rout.

your example is like 4 units forming a square box. In that situation it has no real flank or back. But a single unit in (R)TW does not represent something that is large enough to hold off an attack from multiple sides and still remain at full combat efficiency, regardless of it's formation depth.

Well that depends on how one looks at it. Why should individual units not be able to act like that? After subtracting cavalry and missile units you might not have that many infantry units left to form up more than one or two big columns. Some BI units have the square formation too. TW battles are pretty abstract as we are not using realistic numbers of men. Having special formations that works for a selected group would be great.

you do agree that when a unit is "uncertain" or "wavering" from being surrounded it should lose offensive efficiency, right? because if even that doesn't make sense to you I shouldn't bother discussing this. Just put yourself in the shoes of a soldier that is part of a 60 men unit and surrounded by the enemy

Yes the individual soldier AI is too aggressive. Units and soldiers should fall back when "losing badly" Surrounded units thats are losing badly should become compressed and get penalties for that. Should all soldiers get a combat penalty just because their unit is surrounded? As long as they have room to wield their weapon they should be able to inflict just as many wounds as they would normally do. Maybe one could argue that they should turn into "hold formation" ala STW/MTW and have some attack go over to defense instead, I dont know.


CBR

[econ21]

Interesting discussion - [cf]Adherbal makes interesting points about units not getting a combat penalty for being surrounded; and also about RTW units turning to face threats more easily. I had not noticed either feature until he pointed them out in this and an earlier thread. But I'm not convinced either is feature is particularly silly.

On the first point, just because you've had to turn around to face an opponent to the back of your formation, it does not necessarily mean that one-on-one, you will do any worse in hand-to-hand combat with them. (The exception being phalanxes, where RTW does a pretty good job of modelling the vulnerability from switching to swords). The main penalty for being surrounded or flanked should be a morale one. Beyond that I think the combat bonus from striking someone in the back being negating of the defence skill and shield is sufficient. Surrounded men may well fight more vigorously, hence Sun Tzu's advice to always leave a golden bridge from retreat.

On the second point, if you see a mass of enemy forming up to charge you in the back, it is pretty natural for the rear-ranks to turn to face you. I did notice it recently when I tried to line up my cavalry to charge a phalanx in the back in a forum and my reaction was "clever AI!" not "dumb AI". You can manage to surprise formations and hit them in the back, but in my experience, you have to distract them with another unit or rely on speed. Just slowing lining up behind them will not do it and perhaps rightly so. (I doubt Ancient warfare was as formal and linear as Napoleonic combat).

I think flanking, surrounding etc does work reasonably well in realism mods like RTR Platinum. In these kind of mods, kill rates are slow and morale is high. If you just fight face to face, it's a meat grinder, so flanking is everything. Even the AI does it.

Here's one example from RTR PE, from an AI vs AI battle I contrived for a PBM. Some principes (uber-troops in RTR) fight Gallic warbands (no better than the vanilla ones really).



Another AI Gallic warband lines up a nice rear charge - no principes turn to face them in anticipation:



In the melee, the rear principes do turn and fight:


They break with about 60 men left (loss of their general earlier had weakened their morale):



If their general had not been killed, I concede, the principes might have fought for a long time - almost to the death. But the again, I suspect real principes might also have done that in such a backs to the wall situation. Lesser troops would fold like the principes above did.

[Lord Adherbal]

is that principes unit in guard mode? the formation looks too organised for a unit with guard mode off. If so, that could explain why the unit breaks on impact.

Still, I think it's silly that you have to "surprise" a unit and break it by the charge, or else surrounding has no effect. Even if the soldiers do turn around and notice the unit in their back, shouldn't that cause atleast some sort of confusion and panic in the unit that has an effect on it's performance?
In reality being able to move into the back of an enemy without getting noticed by some soldiers would be impossible. Some men would look behind and notice the maneuvre, at which point confusion and panic would definitly start too spread. Unless they're all the uber cool Gladiator Roman types I guess, those guys obviously didn't fear anything, and don't care if their line of retreat is being cut off.

[econ21]

is that principes unit in guard mode? the formation looks too organised for a unit with guard mode off. If so, that could explain why the unit breaks on impact.

I don't know if it was on guard mode - the AI controlled both sides. Sometimes my own principes start a battle in guard mode, sometimes not. I haven't worked out why. But the principes did not break on impact. As you can see by the third screenshot, the rear turned around and fought for a while.

Still, I think it's silly that you have to "surprise" a unit and break it by the charge, or else surrounding has no effect. Even if the soldiers do turn around and notice the unit in their back, shouldn't that cause atleast some sort of confusion and panic in the unit that has an effect on it's performance?

Yes, but confusion and panic are primarily morale effects, not ones that reduce an individual soldier's chance to hit (or increase their chance to be hit).

Maybe I am wrong, but I don't believe surrounding has no effect after the initial charge. I would expect the morale effects to last for as long as you are outflanked. In MTW, you got a -6 morale for both flanks being threatened and a +4 for both being secure. That net +10 effect is pretty big. We don't know what the corresponding modifiers in RTW are, but unless someone finds out to the contrary, those figures sound plausible.

I think TW models morale rather well - I like the "steady", "wavering" etc status and the way in realism mods, there is a world of difference between a few fragile cavalry charging steady troops in the flank and the same charging waving ones. It's one of the reasons why I think TW is such a superb engine for modding hardcore wargames and why I am grateful for CA continuing to produce products suitable for this.

Here's another screenshot, showing how charging in the rear is important. I distracted the phalanx with cavalry and the triari were able to come in for the kill.



As it happens, I messed up the charge by having left the triarii on guard formation, but still the end result was inevitable. The benefit of charging in the rear is so big, I could safely move on and focus on another point of the battle (flanking the next phalanx...). Note that this "phalanx" is an RTR PE one, so it has spears, not pikes (no switching to swords) and it is not in the special "phalanx" formation, just deployed in a dense square. The phalanx did not break on impact, but slowly inexorably it was defeated at modest cost.

I don't really want to see flanking get any more powerful in TW. At least for the SP game, it's fine. Strengthen it any more and we'll get something like the "knights falling like flies when touching pikes" effect we see in one of the M2TW trailers.

[IrishArmenian]

They are releasing the Demo probably to get feedback from 3rd party players. I see this as a way to fix the game. I assume these issues will be dealt with because this guy spoke out.

[TB666]

Another report here
http://www.totalwar.org.pl/indexeng.php?ArtId=440

[econ21]

Wow, that's a very informative account, TB666.

Sounds like cavalry have been toned down from RTW - perhaps too much. Unlike the author, from a historical realism point of view, I am glad that dismounted English knights can beat mounted French ones; even billmen. (The French dismounted at Agincourt for a reason). But the billmen beating them when they had their backs to horses sounds bad - like the butt-spike effect of spears and pikes we see in RTW.

[hoetje]

The demo that was available in Leipzig didn't reveal any strategic mechanisms but - according to the information that I've heard from Sega - this aspect should be added to the public demo which is still being worked out.

Does anyone know when the demo will be released?I mean an official source.

[TB666]

Well hopefully this will be fixed in the final game.
According to 753 they still got 30% to go and balancing is probably one thing they need to do(unless the stats are made for the demo, in other words the knights are suppose to be weak).
As a member on the TWC wrote

Heavy Cav was the dominating force in RTW, an age of infantry, and now in MTW they have severely nerfed it, in a time where heavy cavalry was king

[Midnight]

Combat slowing down - excellent!
Knights as tough as wet tissues - not so good.

Good find, TB666!

[screwtype]

There are probably alot more things to be ironed out before the release. Just because the AI is bad at Agincourt doesn't mean anything. All this pessimism about the game is gettting really old and really boring me now

Yes, I have to agree with that, the game isn't finished so what is the point of criticizing the gameplay now? Let's at least try and wait for the finished product (ie the demo) before getting all pessimistic about alleged missing features.

[Crazed Rabbit]

Gah. I'm already pessimistic. I remember when we were told not to be pessimistic when the unit preview for the gladiator in RTW was released.

CA have confirmed they are continuing in the RTW battle-lite direction, that they view making a halfway realistic battle simulator as 'market limiting'.

It also sounds like MTW2 has some issues for a game to be released in November(?).

That is not my main problem with it. The problem is having to wait 1+ years for a good mod to make the game good.

It is, of course, CA's right to make whatever game they please. I would not be unhappy about some competition in the genre, however.

Crazed Rabbit

[AussieGiant]

Great report, but I'd keep everything in perspective.

There is a lot of work to be done. Some work sounds kind of serious (Cavalry getting murdered after charging Billmen in the rear), and some not so serious.

In the end I am consistently surprised by the number of reports from people all over the planet regarding movement speeds and kill rates. CA must have worked this out by now surely?

In the end the graphics seem to have been solved but the core battle behaviour is still a tough nut for CA to crack.

I'm looking forward to the guy's here getting their hands on the Demo.

[Lord Adherbal]

There is a lot of work to be done. Some work sounds kind of serious (Cavalry getting murdered after charging Billmen in the rear), and some not so serious.

In the end I am consistently surprised by the number of reports from people all over the planet regarding movement speeds and kill rates. CA must have worked this out by now surely?

these problems existed in the RTW demo and were never fixed in the full release, patched or expansion. If they still aren't fixed now, what makes you so certain they will fix them before the release? I really think CA doesn't care about these kind of combat engine flaws anymore. Aslong as it all looks spectacular and hollywoodish their target fanbase (kids) will be pleased.

[hoetje]

I dont think their target fanbase are kids. Kids want fast gameplay,the campaign map won't please them.They should play tekken or so

[Longjohn4]

I think a point that you've all missed is that in the Agincourt demo, the English army all have huge experience (hence the number of flags) so they're not going to break from morale, and they have a big edge over the knights that they wouldn't have if the experience levels were even.

[Puzz3D]

I think a point that you've all missed is that in the Agincourt demo, the English army all have huge experience (hence the number of flags) so they're not going to break from morale, and they have a big edge over the knights that they wouldn't have if the experience levels were even.

A voice from the past with important info. Thanks LongJohn.

[sunsmountain]

I think this says it all. Creative Assembly is continuing down the path they started with RTW. If that doesn't please you, you must be a hardcore player. Wait for the SP mods a year or so down the road, and hope at least one of them improves the gameplay enough that you find it worth playing. For multiplayer, I'm putting my effort into Samurai Wars.

I hope they at least provide enough moddability to have the "hardcore players" set their preferred game and kill speeds. Cavalry dropping like flies is actually a good thing, since cav is way too strong in RTW now.

[Lord Adherbal]

Cavalry dropping like flies is actually a good thing, since cav is way too strong in RTW now.

I disagree, fights shouldn't be over in 5 seconds. Cav should kill slower, not die faster.

A voice from the past with important info. Thanks LongJohn.

any prove he's the CA LongJohn you're been talking about?

[AussieGiant]

these problems existed in the RTW demo and were never fixed in the full release, patched or expansion. If they still aren't fixed now, what makes you so certain they will fix them before the release? I really think CA doesn't care about these kind of combat engine flaws anymore. Aslong as it all looks spectacular and hollywoodish their target fanbase (kids) will be pleased.

Well if they are then this next edition of their game will begin their demise. RTW was the beginning of fast battle and now RTWII is the second edition after this change. If they persist then they could find themselves on the wrong side of their sales target as they lose a segement they were counting on.

I'm just trying to be positive Adherbal. At the moment that is all I can do.

[Lord Adherbal]

pessimism will save you from being disappointed