MTW old boy just started RTW - some questions

[King Kurt]

After playing MTW for over 3 years - and been an active member in the Main Hall - due to the arrival of a new computer I have recently started playing RTW.
I am really enjoying my first campaign but have a couple of questions to ask.

1) How can I encourage/ obtain more governors? - The family feels spread thin as I start to expand and I could do with a few more governors - any ideas?
2) Already played a few seiges - my towers seem stop start on their way to the wall - I have to keep ordering them forward as they keep stopping. I also have had some problems getting the troops to climb up them when they arrive, so any suggestions welcome.
3) As a long time MTW hand, I am used to a spear/ javalin sign appearing on my cursor during battles. This means start missle attack and not melee. If I want them to fight I have to use the alt key as well as the mouse. Now in RTW my Roman infantry come up with a spear sign so I have been using the alt key to initiate melee as I don't want them to skirmish - is that right? I really want them to charge, throw their javelins then close to contact but if I have to use the alt key at close quarters that seems a bit too much like over micromanagement - am I doing it wrong?

In my first campaign as the Brutti, I seem to be doing OK - I have the Adriatic coast, Greece and am about to take Constantinopole. The game is close enough to MTW to be able to get going quickly, but has enough differences to make it interesting.

[Darkvicer98]

Welcome to RTW King Kurt.

1).You can bribe other factions family members to join your own. But all your settlements don't need a governor,some can go without.

2).If you have your towers too close to each other they stop-start. Try to have one siege tower on each side of the gate so they don't stop-start.

3).The Roman Infantry throw their spears once then charge the enemy. Is this what you want?

Good luck with the Campaign.

[Mahrabals apprentice]

1) How can I encourage/ obtain more governors? - The family feels spread thin as I start to expand and I could do with a few more governors - any ideas?

Also your family members need to end the turn in a city in order to spend a romantic evening with their wifes. I think having +population growth temples in the city improves odds further, as do some ancillaries

[Quintus.JC]

1) How can I encourage/ obtain more governors? - The family feels spread thin as I start to expand and I could do with a few more governors - any ideas?
2) Already played a few seiges - my towers seem stop start on their way to the wall - I have to keep ordering them forward as they keep stopping. I also have had some problems getting the troops to climb up them when they arrive, so any suggestions welcome.
3) As a long time MTW hand, I am used to a spear/ javalin sign appearing on my cursor during battles. This means start missle attack and not melee. If I want them to fight I have to use the alt key as well as the mouse. Now in RTW my Roman infantry come up with a spear sign so I have been using the alt key to initiate melee as I don't want them to skirmish - is that right? I really want them to charge, throw their javelins then close to contact but if I have to use the alt key at close quarters that seems a bit too much like over micromanagement - am I doing it wrong?

In my first campaign as the Brutti, I seem to be doing OK - I have the Adriatic coast, Greece and am about to take Constantinopole. The game is close enough to MTW to be able to get going quickly, but has enough differences to make it interesting.

Welcome to Rome: Total War King hurt.

1) Family members are naturally born within your family, as you control more settlements you may feel the need for more FMs, You may need to select ‘Control all settlements’ at the start of campaign to take charge of the settlements without governors, I guess you did that already. (1) Bribing from other factions is one way to increase your family members, this could be expensive but well worth it if you could spare the money. It is best to bribe other Romans to your family, but beware as in version 1.5 you are not allowed to bribe other Romans until the civil war. (2) As the Brutii you have the ability to build temples to Juno, this type of temple brings health bonus and also brings very useful Ancillaries if you want to have more family members. Retinues such as Druids, Doctors and physicians etc. etc. increase the chance of your male family members of having more children, so have them handy. (3) Adoption is another way to increase your family tree, this is however quite rare and not controlled by the human player. Adoption happens when one of your captains have done well in battle and are promoted to a general, and thus joining your family. This does not happen often and the chance is completely random and is an unreliable way to increase your family tree.

2) Keep the siege towers apart from each other and they should advance quite neatly. After reaching a section of the wall, make sure you select the unit you want to scale the wall and then click that section of the wall as your unit’s destination. They will then start climbing the ladder/tower towards the point you clicked.

3) Roman infantry tend to throw pilum before they charges. This can normally be seen as an advantage as it causes a handful of damage to your enemy before your unit even charges. But in other situation such as when your general is in danger it is more practical to charge straight away, press alt and the javelin sign should be switched to swords. The same could be done to other missile units as well.

Hope this helped, good luck on your campaign.

[salemty]

i know this is completely off topic but im having a problem. im trying to download the 1.3 patch for rtw but it says it going to take 7hrs! is it something im doin or does it just take a REEEEAAAALLLYY long time to download? plz help

[Bartholemew-Varath]

Im pretty sure it shouldnt take that long to download the patch, thats about the time it would take to downloaded Europa Barbarorum for me, but im not sure about the patch as im playing Rome Gold Edition. I think King Kurts questions have been answered so i wont bother repeating other peoples posts

[King Kurt]

Thanks guys - nice to see the Colosseum is as friendly and helpful as the Main Hall. I may be back when I think of some other questions!!

[anelious phyros]

If your coming to Rome Total War you might want to check out the Coming Back to RTW thread in the colleseum. Which is where we are. The thread has a lot of good info on who you should play as. But that's all there personal opinion. Best of luck.

[King Kurt]

anelious phyros - thanks - I have been having a look at that.

Another problem has croped up and I wonder if any body can shed some light. Last night I opened the game up to find all my Brutti save games had gone - tried relaunching - still not there - but my original 2 games before I had started that campaign were there. This was a bit annoying to say the least as I was only a couple of provinces away from finishing the imperial campaign to unlock the rest of the game.
So I started a Scippi campaign instead - going nicely - I have all of Sicily conquered already and I am looking towards Carthage next. The advice above is playing dividends - the pilum throwing before melee is obviously more effective.

Any comments on the lost save games??

[anelious phyros]

"No Pc game is perfect.
And they'll always screw up" - Anelious Phyros

Besides I think you deserve the rest just go to
Local Disk/Program Files/Creative Assembly/Rome - Total War/Data/World/maps/campiagn/imperial campaign/descr_strat -
and you'll find =

campaign imperial_campaign
playable
romans_julii
romans_brutii
romans_scipii
end
unlockable
egypt
seleucid
carthage
parthia
gauls
germans
britons
greek_cities
end
nonplayable
romans_senate
macedon
pontus
armenia
dacia
numidia
scythia
spain
thrace
slave
end

chang it to who you want to play and whal-la'!
Sorry about your lost.

[Bartholemew-Varath]

Just to take off from where anelious phyros stopped, almost all the factions are playable, just edit the file to look like this

playable
romans_julii
romans_brutii
romans_scipii
egypt
seleucid
carthage
parthia
gauls
germans
britons
greek_cities
macedon
pontus
armenia
dacia
numidia
scythia
spain
thrace
end
unlockable
end
nonplayable
romans_senate
slave
end



The factions i have mentioned below are all playable as well, just not unlockable in the campaign. Notice that the Roman Senate and the Slave Faction are not playable. I think the Slave faction might be actually, but im not sure. The Roman Senate is not playable, as major modificiations are needed to make this faction playable, and not all of these work...

[Darkvicer98]

The rebels are playable but they lose money from the beginning and it's not wise to give them loads of Denarii because when playing as another faction the Rebels become more aggressive than just hang around near where they spawn. But you can put taxes up to Very High because they can't rebel against the Rebels.

[Omanes Alexandrapolites]

Both the slaves and the senate are playable, but it's important to note that they are much more buggy than the other factions. When playing as the senate, for example, the game crashes whenever you click on the senate tab in the faction summery scroll.

Basically, if you do choose to play either the rebels or the senate, be prepared for a few nasty surprises. Ensure that you save your game as frequently as possible in case of the occurrence of such random crashes.

BTW, as the rebels, it's frequently a good idea to disband forces, destroy and abandon settlements and centralise your empire around a single strategic settlement (usually in a rich area). Defending the scattered rebel empire is exceedingly difficult. Especially considering that the rebels typically are the favourite first target of the "real" factions.

[King Kurt]

Thanks for the potential edit - I'm happy to play out the Scippi campaign - it is good practice - I'm playing on m/m settings and a short campaign so it should not take long - I played for just over an hour the other night and I have already conquered Sicily. A couple of turns regrouping and I will invade Carthage. My inclination is to go west after sorting out Carthage, taking on Numidia then Spain.

[Darkvicer98]

I think it's best to leave Numidia except by taking their 2 north settlements close to the sea. Dimmidi will give you trouble and it's in the middle of Africa near nothing. Lepcis Magna(North Africa) will have the Egyptians after you. Spain will create big armies so come prepared.

[King Kurt]

thanks for the tips - will report back on my progress

[Quintus.JC]

Darkvicer98 is right, the desert city of Dimmidi and Nepte are hardly worth conquering, but might be nessary if you wish to wipe out the Numidians entirely. Egypt normally end up as the most powerful faction that isn't Roman and definitely not nice to mess with them on your first campaign. Temple selections could also be of some importance, what temples do you mostly focus on KingHurt?

Basically, if you do choose to play either the rebels or the senate, be prepared for a few nasty surprises.........

That reminded me, a settlement under SPQR control doesn't seem to riot no matter what the happiness is. When I played as SPQR i got pretty bored pretty quickly because of the availability of temples and a lack of civil riots.

[King Kurt]

Darkvicer98 is right, the desert city of Dimmidi and Nepte are hardly worth conquering, but might be nessary if you wish to wipe out the Numidians entirely. Egypt normally end up as the most powerful faction that isn't Roman and definitely not nice to mess with them on your first campaign. Temple selections could also be of some importance, what temples do you mostly focus on KingKurt?



That reminded me, a settlement under SPQR control doesn't seem to riot no matter what the happiness is. When I played as SPQR i got pretty bored pretty quickly because of the availability of temples and a lack of civil riots.

Quintus
I am concentrating on Vulcan temples as I like the weapon upgrades. Happiness and squalor don't appear a problem at the moment and I can tweak the situation with buildings if need be. The guides suggest Vulcan but have you used anything else? As somebody who is well versed in MTW the use of temples - and the city micromanagement in general is all a bit new to me.

[Omanes Alexandrapolites]

That reminded me, a settlement under SPQR control doesn't seem to riot no matter what the happiness is. When I played as SPQR i got pretty bored pretty quickly because of the availability of temples and a lack of civil riots.

That's mainly there to ensure that the senate do not end up destroyed by an attempt at taking power by the people of Rome. I do agree though - it does take a fair level of enjoyability out of the game since you don't have to watch public order most of the time. It probably would be better if the restriction were just limited to Rome, but the CA probably did not envisage the senate being played by gamers or expanding beyond Rome.

[Quintus.JC]

Quintus
I am concentrating on Vulcan temples as I like the weapon upgrades. Happiness and squalor don't appear a problem at the moment and I can tweak the situation with buildings if need be. The guides suggest Vulcan but have you used anything else? As somebody who is well versed in MTW the use of temples - and the city micromanagement in general is all a bit new to me.

Temples to Vulcan grants weapons and armour upgrades at first, which is very useful. But later on when you are able to construct awesome temples to Vulcan you’ll get an additional 2 experience bonus to all troops (except naval) trained there. Vulcan for me is probably the most useful temple since it grants weapons and armour upgrade as well as experience, something Mars is not able to do, which makes the Scipii the only Roman faction able to get their units to gold weapon and armour after the construction of a foundry. This temple is however not useful in every each of your settlements, only cities that are concentrate into troop-production should have Vulcan. Administration and commercial cities are better with…..

Temples to Saturn. It increases population happiness and happiness due to law. These temples should be present in administration centres. The law bonus reduces corruption and grants a unique powerful unit – Arcani, when an awesome temple is built.

The other temple choice is Neptune. For me this is the least useful, it gives happiness and later grants unique naval units. Which isn’t that impressive really, but it would be nice to have at least one of them in your empire.

[King Kurt]

Quick up date - and 2 questions.

I now control North Africa from 2 provinces to the east of Carthage through to the west coast. Carthage is now my capital, pumping out Triari etc. I have landed in Spain, taken a province and headed to Cartho Nouvo.

My 1st question is concerning CTDs. When my forces landed in North Africa and started beseiging Carthage, their forces sallied and we fought an open field battle. In probably my best battle to date, I overwhelmed the Cartharginians - including their elephants - routing them off the field. This meant that I took Carthage as well. Just as I was sorting out the aftermath - I think I was enslaving etc - the programme crashed and, of course, all was lost. The auto save was about a turn or 2 before and when I beseiged Carthage, they did not sally this time. so the question is - why the CTD? - is their anything I should be doing? RTW seems a little unstable - compared to MTW that is - do people save reguarly etc?

2nd Question is about riots. Syracuse seems to be in a permenant state of uproar despite a significant garrison, as many happy buildings as I can build and a low tax rate - what can I do?

Overall, I am still enjoying myself - the game is different enough to be challenging and there is still a lot to master. I keep feeling that I am not going as fast as I could - but I am used to playing MTW in a blitz style. I am sure it will come in time.

[Quintus.JC]

2nd Question is about riots. Syracuse seems to be in a permenant state of uproar despite a significant garrison, as many happy buildings as I can build and a low tax rate - what can I do?

Depending on the difficulty, there could be many reason for this. Squalor is the most likely cause since Syracuse by that time should be hitting huge city mark. Squalor can only be solved by building health buildings (Sewers and upgrades), or temples that grant health bonus. Other wise you could put a high-rank governor in charge, preferable someone with high management or influence. They should at least be able to reduce the unhappiness. Culture difference is also key but I think you have held Syracuse long enough to wipe out any Greek influence. Any with Carthage as your capital the distance to capital penalty is definitely not contributing in Syracuse. There might come to a point when you have to exterminate Syracuse when it grows too big, but that also doesn’t seem to be your case because the Marian reform hasn’t happened yet.

Sorry can't help you on CTDs, Ain’t a technical expert.

[Omanes Alexandrapolites]

My 1st question is concerning CTDs. When my forces landed in North Africa and started beseiging Carthage, their forces sallied and we fought an open field battle. In probably my best battle to date, I overwhelmed the Cartharginians - including their elephants - routing them off the field. This meant that I took Carthage as well. Just as I was sorting out the aftermath - I think I was enslaving etc - the programme crashed and, of course, all was lost. The auto save was about a turn or 2 before and when I beseiged Carthage, they did not sally this time. so the question is - why the CTD? - is their anything I should be doing? RTW seems a little unstable - compared to MTW that is - do people save reguarly etc?

R:TW is a frequent random crasher when it comes to settlement capturing. Extermination is the worst cause, but enslavement can also be a problem.

2nd Question is about riots. Syracuse seems to be in a permenant state of uproar despite a significant garrison, as many happy buildings as I can build and a low tax rate - what can I do?

High taxes, unrest, squalor, cultural penalty and distance to capital are the key anti-public order factors which great leaders could do without. You can view the cause of the problem by acessing the advanced settlement details scroll. To do this, double click on the settlement, and select one of the buttons in the bottom left hand corner of the scroll to activate it. I can't quite exactly remember which one it is though, sorry.

To prevent squalor, the best option is to simply prevent growth - as a wise fellow once said - "your war is not against squalor - it's against population growth". Population growth will always occur in even the least hygienic and well fed settlements, yet it can be slowed down by avoiding health and population boosting buildings, including farms. In addition, avoiding enslaving the populace can also be a good method of avoiding this problem.

Unfortunately, your only resort against squalor, once you have it, is building heath buildings and similar happiness structures. I do believe, however, that they do not actually resolve squalor and instead simply counter-act and, over time phase their good out by piling huge amounts of population upon your settlement creating a worse squalor issue. You could also upgrade the Governor's palace, yet that can make things worse in the long run too.

The best thing I find if the problem is too out of hand is abandoning the settlement, leaving it to revolt, and then returning to exterminate the populace. It reduces the population's numbers, yet also removes income within the settlement, so, if you're desperate for cash, then you may wish to avoid this evil strategy.

If squalor is the problem, may I also suggest that you try rebalancing the population. Simply train many units of peasants in your largest cities and disband them in your smaller ones. This migration moves men from the large city, that could do with less people in the populace, to a smaller one that requires the population to expand to the next level to gain better troops. If you have no small cities that require this boost, send the Peasants to their deaths - stick 'em on a boat and send them into pirate/enemy infested waters. They will soon be dead, leaving you with nothing to worry about!

By doing this though, sacrifices will have to be made - to get the best military units you require maxed up cities. In certain strategically important cities, these rules will have to be broken. As long your cities aren't constantly under attack, you probably won't need to do that though.

Secondly, the more people there are in a settlement, the higher the income. Although this won't matter if you aren't extremely rich already, it could be damaging if you are not. If the latter is the case, you may have to carefully balance growth with squalor.

Unrest is caused by recent conquest of a settlement, governor's traits and enemy spies stirring up trouble!

Sadly, resolving unrest caused by the settlement changing hands in unresolvable and cannot really be changed without the help on a unrest reducing governor - sorry.

However, checking out your characters can solve unrest. Does the governor have unrest causing traits in his selection? If he does then get your calculator out and add things up! For every happiness influencing point which is positive, such as influence/subtraction from squalor, add 5% onto your totals unless a percentage is given and then instead add that on. Then subtract everything negative, taking away 5% per point of anything unless a percentage is given. If the governor's rating on your calculator turns out to be below 0 (causing more problems than he is resolving) then take him out and find somebody with a better rating.

Enemy spies are the chief cause of unrest, causing +5% unrest per subterfuge point. Put your own spies in the settlement to track them down and get them executed for their evils, this may take a few turns, however, so it may not be useful if you need an emergency quick-fix.

Cultural penalty is caused by buildings of a different culture being in your settlement. For example, if the Romans were to capture a Greek settlement with many Greek buildings then this factor would run rampant. It causes a -5% penalty per building that is not your culture with a 20% penalty for the governor's building. It does, however, reach it's maximum capacity at 50%.

It can be removed through upgrading the buildings in the settlement to the next level, upgrading the governor's residence, and the city, to the next level and destroying buildings not of your culture, although it's best to do a balancing act here and thing about the positive effects of the building versus a -5% happiness penalty.

Distance to capital is possible the easiest resolved of all the factors in R:TW happiness! Simply move the capital closer to the dangerous settlements and they will be much happier! Corruption, a major income reducer, will also be lowered in this process.

However, bear in mind that other settlements may become unhappier and more corruption riddled if the capital is moved away from them. It's best to browse around for a good place to locate your capital throughout a turn, making sure that everybody is satisfied with your choice of re-location.

On a final note regarding public order, you should bear in mind, as well as prevention, that the cure can be equally effective. If you ever have problems the construction of a law or an increased happiness building can never go amiss. Law is much better since it also aids your financial situation by reducing corruption, but in counter-acting rebellion problems, either bog standard happiness or law will do.

[caravel]

The whole growth, public health and squalor thing is a mess in RTW. I find it the single most offputting factor in the game. I often find myself spending turn after turn training peasants to send them elsewhere just to try and cut growth and that was on settlements where I've built no farming upgrades at all. It seems that no matter what you do, eventually your city will turn it a squalid rebellious mess and you will have to pull out, let it revolt and return in force to re take and exterminate the populous. In short there is far too much micromanagement at the campaign map level. I can deal with the rest of it's flaws but it's this that often leads to me quitting for the day in exasperation.

[Reapz]

1) How can I encourage/ obtain more governors?

Kurt - Another way is to use stacks of units without a general to engage rebels or in fights with other factions they are likely to win. The game engine will often offer the Captain for adoption after the battle if it is a good win.

[King Kurt]

Guys - great advice - thank you very much. I really need to put this advice to work in my my current Scippi campaign. I have just had a disastarous sequence of events where my best general died a move before i stormed a major city. The next turn my faction leader died. So - no general with my mega army and nobody at home at the capital - So 3 towns revolt including my capital and my income goes to pot. Looks like it is back to the last saved game to run the turns again with the benefit of hindsight!!
Is it me or do leaders etc die earlier in RTW? I am enjoying RTW but this winning the Imperial campaign to unlock everything else is a pain - I now you can mod it out but I thought the practice would be useful - oh well just a few more Spainish towns to conquer!!

[Quintus.JC]

The descr_strat files can unlock all the un-lockable and non-playable factions, or else you could just start a short campaign and complete it to unlock all the un-lockable factions.

[Quirinus]

2nd Question is about riots. Syracuse seems to be in a permenant state of uproar despite a significant garrison, as many happy buildings as I can build and a low tax rate - what can I do?

Just to add something that hasn't been mentioned yet, I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that some settlements/regions have inherent penalties to public order (in the form of unrest). Jerusalem, for example, or Britannia or Spain.

The whole growth, public health and squalor thing is a mess in RTW. I find it the single most offputting factor in the game. I often find myself spending turn after turn training peasants to send them elsewhere just to try and cut growth and that was on settlements where I've built no farming upgrades at all. It seems that no matter what you do, eventually your city will turn it a squalid rebellious mess and you will have to pull out, let it revolt and return in force to re take and exterminate the populous. In short there is far too much micromanagement at the campaign map level. I can deal with the rest of it's flaws but it's this that often leads to me quitting for the day in exasperation.

I couldn't agree more. D: The (partial) solution, I find, is to not play for too long-- for full campaigns, I generally quit the game the latest by around 210-180 BC.

Extermination is a great solution (any temporary loss in revenue is also partially offset by the plunder) but, to paraphrase Barbarossa82, using this tactic makes it impossible to roleplay with any degree of humanity.

[Joooray]

Very comprehensive post Oamanes, I just wanted to add some things that I thought you missed.
If I may. ;)

Unrest is caused by recent conquest of a settlement, governor's traits and enemy spies stirring up trouble!

Sadly, resolving unrest caused by the settlement changing hands in unresolvable and cannot really be changed without the help on a unrest reducing governor - sorry.

Of course the level of unrest changes over time, more specific is reduced by 5% every turn.

However, checking out your characters can solve unrest. Does the governor have unrest causing traits in his selection? If he does then get your calculator out and add things up! For every happiness influencing point which is positive, such as influence/subtraction from squalor, add 5% onto your totals unless a percentage is given and then instead add that on. Then subtract everything negative, taking away 5% per point of anything unless a percentage is given. If the governor's rating on your calculator turns out to be below 0 (causing more problems than he is resolving) then take him out and find somebody with a better rating.

Then again if one just wants to know the effect a governor has on a city, one just has to move him out of the city and then check the changes this causes in the city details scroll.
This is especially usefull if your governor seems like he is going to take the ship to the afterlife soon since you don't want to suddenly be confronted with a city with e.g. a runaway population or on the brink of revolt because the influence bonus is gone.

Cultural penalty is caused by buildings of a different culture being in your settlement. For example, if the Romans were to capture a Greek settlement with many Greek buildings then this factor would run rampant. It causes a -5% penalty per building that is not your culture with a 20% penalty for the governor's building. It does, however, reach it's maximum capacity at 50%.

I beg to differ on this point, if I remember correctly it is not that much a matter of number of buildings of a different culture but of the ratio between those and the ones of your own culture. Though I have to agree that the governor building has a greater effect than other bulidings.
Or am I mistaken? I think I read this somewhere in a guide, even being a quote of a developer.

[Quirinus]

Joooray is right, sometimes demolishing a single foreign building doesn't reduce the cultural penalty at all.

Of course the level of unrest changes over time, more specific is reduced by 5% every turn.

Ooh, that makes sense...... I never noticed that before.