Another Gamespot preview

Link


One thing at least some people will be happy to know: You can, in fact, ram enemy ships in the naval battles. I quote a brief passage from a battle being fought by the article's author....

and one enemy ship-of-the-line, seemingly out of desperation, rammed our heavy frigate head-on, smashing the tip of our vessel's forward hull to splinters.

I hope that ramming will indeed be more of a maneuver born of desperation (and not a truly valid "regular" tactic), but it's good to know that it's being included.

There was quite a bit more information on the details of the game, for once.

You have an idea of some of the technical advancements which seem to be subdivided by subject or disciplines.

A couple more of the Indian Nations were mentioned along with a few of the provincial names.

Nothing yet over rifles vs. muskets, though it is sure to be there in some form or another.

The description of naval battles was nice, as was the info on the campaign map. It went into more detail than most.

As for ramming. It sonds like a fun way to liven up a tedious battle where the enemy have sent a fleet of Sloops and you have a couple of First rate lineships.

Yes! This is going to be my trademark strategy! PREPARE TO RAM!!!

Yes but, you saw what the heavy Frigate did to the British line. A squadron of four of those might be enough to out maneuver and chew up a larger force without becoming decisively engaged.

Lighter or faster ships that can cross a T and with draw before being engaged can really mess up your whole day.

Plus, of course, good news from the point of view of ancient Greece/Rome mods.

*Empire does have rock-paper-scissors-like unit balancing in that light infantry handily beat militia, heavy infantry beat light infantry, and pike emplacements beat cavalry (which we remembered only too late after hastily steering some of our dragoons around some fenced-off emplacements to cut off a routed enemy squad's retreat...only to get gored).*

Great rock-paper-scissors - it gets better with every release methinks

!it burnsus!

Plus, of course, good news from the point of view of ancient Greece/Rome mods.

The AI's probably not cut out for that, unless there's a line in ship_AI.txt that goes "priority_ramming 100" or something like that.

/it would be nice.

Ign has a hands on preview from Dec the 18th, it is much better. Someone go find it, url it, link it and start a topic about a decent preview lol.

Maybe I'm reading too much into this but it looks like infrastructure development and techonological development are now separate. That would be awesome.

one thing that got me was the...

The coins in your nation's collective pocket will also determine your stature when it comes to diplomacy, since in addition to standard military alliances, you can propose trade alliances, make national gifts, and trade entire regions to your partners, as well as demand protectorate status, which, if accepted, will require the subject nation to forfeit half of its profits to you and preclude it from declaring war (unless the nation decides to rebel and declare war on you). Of course, demanding a protectorate will be more a matter of military might.


That part of giving half your income and not being able to declare war on another faction is something I believe is new. Atleast I never experienced this when I was the protectorite.

Originally Posted by Belgolas

one thing that got me was the...

The coins in your nation's collective pocket will also determine your stature when it comes to diplomacy, since in addition to standard military alliances, you can propose trade alliances, make national gifts, and trade entire regions to your partners, as well as demand protectorate status, which, if accepted, will require the subject nation to forfeit half of its profits to you and preclude it from declaring war (unless the nation decides to rebel and declare war on you). Of course, demanding a protectorate will be more a matter of military might.


That part of giving half your income and not being able to declare war on another faction is something I believe is new. Atleast I never experienced this when I was the protectorite.

Sadly protectorates have really worked as advertised. In Med 2 they will backstab you as soon as they can. As for getting part of their income, that was in Med 2 but the A.I was always so broke it never happaned.

Up until now protectorates have been next to useless and unbeliveably difficult to get and maintain. Lets hope it changes with Empire.