The Ultimate Test: The First AAR of E:TW on the .org

[Monk]

I'm getting my info from .net. They didn't give difficulty settings, so you may be right. I did read of a guy making peace one year with a weak faction, only to be attacked the next by one or two units... which would be an endimic problem to the game's ai regardless of difficulty I would think.

Honestly it seems to be a mixed bag of impressions.

Some people are saying the AI is greatly improved and offers up a challenge while others say it's just as bad as rtw's. It's really hard to tell who's right as both sides cannot be correct. The only way I can be sure is to get the game myself, but being stuck waiting on the US countdown to unlock isn't exactly easy.

Looking forward to Orgah's reviews, as they are always the most thorough. That other place is like trying to fish information out of a bunch of kindergarteners.

I know what you mean. Most of the .Orgahs i've talked to have (thus far) been satisfied with ETW, I'll know for sure what I'll be later this morning after my download is done. For now all I can do is wait.

[wumpus]

Honestly it seems to be a mixed bag of impressions.

Some people are saying the AI is greatly improved and offers up a challenge while others say it's just as bad as rtw's. It's really hard to tell who's right as both sides cannot be correct.

imho, it depends really on an individual's perspective--and perception--of what "good" or "bad" AI is. there are some who say the AI of shogun:tw is "good" while others say it's "bad" so it must also apply to the new E:TW. the best way to be sure is to try it out yourself. have fun waiting for your countdown to be consummated, my friend. Hawooh.

[pevergreen]

Pre-battle screen. My Southern Army, just before its defeat.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Diplomatic Relations, my faction selected. I have quite a few enemies. Denmark is my ally, Poland-Lithuania is my trade partner.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Besieging St. Petersburg, also showing the new recruit on general mechanic. First number is number to recruit unit, second is travel time to the stack.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Pre-battle screen for the Second battle of St. Petersburg

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Cossack regiment

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

My deployment.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Citizens in action!

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Cannonballs bouncing and impact on ground.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

My Southern Army destroyed.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Showing what you can do when a new town appears.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[pevergreen]

Summer, 1703:

Georgia declares war, causing Poland-Lithuania to call off the alliance. The Southern army moves south, intent on finishing the Crimeans off. Sweden is conducting raids around St. Petersburg.

Georgia raids my southern border, Sweden takes St. Petersberg back after the Northern army went out on a training drill (i misclicked them out, full movement)

Winter, 1703:
Northern army sieges St. Petersburg again. Construction on a new school begins, when the prince reports how far behind in technology we are. Cherkassk is being moved on by Georgia and Crimean Khanate, I may lose my Southern border.

Summer, 1704: Crimean Khanate attacks with an army of cossacks, the South army must retreat, outnumbered 1300 to 570.

Winter, 1704: The siege of St. Petersburg continues

Summer, 1705: The Crimean Khanate destroys the entire Southern Army.

Winter, 1705: Research begins in Plug Bayonets, construction of a Grand Southern Army begins.

Pictures of these various events are above this post.

[lenin96]

Summer, 1705: The Crimean Khanate destroys the entire Southern Army.

It's good to see these "minor factions" surviving, the AI can cope with a human playing as a large faction such as Russia, that means good things.

[Sir Beane]

This is great pevergreen .

[pevergreen]

Alright, I'm looking at if I should continue this. Im about 8 turns ahead of where I last wrote and nothing has happened. The first russian ships took to the seas and were destroyed, the Grand Southern Army was destroyed. I have low income, one ally I cant trade with and i seemed to be royally screwed.

Thoughts people?

edit: upon Monk's suggestion, I started to incite a rebellion, by putting taxes high.

[pevergreen]

Summer, 1703:

Georgia declares war, causing Poland-Lithuania to call off the alliance. The Southern army moves south, intent on finishing the Crimeans off. Sweden is conducting raids around St. Petersburg.

Georgia raids my southern border, Sweden takes St. Petersberg back after the Northern army went out on a training drill (i misclicked them out, full movement)

Winter, 1703:
Northern army sieges St. Petersburg again. Construction on a new school begins, when the prince reports how far behind in technology we are. Cherkassk is being moved on by Georgia and Crimean Khanate, I may lose my Southern border.

Summer, 1704: Crimean Khanate attacks with an army of cossacks, the South army must retreat, outnumbered 1300 to 570.

Winter, 1704: The siege of St. Petersburg continues

Summer, 1705: The Crimean Khanate destroys the entire Southern Army.

Winter, 1705: Research begins in Plug Bayonets, construction of a Grand Southern Army begins.

We fast forward a few years to the Summer of 1709.

My Western Border is secure, held at all parts by Poland-Lithuania. The Swedes are now fragmented around northern europe.

The Crimean Khanate threw up a terrifying defence and managed to obliterate the Grand Southern army.

To pay for the war, taxes were raised, but in the face of strikes and a possible rebellion, they have been lowered.

Ring Bayonets have been distributed around the army, and research has begun on this new mounted infantry "Dragoons". The Tsar has focused all of the greatest minds in his empire on military research.

Dagestan, Georgia and the Crimean Khanate all run free on the southern border and have begun to penetrate deeper into the empire. The Crimeans have launched into the Black Sea, whereas the first russian off land engagement was disasterous. The Swedes annihilated all russian craft.

In line with his new research, the Tsar has ordered that all units shall be nameless. A regiment shall only be bestowed a name for great achievements.

Winter, 1709: Carbines have been perfected. The Swedes still hold a Fur Trader position of ours in the north. The imperialistic Northern Army refuses to give way to the new regiment name orders, citing its many victories. The Prince seems to take a dislike to his ruler.

A new type of ammo for the cannon is being researched. It is unknown what this will bring. A new fleet, though small in planned size, is begun in Ingria.

Summer, 1710: France and Austria are at war. The North army continues towards Abo, in hopes of taking the Swedes to their knees, with only one Region left.

Winter, 1710: A new port emerges! Ingria has founded a second port, doubling the capabilities of the Russian Navy.
The North army avoids the larger Swedish force and makes way for Abo.
They make it, having marched their full distance, so...
Abo is besieged and attacked!

The battle for Abo:

The plan for the assault for Abo was to run for cover. The cannon would lay down supressive fire while the new line infantry would run for the cover of the buildings in town.

The swedes had the same idea.

Brutal hand to hand fighting was seen across the town.

Our Line infantry took the fighting inside all major buildings, outnumbering the Swedes in all of them. The experienced men stood outside and picked Swedish scum off through windows.

We took the town hall and started firing on the Citizens, warning them to clear out lest we kill them all. They would not listen, they stood and fired upon us, so we repayed them in kind. After killing a third of them, they fled.

All that was left was a single strongold of citizens in an outlying house. We lined up and had some target practice. The battle for Abo was won.

Prince Anikita was known to be a Brave Soldier, boosting the morale of his forces by +2.

Research begins on a new formation for our troops, as well as the next stage of military tech buildings beginning construction. Our treasury is at 259 gold. We have begun to recruit some mounted Cossacks.

Summer, 1711: The biggest army in Russians history is completed. Next season it can begin its move south. Canister shot has veen developed, research begins on a way for bigger shipyards to be built. Ships move outside Abo, Finland, in readiness to ferry troops to the final Swedish Region and its Capital. Stockholm, Sweden.

In world news, the Ottoman Empire seems to be the super power in Europe, Spain in the Americas and the Mughals in India.

Winter, 1711: Square formation has been researched, research begins on improving grenades.

The United Provinces and Great Britain have ceased to be Allies, perhaps the time is right to ally with Britain...

Both armies move towards their targets, Stockholm and the Crimean Khanate.

Summer, 1712: Austria and Great Britain are no longer allied...perhaps it is not yet the time to be close with Britain, not when it is losing allies like this.

Hannover is destroyed! They remain no more. Saxony have joined them in the pages of history. Perhaps those still loyal to them will rise up in the future?

Surprise! My Danish allies have besieged Stockholm already! I shall join them in this joyful occasion. It does seem that I am outnumbered by both these armies however. The Swedes have begun raiding my north again, and are sallying out of Stockholm against the Danish. The Prince of Russia decides to support his allies against the weak Swedish scum.

The Battle for Stockholm:

The Swedes have a good defence, cannons everywhere on the wall. The Russian-Denmark forces approach together.

The Prince takes up a command position, in what hopes to be just out of cannon range.

The Danes run to an undefended part of the fortress and throw scaling ropes up and begin the climb to the top, the Swedes rush to defend it, so the Danes keep moving around both sides of the fort.

The danes take the fort, and kill the enemy general. We have not even reached the City yet.

The Danes hold the centre and win, Stockholm is taken!

The Battle in Crimea:

Russia and its general Jan Stoljarov are attacked by all that the Crimean Khanate can muster. Over a thousand Coassacks line up against nearly 1200 Line Infantry. This should be a close victory, but victory nonetheless.

The battle is straightfoward. We intercept the main Crimean line and shoot it to pieces and then we charge with bayonet and horse. The Crimean break and flee.

[A Very Super Market]

Sounds like a lot of fun...

I started out as Russia, got intimidated, and went to good ol' two province Prussia. Hope you don't run me over...

[pevergreen]

Seeing as Prussia is the one that destroyed Hannover and Saxony, I'm kinda scared.

[Strategy]

Some people are saying the AI is greatly improved and offers up a challenge while others say it's just as bad as rtw's. It's really hard to tell who's right as both sides cannot be correct. The only way I can be sure is to get the game myself, but being stuck waiting on the US countdown to unlock isn't exactly easy.

It seems to me this has been the pattern with most TW games - there's always a lot of people saying the game AI is much better this time around right after release, and this continues until the point when people understand the exploits (inevitably, some "get it" earlier than others).

And at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter. What matters is whether the game is fun to play (with AI problems and all) or not. Personally, I am most concerned by the extremely slow pace the gameplay in this iteration seems to have (I love grand campaigns - yes - but I do have a life as well...), but being a sucker for this kind of game, I'm going to be getting it anyway.

[Polemists]

I love grand campaigns - yes - but I do have a life as well

See that makes no sense to me, I love the grand campaigns because they are so slow, and take so little of my nights.

You can play a couple turns, a hour, maybe two and have some fun.

Versus say something like CIV IV where you can beat a whole game in 2 hours.

I like replayability. I'd rather not shell out fifty bucks for a 2 hour game, sorry. Just my opinion

[pyradyn]

That is why I play civ on epic hige map with 18 plus civs :P only victory conditions are conquest I like long long games ^_^


Thanks for the Info and screens btw I have to slug out 9 hours of work before I can play.

[Fisherking]

I don’t think I will play the first time on VH/H like you did.

There is a learning curve and seeing the AI in the demo on M let me know that they can do some unexpected things.

I think I will just take it slow and learn the ins and outs before making it VH.

Getting the feel for the diplomatic and economic game before wading in to it seems fair enough to me.

I know I got waxed a few times in the naval demo and have yet to get a decisive victory on the land battle.

Being out of cash and everyone around me trying to grab off my land and stomping my armies is not my idea of fun.

I will play a slow and cautious turtle the first time or two, thank you very much.

Besides, someone has to hunt the Easter eggs!

[pevergreen]

Yup, its not a great idea to jump into it, but I wanted to test it from the end of a stupid new user.

"OMG IM AWESOME! I must pick hardest and hard difficulty cause i never played before. IM SO Pr0."

My previous experience with TW and extensive following of production helped a lot, but I'm still getting the hang of it.

[Strategy]

See that makes no sense to me, I love the grand campaigns because they are so slow, and take so little of my nights.

You can play a couple turns, a hour, maybe two and have some fun.

Versus say something like CIV IV where you can beat a whole game in 2 hours.

I like replayability. I'd rather not shell out fifty bucks for a 2 hour game, sorry. Just my opinion

I guess you meant to say - take so much of your nights. I know it will consume mine (just picked it up on my way home today). And I think you misunderstand what replayability means. Replayability = being able to play the game more than once (a criteria that Civ IV definitely fulfills in my book).

In any case, my point is simply that if I'm going to play a game, then I'd also like to have the satisfaction of ending the game. If it's a good game (with replayability), I'll play it many times. Playing a game 1/3rd way through and then starting a new game because continuing the first would be excruciatingly boring (unfortunately a common issue in "grand campaign" games of all kinds) is not my idea of fun.

But you know... I once had someone explain to me how their dream game would be a Civilization epic with 1 month turns from the dawn of Civilization till today. Tastes differ.

[andrewt]

I like your definition of replayability. I like grand campaigns more than 30 minute RTS style games as well and I always play Civ 4 on the larger maps. However, I think 2-3 weeks of hard playing is enough for a grand campaign. It's a reasonable amount of time to complete one and start a new one.

Pever, what about fighting a more defensive battle against one of your opponents? It looks like you're trying to counterattack and conquer them both. If you could fight more defensively against one of them and pull more resources to the other side, it might make something happen.

[JeromeBaker]

I am so stoked to hear how much a fight the AI put up on VH/H for pevergreen. In all honesty, if you can play a game VH/H your first go around and never feel close to losing, the game wasnt designed correctly for my version of replaybility. As long as a game is challenging I will want to replay it over and over and over.......

[pevergreen]

As I hadn't played before I think I messed up early. I have no money coming in, the world market isnt favouring me.

My peaceful prussia campaign is fun.