Greetings!

I'm a longtime fan of the Total War-series who's been eagerly awaiting Empire: Total War to get a) cheaper on the market and b) patched up so it's more playable than what appeared to be the case at release. So, as a steady lurker on these forums I noticed that this would be a place to get informative, mature and relatively insultfree answers to any questions I have about the game. Here goes:

* How do the armies function on the campaignmap compared to Rome?
As I spent a majority of my time in Rome sending armies here and there for reinforcing I've been looking forward to a smoother approach, and I heard that this might've been implemented in Empire.

* Have they replaced the old diplomats from Rome with any new characters or is the diplomacy simply run from a popup window or similar?

* Do you know any good litterature or films about the era (or aproximately the 18th century) that you can recommend?
Yeah, it's a bit offroad, I know. Being a Total Nerd I kinda like to get the feeling of the game's era before and while playing, and I'm pretty new to the age of Empire, if you pardon the reference to a lesser game.

Kind regards

PS Seeing as this is my first post I apologize in advance if this is offtopic or strays from any rules.