The Warpath Campaign Expansion DLC

[Tsavong]

Looks like they have some more DLC a campaign this time.

Hi guys,

The official downloadable expansion pack for Empire: Total War has been announced! Click here for full details on The Warpath Campaign!

The Warpath Campaign will be available in October 2009.

Update 1.4 will be released tomorrow - Tuesday 22nd September!

Thanks,

Mark O'Connell
(aka SenseiTW)

http://store.steampowered.com/app/10606/
http://shoguntotalwar.yuku.com/topic...-revealed.html

[Fisherking]

Well, that is interesting...

Is the release tomorrow with the patch?

A whole campaign and Native American at that...

[Peasant Phill]

You'd reckon they would announce the release of patch 1.4 a bit sooner. What do I care about a DLC, I'm gonna test 1.4 first thing after work.

[Slaists]

Looks like they have some more DLC a campaign this time.



http://store.steampowered.com/app/10606/
http://shoguntotalwar.yuku.com/topic...-revealed.html

I, for my part, couldn't care less about some new North American Indian wars (those wars were won mostly by measle-infected blankets not major military confrontation anyway). I'd much rather prefer CA expanded the GC map to include Africa and South-East Asia.

And they should give us slave trade while they're at it... What's an XVIII century plantation economy without slaves!? On that note, they should include Berbery Pirates (and the like) enslaving coastal Europeans and selling them off in African slave markets. This was still happening in the XIX century.

[Mailman653]

The new detailed map might be used for mods......and the DLC does look interesting but I think I'll pass.

[Peasant Phill]

I've read the links now and it actually says 'Official expansion".

So CA actually made an expansion with nothing more (They don't mention anything more at least) than a map and and some units from a conflict that was uninteresting any way you look at it.

Please confort me and tell me there will be more expansions coming.

[A1_Unit]

I'm dissapointed with this new DLC.

[Graphic]

I've read the links now and it actually says 'Official expansion".

So CA actually made an expansion with nothing more (They don't mention anything more at least) than a map and and some units from a conflict that was uninteresting any way you look at it.

Please confort me and tell me there will be more expansions coming.

Instead of giving us "ETW Kingdoms," they're just going to sell the campaigns individually for a low price. Expect more mini-campaigns in the future. This is the reality of the modern gaming industry. Full-on expansions are dead. Everything is sold cheap and in small pieces as DLC. The end result is basically the same, though, except you can save money by cherry-picking only the stuff you want.

Personally, I think this looks awesome.

[Servius]

I'm glad patch 1.4 is coming out tomorrow.

As for the DLC, I think I'll pass. I hope I can say this without offending any Native Americans who may be reading, but I'm not interested in an expansion that focuses on them. For an expansion, the game must get bigger. IMO, the best way for ETW to get bigger is to expand the playable map (Africa, South America, Southeast Asia, etc.)

Of course, as always, the AI needs to be fixed first. I'll not spend any more money on this game until the DAI and CAI are fixed and start making rational decisions.

[Zenicetus]

It does seem like an odd choice for an expansion. Empire brings more advanced artillery, naval combat, more complex world trade and technologies than we had in previous games. I don't see where Native Indian warfare fits into this... unless it's just a way to do a quick 'n dirty expansion that will work precisely because it doesn't have to integrate into the rest of the world for diplomacy and trade.

They're probably looking at recent games like Fallout 3 as a model, but the Fallout 3 DLC's were popular (well, at least two of them were) because the main game was solid, with no major flaws. We're still waiting for an Empire:TW engine that isn't a disaster at the level of the campaign map. Offering up an expansion that doesn't really interact with that map (if that's what they're doing), isn't going to cut it.

[Discoman]

I hope it doesn't end up being too much like the Americas campaign in Kingdoms. I'm surprised they aren't actually adding any new factions or settlements in the Midwest.

[Durallan]

This does look exciting to me, Hopefully it means the North American Map is expanded in the Grand Campaign, otherwise I'm giving this a miss because that is the only reason i would buy any DLC... for more Grand Campaign Territory and factions...

for example something I would pay an Expansion price for ( 50 bucks Australian) is them Finishing off the West coast of America, Adding South America, Creating a new Pacific Region, and Adding Africa, hell I might even pay 90 bucks australian for all that if they included australia too!

[FactionHeir]

Looking at the minimap of that campaign suggests regions were simply blown up a bit. Same area as vanilla ETW.

[Sheogorath]

The sheer number of anachronisms in that trailer made my brain hurt.

[Meneldil]

A campaign aimed to the american market and players. Why am I not surprised?

Not that I care about it really, I've played ETW 3 times, but this is kind of silly, given they were much more important events back then than this. As said, native nations were defeated by blankets more than by firearms. French revolution? Beginning of colonisation? China?
It looks like they went for the easy way: add a new tech tree, a few new units and nations, a few provinces and there you go. No new gameplay feature, no nothing. And they're gonna sell this 'expansion' not even worthy of being called an amateur mod for 20€, fallout-3 style.

I'm not even going to complain about the historical accuracy of it (hopefully, indian nations won't be able to field elite armies larger than those of France, Spain or even Westphalia) and the new silly indian tech tree, because well, a game has to have gamey mechanics.

[Dead Guy]

The trailer narrator might as well have said:
White man came across the sea, he brought us pain and misery

This doesn't work at all for me. If they're aiming for the American market, wouldn't the civil war be much more interesting? I don't know much about it, but it feels like it would suit the engine better as well. Getting states to commit to your side in the conflict could make for some interesting gameplay, but I guess they don't want to work on that, just throw out a mini campaign and cash in.

[Prussian to the Iron]

looks like crap; the campaign map hasnt even been expanded! all that happens for $10 is that the indians get more units and buildings!

I'd much rather have either a full campaign of north and south america starting when john smith arrived, or the american civil war. that i'd pay 10 bucks for, but not a couple of units.

heres hoping they come out with a kingdoms-like expansion with all the campaign DLC's in it in a year or 2.

[rvg]

bzzzzzp. I'm giving this one a pass.

[Hooahguy]

bzzzzzp. I'm giving this one a pass.

same

[Tsavong]

I might get it some time after its out but as I play slow I have other campaigns in Empire I think ill play first.

[Zenicetus]

The trailer narrator might as well have said:
White man came across the sea, he brought us pain and misery

This doesn't work at all for me. If they're aiming for the American market, wouldn't the civil war be much more interesting? I don't know much about it, but it feels like it would suit the engine better as well. Getting states to commit to your side in the conflict could make for some interesting gameplay, but I guess they don't want to work on that, just throw out a mini campaign and cash in.

Speaking as someone in the American market, I wouldn't like to see a Civil War expansion, for many reasons:

1) It's been done before, many times, and in ways that don't require jerking around a game engine that was designed to cover a much larger part of the world with more factions. A good Civil War game really needs a more focused approach, with much more local detail than we see on the campaign map.

2) What I've enjoyed the most about the Total War series are the battles between dissimilar armies. For me, it's just more interesting to see something like barbarians vs. Roman troops, or desert horse archers vs. armored European soldiers. It's tactically interesting, in the earlier eras where gunpowder didn't level the playing field and make armies nearly identical. ETW is already a much less varied game; in many battles you're fighting an army that looks just like yours except for the color of the uniform. The U.S. Civil War is like that, only more so. You have two armies fielding the same units with only very small variations. It doesn't matter which side you choose to fight, it's just a different colored uniform.

3) By the time of the U.S. Civil War they were using rifled weapons, which means much longer engagement distances. The game engine would have to be re-worked to handle that, and the battlefields should also be larger. I don't see CA making that big a change. And it would be ludicrous to have troops with rifled weapons just plopped into the current engine, where they can't fire until they're right on top of the enemy.

4) The Civil War was the start of a shift away from Napoleonic tactics (disciplined ranks in open field warfare) and towards the start of trench warfare, fighting from heavy fortifications, sappers to undermine those fortifications, etc. The game engine doesn't support this type of combat.

5) It doesn't bring anything interesting to the naval combat side of the game, other than eye candy (Monitor, Merrimac, etc.). The South didn't have a real navy, and the North blockaded the Confederate ports for the duration of the war. A Confederate navy would only be interesting if it was completely a-historical and much stronger than it was in reality.

The "natural" expansion for ETW was into the Napoleonic wars in Europe which is better suited to the game engine. Unfortunately, they decided to spin that off into what sounds like a heavily scripted, episodic game like the Road to Independence in ETW, instead of incorporating it into the main campaign as a seamless expansion. Bah, humbug. At this point, I just hope the 1.4 patch gives some new life to the main game, and I'm going to pass on both the expansion and the Napoleon game.

[Prussian to the Iron]

I believe you are wrong on several fronts:

Speaking as someone in the American market, I wouldn't like to see a Civil War expansion, for many reasons:

1) It's been done before, many times, and in ways that don't require jerking around a game engine that was designed to cover a much larger part of the world with more factions. A good Civil War game really needs a more focused approach, with much more local detail than we see on the campaign map.

really? I haven't seen any recently, or at least not RTS's about it. and it's not like nothing has been done about warpaths setting or time. AoE and empire earth are 2 notable examples.

2) What I've enjoyed the most about the Total War series are the battles between dissimilar armies. For me, it's just more interesting to see something like barbarians vs. Roman troops, or desert horse archers vs. armored European soldiers. It's tactically interesting, in the earlier eras where gunpowder didn't level the playing field and make armies nearly identical. ETW is already a much less varied game; in many battles you're fighting an army that looks just like yours except for the color of the uniform. The U.S. Civil War is like that, only more so. You have two armies fielding the same units with only very small variations. It doesn't matter which side you choose to fight, it's just a different colored uniform.

I have a big beef with this. They did not have the same units in any way. Confederate soldiers were generally less trained, and worse at ranges, but better in a melee. they also had worse weapons (many had muskets) and more patriotic fervor.

3) By the time of the U.S. Civil War they were using rifled weapons, which means much longer engagement distances. The game engine would have to be re-worked to handle that, and the battlefields should also be larger. I don't see CA making that big a change. And it would be ludicrous to have troops with rifled weapons just plopped into the current engine, where they can't fire until they're right on top of the enemy.

No. just no. every single soldier did not use rifles, in fact far fewer than generally thought. most rifles were given to the more elite units, and even then that was almost exclusively in the north. cannons mostly had rifling though.

4) The Civil War was the start of a shift away from Napoleonic tactics (disciplined ranks in open field warfare) and towards the start of trench warfare, fighting from heavy fortifications, sappers to undermine those fortifications, etc. The game engine doesn't support this type of combat.

this has never stopped TW from portraying native american units as well-organized, professional military units (see M2 kingdoms americas campaign and ETW american theatres)

5) It doesn't bring anything interesting to the naval combat side of the game, other than eye candy (Monitor, Merrimac, etc.). The South didn't have a real navy, and the North blockaded the Confederate ports for the duration of the war. A Confederate navy would only be interesting if it was completely a-historical and much stronger than it was in reality.

while that may be true, lots of people have complained about the naval combat in the game. I honestly wouldn't mind having the option to take it out.

[Slaists]

I believe you are wrong on several fronts:



really? I haven't seen any recently, or at least not RTS's about it.

.

Regarding American Civil War, check out "Take Command: 2nd Manassas". Arguably, the battle AI is way better there than in ETW. Graphics are sub-par though.

I have a big beef with this. They did not have the same units in any way. Confederate soldiers were generally less trained, and worse at ranges, but better in a melee. they also had worse weapons (many had muskets) and more patriotic fervor.

I thought, at least at the beginning of the war, the Confederates had the bulk of the American pre-war officers. I wonder how did that translate in them having the less trained soldiers.

while that may be true, lots of people have complained about the naval combat in the game. I honestly wouldn't mind having the option to take it out.

Hmm, just a few years ago, the community believed the naval battles would NEVER be even considered by CA... Now, we have them and I find, in that department, CA has done a pretty good job actually. So, no, I, for example, would not want the naval battles to be removed.

[Fisherking]

I would not base everything on the trailer just yet. They do have some time to go before it comes out so there may be more changes made.

Picking the Native Americans vs. Europeans is not shooting at the American Market. There is world wide interest in Native Americans and it should have some broader appeal.

Most of us are feeling pretty jaded after the last couple of patches. If the game is vastly improved then this campaign may look more interesting in a week or two.


As to the War Between the States; the CSA started with better trained troop than the Union. That was because most of the veterans of the Mexican War were Southerners and the south had a much stronger military tradition than the northern states.

What they lacked was manufacturing and infrastructure. They also had a much smaller population to draw from.

[Prussian to the Iron]

maybe they started out with better guys, but they ended up recruiting old men and young boys to fight a war against a technologically superior foe.

[Zenicetus]

I have a big beef with this. They did not have the same units in any way. Confederate soldiers were generally less trained, and worse at ranges, but better in a melee.

In game terms, you're talking about differences in unit stats (range, morale, melee attack), but the technology and tactics were essentially the same on both sides.

It was a civil war within one country, that shared the same military culture and technology until the outbreak of the war. Civil wars always have the most similar armies on each side, unless it's something like a peasant revolt where one side vastly outclasses the other. It's different from clashes between countries where the military hardware and culture evolved in different ways.

No. just no. every single soldier did not use rifles, in fact far fewer than generally thought. most rifles were given to the more elite units, and even then that was almost exclusively in the north. cannons mostly had rifling though.

I didn't say that every soldier had rifles, that's not the point. If rifles are in the game at all, then it changes the engagement distance, and that means a major change in the game engine... especially the AI's ability to deal with it.

[Zenicetus]

maybe they started out with better guys, but they ended up recruiting old men and young boys to fight a war against a technologically superior foe.

No, it wasn't a technologically superior foe, that's ridiculous. The Confederacy developed the first submarine in the world that successfully sank a ship, in an effort to beat the blockades. They had some very smart engineers and inventors.

The North was industrially superior, with an economic base built on factories, iron works, and shipyards. The South had agriculture as the main economic base, which was badly hurt by the naval blockade, and far fewer factories to support their armies. That was the difference, not a difference in technology.

[Prussian to the Iron]

Submarines in the American Civil War

During the American Civil War, the Union was the first to field a submarine. The French-designed Alligator was the first U.S. Navy sub and the first to feature compressed air (for air supply) and an air filtration system. Initially hand-powered by oars, it was converted after 6 months to a screw propeller powered by a hand crank. With a crew of 20, it was larger than Confederate submarines. Alligator was 47 feet (14.3 m) long and about 4 feet (1.2 m) in diameter. It was lost in a storm off Cape Hatteras on April 1, 1863 with no crew and under tow to its first combat deployment at Charleston.

The Confederate States of America fielded several human-powered submarines. The first Confederate submarine was the 30-foot (9 m) long Pioneer which sank a target schooner using a towed mine during tests on Lake Pontchartrain, but was not used in combat. It was scuttled after New Orleans was captured and in 1868 was sold for scrap. The Bayou St. John Confederate Submarine was also scuttled without seeing combat, and is now on display at the Louisiana State Museum.

The Confederate submarine H. L. Hunley (named for one of its financiers, Horace Lawson Hunley) was intended for attacking the North's ships, which were blockading the South's seaports. The submarine had a long pole with an explosive charge in the bow, called a spar torpedo. The sub had to approach an enemy vessel, attach an explosive, move away, and then detonate it. The sub was extremely hazardous to operate, and had no air supply other than what was contained inside the main compartment. On two occasions, the sub sank; on the first occasion half the crew died and on the second, the entire eight-man crew (including Hunley himself) drowned. On February 17, 1864 Hunley sank USS Housatonic off Charleston Harbor, the first time a submarine successfully sank another ship, though it sank in the same engagement shortly after signaling its success. Submarines did not have a major impact on the outcome of the war, but did portend their coming importance to naval warfare and increased interest in their use in naval warfare.

from wikipedia. no tehy were not first to build submarines, and they were technologically inferior. fewer factories=technological inferiority.

[A1_Unit]

The Confederates built the first Ironclad I think.

[Discoman]

The Confederates had the better generals, and they had the better soldiers. Even if they aren't war vet, I'm sure alot of Southern boys knew how to handle a musket from hunting and what not.

The Confederates did obtain rifles during the war, and that was mainly because they took them off of dead Yankees.