Multiplayer Campaign Thread

[pevergreen]

So its here, and it works.

No one is hosting in my area.

Someone get here, add me on steam (pevergreen) and tell me its time to play a MP campaign, I've been waiting for this for a year people.

[A1_Unit]

Sorry to dissapoint but it has MASSIVE bugs. I'm glad it's a BETA. There is a cursor bug (it's a spinning clock that never goes away - can't click on anything, crash comes not long after that), and if you get past that the AI will crash your game as well.

[pevergreen]

Really? I havent tried it yet, as there is no one to play...

Have you experienced these, or just read about them?

[peacemaker]

:( im all busy for the next month with finals....Blegh. I hope they iron out some bugs soon.

[pevergreen]

I played a few turns.

No bugs.

The diplomacy was hilarious. I was france, enemy was GB, he invaded me and his message of war was

"OMG DO U SPEKA ENGLISH I INVADE YOU LONG TIME"

All in caps coming from the stern looking diplomat. Was great.

[Heinrich VI]

The spinning clock means that it's your opponents turn.

There is one thing about the MP campaign that forced me to shelf it again after 3 turns. You can not fight battles vs the AI without letting the other player takeover the AI troops. Just the basic player vs AI battles like in SP. I can't believe they disabled this and force you to play every battle basically against the other player or autoresolve...

We wanted to cooperate (France and Spain) and not sabotage each other, especially considering that my mate was pretty new to ETW and stood no chance. And for this we had to wait 9 months.

Should have tried the MP campaign before buying the elite units of america...

[pevergreen]

The spinning clock means that it's your opponents turn.

There is one thing about the MP campaign that forced me to shelf it again after 3 turns. You can not fight battles vs the AI without letting the other player takeover the AI troops. Just the basic player vs AI battles like in SP. I can't believe they disabled this and force you to play every battle basically against the other player or autoresolve...

We wanted to cooperate (France and Spain) and sabotage each other, especially considering that my mate was pretty new to ETW and stood no chance. And for this we had to wait 9 months.

Should have tried the MP campaign before buying the elite units of america...

It should have been an option, but think about it:

Oh its your turn. Ok, I'll sit and wait for an hour while you fight a few battles.

[Heinrich VI]

True, thats why it should be an option because not everyone would like to wait. On the other hand that was exactly the way some friends of mine and me wanted to play. It really makes no sense to not make it at least optional.

[Dead Guy]

When playing "for" the AI, what's stopping you from just putting half your units in buildings and then march the rest of them up to your friends' line and let them get shot to pieces while deciding which direction to walk in? It'll be just like a single player campaign.

[al Roumi]

When playing "for" the AI, what's stopping you from just putting half your units in buildings and then march the rest of them up to your friends' line and let them get shot to pieces while deciding which direction to walk in? It'll be just like a single player campaign.

I think you're being a little harsh there. That sophisticated and refined strategy has been shown to be elegantly effective and efficient in all three theatres of ETW.

Oh wait... No it hasn't.

[al Roumi]

Sorry for double post.

True, thats why it should be an option because not everyone would like to wait. On the other hand that was exactly the way some friends of mine and me wanted to play. It really makes no sense to not make it at least optional.

You would need some sort of hybrid play by email and simultaneous play. Turn based campaign with real-time battles does pose a few problems.

I agree though, there should be an option as you describe. At least this is classed as a beta so you should be able to post a "suggestion" without CA resenting you for it.

[NimitsTexan]

It should have been an option, but think about it:

Oh its your turn. Ok, I'll sit and wait for an hour while you fight a few battles.

When designing any product, you have a finite amount of resources to invest (and a finite number of options to present in a workable manner). While I agree in a perfect world it should be an option, I can also suspect that CA have very reasonably concluded that few people in practice will atually play it that way long term, and so have probably not put player v AI battles on the "front-burner."

[pevergreen]

Which is my actual position, but in a perfect world, it would be an option.


I just got added by a guy who google'd for "no one online in empire total war" it brought him to the totalwar.org website as the first result, where this thread is the first thing on the page!

[A1_Unit]

The spinning clock means that it's your opponents turn.

Sadly no. It happens upon starting the campaign. I know this because with one host I had this bug and with the next I didn't. With the second host we were playing as France and Spain but UP DOW'ed me on the first turn every time and always caused a crash. Then we tried DOW-ing on them; that worked but then GB attacked his navy in the Caribbean. We both wanted to play the battle and started the loading screen. My host crashed for some reason and we were back to stage one again. We had to give it up.

I'm really hoping that by the final release of the MP Campaign all of this will be smoothed out, because I was having fun until the crash.

[antisocialmunky]

Actually, they should allow you to minize ETW and give you a notification when you cna play again.

[Krusader]

I'd like to see an option where you can give your fellow player control of half your army if you so desire. Or fight against the player in battles. Always good with choices.

[al Roumi]

I'd like to see an option where you can give your fellow player control of half your army if you so desire. Or fight against the player in battles. Always good with choices.

That's not a bad idea. Minimising the game or allowing you to alt+Tab out and be notified that "it's your turn now" out is also a good idea. Not sure how feasible the latter is though. I hope you guys are posting these on the multiplayer campaign beta page (assuming such a thing exists).

[nameless]

Actually there's going to have to be some sort of option to simply let the AI run the armies.

Mainly because this is a beta so we're on 1 vs. 1

Ideally, CA wants to make this up to 4 people at least (or at least more people).

Therefore there's going to have to be an option to handle since some are going to be spectators so an option should be there. That or it's really just 3 guys controlling one army which I think is overkill.

When playing "for" the AI, what's stopping you from just putting half your units in buildings and then march the rest of them up to your friends' line and let them get shot to pieces while deciding which direction to walk in? It'll be just like a single player campaign.

Nothing, it's a house rule you'd have to follow in that case. Not much can be done about that.

[Slaists]

So, anyone want to try out this baby? I've got a few hrs. and good connection. Add me on Steam (the same nick as here).

[batemonkey]

I played last night, i got beaten - I LOVED IT

[Slaists]

Sorry to dissapoint but it has MASSIVE bugs. I'm glad it's a BETA. There is a cursor bug (it's a spinning clock that never goes away - can't click on anything, crash comes not long after that), and if you get past that the AI will crash your game as well.

That spinning cursor bug, on a game open, is not a bug. It's an unfinished/incomplete feature. It happens on the first turn if it is the other player's turn on the strategy map. I know it's stupid. But still, that cursor does not mean the game is broken. Once the other player ends his turn, the cursor becomes normal. In the next turn, during the other player's turn you'll have a counter showing how much time the other player has left to complete his turn.

The counter should have been there during the first turn too, but, alas, it's a beta.

[Slaists]

So, here are my observations from playing a few (too many) hours last night. Overall, it was a very enjoyable experience once I was lucky to find a serious player with a stable internet connection and a PC that allowed for the campaign game not to crash every other minute. OK, now onto more detailed observations.

First

The feature that allows the player to control the AI side in battles is quite ingenious in my opinion. I applaud CA for it! Wasn't utterly dumb battle AI one of the biggest SP campaign complaints? Now, you can have a human trying to stop your expansion in every campaign battle.

I was lucky enough to have a decent human opponent in a 20 campaign turn session (the game did not crash once during those 20 turns). Let me tell you, I learned quickly to think twice before sending sub-par armies against the AI. Even town's folk garrisons can be quite deadly when controlled by a human and place correctly.

In situations when in a straight human-AI battle, the human side would suffer 1:10 casualties at worst, we (on both sides) routinely had close to 1:1 casualties when the AI side was controlled by one of us. So, the "control the AI" feature can greatly enhance the difficulty (and enjoyment) of the campaign.

I saw some earlier comments complaining that now you always have to fight on the side of the AI. Actually it is not so. It depends how the game host sets the game options at the start. There are three options relating to this aspect:

1. Fight the battle if the player choices differ
2. Autoresolve the battle if the player choices differ
3. [a separate checkbox] Allow player control of the AI side in battles

My preferred settings would be:

[check] Autoresolve the battle if the player choices differ
[check] Allow player control of the AI side in battles

I find this setting to be the most flexible one. Both players have to select the option "fight" for the game to allow the AI side be controlled by a player. If a player does not feel like controlling a foregone conclusion battle, he just has to select "autoresolve" before the battle and the outcome will be decided by the game engine. Easy...

I feel, the other option, "Fight the battle if the player choices differ", is too limited. I'd even say, a host that elects that option is being cruel on his opponent. If this option selected, there is no way to avoid going into every single battle and controlling the AI.

Likewise, the option of leaving unchecked the option "Allow player control of the AI side in battles" is limited since it would force all player versus AI battles to be autoresolved, missing out on potential (and diverse) enjoyment.

I have also heard some folks here suggest that "observing" while a player fights against the AI should be an option. Sure, an option would be nice. However, I personally, would prefer to jump into the fray and try to do something with the AI's troops. At least, I could try to prevent the AI general from sitting right in front of their own cannons, while, just accidentally, the cannons would be facing a cliff, not the enemy...

Second

I have heard complaints about the strategy map timer. 2 minutes is too short, 5 minutes is too short/too long, etc. This timer, actually, is NOT set in stone. It is set by the game host and can be negotiated before entering the game. I find 10 minute setting to be the optimal choice as long as I have a reasonable (somebody I know) opponent. Most of the times, we'd be done with the turn in 2-3 minutes (and turn the game over to the opponent promptly), but there would be times when those extra minutes were needed to make more complex decisions or just, you know, a bathroom/kitchen break, or... we'd just get carried away talking to each other.

Note, while it's your opponent's turn you can scroll the map, examine your government composition, schedule damaged building repairs and troop replenishment. So, those things you should not waste time on during your own turn.

General observations

The game was quite stable (on the strategy map, in land and sea battles). It surely did not feel less stable than the SP campaign game. Given that I had one crash during the evening, the old, good "click on a fleet carrying troops" crash. This bug (fixed at some point), was reintroduced by the 1.5 patch and it is not specific to the MP beta. Once, during the evening, I lost my opponent because his connection was severed. I don't think, it was due to a MP platform bug though. Folks lose their wireless connection, folks pull a modem plug, etc...

Each player can choose their own difficulty settings in MP. This should be better explained by someone from the CA. What happens, for example, if a player chooses battle setting "easy" and the other player controls an AI army against such an "easy" player? Would the player controlled "AI army" get inferior stat alignment against the player? I suspect, the most fair setting for both players is "normal" in the MP.

Overall, good job, CA! I can see, I should set my alarm clock (for going-to-bed time) when loading the MP game up...

p.s. I have the same nick on Steam ;)

[Slaists]

The spinning clock means that it's your opponents turn.

There is one thing about the MP campaign that forced me to shelf it again after 3 turns. You can not fight battles vs the AI without letting the other player takeover the AI troops. Just the basic player vs AI battles like in SP. I can't believe they disabled this and force you to play every battle basically against the other player or autoresolve...

We wanted to cooperate (France and Spain) and not sabotage each other, especially considering that my mate was pretty new to ETW and stood no chance. And for this we had to wait 9 months.

Should have tried the MP campaign before buying the elite units of america...

But what would you propose the other player do while you fight your battle against the AI? Sit and twiddle his thumbs or maybe pick up knitting? Of course, one alternative would be to allow the player watch you "give it to the AI". I agree, such an option should be included. However, to be honest, I prefer the current solution. Even an incompetent human controlling the AI is better (more fun too) than the AI controlling it.

[pevergreen]

Thanks for that insight Slaists.

I'm cooking something up...you'll hear more about it soon.

[Slaists]

Thanks for that insight Slaists.

I'm cooking something up...you'll hear more about it soon.

LOL, note that I'm on EST time.

[pevergreen]

I didn't say it would be for you alone...

[Ethelred Unread]

I'll be on today if anyone is about - my wife has gone to her grandparents, ALL WEEKEND

Which means wine, cheese and gaming. Nickname is Ethelred on steamn (see below)

[Slaists]

another advantage of the multiplayer: you can let the AI retreat when it's facing impossible odds... that's a feature CA promised but never implemented.

[antisocialmunky]

Awesome. :)

[Beskar]

I am interested in a game as well, search for Beskar (or might be tiberiusbeskar). I am wanting to try this out.