Aggressive factions are unrealistic

[QuintusSertorius]

herm i do not believe the factions are over agressive i do believe however that they react accordingly to th level of threat they perceive and prepare so if you go blitz on them the ai´s will try to harness as much power as they can to opose you if you play it slower the ai will feel less threatned (unleass it starts to catch your spies and )

Well as someone who moves very slowly in my games, that doesn't reflect my experiences at all. The AI moves at a slightly-slower-than-blitz speed all the time if they have funds. I don't even play on VH campaign difficulty, with the bonus money, and they still move far too fast for my liking. Seriously, within 20 years of the game start, if unchecked either Koinon Hellenon or Makedonia will have destroyed the other. Parthia and Pontos will tend to have vanished. Baktria often does too. Either the Aedui or Arverni will have been wiped out. Look at virtually every map at 50 years after game-start that people post, and you have about ten super-factions left.

Arche Seleukeia and the Ptolemaic Kingdom are both examples of Super Powers as well (although their sphere of influence was confined to a smaller area of the globe).

However, the Ptolemies intentionally confined their area of influence to what was sustainable. From their very inception they weren't expansionist, it was all about keeping a very firm hold of what they had, dominating (eastern) Mediterranean trade, and preventing any other power from rising to significance.

[Atraphoenix]

If you want to create super power no matter on which mod, simply make their units with 2 hitpoints then watch the show, I never did it myself. I like the mod the way it is in..

[B-Wing]

I think the OP's concern is with preventing the creation of numerous superpowers...

[fomalhaut]

Luckily my experiences with super factions has been relegated to only a few, mine included when i play one of the big hitters like SPQR. To be honest, I really like playing as isolated, minor powers and watching the great power politics from a far. This is why Lusotan, Saby'n and Koine Hellon are my favorite. I really enjoy colonizing foreign lands and barbarianizing/arabianizing/hellenizing the lands into my own and using their unique regional auxilaries.

[Drunk Clown]

Well as someone who moves very slowly in my games, that doesn't reflect my experiences at all. The AI moves at a slightly-slower-than-blitz speed all the time if they have funds. I don't even play on VH campaign difficulty, with the bonus money, and they still move far too fast for my liking. Seriously, within 20 years of the game start, if unchecked either Koinon Hellenon or Makedonia will have destroyed the other. Parthia and Pontos will tend to have vanished. Baktria often does too. Either the Aedui or Arverni will have been wiped out. Look at virtually every map at 50 years after game-start that people post, and you have about ten super-factions left.

If there are ten factions the same, then no one is "super".

However, the Ptolemies intentionally confined their area of influence to what was sustainable. From their very inception they weren't expansionist, it was all about keeping a very firm hold of what they had, dominating (eastern) Mediterranean trade, and preventing any other power from rising to significance.

Sounds like a superpower to me.

[DECEBALVS]

I think its more the lack of internal problems for those superpowers rather than external enemies, who were able to actually threaten their existense. The unrest implemented in many provinces seems to me beeing neglected by the additional bonuses for AI gouverneurs, and also by the immidiate placement of the gouvernment buildings for the AI. Although, i have no idea how the money script for the AI actually works, it´s still able to recruit troops + build barracks, while struggling with minor rebell parties or all too rebelios settlements. The restriction of the availiability of particular troops might be a part of solution, but the AI will still spam armies, no matter what. Since there will be no counterfactions to not waste faction slots, and there, apparently, won´t be any superfaction in game, to represent an active resistance in diverse parts of the world, i would like to know how the team supposes to stop AI from going nuts in a total war style? As QS said, it takes very short period of time for those superpowers to emerge, so a player can either play slowly and patiently, trying to maintain some kind of realism in his actions, but then be confronted with endless enemy stacks, or one can blitz, intervene, use console commands and play kind of world police force, to slow down some factions. My problem with that - it´s getting boring, and quite intensively annoying, to not only manage your own empire, growing more and more, but also to watch over the world too. I hope no offence will be taken from my words, we all know the limitatons of TW engine, but not all of us are high class modders, so it´s more curiosity about the master plan of the team :)

I think the creation of new factions from the aggressive rebels at normal level game can limit the expansion of superpowers. All the rebels might have the chance to conquer another settlement and to have diplomatic rellations. So the map will be stable, we can then create a Pax Romana where the commerce with others will never end to be interesting and where will make war only for peace [a good status quo of politics]. We'll no longer fight to death to become the single faction on the map [because we can be defeated by another unrealistic ultragigaempire]... isn't that?

[Drunk Clown]

I think the creation of new factions from the aggressive rebels at normal level game can limit the expansion of superpowers. All the rebels might have the chance to conquer another settlement and to have diplomatic rellations. So the map will be stable, we can then create a Pax Romana where the commerce with others will never end to be interesting and where will make war only for peace [a good status quo of politics]. We'll no longer fight to death to become the single faction on the map [because we can be defeated by another unrealistic ultragigaempire]... isn't that?

It may be just me but I can't follow you anymore. You want peace in... a war game?

[QuintusSertorius]

If there are ten factions the same, then no one is "super".

Course they are. After dealing with their local rival and absorbing the rebels nearby, you get a collection of regional superpowers, each the master of their area. They then spend the next 10-20 years duking it out til you're down to four or five.

Is EBI designed to basically be done within 200 turns? Because in reality that's what we get with the pace of AI conquest.

Sounds like a superpower to me.

But not one that behaves anything like AI Ptolemaic Egypt. Which not only tends to gobble up all the Seleukid lands, but in some games all of Qart-Hadast's territory too.

[Populus Romanus]

Arche Seleukeia and the Ptolemaic Kingdom are both examples of Super Powers as well (although their sphere of influence was confined to a smaller area of the globe). Furthermore Achaemenid Persia was also a Super Power of the East.

Your example of Lusotanna is ridiculous (other than that they do have a tendency to go on the rampage in EBI). The Lusotannan were a people who were pastoral with very little in the way of large centralised government (and by very little I mean none). They never developed the bureacratic complexity to administer conquered lands for any length of time, and had no need to do so - they were successful enough as they were. That would be like me saying that because the Pacific Islanders havent developed into a Super Power, we should dismiss the case of the United States and Soviet Russia.

Of course Super Powers are the exception not the rule in any given time, but thats because a world stage cannot accompany more than 2 or 3 by definition (if the world was replete with super powers, they wouldn't be super powers).

I don't think you've made your point at all, and the collapse of nations and tribes to one faction was common throughout all eras until only 2 or 3 are left standing. Its an arms race, the size of the powers dictated by what is politically and socially feasible at the time.

Foot

I would hardly say the Seleucids and Ptolemys are good examples, after all they never conquered any of their territory. It was all conquered for them by Alexander. Indeed, they are fragmentations of a larger empire. And they, for the most part, never expanded much. For the majority of their history their borders remained static, with the regular, but very small, fluctuations of the border either way. Mostly, however, their borders would shrink rather than grow, though this applies to the Seleucids more than the Ptolemys. The Seleucids in particular were held in check by rebellious satrapies, though I do not know what exactly was holding the Ptolemys back. Also, the elimination of nations until their are progressively fewer and fewer nations is not inevitable. If it was, why isn't the entire Earth one country? If the constant assimilation of power was inevitable, then that is what inevitably would occur. However, the entire world is officially divied up between 100 to 200 nations (I'd rather not look it up), although that is an extreme understatement given all the regions of the globe where "official" nations have no juristiction whatsoever.

[QuintusSertorius]

The Seleucids in particular were held in check by rebellious satrapies, though I do not know what exactly was holding the Ptolemys back.

The Ptolemies were held back by ascribing to their founder's notion that what they had was broadly enough. Old Ptolemy I was a canny fellow, he realised the futility of trying to seize hold of all of Alexander's conquests as one unit. Furthermore, he saw the value in sitting outside the fray and letting his rivals kill each other, just ensuring none of them were able to get so strong as to turf him out of his comfortable spot.

[Grade_A_Beef]

That, and the inbreeding.

[bobbin]

I would hardly say the Seleucids and Ptolemys are good examples, after all they never conquered any of their territory. It was all conquered for them by Alexander. Indeed, they are fragmentations of a larger empire. And they, for the most part, never expanded much. For the majority of their history their borders remained static, with the regular, but very small, fluctuations of the border either way. Mostly, however, their borders would shrink rather than grow, though this applies to the Seleucids more than the Ptolemys. The Seleucids in particular were held in check by rebellious satrapies, though I do not know what exactly was holding the Ptolemys back.

Since when was constant expansion the sole defining feature of a super power? As i understand it a super power is a nation that vastly surpasses most others in power and wealth.
Say what you like but by EB's start the Ptolemies, Seleukids and possibly the Carthaginians were the superpowers of the region and the Romans, Parthians and Baktrians would later become ones too.
So thats 6 (7 if we count the Mauryans who were just beyond our map) in the space of 300 years, as you can see they were hardly rare.

Also, the elimination of nations until their are progressively fewer and fewer nations is not inevitable. If it was, why isn't the entire Earth one country? If the constant assimilation of power was inevitable, then that is what inevitably would occur. However, the entire world is officially divied up between 100 to 200 nations (I'd rather not look it up), although that is an extreme understatement given all the regions of the globe where "official" nations have no juristiction whatsoever.

The reason there are so many countries in the world today (203) is because we don't live in an age of rampant imperialism where annexing territory is the norm, go back 100 years and things looked a lot different (~60, even less if you miss out the tiny principalites).

[Populus Romanus]

I am not denying that Carthage, the Ptolemys, and the Seleucids were superpowers. Certainly no! I can't see how you even got that impression from what I said about Carthage. About the Seleucids and Ptolemys, I am saying that they reached superpower status by inheriting the conquests of Alexander, rather than actually doing the conquering themselves.

[bobbin]

The reached that status through a long and bloody civil war you know, it wasn't the case that once Alexander died they just received those kingdoms. Seleukos especially gained his entire empire through conquest and Ptolemy gained all his holdings outside of Epypt this way too.

I should also point out that these men were part of Alexanders armies, they had already conquered the territories from the persians, under his banner.

[Hax]

The reached that status through a long and bloody civil war you know, it wasn't the case that once Alexander died they just received those kingdoms. Seleukos especially gained his entire empire through conquest and Ptolemy gained all his holdings outside of Epypt this way too.

That's right, only after defeating Antigonos I Monophtalmos (meaning "The One Eyed") Seleukos managed to establish his authority in Asia Minor. And then, a couple of years later, they killed Lysimachos, but was murdered himself not too long after (while trying to conquer Thrace, iirc).

[DECEBALVS]

It may be just me but I can't follow you anymore. You want peace in... a war game?

I only want to say that the eternal and "global" war wasn't the best description for Antiquity. All wars and peaces had peak points and we don't see that on the map.The peaces were when the states became too military stable to be conquered: so, even if there is an official war between x and y, there will be no battle [="peace", like Russia and Japan today, without peace agreement after world war 2]. An AI empire cam be made enough little/big if we'll introduce the internal rebellion able to create new factions. These new factions will make the map interesting at any moment.

>>I think the creation of new factions from the aggressive rebels at normal level game can limit the expansion of superpowers. All the rebels might have the chance to conquer another settlement and to have diplomatic rellations. So the map will be stable, we can then create a Pax Romana where the commerce with others will never end to be interesting and where will make war only for peace [a good status quo of politics]. We'll no longer fight to death to become the single faction on the map [because we can be defeated by another unrealistic ultragigaempire]... isn't that?<<

[bobbin]

I only want to say that the eternal and "global" war wasn't the best description for Antiquity. All wars and peaces had peak points and we don't see that on the map.The peaces were when the states became too military stable to be conquered: so, even if there is an official war between x and y, there will be no battle [="peace", like Russia and Japan today, without peace agreement after world war 2]. An AI empire cam be made enough little/big if we'll introduce the internal rebellion able to create new factions. These new factions will make the map interesting at any moment.

That would require using up faction slots of which there is a limited number, we are looking at the possibility of having re-emergent factions though.

Oviously we will be changing the campaign AI to make it less aggressive, although M2TW AI is already a lot less aggressive than RTW's.

That's right, only after defeating Antigonos I Monophtalmos (meaning "The One Eyed") Seleukos managed to establish his authority in Asia Minor. And then, a couple of years later, they killed Lysimachos, but was murdered himself not too long after (while trying to conquer Thrace, iirc).

He also spent about 9 years reconquering the eastern pasts of Alexander's empire after he regained control of Babylon.

[DECEBALVS]

That would require using up faction slots of which there is a limited number, we are looking at the possibility of having re-emergent factions though.

Oviously we will be changing the campaign AI to make it less aggressive, although M2TW AI is already a lot less aggressive than RTW's.


He also spent about 9 years reconquering the eastern pasts of Alexander's empire after he regained control of Babylon.

The return of re-emergent factions is an awesome idea for EBII if it will be done. ;)

[Populus Romanus]

Re emergent factions? Interesting, although that might frustrate the player occasionaly. I presume that this will not be applicable to the player? Will this, if it actually goes through, be used for a select few factions, or all of them?

[B-Wing]

Based on what the team has said, I don't believe they will attempt to implement re-emerging factions. If I understand the mechanics of the game correctly, the only way it is possible to have a faction re-emerge is to designate it as non-destroyable, which I think is applied to the Papacy in vanilla M2TW. I haven't actually played a campaign in which I (or another faction) attempted to eliminate the Papal States, but I've read that even after their last settlement is lost, they will reappear in a few years by requesting land from other Catholic factions. So I don't know if it could even be applied appropriately to a non-Papacy faction.

[DECEBALVS]

Based on what the team has said, I don't believe they will attempt to implement re-emerging factions. If I understand the mechanics of the game correctly, the only way it is possible to have a faction re-emerge is to designate it as non-destroyable, which I think is applied to the Papacy in vanilla M2TW. I haven't actually played a campaign in which I (or another faction) attempted to eliminate the Papal States, but I've read that even after their last settlement is lost, they will reappear in a few years by requesting land from other Catholic factions. So I don't know if it could even be applied appropriately to a non-Papacy faction.

There is nothing to be believed. EBII team said that. And re-emergent factions are as old as Rome - Total War: Barbarian Invasion [they dissapear and appear without being as pope did in MTW].

[Foot]

There is nothing to be believed. EBII team said that. And re-emergent factions are as old as Rome - Total War: Barbarian Invasion [they dissapear and appear without being as pope did in MTW].

You don't know what a re-emergent faction is. Re-emergent factions (except for the Papal Faction in M2TW) have not existed in Total War games since MTW (I don't think they exist in Empire or Napoleon, but they might do).

Foot

[vollorix]

Wasn´t the hording ability required to let a faction become re-emergent? At least that was the case with RTW BI, iirc.

[jirisys]

Don't worry. EB1 is not history-on-rails, nor will EB2 be. The starting positions will be historical, but beyond that it will be up to the player, and the A.I.

Welcome to EB, by the way.

Yes, it pretty much is. However scripting can sometimes do magic (for instance IIRC I could simply change several lines and when rome reaches the condition for the marians, it can instead vanish, conquer every single saka settlement or even move to Terrazha, trigger an event, etc.).

This is pretty good actually, the romans won't take taras by force or CTD magic if I'm Epeiros, and they themselves won't besiege Pella if I'm Makedonia.
However sometimes this can be awfully annoying. I like that Rome goes historically on their conquest, that Quart-Hadast conquers Hispania and then even goes besieging Rome. It would be so great to actually see the rise of Hasdrubal and Hannibal, the destruction of Korinthos and even the battle of Magnesia.
Now I know very well that this would make severly tedious and complicated scripts, and maybe wouldn't even be possible at all. When I play as KH I want to see that Rome goes and takes Quart-Hadast down in Africa, or that the Sakae go and weaken Baktra before the Yuezhi come and terrorize them. It would be very neat and sometimes extremely appealing.

But what I get is Rome chewing up north the Rhine in 140, the Lusotannan steamrolling Gaul, the carthaginians steamrolling Hispania, the Ptolemaioi eating up arabia, the AS... well, pretty much Arche Seleukeia-izing, Getai all like a central European thug, and Sauromatae as the norther Europe monarchic empire. I can bear that, I go around with my stuff and try to go Role Playing, or just plain eating up what I can. But in the end, I never get to interact on a more deeper level, to see them actually doing what those that they represent this in the day.

Now I do realize this is just a game and all, but it would be far more enjoyable. The fact that an image or a drawing is intangible and frankly not that important in real life, I want it to represent something, for it to mean something and look good.
I know these are engine limitations, and me wanting something that is almost impossible, but this is only my opinion, and possibly an internally contradicting one, these are not suggestions or plans I put in motion.

This are my two cents , penny for my thoughts if you will. Even if those thoughts are unimportant, viewed down upon, or simply you did not wish to hear them; but still, I wished to spit it out.

~Jirisys ()

[Megas Methuselah]

(I don't think they exist in Empire or Napoleon, but they might do).

Yeah, they exist in Empire. Pretend you conquer France. If that province becomes rebellious and successfully casts aside your authority, rather than the rebels becoming part of the standard rebel faction, it becomes a re-emergent France. Almost all of the factions in ETW can re-emerge from rebellions in their former-capital provinces, which is one of the few reasons why I love the game.

we are looking at the possibility of having re-emergent factions though.

I hope everything works out, bro.

[Elzeda]

I remember this one AMAZING game i had, as lusitanni, where everyone balanced out everyone else. No superpowers emerged. AND no intervention from me, aside from what lusitanni would usually do. And, that was after a lot of years too.

Seleucia and ptolemies had fought to a standstill. ptolemies had lost the whole syrian coast to seleukids, but kept the whole egypt. however seleucia was crippled, cuz in the east bactrians and pahlavans had divided the kingdom pretty much half/half, as far as just south of the caspian sea i believe. as for asia minor, pontus took it, then lost to KH (who had taken the whole continental Greece, but were at peace with epirus who was confining them to greece), who then lost it to the Lesbo makedonian empire. The hai were warring up north, fighting against sauromatae and their "protectors", the (KH) bosphoran kingdom.
The aedui won the civil war and were quite dominant for a bit, but then they invaded iberia and lost a lot of troops doing that. after that, sweboz had the northeast, romans the southeast and me the southwest, aedui confined in the northwest. Romans had good drives, but always had a major thorn in their side. Carthage was actually winning the war down south. then i attacked carthage, and romans retook the south (and sicilia), but then epiros sent this one army that cut a large swath into roman territories, and i challenged them in Gaul (took the southwest from 'em). they just couldn't catch a break.

Just to say, changes dont have to be drastic. it's already possible to have that awesome game OP was talking about. Just extremely rare. a little tweaking and the new engine hopefully will make it happen more often.

[Tuuvi]

Just to say, changes dont have to be drastic. it's already possible to have that awesome game OP was talking about. Just extremely rare. a little tweaking and the new engine hopefully will make it happen more often.

Yea, I don't think factions are going to emerge as superpowers as quickly as they do in EB 1. For starters, there is going to be 10 new factions, which means AI factions will have more opposition and there won't be as many blank provinces for them to conquer. As many people have already said the diplomatic AI is a little more reasonable and honors alliances more frequently. Also the government buildings have been replaced with the authority buildings, which if I remember correctly are supposed to represent the difficulties of exerting influence over a province, so If I'm interpreting their function right I think we can expect to see more province rebellions than we did in EB 1.

[Ichon]

Hmm... I think factions which emerge are impossible to defeat completely but not sure how you can make re-emergent factions from start.

[WinsingtonIII]

The way some M2TW mods simulate reemerging factions is with the horde ability. When you destroy a faction, they will instead horde and wander off to claim a new homeland/reclaim their old one. It's a feature that works pretty well for nomadic factions, and probably works OK for "barbarian" factions, but it looks really silly to see a "Republic of Venice" horde moving down the Italian peninsula to settle a new Republic of Venice located in Bologna.

[artaxerxes]

I'm generally content with EB as it is, but since we're discussing whether EB superpowers are realistic or not, I would like to agree with the point, that in EB the AI is like - well - a person who keeps being hungry no matter how much he eats. In real life, the Ptollies might dream of taking Syria and parts of Anatolia and Macedonia. But taking both Carthage and India seems very improbable. I know the Roman Empire and Alexanders Empire were that large, but in EB these states happen a little too often. But I've always supposed it was to do with the game engine and therefore a pointless discussion. In real life, even great conquerors would still operate with a "sphere of influence" and not move outside what was possible to govern from their heartland. But in EB, great expansion is easier than in real life + even when it isn't, the AI doesnt' care. That's why Ptollies suddenly turn up in southern Russia. The reason this is annoying is because its unrealistic that a Ptolemaic King would not have shown moderation and even if his forces were large enough to conquer southern Russia, he would have gone to the point, where there were natural borders (fx Armenia) and then stopped there.
Alexander conquered a lot, but what he conquered was mostly Persian, so though a large territory, it was territory that was "used to" being together. The Roam Empire took a long time to make. In EB, the AI never has enough, so it never decides to stop a war, having gotten what it came for. It keeps driving on, whether feasible or not.
But as I said, though i agree with you who argue that this is unrealistic, I still dont think it can be changed, and its a small price for as great a game as EB. So dont know why it's been argued so vehemently as it is here. Cheers ;)