Your own TW style game: What features would you like to see?

[Ptolemaios]

This is something I think you could actually do. When you have a crushing defeat you should lose money,
because your soldiers left there weapons on the field or your opponent raided your camp, which you couldn´t defend.
In addition the faction you lost against should get the same amount of money, of course. The same occurs when you
have a heroic victory. You could make the amount of money referring to the upkeep cost of the defeated army. The more
elite a unit is the more expencive equipment an more money they have to lose. I think this would make battles more decisive,
but I have no idea how much it would effect the AI and it´s money scripts...

[Ludens]

There already is such a thing for EB1: search for the "spoils of victory" submod. However, the way you describe it isn't very realistic. Yes, the camp will be looted, but it's unlikely a substantial part of the state treasury is kept there. The profit comes from looting the possessions of rich soldiers, not the state. In most cases, it was the citizens rather than the state who bought the expensive bits of equipment, so the state wouldn't be out of cash for lost weaponry. Anyway, what would fleeing soldiers leave behind? Shields, perhaps (and I only know that for certain about the heavy hoplite shield), and pikes probably. Both of which were fairly cheap. Expensive equipment, like swords and armour, doesn't impede running very much.

Also, you are assuming the looters would obediently yield their plunder to the commanding general, who would then sell it for full-market value and donate the proceeds to the state treasury. In reality, with the Romans at least, the general would keep a good share, and divide the rest amongst his men. The spoils of victory went to the army, not the state.

[Marshall Louis-Nicolas Davout]

My TW game...

Ok, First ,Bigger armies and Biggger maps. More reaslitic units in the game, like Shogun 2 really.

Money - Should be coming dpeneding on industry. One thing I found in the total war games were there were buildings that deveopled your industry and gained access to new technological advances, it weren't meantioned there. I'd make sure that buildings make a contribution to your industry.

Millitary buldings: They should aslo have advances, like researching this technology or that, and vets should be added.

Generals can now have more speeches, or you can type it in. Its the same with diplomacy I guess, I would like to write something to them.

AI should help you ,not stack loads of armies agasint you.

Battle victories should be depended on how you fought, so once you have finished a battle, you will be given a option to see it in real time movie player or whatever, and it will present you in a view as if you've never seen before, the general making his speech and the troops moving, you can zoom to any part of the battlefield. And of course, you can save Replays

More reaslitinesss in campagains. Fleets shoiuld be more of a millitary standard. and you should be able to upgrade and have better fleets.


Once you have conqerued a province, you have two choices: Recruit their units or don't recurit it.

Mercanerys/ They are well important in TW games and I would have them.

We should see more of the commenoers , you can create stories, then put it into the game and watch it, like ''Samurai vs Samurai '', of course,there will be a built in feature for that.

And Modding: There should be a modding menu which allows you to download as many TW mods as you want. You should be able to play agasint people who have modded their games and this should not cause much of a excuse.

Historical accuiracy: Make it even more hisotrically accruate.

[asugrynd]

How about if you take over a province you get control of tribes who historically lived there and be able to 'use' the land?

-Being able to lay out traderoutes by yourself to these tribes (or allied provinces nearby).
-Keeping control and peace between the different tribes within each region, this will bring in more depth and chaos to the whole war, rather then straight on attacking other factions.
Then also your diplomats will be more usefull (atleast that's what I think) and they will have had an amount of training when dealing with the 'big guys'.
-Having groups of civilians/slaves led by a noble or a tribe work up defensive hills, moats etc. (within reason ofcourse).

What will be the uses of these tribes?

- You can demand (emergency) taxes.
- You can bring a 'call to arms' meaning every tribe will send you a few (free?) troops which can only stay in the region (perhaps except in special circumstances?), this could tip the balance any time anywhere when attacking or defending and make the war a bit unpredictable.
- They could give a wider supply of new sons and daughters to marry into the ruling family (the opposite of sending a daughter to them to keep the local chieftain happy might be interesting.)
- If they are pleased they may send out troops to deal with rebels? Or become rebellious against you themselves. (You can only enjoy crushing rebel-armies popping up for so long)
- Uncovering/producing resources if they grow powerfull enough under your rule maybe?
- The option for selecting chieftains/generals among a list of candidates of these tribes instead of randomly having one recruited?

What's their influence on the region?

- They are responsible for a % of public order (wether that's displayed as the order in a capital or a very own version of regional order is up to the modders I guess).
- They could have fights amongst eachother, not something you necesarily have to deal with except perhaps on occasions when things get out of hand.
- Enemy factions could assault these tribes aswell for quick cash, wether you can protect them or not may reflect on how they will like your presence.
- What if a network of spies get's into these tribes and they rat them out, or buy all the lies that have been spread against your superior rule?
- Perhaps how easy trade goes and how likely it is rebels will pop up alltogether?

Possible perks.

- They could have their own demands, which noble family will rule the tribe, under your rule?
The local chief or a puppet whom his strings you are pulling?
- Obviously the chance they resent to pay taxes to the point where they take up arms against you.
- Demand money/protection after some storm wrecked their barracks.

This is just a few suggestions what's all possible and I think though a huge work in itself that it may yet make the game interesting every single round.
(Though proper balancing of complaints or praise from these tribes might be wise ofcourse.)

Peace, (as if that's gonna happen.)

[KyodaiSteeleye]

Well, there's lots of things that would improve the game, but one of my bugbears is lack of unit limits, and on the counter-side, having to wait for ages to build high-end units.

I think this may already being implemented in EBII, but having a limit on high-end units would be more realistic, and would also stop human players from dominating battles by using elite troop-spam. So, for heavy-cavarly, there maybe should be a limit of one unit per province owned, and so on down for professional units, with maybe only militia's being unlimited. Limiting numbers by province would also help - so you can't spam all your heavy cavalry allocation from one province, but need to raise each unit in the province that has the allocation for it.

On the other hand, it pisses me off that I have to wait three-quarters of the game to get to some high-end units, which would be available to a tribe without such massive requirements. Therefore, maybe in conjunction with the above, I'd make far more units available at lower barracks levels, but change it so that more advanced barracks allowed greater numbers of higher-end units to be maintained, rather than allowing better units to be built. I'd prefer that only reforms/political/sociological changes make new unit types available.

[Populus Romanus]

On the other hand, it pisses me off that I have to wait three-quarters of the game to get to some high-end units, which would be available to a tribe without such massive requirements. Therefore, maybe in conjunction with the above, I'd make far more units available at lower barracks levels, but change it so that more advanced barracks allowed greater numbers of higher-end units to be maintained, rather than allowing better units to be built. I'd prefer that only reforms/political/sociological changes make new unit types available.

I always disliked the fact that you had to build up huge barracks to recruit units that should be available from the start (historically). However, a unit limit doesn't seem right. The most logical answer would be to jack up upkeep so high that there would be a de fact unit limit without actually putting one in place. Unit limits limit the fun in a game because it tightens the already narrow limits imposed by the game mechanics onto the player.

[Horatius]

Here are mine off the top of my head.

1. Make cultural aspects of the factions matter and have an impact on the game. Here are some examples.
a. Marriage. Not all cultures were monarchies; and I simply eye roll when asked to confirm a spouse as a Roman, Celtic, or Greek faction; and here is why. Roman culture didn't have the senate deciding on who a young woman married; if her father was alive he decided; if not it was her decision (but if she was very young her mother would handle the first marriage). Either way me as consul/senate/even emperor should not be managing the private lives of every single person of importance; should I also arrive at their houses in the morning to dress them and brush their teeth? In Greek cultures a woman's kyrios (father, brother, uncles, sons) decided on her marriage not her archon. I could go on but the marriage thing has to turn automatic in cultures where the government did not decide.

b. Fertility. Why not reflect on actual social conditions to determine fertility and why should high fertility always be a blessing? EB was right to remove the end Roman Civil war for being overtly biased; but high fertility in royal families was a recipe for civil war. The most famous example is Caesar's intervention in a Ptolemaic Civil War; where too many children meant a faction split. Culture should have a direct effect on fertility; while some (i.e. Roman) makes fertility stay always at a very low rate (reflecting the liberal nature of Roman Marriage Sine Manu, apathy towards male heirs when adoption through a will did the same thing etc) while others like the Sweboz should have a very high birthrate (reflecting Tacitus' account of the idealistic nature of their marriages and polygamy; p.s. I regret that more isn't known about Germanic Tribes from bc years). Each culture had civil wars for it's own reasons; and fertility as one source shouldn't be overlooked.

Greed and ideology as causes of civil wars. With fertility I went over what should cause stability drops in the more monarchic cultures (I just used Germans as a random example for higher fertility; I know their tribes had high levels of democracy) but the republics and oligarchic states (except Rome most of this time period and Carthage) had their own problems with civil war. A minor but important example is the many times Dumnorix was pardoned before his brother apparently died and Caesar just had enough of him. From a distance it looks like Dumnorix had his ambition shattered by his brother being Vergobert and made deals with every foreign power that could give him an opportunity. According to the total war engine that was such a rarity it shouldn't even be reflected slightly; according to everyone else it would be nice if nobles of all cultures made deals with foreign powers and even tried to seize controll of the faction by creating a new one with the same name.

c. Farming. The only culture where capturing the main cities would mean control of the population was Carthage. In the ancient world most people lived in the country and this should be reflected by many obstacles you need to capture outside of the city; in fact cities should be parasitic; while the country land should be very hard to take and maintain without some reforms done in the land. No control of the farmland? Well no profit except for Carthaginians then. All a city should do is allow you to collect tax and allow recruitment past levies (reflecting state arms control) but without the mini obstacles representing control out of a city taken there should simply be no tax to collect. Trade depended on agriculture; no food no money in the city to purchase luxury goods so again no countryside no tax.

d. Surrender-Cities often needed to neither be starved nor stormed when in a hopeless situation. It would be nice to see non-Roman culture reflected; because only the Romans would force enemies to go through every city before agreeing they were defeated.

e. I mentioned the roman exception plenty of times so here should be the roman and carthaginian weakness. severe penalties for losing Rome or Carthage to reflect the historical importance those two exceptional cities have. They both have great advantages if you factor in culture; they should have that extreme weakness.