Unbelievable problems...

[Shaitan]

No I did not before my post, I discovered it a few hours later :P I have been playing many of the latest games in the series solely through Mouse...but then it hit me to check the Keyboard Controls...Yet, thanks for the Reply nevertheless appreciate.

And It was really something I was missing, I am so glad now, as I can do custom formations to fit my tactics!

Cheers :)

You can also do this via mouse. There is a pull down (or rather pull up) menu. But it's much faster to use the keys.

[antisocialmunky]

Formation units are stupidly broken because they will break formation to turn the whole unit to face the attacker. This makes is stupidly easy for the AI who tends to do a last minute swerve into your lines to screw up your line and get flanking bonuses on everything. It really hurts phalanx units. Additionally formation units suck at surrounding enemy units because they seem to be unable to wrap so the optimal defensive deployment now seems to be a line made up of short squares rather than multiple lines of thing units. Now battles tend to become massive moshpits compared to even shogun because of this crap.

[Azi Tohak]

The game dearly needed more play testing. However, I believe it's getting better. Whether that's because of CA or the brilliance of the Radious mod, I can't say, but I'm enjoy the game a great deal.

Azi

[Sp4]

I never use the ingame formations and unless you can save your own custom formations, I think I will never touch to buttons because half the time, the formations may have been a good idea at the time and in real life but in the game, all they're achieving is a confused me. Battles are very very simplified anyways and don't really need fancy formations and at the speed they are happening, I doubt there is a single answer to everything formation anyways.

[Bramborough]

I never use the ingame formations and unless you can save your own custom formations, I think I will never touch to buttons because half the time, the formations may have been a good idea at the time and in real life but in the game, all they're achieving is a confused me. Battles are very very simplified anyways and don't really need fancy formations and at the speed they are happening, I doubt there is a single answer to everything formation anyways.

Yep. I used to tinker with my formations during deployment phase a lot. After a while, I started noticing that the default formation into which the game plops my army was getting closer and closer to what I was doing myself. Now pretty much the only change I make is position of my few spear units (I included them in composition mainly for flank protection against cavalry end-runs vs my siege arty...the game never puts them there).

[Sp4]

Yep. I used to tinker with my formations during deployment phase a lot. After a while, I started noticing that the default formation into which the game plops my army was getting closer and closer to what I was doing myself. Now pretty much the only change I make is position of my few spear units (I included them in composition mainly for flank protection against cavalry end-runs vs my siege arty...the game never puts them there).

Playing as Rome, the game puts anything ranged into the first line, which is fine, spears into the second and then melee into the third and forth if there's enough with cav behind and on the flanks. The only thing I change is moving all cav to one side and the spears behind my melee to guard flanks.

[antisocialmunky]

I never use the ingame formations and unless you can save your own custom formations, I think I will never touch to buttons because half the time, the formations may have been a good idea at the time and in real life but in the game, all they're achieving is a confused me. Battles are very very simplified anyways and don't really need fancy formations and at the speed they are happening, I doubt there is a single answer to everything formation anyways.

I expect a line of units to stay in a line. It would be better if formation was just stripped off everything but pikemen so making a line of units doesn't lead to a ton of sideways facing hoplites

[Sp4]

Sideways facing hoplites?

[bthizle1]

I myself am amazed (and not in a very positive way). Naturally having been a TW fan since something like 10 years old playing the original Shogun for hours on end and having played every TW game since fairly avidly, I was well aware of the fact that CA doesn't usually release a " decent" vanilla game, from my point of view at least. I was considering holding off on purchasing it until it'd been out for some 6 months to a year (patches, and more so mods), but I was not sure if I'd even have access to a computer in that time frame so I made the purchase and have played a campaign as Pontus with the beta 3 patch. I tried to be fair in my judgment, and tried convincing myself that although I was not too keen of the new "style" and rather lackluster indepthness as it seemed, but I just couldn't do it and decided to make a brief list while playing only some say 50 turns of the pros and cons. My con list was immensely larger than that of my pros.

To name a few cons:
Handful of crashes, enemies reinforcing a city from sea landed then didn't even move from beach, the morale is horrible, the throwing of javelins is absurd, no family tree, the building method, overly fast paced battles, poor movement on battle field, not being able to see garrison of city even with spy without having to specifically look at the structures one by one, autocalc is horribly done, AI in general is absurd (nothing new).

A few pros:
Men look winded when fatigued, many interact-able factions......really nothing else I can think of that I was actually impressed with.

And of the cons those were just a few and from a very brief campaign as well. I expect this from CA at this point, but I just feel that in particular with this game they have really created a game that at least in my opinion is simply not my cup of tea and that being said TW is my favorite game series of all time (followed by a handful of paradox titles).

[nafod]

Playing beta patch 3 overall it's a game I can play, but with the other demands on my time it doesn't warrant much attention.

Going back to Shogun 2 I just feel the game was much more finished, as in, it possessed all the bells and whistles, and polish, of a delightful title. Rome 2 lacks all of this. It's functional, it plays ok, but that's it.

Even going back to Rome Total War I feel the game hasn't really improved other than visually.

I wouldn't discourage anyone from purchasing it, and I don't want my money back, but I feel like I've been sold another ETW.

[Sp4]

not being able to see garrison of city even with spy without having to specifically look at the structures one by one

You can actually mouse over the little garrison icon when you select a town (it's a tiny icon that sometimes seems like it wants to hide behind the bottom UI) and see even the exact numbers of men left in your or any settlement's garrison army. It does not work for navy though I think.

[Kamakazi]

There is a reason I have 451 hours clocked on TWS2. The Diplomacy is complex if at time irritating. The combat is realistic and exciting and over all the game is graphically stunning. When I heard that TWR2 was coming out I almost died of excitement. I figured after the shining pinnacle of S2 that R2 would be better and far more detailed. I have to say that im disappointed. All diplomacy if for the most part GONE. Graphically it Is a step backwards. Im playing on highest settings and all I get a bland models of the same soldier over and over. Combat is broken I have battle time limits off because I like the full win or die feel of it. But when the AI attacks from the sea or with big armies at least one but up to half of the units it uses NEVER MOVE. So I have to do 1 of 2 things. A quit the battle and reload my quick save with a time limit or slowly run my troops back and fourth through static unfighting units to win. Not to mention half the time people just die for no reason at all. What happened to the cool fluid fights with epic kills like in TWS2? I want to see personal battles down to the last roll or parry.

Overall I think Rome 2 is a step backwards not one to the front of the series. Its still a decent game and ill clod my way to at least one win... But if nothing gets fixed soon im going back to TWS2

[AntiDamascus]

I'm not gonna lie. I did not like Shogun 2. Every city I took was way too easy. Is it better than R2 to me? I don't really know yet. But compared to other games I've played more of, Rome I and M2, I like those way better. I guess it's just funny watching everyone post about how much they loooooved S2 and I just kinda shrug my shoulders at it.

[Hooahguy]

I'm not gonna lie. I did not like Shogun 2. Every city I took was way too easy. Is it better than R2 to me? I don't really know yet. But compared to other games I've played more of, Rome I and M2, I like those way better. I guess it's just funny watching everyone post about how much they loooooved S2 and I just kinda shrug my shoulders at it.

Agreed. I also was very bored with the game, only had 3 hours in it before I had to put it down. You want to talk about cookie-cutter? I mean come on, Shogun 2 couldnt get any more cookie cutter. Everyone was Japanese so everyone had the same swordsmen, same spearmen, and a small variation in some elite units, and even then it was primarily just their banners and names. Why should I pick the Oda clan, or the Chosokabe, besides some random faction bonuses like better farms or swordsmen? I mean come on. Taking a town/castle was the same thing over and over, little variation. And dont mention the incredibly gamey climbing the walls mechanic. Why bother with rams or whatever when you can just climb the walls. Kinda similar problem with the torches in R2TW, but I think its worse in S2TW. And personally I prefer the graphics in R2 but thats just me.

[Sp4]

If your R2 is looking worse than S2 it is because you don't have the power to run R2. It downgrades the graphics until you can by default. I guess S2 did that too but it was less demanding. Even on medium settings, R2 looks better than S2.

[Kamakazi]

no there is no graphics downgrading.. ive checked all my settings and its easily running highest graphics... it just doesn't look as good as S2

[Hooahguy]

Resolution plays a big part of it, by the way.