Attila 1st Impressions

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

First impression of the game are good - battles are too fast but I understand that's been an issue for a number of years, game runs fine on my mid-range system, except for some freezing during the end of a turn and (oddly) during Cinematics.

In terms of the Western Roman Empire, after a few false starts I finally got into the groove but between the silly infantry general and the fact that your starting armies contain no archers (ERE gets archers in it's starting armies by WRE has to tech up and build barracks) the game is turning into a grind.

At one point I actually opted to autoresolve a battle I should have fought simply because it was exactly the same as a battle I had fought 30 seconds before, being another rebellion where the rebels spawned better units than the province can support and attacked my garrison - exactly the same rebel army make up and the same garrison.

As regards the setup on the WRE generally, it's pretty much a death spiral, settlement destroyed by Huns, settlements rebel due to loss of grain, raise taxes to prevent bankruptcy, more settlements rebel, aemies collapse, lose to huns, settlement destroyed, rinse repeat until dead.

Unless you can stop it, which is proving difficult with the poor starting armies you get as the WRE - the lack of archers is real painful, it means your troops are always advancing under fire, you have no fire arrows and no realistic way to defend settlements, most of which lack walls and gates.

Certainly, the post-Apocalyptic feel is very well done, but I have to say, I think the Roman roster has been somewhat unfairly gimped, it's not like it NEEDS to be any harder than it is already.

[Bramborough]

So...at this point I've completed the Prologue campaign (which has you play the Visigoths; took me about 50 turns) and am 22 turns into a Saxon GC. A few random thoughts, in no particular order:

- Game has been quite stable and non-buggy on my machine. I rather expected this, since TWA is an evolution of R2.

- Desolated areas are annoying. As far as I can tell, a horde army can settle a desolated region, but an established faction cannot expand into one. This doesn't make much sense to me, really. Right now I've got a perfectly good province capital next door that I can't take over unless I migrate...and therefore give up the 4 towns I already have.

- Early missile infantry (at least those available to the Visigoths and Saxons) seem rather ineffectual against quality troops, although they still shred low-end units quite well. My initial impression is that they're more effective in a morale-nerfing role than as outright killers.

- Both the Battle and Campaign AI seem much improved. The Saxons' most obvious first opponent are the Franks next door (and they'll declare on you anyway, so there's not really an alternative). It was a rude awakening; they did a nice job of isolating and destroying my secondary armies...and killing off two of my family members...before my FL finally kicked them out of Flevum.

- The political system is not terribly intuitive. I generally understand the concept of balancing Dominion and Control, but the nuts-and-bolts of actually managing these are not all that clear. That said, it's quite complex and fun. I like how the wives have a much bigger role. And the limited number of family members is a big plus for immersion; there's real risk in losing one in battle. I was forced to adopt an opposing character when FL's heir and son-in-law (both of them without male heirs) were killed in a rather bumpy war with the Franks.

- Agents seem to have a much diminished role in the game. Compared to R2, you have to go much deeper into the tech and building trees before you're able to recruit any at all. I'm sure their presence will increase in the later stages of the campaign, but right now it looks like the "agent spam" of R2 has been reined in a good bit (I hope I don't have to eat those words later...).

- The Prologue campaign is pretty well done. Re-creates the Gothic War of 376AD. Culminates in the Battle of Hadrianople, which you have to win (as the Visigoths, against ERE) to complete the campaign. Even on just Normal difficulty, it's not easy. Took me 5 tries, and even then it was a Pyrrhic Victory. Quite the bloodbath. Rather fun. The Prologue is well worth playing, even if you don't really need the tutorial.

- Fatigue is a bigger deal now. It depletes much more quickly, and seems to have a larger detrimental effect when low. Be stingy with double-click movements of any distance. That said, troops also seem to recover faster to "Fresh" status if they get a chance to stand still for a few moments.

- In the early stages, Sanitation isn't much of a factor. At least, not for small-start factions like the Saxons/Goths. Probably not the case for WRE/ERE/Sassanids.

Overall, I'm pretty happy with my first couple of days of Attila. Game seems release-appropriate polished. I find it more complex, and more challenging, than R2. I found R2 mostly an exercise is carrying out a long-term imperial plan, with few really important campaign decisions...if something didn't work out, it usually didn't hurt too bad, you could just regroup and try again in a few turns. With Attila, you're more scratching for your life, with significant choices and potentially disastrous consequences nearly every turn. And that's with one of the easier factions...you guys playing WRE on higher difficulty levels must be pulling your hair out. Nice job, CA.

[Jacque Schtrapp]

Desolated areas are annoying. As far as I can tell, a horde army can settle a desolated region, but an established faction cannot expand into one. This doesn't make much sense to me, really. Right now I've got a perfectly good province capital next door that I can't take over unless I migrate...and therefore give up the 4 towns I already have.

I'm around turn 90 in my Sassanid campaign. The Huns swung through eastern Anatolia and burned half the cities on my border with the ERE. I have settled five of those cities. I'm not sure if there is a faction difference, but as the Sassanids, when I mouse over a ruin, I get a sword icon. Right clicking the sword icon on the ruins allows me to colonize the ruin. It costs about 9k on average and half the troops in the army that "attacks" the ruins will become settlers. The building plots slowly regenerate over time as the population grows. On a side note, the ERE sent three legions after the Hun horde that had been destroying their cities. The Huns retreated into my territory and the ERE marched right in after them, having multiple battles with the Huns over several turns, before destroying them and leaving my territory. I'm not really sure how I feel about that.

I'm having a completely different experience with family members. You've only got a few which you need to protect. I have the opposite. My family is so large that I've got innumerable loyalty issues and have fought two civil wars already. Every end of turn is a constant spam of loyalty warnings and illegitimate child births. This brings up my only gripe with the family tree. there is no way to "maximize" it so that you can see everything on it at once. I have to click + drag the tree around the screen to view parts of it.

[JeromeBaker]

My first impression was the game is more polished than I tend to expect out of TW games right after release. I have not had any crashes or major bugs occur (that I have noticed). The end of turn speed is ok for me, but does slow down on occasion when my turn comes back around and I have a mission issued.

Replayability seems to be there. I lost steam playing R2 pretty quickly, but I am not as worried about that happening here.

I am playing as the Geats in my first campaign. My quest to ally the norsemen ended up creating a war between the Jutes and the Danes. I ended up allied with the Jutes against the Danes. While fighting the Danes and taking their capital, I noticed the Jutes just up and left as a horde and their capital became a desolute area. This really caught me by suprise as I was counting on their Navy to help me finish of the Danes. Even though I captured their capital, their last stack of the Dane Navy could easliy crush mine.

Then I pretty much bankrupted myself trying to purchase, resettle, and rebuild the desolute area left by the Jutes. (As Jacque stated above it drains about half of your stack's man power and can run 8 to 12k)

I now have mounting unrest, no money to build or add troop strength, and I only have one trade partner left. No one else seems willing to make any deals with me and I have no money to tempt them into diplomacy.

After all this I realized I had ignored the family tree system and my clan seems ready to split down the middle. I have had a lot of fun with the tree so far, but perhaps it would be more tedious if I were the WRE or ERE and had more family members.

So with everything falling apart I mustered the best stack I could and sent them off with my only navy left to raid around Britain. When my naval stack arrived on the other side of Britania I realized I lost most of my sailors and a large part of my army in the 2 to 3 turns of transit. Not sure if this is due to a storm or becuase I didnt hug the coastline when sailing. My ships are so light on crew I am worried I would lose them sailing for home. I think my only option is to take the least defended settlement I can find and replenish my crew and get some more money comming in and then launch raids from my new city to help rebuild my other territories.

So far I would give it an 8 out of 10..... The last time I remember being this hyped playing out of the box was S2TW. My fingers are crossed that the replayability doesnt wear off as I get accustomed to the new additions to the game. At least for now I am really excited to get home and pick up where I left off.

[Slaists]

- Desolated areas are annoying. As far as I can tell, a horde army can settle a desolated region, but an established faction cannot expand into one. This doesn't make much sense to me, really. Right now I've got a perfectly good province capital next door that I can't take over unless I migrate...and therefore give up the 4 towns I already have.

- Anyone can colonize desolated areas if they have cash. At least on very hard difficulty, the AI is doing that. I am playing as Geats colonizing Britain from the South. Midway I met up with Pitcs who were doing the same from the North.

- Early missile infantry (at least those available to the Visigoths and Saxons) seem rather ineffectual against quality troops, although they still shred low-end units quite well. My initial impression is that they're more effective in a morale-nerfing role than as outright killers.

- There are some multiplayer youtube videos analyzing units. It seems, the only missile types effective against quality armored troops are crossbows (and javelins).

- Both the Battle and Campaign AI seem much improved. The Saxons' most obvious first opponent are the Franks next door (and they'll declare on you anyway, so there's not really an alternative). It was a rude awakening; they did a nice job of isolating and destroying my secondary armies...and killing off two of my family members...before my FL finally kicked them out of Flevum.

- The AI seems really focused on the player. If they declare war on you they will come after you no matter from how far away.

- The political system is not terribly intuitive. I generally understand the concept of balancing Dominion and Control, but the nuts-and-bolts of actually managing these are not all that clear. That said, it's quite complex and fun. I like how the wives have a much bigger role. And the limited number of family members is a big plus for immersion; there's real risk in losing one in battle. I was forced to adopt an opposing character when FL's heir and son-in-law (both of them without male heirs) were killed in a rather bumpy war with the Franks.

- I guess, the family member situation is quite random. In my Geats campaign I had a rather broad family from the start. By the time the third generation started multiplying, browsing of the family tree (to find who is unemployed, disloyal, etc.) became horrid. The tree is not really designed for a rapidly expanding family. Having all family members displayed also in a list format would be highly helpful. They already have it for non-members so would not be a huge leap of design to implement.

- You can also marry your family's young females to your opposition generals. This turns the general into a family member.

- Agents seem to have a much diminished role in the game. Compared to R2, you have to go much deeper into the tech and building trees before you're able to recruit any at all. I'm sure their presence will increase in the later stages of the campaign, but right now it looks like the "agent spam" of R2 has been reined in a good bit (I hope I don't have to eat those words later...).

- Agents are crucial for keeping PO (more than in R2) and stopping/controlling AI army spam. In my first try, I did not realize you need very specific buildings to get agents and it bit me. I abandoned that campaign and in the new one beelined for agents. It is easy to get them (within 10-15 turns) if you aim for it.

- A crucial thing with agents is that, at least for barbarians, they are only available from province capital buildings. So, if you only have minor settlements: no agents for you...

- In the early stages, Sanitation isn't much of a factor. At least, not for small-start factions like the Saxons/Goths. Probably not the case for WRE/ERE/Sassanids.

Sanitation is a curious beast. I got sickness in one settlement and it gave me -1 to PO and -1 to growth. So, it seems, you can pretty much ignore sanitation in select areas. Effects on armies are bad though. So, keep your troops out of squalor.

[Bramborough]

@Jacque and Slaists, yep, some time after I wrote that post, I realized that the reason I couldn't move into that desolated capital was because of the exorbitant cost to do so (16K+ in this case). Which also explains why no one else has moved in to fill that vacuum. I guess I'm more content now with the concept of this particular mechanic...but still wonder if maybe they should fine-tune it by tweaking the cost down a bit.

I can see how early impressions of things like sanitation, family tree size, and a whole host of other things would be completely different for the big factions, compared a single-town-start faction like Saxons. Although I do think it's weird that Slaists' Geats (also a small-start) apparently had a more robust starting family.

For comparison's sake, I started with 3 male family members (one FL, one son FH, and one son-in-law), two of whom had wives (and I managed to fumble away 2 of the 3 guys in the early going, as earlier mentioned). I infer, Slaists, that your Geat family was larger than that?

[oz_wwjd]

My problem is that the upgrade system in the game locks out certain units. For example Limitani were the most numerous troops type of the Late Roman Empire, they featured prominently in every campaign waged in the West...yet they just disappear. Worse still in some circumstances the new troops upkeep,doesn't seem to be displayed,so I don't know what the upgraded troops are going to cost in upkeep.

Also Techs should not upgrade units to a different type. The gothic warband->falxmen were named as an example. Axemen to swordsmen is fine, as would be a two-handed axemen to a falxmen or something, but weapon and board units should be replaced with weapon and board, while two handed units should be replaced with two handed units. For this particular example I suggest adding falxmen as a unit unlocked by the technology but not replacing other units.

There's a 16 page thread on it here http://forums.totalwar.com/showthrea...d-game./page13. I don't like this at all,as ca said in a lengthy response that it was "

TLDR: This is a key difference with ATTILA to previous TWs, you have to think and plan far more for the mid-end game. Balance your tech research, carefully consider your trade-offs.

[I_damian]

It's CA catering to the people who want armies composed of awesome looking hollywood badasses. I shit you not I've seen people asking why Spartan Warriors aren't in the ERE roster. It's heart breaking.

[Slaists]

@Jacque and Slaists, yep, some time after I wrote that post, I realized that the reason I couldn't move into that desolated capital was because of the exorbitant cost to do so (16K+ in this case). Which also explains why no one else has moved in to fill that vacuum. I guess I'm more content now with the concept of this particular mechanic...but still wonder if maybe they should fine-tune it by tweaking the cost down a bit.

There is a trick to colonizing: the larger is the size of the army you are colonizing with the smaller is the cost for doing so. The mechanic is that part of your army settles in the colony and drives the cost down. So, a full stack of the cheapest yet largest size units (avoid cavalry, dogs, etc.) you get is the most cost efficient way to do so (the cost is around 8K for me).

I can see how early impressions of things like sanitation, family tree size, and a whole host of other things would be completely different for the big factions, compared a single-town-start faction like Saxons. Although I do think it's weird that Slaists' Geats (also a small-start) apparently had a more robust starting family.

For comparison's sake, I started with 3 male family members (one FL, one son FH, and one son-in-law), two of whom had wives (and I managed to fumble away 2 of the 3 guys in the early going, as earlier mentioned). I infer, Slaists, that your Geat family was larger than that?

Yes, my Geats start with quite a large family (several members idle) + some marriage age ladies to spare. I believe, several of king's offspring had their own children at the start of the campaign already.

[edyzmedieval]

I'm considering purchasing Attila, haven't pre-ordered because I wasn't sure whether my computer would hold up to it, but my question revolves around the ERE.

How balanced is the unit roster?

Back in the RTW BI times, they were equal to the Sassanids.