as the Saxons on VH. Overall I have found it to be interesting and enjoyable, none of the issues everyone was worried about. Mucho better than R2
My original plan was to move south into Spain and pick up Britain along the way, but the Scandinavians wanted to fight so I had to make mice with the Alamans. As I moved into Britain I thought it better to stay friendly with Gaul
By the time I was ready to cross the Pyrennes Gaul and the Alamans had already cleared Espana and some rabble out and claimed it for themselves, so I went across the north and dropped down the east side into Yugoslavia.
The Fertility mechanism allowed me to get a good start but as it spiralled down it just became a drag on my economy, forced me to devote precious building space to food production which in turn really hurt my economy. Not my favorite new feature, it seemed especially harsh on the northern provinces.
I played the entire game on the north half of the map, everyone in the north who loves me is still alive. Only recently has Gaul started to turn red, mostly since I won't help them fight everyone else on the map. Man they start a lot of fights.
One of my personal goals was to have Kingy lead the charge into Rome, and now he rules from there. Had a big fight in Ravenna with the Romans;
I ran into the Hun in Yugoslavia, he was quite OP with full stacks of 20. His cav archers melted many of my stacks since I did not have any good horse archer options except the occasional merc. Finally killed Attila and ended the Hun scourge, but it took quite a long time and I could feel the AI giving me a break on everty other front while I was engaged. More than once the Romans should have popped out to take advantage of my thin line.
Constantinople was much easier, mostly desolation down in that part of the world due to the Huns.
I didn't try too hard to clear the tech board, got most of it but didn't really feel it was as important as previous games.
food and happiness was a PITA. I do not care for the design concept where I have to choose between a well and a chieftains house. I get what they're trying to do, make us make choices, but I like to build and solve problems, not be so constrained in my options as I felt I was here.
The politics and family tree was much more interesting than previous games. I liked the influence mechanic, even tho I still don't understand Dominion. The cost of installing some governors and generals is outrageous, it made it impossible for me to get the guy I wanted and had to settle for a cheap guy that had issues.
Same for agent actions. So few agents and governors, I felt unable at times to solve the problems the game presented me. You mean to tell me that I control all of Europe and can only have 3 spies? I can't point to guy and say "go manage Provincia"? Sorry, you only get 5 guvs. Silly. Priests were more than plentiful at the time, I only have 3? And then they cost so much to use. Way too much. When I got agent spammed I had to stop my campaign to clear it out.
The growth trees for most characters were interesting and provided useful benefits, needs some work on Admirals and Priests.
I enjoyed the battles, combat seemed to be the right speed and morale was working as I anticipated, some missile types seemed very strong while all of my hurler/jav types seemed pretty weak.
Bookmarks