Next Total War era Title

[Hooahguy]

I definitely think they are going for the romanticized version, which did have those sorts of heroes who could take out whole units and such. I think they definitely saw the success of the Warhammer TW games and want to try that formula just minus the magic.

[Seyavash]

I definitely think they are going for the romanticized version, which did have those sorts of heroes who could take out whole units and such. I think they definitely saw the success of the Warhammer TW games and want to try that formula just minus the magic.

If they use the romance as a source I wouldn't discount the possibility of magic being included in some form.

[hoom]

So I started watching 2008 Red Cliffs movie (got distracted & only watched the start so far), whats the consensus on its historicity?
Seems to have a pretty interesting selection of armor/weapons/unit types.

[Intranetusa]

So I started watching 2008 Red Cliffs movie (got distracted & only watched the start so far), whats the consensus on its historicity? Seems to have a pretty interesting selection of armor/weapons/unit types.

I'm no expert, but from what I've read/researched, the Red Cliff movie seems like garbage in terms of accuracy. It's not almost pure fantasy like 300, but it gets tons of stuff wrong and uses some semi-fictional elements.

1) The weapons and armor are incorrectly used or not portrayed correctly. The majority of weapons during the Han Dynasty were regular & heavy crossbows, pikes, halberds, long-halberds, and other types of polearms. Han Dynasty warfare heavily used pike and shot-esque combat with pikes/halberds and crossbows. Yet you don't see a single crossbow (they only show you the more niche repeating crossbows...which would've been more rare). They don't portray any of the common historical weapon formations - pikes, pike & crossbow, volley firing, etc.

The halberd (ji/daggeraxe-spear) is incorrectly portrayed as a slashing weapon, when in reality it was more of a armor piercing stabbing weapon that is swung like a warhammer and used to hook cavalry. This was a common weapon with a lot of variations, and they don't portray the other types (long halberd-pike hybrids, multi headed halberds, halberds with different secondary attachments such as cavalry hooks, etc)

The guandao/pudao (glaive looking polearm used by Guan Yu) wasn't wasn't invented until the Tang Dynasty a few centuries later...although this is not that big of a deal since it was basically a dao on a polearm so it may have existed.

And most of the soldiers are equipped with short 1-handed spears that for some odd reason they carry with two hands and they carry nothing in the other hand. That makes no sense - one handed spears are always carried with shields. Even shorter halberds are carried with shield. Shields are also one of the cheapest and most effective forms of protection. Everybody with a one handed weapon SHOULD be carrying a shield. Only two handed weapons (pikes, crossbows, long halberds, etc) would be used without shields.

2) The armor is off. One of the characters wears plated chainmail...which wasn't even invented until the medieval era in the Middle East/South Asia. That might be the inspiration for the plated chainmail Lu Bu wears in this 3K trailer.

The infantry are wearing leather caps combined with what should be metal lamellar (some infantry seems to be wearing non-overlapping coat of plates, which is inaccurate). Leather caps are light infantry/light cavalry helmets used during the Western Han period when they were mostly used lacquered rawhide lamellar from the Qin era. It makes little sense that they would be wearing light infantry Western-Han era helmets with heavier infantry Eastern-Han era body armor. The lamellar helmets are also more Western Han era in design, as they used more rigid helmets by the Eastern Han era iirc (although lamellar helmets could have still been in use, the movie leaves out the rigid helmet types). Not sure why nobody has shoulder guards except the generals, as these were pretty common for standard armored infantry dating back to the Qin Dynasty/Warring States era as seen by artifacts and terra cotta warriors.

All factions are also incorrectly portrayed as wearing the same armor and weapons...which would be inaccurate. The factions didn't have the same industrial and manufacturing base, so they had to make do with different armor designs and materials. Eastern Wu was a naval/marine/infantry power in the subtropical jungle and mountains of South China, so it makes no sense they're using the same weapons and armors as Tsao-Wei, which was more cavalry + pike/halberd oriented power around the central Chinese plains.

3) The formations are a joke. The infantry semi-circle only has a single line of troops which would be easily broken with a cavalry charge. The spinning turtle-tank formation created from small shields is total fiction. Again, you don't see any common historical formations portrayed as at all (pike formations, pike and crossbow formations, repeating crossbow volley fire formations, etc)

[hoom]

Thanks for detailed answer
It was particularly the guy with the plate/chainmail armor in the bit I saw that seemed questionable
Its clearly better than 300 in that they actually wear their armor though.

[edyzmedieval]

Let's remember that Shogun 2 had the same type of trailer and people thought it had duels.

[Crandar]

As a reminder, CA has announced that their game is based on the Romance and not the Records.
The answer to their concerns was also very evasive ("We assure you that Cao Cao will not sit in a huge throne throwing flames"-straw-man fallacy). It's true that we don't know much yet, but there are strong indications, more concrete than a cinematic trailer, that it's not going to be as historical as the previous titles.

[Intranetusa]

Let's remember that Shogun 2 had the same type of trailer and people thought it had duels.

Well, Shogun 2 had matched combat...which might as well been duels. The trailer's depiction of units, weapons, and armor were pretty close to what the actual game had.

If the soldiers, weapons, and armor depicted in the 3K trailer is similarly representative of what is found in the actual 3K game, then the game would be as inaccurate as portraying the army of the late Roman Republic during the days of Caesar as a hoplite phalanx army from 500 BC.

[JStahlhelm1090]

I think it's a fresh idea for CA to create a total war game on a time period that many people probably not know about. From my experience from Shogun 2 total war (actually my first total war game), I learned a lot of the history behind it which sparked my interest for medieval Japan.
I would be expecting a lot of flaws in the game once it gets released but that's where mods come in. In case people are saying the game isn't as good upon released, I would just buy it when it's on sale.

[edyzmedieval]

Speaking of TW games, they are now on sale on the Steam Store!

http://www.steampowered.com

[edyzmedieval]

Did anyone play TW 3 Kingdoms during this period? Any thoughts on the updated game?