RTW speed: reduce or not reduce?

[Dead Moroz]

OK, gentlemen, let's count all pros and contras.

I think there should be option in preferenses to choose the desirable speed. But the minimal speed of units and "killing speed" must be reduced much in comparison with speeds we have in demo.

[Thoros of Myr]

While I think some units don't need to be messed with, most of the units need thier movement and killing speed reduced, in line with the killing speed, CA seems to have gone overboard with the effect of valor. Zoom in for a look, High valor units basicly vaporize weaker foes on contact.

[Shahed]

I think it's too late for a vote like this, but I agree that the battle speed is way too fast. It feels highly arcade....ahh teh pwn

[Lucius Lucullus]

From what we have seen of the demo, both needs to be reduced, but we do not know if it really is needed in the game just yet.

[Steppe Merc]

Reduce both, but espically the unit speed.

[Aelwyn]

I don't feel the speed of the game is bad. Its not much faster than MTW, and its definitely slower than STW at least imo. Killing speeds may beed to be tweaked just a bit, but I feel most of this is coming from people's ideas that the Poeini Infantry die too quick. True they're are meant to hold, but they were facing Roman swords. The mercenary units on the Carthaginian side seemed to do well in taking on the Romans. True they were high valour, and some of the Roman units were lower valour, so thats why I think they may need a slight change, but this is all based on the demo.

Remember, the MTW demo was very choppy, and the actual game wasn't like that. So don't base too much opinion on the demo.

[son of spam]

I like the speed in this game, it's more like a standard RTS now. I always ran my MTW battles at 50-100% anyway.

Perhaps a better speed slider would be in order though.

OT: Actually I love the way cav vaporizes low valor inf on contact. It's just...cool!

[Blodrast]

definitely both; the current state almost forces you to use Pause, it gives you too little time for maneuvres, and it looks kinda cheesy to see the zerg hordes dying as fast as they're spawned...

[Steppe Merc]

Son of Spam, that's a horrible thing to be like a RTS! Total War is above RTS! ~:p

[Husar]

I don´t want them to change anything yet, I would wait for the full version, I have seen Poeni infantry getting killed quite fast with romans all around them, but I´ve also seen them standing very long when the romans couldn´t get behind them. As soon as you get elephants to stand instead of run, their killing speed is way lower. And the movement speeds are just realistic I think, this are trained fighters, at least young men in their best years, they shouldn´t move like grandfathers.
Keep in mind that valour and other things in the demo are not very balanced, how often did you have valour 10 cav in MTW(not talking about generals here)? and even my high-valour SBC have few chances in a head on fight against Triarii, note that people that fall are not necessarily dead, often they stand up again.
I suggest to include a speedbar or wait for the full and see how it is then, don´t rush things just because of a demo with two prepared battles.

[son of spam]

Son of Spam, that's a horrible thing to be like a RTS! Total War is above RTS! ~:p

lol. the game just reminded me a lot of AOM with kickass battles, that's all.

[hoom]

The faster speed was supposed to be about making the pre contact manoeuvring on the 4 times larger battlefield less tedious.

But it means that when contact actually comes, we seem to get overly quick closing.

[The Witch-King]

I agree that unit and killing speed are slightly too fast for my liking. I had to chase a routing unit of exhausted Hastati all over the field before I trampled the last one during the Trebia battle. My Sacred Band Cavalry had problems keeping up with them and they were still fresh! :) Of course, watching my cavalry trample them all was highly enjoyable, but slowing down the unit's speed would certainly be prudent, I feel. As for killing speed....Well, high valour versus low valour, what can you expect? I withhold my judgement about this until I've played the full game. :)

[Aelwyn]

I just played the battle, and focused on cavalry speed up close, as close as I could get (this was after I had already won). They seemed to move exactly as I would want them. I think the speed of cavalry is not perfect, but its very close (I like it but hesitate to call anything perfect). Not so sure about the inf. speed as I wasn't able to focus on that until they were routing, and thats not the speed I want to judge.

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

I just played the battle, and focused on cavalry speed up close, as close as I could get (this was after I had already won). They seemed to move exactly as I would want them. I think the speed of cavalry is not perfect, but its very close (I like it but hesitate to call anything perfect). Not so sure about the inf. speed as I wasn't able to focus on that until they were routing, and thats not the speed I want to judge.

I agree, Aelwyn. The cavalry wasn't noticeably faster than it was in MTW. I don't know the numbers, but it was fairly reasonable, and I think they could get away with not fixing calvalry speed.

[Puzz3D]

It's the infantry run speed that's the problem. It's 2.5x the walk speed. In STW and in MTW it's 1.67 times the walk speed. The cavalry walk 1.25x and run 4.375x speeds are close to MTW's 1.5x and 4.0x (fast cav).

Fighting speed is hard to judge right now.

[The Marcher Lord]

Having played the original demo a few times now I think a lot of the speed is down to the high valour of the Carth troops in the Trebbia battle and thats why they appear to carve through the Romans so fast, same thing for the senate/Julii v Gauls battle. With things evened out a bit more in most of the mods I have had some longer battles, and with troops really standing their ground it turns into a regular hackfest. I'm reserving final judgement till the real game comes out - if it looks too fast in that then they need to give us some speed options.

[TexRoadkill]

I think the run speeds are a bit high. I've seen fleeing troops outrun tired cavalry.

The kill speeds don't bother me considering there isn't much armor and all it would take is one good hit to take somebody out of battle. It also makes it much more important to use your troops properly. A phalanx can hold off a frontal attack for quite awhile.

[afrit]

I have seen Poeni infantry getting killed quite fast with romans all around them, but I´ve also seen them standing very long when the romans couldn´t get behind them.

CA did mention in interviews and such that they wanted to maximize maneuvering rewards. So it is reasonable that they now give more bonus to rear attack/flank attack compared to MTW. This is a good thing. In MTW sometimes you labored long and hard to manage to charge the enemy from the rear, only to discover they still would not rout.

afrit

[Blodrast]

well, IMHO, "waiting for the full release to see if the speed needs tweaking or not" is an exercise in futility, because if it turns out that it does need to be tweaked indeed, well, it would be too late to do anything anyway.
Sure, there might be patches, at some point in the future...

I do agree that we might be drawing erroneous conclusions due to the inconclusive data that we were exposed to, this being a demo and all. But that's pretty much all we can do right now.

After all, it is possible that higher valour troops run faster, or fatigue affects speed in various ways for various units, we don't know deep the changes run.

So again, we're drawing conclusions on the limited set of data that we were provided.
Faith lies in the CA guys that they know what's really going on and can tell which of our issues are false issues or non-issues, and hopefully do the right thing in the final release.

[The Marcher Lord]

I think I was trying to give the benefit of the doubt to the CA chaps in that post and like you say, we don't have a hell of a lot to go on at the moment. It would be good if a CA rep could let us know if the current speeds can be expected in the final game or whether these were just a by-product of the 'lets try to please everyone' demo factor.

[Spino]

I'm all in favor of reducing the 'killing speed' but only have qualms with the running and charging speeds of infantry units. Simply tone down the 'olympic sprinter infantry mode' for running and charging. Cavalry speeds seem fine.

[Steppe Merc]

I played the extended Trebia, and while everyone didn't seem as fast as before, that was mainly because most of my troops were on Phanlax formation. Regardless, everyone was way to fast, and when the Romans were routing, I don't know how many out ran my elephants. No matter how fast you are, when you have a lot of armor and weapons, you shouldn't be able to out run a ticked off bull African Elephant.

[Husar]

I think the Cretan archers may be running a bit fast, but not that much, as I looked at roman infantry running, their feet didn´t hover or anything on the tutorial map, concidering they are motion-captured this means the speed would be nearly 100% exact. On snow soldiers seem to be slower and if you look at their feet it looks more like they are too slow but too fast, like they move but don´t get forward. I wouldn´t slow all the infantry down to grandfathers, let your brothers or friends charge down the street with 20kg or so on their back and then tell me what you think.
i just want it to be realistic, not slower than the real thing just because you think people can´t run with armor.

PS: Keep in mind I´m not an expert and there is no offense intended by me, just my oppinion.

[Nelson]

I didn't vote.

It's like Puzz says, it's the infantry that runs too fast.

The casualties may happen too easily and quickly but one demo battle isn't enough to tell us definitively.

[Sjakihata]

well, IMHO, "waiting for the full release to see if the speed needs tweaking or not" is an exercise in futility, because if it turns out that it does need to be tweaked indeed, well, it would be too late to do anything anyway.
Sure, there might be patches, at some point in the future...

I do agree that we might be drawing erroneous conclusions due to the inconclusive data that we were exposed to, this being a demo and all. But that's pretty much all we can do right now.

After all, it is possible that higher valour troops run faster, or fatigue affects speed in various ways for various units, we don't know deep the changes run.

So again, we're drawing conclusions on the limited set of data that we were provided.
Faith lies in the CA guys that they know what's really going on and can tell which of our issues are false issues or non-issues, and hopefully do the right thing in the final release.

I agree with that. However, after screaming women, head hurlers etc I find my faith disappearing. It seems CA wants to turn RTW into a standard RTS, with 'special attack' (will the druids now cast magic or heal?) and the fact that names are mentioned and the speed of legionaries carrying heavy shields (scutum) and armour they run like crazy.

I think they need to incorporate three speed levels. Normal, aka walk, fast, aka run, and then charge. Charge will only be used for a short period, it is a sprint, and cannot be maintained for more than 50-100 meters. So first you walk, then run and finally charge. The charge can also only be used when enemy units are within range.

But now the running speed needs to be turned down. This is the only concern. And since Yuuki has desected the numbers, it is safe to say that this will be true in the game for every infantry (except the obvious slower ones), however, killing speed cannot be jugded because of uneven valour/honour what ever.

[King Azzole]

The more I watch the unit speeds the more im convinced they are running about the top speed a human/horse can do in real life based on there movement across the terrain. I think the speeds are perfect.

But I do agree, running at full speed drains endurance fast for real people, so there should be a jog mode also. So you would have march, jog and sprint. Sprinting speeds in game now are deadon the more I watch them.

[Thoros of Myr]

I like your 3 speed idea Sjakihata, it would certainly add more balance to the game.

I would like to point out that when they are given a favorable condition (flank or elevation) the high valor units lliterally kill weak units so fast that it's not humanly possible. It's so fast it's like they have automatic, lock-on, laser guns. Again this is only in certain conditions and with high valor vs weak, but it's just not right and was very jarring the first time I saw it.

[1dread1lahll]

puzz is correct, the game speed is to fast,....CA said before that they were going to increase it; the only reasion was because of the increased map size....it was made faster for MI and the speed was too much for 'noobs' to multi and eventualy patched back to the origional speed

[Puzz3D]

I just played the Trebia battle with all the Roman maniple infantry and the Carth heavy poeni inf set to experience 8. I did increase the size of the Carth poeni to 90 men and the barbarian inf to 80 men. I made all skirmishers on both sides 80 men. I left all the cav unchanged except I inadvertantly reduced one sacred cav from 60 to 40, and didn't change the elephants. When I played this modded battle at medium difficulty the infantry fought for a long time, the casualty rate seemed low and cav did not plow through them. The two sacred cav in the rear were actually blocked by two triarii. The importance of the elephants in achieving the win seemed increased, although, one got spooked and almost cost me the battle, and I had more time to give individual unit commands. So, it played a lot slower as far as fighting speed (rate of casualties), and the cav couldn't blow out big infantry units, but the infantry was pumped up a lot higher than the cav.

I then played with all units set to exp 0, weapon 0 and armor 0 at CBR's suggestion, but the battle was over very quickly with a mass rout of all the Romans once the elephants engaged. Total casualties were 1/2 what I got with the higher exp modded game (700/200 with exp 0 and 1400/400 with pumped up inf). This shows that morale is still tied to the experience upgrade.