New idea! Orders...

[Productivity]

Add another factor that you can only see where your general is, and suddenly your general becomes far more important than just a heavy cav. unit.

Ie. you may have skirmishers out the front and suddenly they come under fire. But you don't have a clue from what. Are they under fire from other skirmishers, archers, ballistae, what? So you have to make a choice as to how you are going to get information.

[Lochar]

You know this could be a toggle like the camera on general only, each general has a Zone of control, as units stray past this they can have a tendancy to chase routing armies, run back to the zoc, or stand around picking their collective noses. Other than morale effects, I hadnt really noticed any difference to better generals, maybe a discipline type effect could be added. After all its easy to buy a unit of merceny and throw them away as cannon fodder here, but with a poor general they actually refuse to charge than line of pikes, it would add some spice.

I am not even sure how large scale battles were handled in this time period, were there bugles? flags? loud mouthed sargeants? But I think orders is a nice idea.

I was even thinking to go beyond this, and have messengers for ungoverned cities, so that nothing could be built unless the messenger got thru, or that un generalled units could be given a order, and until another general sent a messenger to them they would follow it out and not be able to be diverted. Even towns with governors would do their own thing depending on the type of governor there unless the heir or leader gives them a different directive. Sure we can turn on auto manage and sort of do the same thing, but if orders were all carried out by messengers, maybe sending assasns or a unit along a road to waylay one could cause some havoc, or maybe even not be able to deliver the message that your city is about to be sacked!

To be honest with diplomats, spys and whatnot, most players have ample time to see a enemy force approaching, it would make a little difference to have your 2 unit milita city now facing a full army that came out of nowhere.


I am sorry for diverting your idea somewhat but I got caught up too much one thing and it sorta branched into the other..:)

[Browning]

This would add just another tactical feature the AI would be unable to cope with. AI is helpless in battles even without it.

[Aetius the Last Roman]

Sounds like a good idea at first but there are too many issues with it:
1. How will the AI cope?
2. How are the barbarians affected?
3. Are the battles big enough to require such macro-organisation between the commanders and his units?
4. How annoying will this be for the player?
5. How would units meant to act cohesively (i.e. the phanlanx) act if some parts of the line refuses to move?

[Marshal Murat]

I think it a good idea, but for the others CA should allow a spot in the options to mark wether or not to use it.

I feel its a grand idea.
You have a orderly Roman army. The other barbarians, a horde. Order them into line, and they respond with rapid precision. The Barbarians are still shifting units around. When the barbarians attack, your troops repsond. You outflank the barbarians. THey slowly turn. Thundering in, the cavalry plow ahead, ripping the barbarians to shred, with thier backs turned to you.

[QwertyMIDX]

It's not a bad idea, but can we do it or are we just waiting for CA to do something nice for us?

[TF923]

Hate to tell ya this, but this "superior Romans" myth is just that. The Romans had just as many screw-up generals as the barbarians did. The generals often would even blatantly refuse to help other armies that were commanded by a rival family, or due to political reasons of the day. This sometimes even resulted in the annihilation of tens of thousands of Roman troops.

The Romans weren't always so superior to everyone else, and just because their opponents were called barbarians did not necessarily make them morons.

Nevertheless, discipline is modeled in RTW in units that will 'attack without orders' but from my experience this only happens when they're commanded by the AI.