A few questions (five in total)

[clayton ballentine]

Q: Why is there an expantion coming out for Rome Total War if it is already good?

Q: Is there a bug in the game that makes all the faction not playible?

Q: Why did Desicive Battles (on the History Channel) go off after just 10 or less shows?

Q: What happend to Alexander the Great?

Q: Why is there no Giaus Julius Caesar or Hannibal Barker in Rome Total War?

[TheSilverKnight]

Q: Why is there an expantion coming out for Rome Total War if it is already good?

Q: Is there a bug in the game that makes all the faction not playible?

Q: Why did Desicive Battles (on the History Channel) go off after just 10 or less shows?

Q: What happend to Alexander the Great?

Q: Why is there no Giaus Julius Caesar or Hannibal Barker in Rome Total War?

A. RTW has a lot of bugs in it.

A. No, the factions are made unplayable for a reason.

A. I dunno, I don't live in America.

A. He died in 323 B.C. and his empire was divided between his generals into successor states.

A. Hannibal Barca, not Barker. I dunno why they're not in there.

[IliaDN]

Q: Why is there no Giaus Julius Caesar or Hannibal Barker in Rome Total War?

There are historical characters in RTR.

[clayton ballentine]

OK and a few more questions-----------------------------------------------
Q: Why are there no movies of battles on the game?

Q: Why can't you make a wall of Pikes?

Q: Why can't you attck any city instead of just there capitals?

Q: Why is there no blood like in STW (Shogun Total War)?

Q: Why can't you are generals hard to kill?

[clayton ballentine]

There are historical characters in RTR.

Like who. I waited 40 SEC TO POST THIS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!

[antisocialmunky]

OK and a few more questions-----------------------------------------------
Q: Why are there no movies of battles on the game?

Q: Why can't you make a wall of Pikes?

Q: Why can't you attck any city instead of just there capitals?

Q: Why is there no blood like in STW (Shogun Total War)?

Q: Why can't you are generals hard to kill?

A: Because CA is cheap and cut movies after STW
A: It's call a phalanx, there's a phalanx button
A: It's called functionality vs plability. Too many cities = LAGGGGGGG!!!!!
A: Because they probably dont' want an M rating so they can' sell their games to the largest audience.
A: Practice good grammar and this will be understood so it can be answered.

[clayton ballentine]

Q: Why are generals hard to kill?

is that better!

[aw89]

Because of the suicidal general bug (Or is it a feature now?)

[Mikeus Caesar]

Hm....i'm amazed. All of your questions in one post!! Anyways:

Q: Why is there an expantion coming out for Rome Total War if it is already good?

Q: Is there a bug in the game that makes all the faction not playible?

Q: Why did Desicive Battles (on the History Channel) go off after just 10 or less shows?

Q: What happend to Alexander the Great?

Q: Why is there no Giaus Julius Caesar or Hannibal Barker in Rome Total War?

Q: Why are there no movies of battles on the game?

Q: Why can't you make a wall of Pikes?

Q: Why can't you attck any city instead of just there capitals?

Q: Why is there no blood like in STW (Shogun Total War)?

Q: Why can't you are generals hard to kill?

1) I am asuming you are referring to Barbarian Invasion, the expansion pack. well, there are two answers: One, every TW game has had an expansion pack called 'Something-or-other Invasion' and Two, they are making an x-pak to milk the giant cash cow that RTW is to death.

2) No, for some incredibly stupid reason CA didn't make all factions playable, but it is easily moddable.

3) I don't know, i'm not american.

4) Read TheSilverKnight's answer.

5) Because unlike MTW, CA didn't implement historical characters. After all, you gotta think. Playing RTW, you're changing the course of history, and if you're playing as, let's say, Carthage, and you do incredibly well, there would be no need for Hannibal to come to the rescue. But you do get the occasional random character who has a historical name. I've heard of people getting Gaius Julius and Hannibal Barca.

6) I don't get what you mean by this question.

7) You can make a wall of pikes, just bunch your pike-men together so there are no gaps in between units, and you have a pike wall.

8) You can attack any city.

9) Imagine if every time on of the thousands of little men died, there was a spray of blood. Now imagine how hard this would be on your computer. It's quite logical that with graphics like RTW, you can't have all the little details like that.

10) If you mean why aren't Generals hard to kill, it's because unlike MTW, the Generals aren't like Jedi. Instead of taking forever to die, they now die at the drop of a hat.

[clayton ballentine]

ok and some more questions.-----------------------------------------------
Q: why do the horses die with the men?

Q: why do they start you off with very little money?

Q: why am i a jr member?

[Zakor]

Clayton, I can attest to at least TWO historical figures being in RTW.

I was playing a slow game as the Egyptians, I was only trying to hold on to my local area, rather than expand a lot, to see just what Rome would eventually throw at me during the end game.

In the year 3 B.C. I noticed a general and some troops outside of Jerusalem. I clicked on him, and his name was Jesus!

That very same turn, I got a report of a "Plague" in Alexandria, and I lost half of my population in ONE YEAR! Then the plague was gone! I've never heard of a plague lasting only one year, have you?

Anyways, Jerusalem, which was my main army production city, immediately revolted. It took me about 2 years (4 turns) to take the city back, and when I did, I found that ALL troops cost twice the amount of denarii to recruit!

I sent a good general after Jesus, and we slaughtered them. They didn't even fight back. This must be some aspect of "turn the other cheek," because we ran them through like nobody's business. What's funny, is that on the next turn, the general and all of his troops were still there! It's like they came back from the dead.

After a few turns, in 7 A.D., I had Jerusalem surrounded by my troops, trying to quell the rebellions and trying to get the cost to recruit my troops down. This Jesus general walked out into the sea, went around my troops, and walked into Jerusalem. The city revolted again, and the city was under His conrol!

On the map I saw a Numidian assassin. I took a look at him and he was Jubal, 7 star assassin! I don't know what happened next, but this Jesus general disappeared off the map. I thought maybe this Assassin had killed him. I looked up the name in my Numidianese-English dictionary, and Jubal is Numidianese for Judas!

So, Clayton, if you're playing as Egyptian, there seems to be a special trigger that happens right around 3 B.C. or something. It might have to have some special conditions to trigger it, much like the Marius Reforms, but I can tell you that I've seen at least two historical figures in the game!

[Viking]

Q: why do the horses die with the men?

Why do the men die with the horses?

Q: why do they start you off with very little money?

To make the game more difficult, and so that you actually have to care about money.

Q: why am i a jr member?

`cause that you didn`t realise you could ask all your questions in one thread before now.

[Virtute71]

As far as the Decisive Battles, they showed all 12-13 episodes in the U.S. and then showed the re-runs but didn't re-run all the episodes.

[antisocialmunky]

Because it was to showcase RTW. There's no point to it because RTW is already out. That was the lowest budget show on History Channel pretty much ever, all they had to do is get some guys to play the battles and use good camera angles and spend $300 per show to send that host to where ever...

[Mongoose]

WOW, great job clayton! See how much better it is when you have one thread?

ok and some more questions.-----------------------------------------------
Q: why do the horses die with the men?

Q: why do they start you off with very little money?

Q: why am i a jr member?

1)I guess it is a game engine limit. Maybe if they could survive sometimes it would slow the game down .

2)Makes the game harder.

3)Past actions...but i think that you have improved alot

You should get stuff like your sig/title back after afew weeks. IIRC.

[IrishMike]

Yeah personally I found Decisive Battles to suck. I mean it was generally horrible, and they didn't tell much at all. Just really really basic info.

[Sid_Quibley]

Q: Why is there an expantion coming out for Rome Total War if it is already good?

Cuz CA is a commercial business and they have to make money to make new product.

Q: Is there a bug in the game that makes all the faction not playible?

No its a feature, and there are mods to make all factions playable.

Q: Why did Desicive Battles (on the History Channel) go off after just 10 or less shows?

Cuz they only had a £5.00 budget . and 50p a show is stretching things a bit thin.

Q: What happend to Alexander the Great?

He died in his early 30s after a night of over consumption.

Q: Why is there no Giaus Julius Caesar or Hannibal Barker in Rome Total War?

..........

[IliaDN]

Clayton, I can attest to at least TWO historical figures being in RTW.

I was playing a slow game as the Egyptians, I was only trying to hold on to my local area, rather than expand a lot, to see just what Rome would eventually throw at me during the end game.

In the year 3 B.C. I noticed a general and some troops outside of Jerusalem. I clicked on him, and his name was Jesus!

That very same turn, I got a report of a "Plague" in Alexandria, and I lost half of my population in ONE YEAR! Then the plague was gone! I've never heard of a plague lasting only one year, have you?

Anyways, Jerusalem, which was my main army production city, immediately revolted. It took me about 2 years (4 turns) to take the city back, and when I did, I found that ALL troops cost twice the amount of denarii to recruit!

I sent a good general after Jesus, and we slaughtered them. They didn't even fight back. This must be some aspect of "turn the other cheek," because we ran them through like nobody's business. What's funny, is that on the next turn, the general and all of his troops were still there! It's like they came back from the dead.

After a few turns, in 7 A.D., I had Jerusalem surrounded by my troops, trying to quell the rebellions and trying to get the cost to recruit my troops down. This Jesus general walked out into the sea, went around my troops, and walked into Jerusalem. The city revolted again, and the city was under His conrol!

On the map I saw a Numidian assassin. I took a look at him and he was Jubal, 7 star assassin! I don't know what happened next, but this Jesus general disappeared off the map. I thought maybe this Assassin had killed him. I looked up the name in my Numidianese-English dictionary, and Jubal is Numidianese for Judas!

So, Clayton, if you're playing as Egyptian, there seems to be a special trigger that happens right around 3 B.C. or something. It might have to have some special conditions to trigger it, much like the Marius Reforms, but I can tell you that I've seen at least two historical figures in the game!

How that can be - thougth the game ends in 14 B.C.

Edit:

[player1]

Not to mention that there is no Jesus name in descr_names.txt file (but there is Jubal for carthage, numidia and slave factions).

[player1]

Q: Why is there an expantion coming out for Rome Total War if it is already good?

Because expansions are made for good games, not bad ones.
Bad games usually get patch (or two) and get dumped, since there is no finnancial benefit to make expansion for bad game.

It's also a good way to add extra content, like new units or campaign, as well as some extra features.

[Uriel]

That's good going for Jesus. In 3BC he was only about 1 year old!!! Still, the game ends in 14AD so that wouldn't leave time for him to grow up.

Having said that, it was a fairly common name at the time. There were plenty of 'Y'shua's (mistransliterated 'Jesus' from Greek and 'Joshua' from Hebrew) about at the time.

[antisocialmunky]

It's probably a hard coded easter egg if it came back.

[Mega Dux Bob]

That's good going for Jesus. In 3BC he was only about 1 year old!!! Still, the game ends in 14AD so that wouldn't leave time for him to grow up.

Having said that, it was a fairly common name at the time. There were plenty of 'Y'shua's (mistransliterated 'Jesus' from Greek and 'Joshua' from Hebrew) about at the time.

Too bad; if the game when on to later they could have the Jesus unit as a rebel in Judah.

That would be cool.

Just imagine the posts;

"Man, I thought this is going to be easy, a rebel leader and his twelveman body guard. Well I am fighting him a he has this sword coming out of his mouth just wasting my troops. Every time I'd kill one of his followers, the rebel leader would wave his hand and the guy would get back up! Nothing was hitting and the guy was only wearing freaking robes. The they guy would stop and say something and my units would switch sides. He was bribing in battle or something! It was unreal."

[antisocialmunky]

He could always order down twelve legions of angels and burn you like ants and pave your cities under heavenly asphalt before sinking them to the bottom of the sea like Sodom and Gomorrah.

Though the whole point of the Jewish Messiah is to die in the service of Jehovah god to allow men to be restored to perfection after armageddon...

[Bromley]

IANAJ, but I don't think that the Jewish messiah was meant to die to absolve anyone's sins. That's a Christian belief.

[antisocialmunky]

Well, technically, Christianity is a part of Judaism that believes the Messiah has come...


Look at Isaiah 53:

Isaiah 53

1 Who has put faith in the thing heard by us? And as for the arm of Jehovah, to whom has it been revealed? 2 And he will come up like a twig before one, and like a root out of waterless land. No stately form does he have, nor any splendor; and when we shall see him, there is not the appearance so that we should desire him.

3 He was despised and was avoided by men, a man meant for pains and for having acquaintance with sickness. And there was as if the concealing of one's face from us. He was despised, and we held him as of no account. 4 Truly our sicknesses were what he himself carried; and as for our pains, he bore them. But we ourselves accounted him as plagued, stricken by God and afflicted. 5 But he was being pierced for our transgression; he was being crushed for our errors. The chastisement meant for our peace was upon him, and because of his wounds there has been a healing for us. 6 Like sheep we have all of us wandered about; it was each one to his own way that we have turned;and Jehovah himself has caused the error of us all to meet up with that one. 7 He was hard pressed, and he was letting himself be afflicted; yet he would not open his mouth. He was being brought just like a sheep to the slaughtering; and like a ewe that before her shearers has become mute, he also would not open his mouth.

8 Because of restraint and of judgment he was taken away; and who will concern himself even with [the details of] his generation? For he was severed from the land of the living ones. Because of the transgression of my people he had the stroke. 9 And he will make his burial place even with the wicked ones, and with the rich class in his death, despite the fact that he had done no violence and there was no deception in his mouth.

10 But Jehovah himself took delight in crushing him; he made him sick. If you will set his soul as a guilt offering, he will see his offspring, he will prolong [his] days, and in his hand what is the delight of Jehovah will succeed. 11 Because of the trouble of his soul he will see, he will be satisfied. By means of his knowledge the righteous one, my servant, will bring a righteous standing to many people; and their errors he himself will bear. 12 For that reason I shall deal him a portion among the many, and it will be with the mighty ones that he will apportion the spoil, due to the fact that he poured out his soul to the very death, and it was with the transgressors that he was counted in; and he himself carried the very sin of many people, and for the transgressors he proceeded to interpose.

Now that is Isaiah talking about?


Take the second question posed by Isaiah:
"And as for the arm of Jehovah, to whom has it been revealed?"

Isaiah is talking about an 'arm of Jehovah(God).' In the bible, the world 'arm' or 'hand' are both used many times to figuaratively describe a force(Jer 27:5), God's force or 'arm.'

Evidently from the rest of the first paragraph, Isaiah is talking about a person because he uses the pronoun 'he.' He proceeds to desribe his coming.

"And he will come up like a twig before one, and like a root out of waterless land. No stately form does he have, nor any splendor; and when we shall see him, there is not the appearance so that we should desire him."

Jews at the time of Jesus were historically rebelious againt the Roman authority. Many false Messiahs had come before as rebels. Many of the Jews were looking for somone like Moses or David to overthrow the Roman occupation. This expectation is confirmed at Luke 24:21.

"21 But we were hoping that this [man] was the one destined to deliver Israel; yes, and besides all these things, this makes the third day since these things occurred."

However, the Hebrew scriptures paint the Messiah as having two roles. In one way, the Messiah was humble going to appear humbly as in Zecheriah 9:9 states:

"Be very joyful, O daughter of Zion. Shout in triumph, O daughter of Jerusalem. Look! Your king himself comes to you. He is righteous, yes, saved; humble, and riding upon an ass, even upon a full-grown animal the son of a she-ass."

In another way, he was coming as a mighty man to destroy the opposers of God such as Daniel 7:13 which reads:

"I kept on beholding in the visions of the night, and, see there! with the clouds of the heavens someone like a son of man happened to be coming; and to the Ancient of Days he gained access, and they brought him up close even before that One. 14 And to him there were given rulership and dignity and kingdom, that the peoples, national groups and languages should all serve even him. His rulership is an indefinitely lasting rulership that will not pass away, and his kingdom one that will not be brought to ruin."

Now, these are two very different roles, many of the Jews of his time didn't recognize that these were TWO different comings of the Messiah.

The fact that there are two comings can be furthered inferred by Psalms 2:6-9:

"6 [God Saying:] "I, even I, have installed my king
Upon Zion, my holy mountain."

7 Let me refer to the decree of Jehovah;
He has said to me: "You are my son;
I, today, I have become your father.

8 Ask of me, that I may give nations as your inheritance
And the ends of the earth as your own possession.

9 You will break them with an iron scepter,
As though a potter's vessel you will dash them to pieces."

That passage in Psalms refers to the Messiah. This corralates with part of Daniel's writings about the Messiah but not Zecheriah or Isaiah.

Thus it can be reasoned that, the Messiah will do TWO distinct things at TWO seperate times. Thus, whoever this Christ was, he would come twice. Once to save humanity and another to wipe out all who oppose the true worship of God.

[Muska Burnt]

Q: Why is there an expantion coming out for Rome Total War if it is already good?

Q: Is there a bug in the game that makes all the faction not playible?

Q: Why did Desicive Battles (on the History Channel) go off after just 10 or less shows?

Q: What happend to Alexander the Great?

Q: Why is there no Giaus Julius Caesar or Hannibal Barker in Rome Total War?

the expansian is covering where the game leaves off (the fall of rome) and i dont know about the shows and alexander and stuff

[Bromley]

@asm

Perhaps, although you could equally argue that Christianity is a perversion of a Jewish sect and thus, as far as other Jews are concerned, separate.

I did have a quick search before I first posted to check out what biblical/torah scholars were saying about the Jewish messiah and dying for sins. I didn't see anything about it - most of the discussion was about whether the prevailing belief was that the messiah would be a political/military figure or a spiritual one.

BTW, whilst bowing to your obvious knowledge of the subject, nothing you posted confirms that Jews thought their messiah would turn up, preach a bit and then die in pain for them.

[antisocialmunky]

I do completely agree, the most of the latter Jews did think their Messiah would be a military figure. Several men even tried to crown Jesus as their King to try and reestablish the Davidic Line of Kings. They wanted him to overthrow their gentile conquerers.

According to Ancient Hebrew Cannon,"all the things written in the law of Moses and in the Prophets and Psalms," many things about the Messiah were prophecied. How he'd be born, how he'd live, how he'd die.

They specified when he'd be annointed as the Messiah(bapitism).

However, I believe that Isaiah 53 is the most complete and straight forward narration of his life, I could be wrong though. It's very detailed about what the Messiah would do.

However, I think what you're getting at is a more secular point of view. To this, I have to say that modern Judaism and ancient Judaism are two distinct animals.

While old Judaism was based on the Law of Moses with a Levitical priesthood, modern Judaism is based on the Mishnah, a set of laws that superceded the Bible after the destruction of Jerusalem . After 607 BCE, the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians, the temple was destroyed but rebuilt afterwards. However, the Levitical priesthood was disbanded sometime after the return of the Jewish exiles after Cyrus the Great's conquest of Babylon. Also, Judah(what was left the 12 tribe kingdom after the Assyrian destruction of the Northern 10) became a vassal state of the sucessive world empires(Persia, Greece, and finally Rome) and the Davidic kingship lost.

Without a legitimate kingship, the religious authority assumed a governing role just under the appointed local governors(Pilate and King Herod come to mind). The Pharisees and Saudecees gained political power. With this, Judaism lost it's religious backbone and became a political tool much like Christianity to Constantine. People including Jesus battled with these two factions because THEY had perverted the Law by tacking on needless and secular points.

These include the buying of animals at the temples for high prices. Charging people to be cleansed in the temple baths. They even mandated the cleaning of hands before eating so to keep 'clean.' All these things Jesus rallied against.

After the fall of the temple and the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE, the Jewish faith was shattered with no center. More traditional elements of Judaism such as the Saudecees gave way to a Pharitic view point of Judaism. Thus the modern form of Judaism emerged. The Mishnah came to power. A collection of RABBITIC LAW AND TRADITION that perverted the Law. These things include the second classing of women(wake up everyday and thank god you're not a woman) and the influx of Arab, Greek and other local influences.

To rationalize these laws and harmonize them to the Law of Moses, the Palestinian and the Babylonian Talmuds were written.

Thus, Christianity is actually more of a continuation of ancient Judaism with it's center pillar of the Bible, though both are rather far from being pure anymore.

The reason you keep finding the Messiah being talked about as a 9 star Jedi General sent by God is that modern Judaism is not ancient Judaism anymore. It isnt' the same thing anymore. While the Bible tells of a humble Messiah taking away Adamic sin though death and then acting as God's executioner, the thoughts of men say that the Messiah will save the Jewish people and be incarnate as a greater David.

I'm not trying to piss off anyone so please don't flame... I'm sure I'm wrong on some points, but I'm just trying to make the point that Judaism changed after the Diaspora and the mission of the Messiah after it.

[PseRamesses]

So, Clayton, if you're playing as Egyptian, there seems to be a special trigger that happens right around 3 B.C. or something. It might have to have some special conditions to trigger it, much like the Marius Reforms, but I can tell you that I've seen at least two historical figures in the game!

I found this in the "events text-file":
event trouble_in_judea
date 284 winter
, but couldn´t find a description though.