FAQ Message from the Shogun

[professorspatula]

Q. Will AI factions have additional defined characteristics at the start of the campaign? Currently AI factions just have basic and not terribly helpful building prefences (caesar, smith for example). What about another trait such as: 'xenophobic', 'aggressive', etc that gives them actual predisposed diplomatic and expansion traits from the off.

Q. Are there are any additional attributes that can be affixed to buildings? Can they give more negative and positive bonuses, and how about certain buildings giving specific (ie not all) units different morale and cost bonuses/penalties?

Q. Will screenshots actually work properly with the game with AA switched on? Not a problem for some people, or those using another screengrabber, but annoying for newer players who are confused when all their screenshots are black.

Q. Can we expect diplomacy to be improved? I'd especially like to see alliances to be of more value, with the added option of asking your ally not just to attack the enemy - but to attack a specific settlement. You could then show up at the targeted city in advance and wait for your ally to join in the siege. All allies currently seem to do is stab you in the back and attack you at every opportunity.

[Divinus Arma]

Yes, but if the owner's dog is in my yard chasing my cat, I target the dog and make short work of it. In RTW I don't have that option. There is the rub.

I see your point.

[professorspatula]

On the subject of wardogs: how about improving their ability to kill routers? They're useless. They just jump up and miss spectacularly. I've had peasants flee half the map with dogs biting at their heels, but always missing. Plain silliness. They don't jump far enough forward when chasing to ever kill any but the most tired of routers. I've seen worms on the battlefield trip up more fleeing troops than those dogs.

[KSEG]

Q.Will there be any new siege equipments?
Q.Will it be possible to use ladders against a wooden wall?
Q.Will it be possible to command more then 20 units?

[Colovion]

Q: Is Sega changing the current patch policy?

[screwtype]

Are there any plans or possibilities for adding a 'Stats Sheet' or something similar which can keep a track of total losses inflicted and incurred during the length of a given campaign, as well as other interesting statistics, such as the most successful General, Most kills by a Unit, Kill-to-loss ratios, etc.?

I'd like to endorse this suggestion. It shouldn't be that hard to implement and I'm sure that a great many RTW fans would love to have a feature like this - preferably with your statistics versus each faction separately, including number of battles fought and kill-loss ratios against each faction, as well as a grand total against all factions.

[player1]

Q:
Why is this thread not sticked?

[screwtype]

Are attacking AI infantry capable of launching a single coordinated attack, instead of feeding me units piecemeal?

IMO, this is the single biggest issue with regard to the game, because it is the main reason for the lack of challenge in battles, and therefore the lack of challenge and interest overall.

Please CA give us co-ordinated attacks, or at least make it so that the AI keeps its troops closer together rather than attacking with them piecemeal because it makes the AI pathetically easy to beat and so the campaigns far too easy to win.

[Revelation]

On the subject of wardogs: how about improving their ability to kill routers? They're useless. They just jump up and miss spectacularly.

Or, on the other hand, is there any plans to remove these sort of "fantasy" units all together?

[Lord Zimoa of Flanders]

Q Will there ever be a Napoleonic Total War game and if not, could The Lordz get a licence agreement on the RTW game engine and source code and make one for you?

LZoF

[Little Legioner]

Little Legioner
Q. Do you plan on having an option of making the battlefields bigger for campaign battles? Will there be an option for it? Big / huge or or your preferred term for usage?

I knew that same question asked before mate. I opened CA's answers to discussion to fans and result was impressive. Many of them have disappointed from this situation and they wrote their opposing opinions. I don't want to bore you but just read examples:

Quite true. The kill rates are ludicrous and I spend 80% of my time on the battle map hunting routers. They really oughta fix infantry run speed too.

TW games are all about the 3D battles. (for me anyways) But a typical battle in RTW goes something like this. Setup, click start, enemy right in front, 30 seconds later it's all over.

Well even the kids don't like tiny featureless battlemaps.
And battles where the load and setup time takes longer,(well almost)
than the actual battle.

The Shogun said, "The basic battle game won't change that much; this is an expansion, not a re-imagining of RTW. " I would say that BI's 80 new units is a "re-imaging" of RTW. What's needed is a "re-balancing" which apparently isn't going to be done.

CA said that the Total War tactical features were intentionally diminished in RTW to cater to the younger market of players who they felt wouldn't grasp them. CA sought and got a T (teen) rating for RTW rather than the M (mature) rating of the previous games.

I could understand it if STW and MTW were critical successes but commercial failures so you felt you had to make the game more "accessible" but thats not the case, I know they both went to the top of the charts in the UK when they were released. Obviously I don't have the sales figures to compare for STW, MTW and RTW, but STW and MTW proved that there is a market for realistic strategy games. I can only echo what dgb said about exploiting your niche in the market.

I'll make the point again that I did earlier: RTW is much easier to like once you realize it is NOT an in depth strategy game. I think the deep strategy elements were removed by design not accident. The vast majority of casual gamers will be satisfied with eye candy and funky units like Head Hurlers and Incendiary Pigs.

I understand the point that "there's millions of threads on this already" but some people just started playing the game last month, last week, yesterday and are pointing out what THEY see as flaws for the very first time.

Interesting how 90% of the players point the same issues out...

Sorry i don't want to push so much but fans gave too much attention about "battles&battlefields" problem. I've picked up directly or in directly comments. I think that battlefield questions should ask again to CA. They should have to re-think about them. Just look at the given attention from fans to "Bad news from CA about Battles" topic.

If you find it not enough i promise i don't speak or ask anymore if you find enough they have really deserve to ask or clarify again.

Regards,

[Epistolary Richard]

I doubt you'll get the answer you want, but there's no harm in asking the question again if you think you'll get more detail out of it

[Little Legioner]

I doubt you'll get the answer you want, but there's no harm in asking the question again if you think you'll get more detail out of it

Agreed and granted my master

[Puzz3D]

Some game features are too much work to change. Unfortunately, the players don't see the game until all the design decisions have been made. At that point, only things which are relatively easy to change are going to have a chance of being changed.

Just to give one example: over the 4 years prior to RTW, I don't recall a single player asking for faster movement speed or faster combat resolution. When the RTW demo was released, the running speeds were 50% faster than they were in the previous game engine and the combat speed was much faster as well. I wonder how that happened since no one in the player community was asking for a speedup. In addition, a unit's movement speeds are no longer controlable from the unit stat file as it was in the previous games. It's controlled by the animation skeleton, which is a lot of work to change. So, it was very important to make a good decision on gamespeed in the beginning because for practical purposes it's set in stone in RTW. Sorry but I don't see how it can be reasoned that faster movement + faster combat + more unts = better control. To me it's not logical unless somewhere along the way CA decided that control and coordination of the many units in the army wasn't very important to the gameplay.

Currently, there is no way for the players to provide input when it could make a difference on important design decisions. The feedback players gave during STW/MTW over the previous 4 years doesn't seem to have made much difference in RTW which might be because CA said they used two different design teams for each game engine.

[Duke John]

I wonder how that happened since no one in the player community was asking for a speedup. In addition, a unit's movement speeds are no longer controlable from the unit stat file as it was in the previous games. It's controlled by the animation skeleton, which is a lot of work to change.

Actually I would have been willing to fix that in one day if asked. Instead I only see people complainging about it. Now I have Sengoku Jidai to worry about, but I am sure that there is an animator somewhere who could reduce running speeds; it's a piece of cake.

[player1]

Or, on the other hand, is there any plans to remove these sort of "fantasy" units all together?

I guess this question will be answered with:
What fantasy units. I see no orcs and dragons, or any other fantasy creature in RTW.

To get the right answer you need a clear question, otherwise you get answer as that in FAQ about "infantry behaving like cavalry" question.

Proper question would have term "unhistoric" instead of "fantasy", and have several examples to catch the meaning.

[IceTorque]

Re: Running speeds.

Is it just me or do they seem to only move too quickly when either skirmishing or routing.

[Red Harvest]

Actually I would have been willing to fix that in one day if asked. Instead I only see people complainging about it. Now I have Sengoku Jidai to worry about, but I am sure that there is an animator somewhere who could reduce running speeds; it's a piece of cake.

I've thought the same as well. I've heard CA imply that it would be too difficult to change. I just don't see that. Instead, it looks like they didn't want to alter the animations, even for BI apparently. Admittedly, it will take some rebalancing of other effects to make things look right when zoomed in. It will also have some gameplay aspects. It is the sort of thing that should be done if the full context of combat kill rates and archery rebalance.

There is a terrain speed adjuster. And there is some other speed control going on which is tied to fatigue. Not sure how many levels of fatigue speed there are. I would go into my observations on this...but it has been a several months since I've even had RTW installed so it would likely be jumbled.

Skirmishers tend to use the fast skirmisher skeleton (seem to recall their being a "normal" and "fast" version of each skeleton.) Those are really quick. One of my bigger disappointment in movements speeds was having only two increments for cavalry and chariots.

The issue some have with routing is that usually your pursuing forces are fatigued while the routed forces might or not be fatigued (units that were on defense, and broke rapidly, won't be fatigued.) I don't see this as a problem. Footsore units won't be able to easily chase down men fleeing for their lives, that is in historical context.

[The Hun]

Q: Will there be units of each faction available as mercenaries. This was mixed up times with Romans using Huns to fight Huns and Goths in each army etc. I would hope to see mercenary units of any faction available to highest bidder

[Puzz3D]

Actually I would have been willing to fix that in one day if asked. Instead I only see people complainging about it. Now I have Sengoku Jidai to worry about, but I am sure that there is an animator somewhere who could reduce running speeds; it's a piece of cake.

I don't think CA will use anything produced by a non-employee. During the RTW v1.2 beta, I pointed them to the person who had generated all of the missing glowmap templates which make silvery metal reflective and CA apparently didn't have time to complete. There was no response from them.

[Colovion]

I don't think CA will use anything produced by a non-employee. During the RTW v1.2 beta, I pointed them to the person who had generated all of the missing glowmap templates which make silvery metal reflective and CA apparently didn't have time to complete. There was no response from them.

It would be nice if CA half-supported mods like that. Little additions which they would post a link to on their main site (which needs a revamping) and they would make clear that they don't support the mods to their game, and post a link to the thread the mod is attributed to. So much potential.

[Viking]

I know that BI is adding a completely new campaign, that's obviously the point.

Q: Will the campaign map have expanded since vanilla; for example, will my own home country Norway be on the map?

[Jambo]

Q: How will the AI be tweaked to improve its siege assaults? Currently, it's nigh impossible for the AI to take a stone-walled city.

Q: How has diplomacy been improved? For me it seems to work fine at the start of each campaign, but then quickly descends into a case of all AI against the human. This effectively means diplomacy becomes pointless... Maybe having a "how much would it cost to accept this..." (e.g. CivIII) button on the diplomacy screen so the human has an idea of what it will take to get an acceptance? Currently it's awfully deflating and time-consuming trying to get anything useful from diplomacy.

Q: Related to the above, will the AI actually use their Military Access on the campaign map to perform joint wars. Will the human and AI factions be able to attain military access more easily?

Q: Will more information and stats be included for the family members? For example, how they die, individual win/loss ratio, their achievements, all to help personalise them more. Likewise will there be more info/stats included for all factions - most successful general, most aggressive general, etc?

Q: Will there be a Hall of Fame, so scores and successes or failures of campaigns can be recorded?

Q: Will the AI use fords/bridges and choke points to defend their territory better?

Q: Will the current double-awarding of the battlefield VnV's from non-autoresolved battles be corrected in BI?

Q: Will the AI take better care of its family members?

Q: What improvements will the original campaign receive?

Q: On the battlefield, will the AI be better equipped with the following:
Keeping its phalanx units in formation?
Not charging its skirmishers and archers suicidally into hand to hand for no reason?
Waiting until its infantry have engaged before charging its cavalry?
Not suicidally charging its general in siege assaults when the gates are preopened?
Issues with ladders getting stuck in sieges being fixed?

Q: On the campaign map, will the AI be better equipped to organise its forces to conduct multiple-stack battles? Conducting all troop movement before entering the battle phases for instance. Lining up its troop stacks all around a city before assaulting/besieging and multiple stacks being able to beseige!

Regards

[NihilisticCow]

Q. Will the exploits that mar multiplayer gaming, e.g. cavalry spamming/stacking be dealt with? (a long with potential, though rare, ones like the phalanx push through exploit)

Q. Will/has multiplayer game balance been looked at? Both between factions, as some like Egypt and Rome are very powerful with no real weaknesses, where as others such as Gaul and Thrace are unplayably weak, and within factions, e.g. anti-cavalry infantry is not sufficiently effective versus heavy cavalry.

[The Hun]

Q: Will there be extra historical battles?

Q: Will there be realistic chance to fight battles with allies? For example it would be nice to fight coordinated battles with allies against a common enemy. Being able to summon support or offer it would add much to campaign enjoyment.

[Uesugi Kenshin]

Will players be able to "force" units to use their secondary weapons? As of now units don't always whip out their secondary weapons as quickly as I like, for example the Cataphracts who sometimes don't take them out at all.

[IceTorque]

Will players be able to "force" units to use their secondary weapons? As of now units don't always whip out their secondary weapons as quickly as I like, for example the Cataphracts who sometimes don't take them out at all.

Use alt + click when they are in melee.

[Jambo]

IceTorque, he may be talking about the AI. Think the AI never uses alternative attack.

When's the deadline for this thread? It seems to have stagnated a little...

J

[Captain Fishpants]

When's the deadline for this thread? It seems to have stagnated a little...

J

There isn't a deadline as such from our end. What we're hoping for is that a single person here will take it upon themselves to collect all the questions into one place, eliminate duplicates, and then we can get answers together for you all.

Nelson very kindly used his moderator status to sticky this thread, but we still need an editor!

Anyway, good questions so far and please keep them coming.

[Epistolary Richard]

Moderator Catiline has already kindly volunteered.

I'm notnoble, and by the end of the evening will not be upstanding with a bit of luck. I'll do my best to collate the questions however.