FAQ Message from the Shogun

[Uesugi Kenshin]

Using alt+click doesn't actually really force them to use their other weapon. For example when my Cataphracts are in battle I want to be able to yell at them to whip out their handy maces right after the charge, but in large multi-unit skirmishes if too many of the men are far back in the line of units they won't. This often happens in cramped siege assaults.

C= Cataphract clump from forced group
E= Enemy troop clump
F= Friendly non-forced clump

CCCFFFFFFFFCCFFFCCFFFCCEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

So as you may be able to see the cataphract unit is too spread out so the rear units (who are in charge range or closing to charge range, but held up by friendlies) stop the front soldiers from taking out their maces.

[sunsmountain]

Q: Will AI missile troops use their missiles on full range or at 2/3 range as in R:TW (1.1/1.2)?

Q: Will AI missile troops still charge my lines before their fellow melee infantry as opposed to actually using their missile weapons?

Q: Will AI generals continue to charge suicidely into my lines while the AI infantry tries to catch up?

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

Q: Are AI cavalry still coded to immediately charge the players missile troops?

Same as John Duke, don't bother bringing out BI without AI. It's the main thing you can do better than the modders, because they dont have access to it.

Also, could you please make sure the Campaign Map AI does two things:
1. does not drain its cities to 400 pop
2. does build peasants in 8000+ (and growth rate high enough) cities to distribute them over other cities.

Even in Huge mode? cheers.

[KSEG]

Will it be possible to assign more then 240 units per uniy?

[Epistolary Richard]

Question
In RTW the game crashes to desktop when a Rebel army disembarks from a ship, does the same thing occur in the expansion pack? I realise that the slave faction is not supposed to be playable, however I find it very interesting to play as it poses some unique challenges, can this issue also be addressed in the patch for the original RTW as well?

[screwtype]

Not many replies to this thread are there? I guess most of us have moved on from RTW by now. I had a lot of suggestions at one stage but it's so long since I played the game I just can't remember what I'd like to see changed.

Anyhow, here's one I thought of today. If you assault a city and lose the battle due to the timer running out I don't think the siege should be broken. The siege should only be broken if your army is actually routed off the map.

Also, it would be nice if you could decide whether or not to have the timer on at the start of *every* battle, because most of the time I'm happy to have the timer on but for some major assaults on cities I'd prefer to have it off. I don't want to fight a huge, long battle only to have to fight it all again because some lone spearman I missed pops back into the city square a few seconds before the timer runs down.

Which reminds me of a third suggestion. I think after you take the city square in a siege assault, enemy units should no longer rout to the city square, they should rout off the battlefield.

[screwtype]

Here's another suggestion I've made numerous times which I probably have little hope of seeing implemented but there's no harm trying I guess.

I'd really like to see a strategic movement option in the game. It's really silly that armies can only march about one province in a six month turn. Not only silly, but it slows down the action and makes the game more tedious.

My suggestion has been simply that an army should be able to move, say, six provinces per turn provided that army does not start in, or move into, a contested province at any time during its move (a contested province being one which contains an enemy army).

This would enable both you and the AI to move your armies around much quicker, but not so quickly as to alter to a great degree the game dynamics. For example it would take 3 to 5 turns to move out of an enemy contested province into another enemy controlled province - 1 or 2 turns to move out of the province, 1 turn to use strategic movement to move 6 provinces, and another 1 or 2 turns to march into another enemy controlled province. So you wouldn't be able to switch too quickly from one battlefront to another.

Also it would also encourage the use of reserves - armies held away from the borders which you could march relatively quickly to any point on your border - paralleling real life tactics. These are not original ideas BTW - they are well established wargame rules which emulate the difficulties in disengaging and re-engaging with the enemy. I think they'd work very well in a game like RTW, and also make much more likely the possibility of those large "decisive" battles which were a feature of the earlier games but which don't occur very often with RTW due to the much larger and more detailed campaign map. It makes sense with the new style map to facilitate the movement of armies in this way.

Secondly, I'd like to see a return to the system where sea units can move any distance on the map in a turn. Once again to add realistic limits to ground units utilizing sea movement, just make it so that a sea unit can't move any further in a turn once it has taken on board ground units in that turn. That means it will take at least two turns to move any ground unit by sea.

Sea units should be subject to a possibility of interception in any sea zone into which they move which contains enemy sea units, with surviving ships being returned to where they began the turn if they lose the battle.

Rules like this might also encourage players to defend their coastal zones with shipping.

Oh, and although the Shogun has already said there will be no stacking limits to ground units in ships, I'd encourage him to reconsider. It really is stupid that you can move gigantic armies on a single ship. I think each ship should be limited to carrying 2 ground units. These limitations should at least apply when you are mounting a seaborne invasion of an enemy province, if not at other times.

[sapi]

3. 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. (IMO, it is a must for a serious strategy game)?

[/begs]

[Jambo]

Hi Catiline,

Can we get these compiled now?

Cheers

[Jambo]

anyone?

[player1]

I second the request.
Question don't mean anything if not sent.

[Catiline]

I'll do it over the weekend

[econ21]

One question I'd like to see answered is what is the formula that generates kill probabilities in close combat from combatants' attack and defence stats. We were told in MTW, told that it has changed beyond all recognition in RTW but have never been told the new formula. It does not have to include only the modifiers, but just some basic information about what the stats imply would be interesting.

A second question is whether there is any chance of being given an excel file similar to the one provided with MTW that showed where unit stats came from (based on tables for armour, weapons, troop quality, fudge factors etc).

Any constructive response to these two questions would be useful for the Ludus Magna.

[Catiline]

Actually that was quicker then I thought. I've compiled a list and am about to send it to Captain Fishpants...

I'll keep you posted

[Jambo]

GReat, thanks for that Catiline. :D

[The_Doctor]

One very important question that has not been asked:

Can cavalry be dismounted before battles, especially seiges?

[sunsmountain]

@Martinus, dont worry, that one has been asked...

[Lord Adherbal]

hmm, got a question too:

in Multiplayer, will players be able to choose between playing the BI "era" or the original RTW era ? If yes, can modders add new/more "eras" ?

[Duke John]

Q: Will we be able to add a lingering smoke effect when firing a missile weapon?
We can add lingering smoke effects when the bullet hits the target, but the current code doesn't allow it when the bullet is shot. It would greatly enhance any mod with gunfire.

I will buy BI two times if you add it

[gardibolt]

Q: Will the patch and/or BI deal with the bug that prevents you from uninstalling and reinstalling 1.2 without mucking around and manually deleting things in the registry?

[Mongoose]

@Martinus, dont worry, that one has been asked...

The answer is "No"

[sunsmountain]

1. Will the glossy textures made by B_O_L_T and others be complete in BI?

http://www.twcenter.net/downloads/db/?mod=73

2. Will all units have sprites/models in order to have optimal performance?

3. Will the bugs pointed out by player1 be fixed?

4. Can you set the time during custom battles, if night battles are an option?

5. AI, AI, AI. No BI without better AI. Please? The individual units behave on their own instead of as a team. Archers fire too late, generals charge, phalanxes split up and select their individual targets breaking up the line; barbarians & heavy infantry behave relatively well, but rarely try to actively flank.

[Ludens]

I have a few questions about the patch-policy under Sega.

Q- What can we expect from the 1.3 patch for vanilla R:TW? Will it include the improvements made to AI and unit-balance in BI or will it only fix load- and charge issues?

Q- Will there be further patches for vanilla R:TW after BI?

Q- How many patches do you plan on releasing for BI?

[sunsmountain]

Will it be possible to assign more then 240 units per uniy?

The answer is no. Some design decisions have already been made, i believe a 300 soldiers/unit MAX, or even already at 240. More tends to crash Rome at startup.

[edyzmedieval]

I also have some questions.

Q - Does CA plan to help modders by helping them on their mods?!

Q - Why do you have to hardcode some parts of the game?!

[Barbarossa82]

Q - now that we have been told that BI will incorporate some patching to the original Imperial campaign, can we be told whether or not this will involve mending/improving the Marius Reform event to allow non-Roman factions to trigger their own general upgrades, rather than waiting for a Roman faction to fulfil the criteria?

[Princeps]

I wish a medium (30-35 cities) campaign for the old imperial campaign. The short campaign (15 cities) is too short and the long campaign (50 cities) is too long.

[Refnulf von Holland]

Hi guys, I have a few questions I hope that they have not been asked yet.

Q. Has the square beach effect that started poping up in the 1.2 patch been improved or fixed in BI expansion?

Q. There are some new features that appear in the Demo, the bubbles when a unit swims and a sparkle effect that appears on a unit when it levels up in valor. Will there be a option to disable these features?

Q. Will there ever be blood in a totalwar game, or a least the ability for the mods to add it fully.

Thanks guys

[Shaun]

Q- i heard that putting the right files in to the campaign folder adds a new campaign, can you tell me more please?

[SomeNick]

Haven't had time to read all the posts but here's my 2c worth. Q's and Critiques :)

Love the game btw :)

Q1. Will there be some sort of modification to the time it takes for units to reassume new orders? I lose way too much cavalry to phalanxes :(

Q2. The mouse speed in the game should have some sort of option to modify it in game menu. I've been playing RTW for 6 months with a very poor mouse speed :O I have a good pc but...

Q3. A map editor like in MTW ? That'd be fun :)

Q4. Some sort of option on multiplayer server to restrict the spamming of cavalry etc. Maybe an optional setting of a maximum for unit type and for allowing/disallowing seige weapons that could be viewed in the game server list. Bet a lot more would play then.

Q5. I saw on the official Total War site new units being offered for download. However there is only one and can't find any others released if any. Is there a link to these units? The spartan one looks very cool btw :)

Q6. Might sound a bit trivial but could there be some way of altering the colour scheme of the standard factions. Parthian pink is a bit jaded. heh. It would make the battles a lot more realistic looking too. I mean this as an option in the game. I know a mod could do it, but I'm just pointing it out as a purchaser of 2 games in Total War series, who has trouble with mods. (fantastic as they are)

Q7. I know there was a post on the shogun forum about flame affecting terrain costing to much pc resources but could it be added as an option in game menu? It'd be kinda cool seeing a forest alight with infantry getting trapped.

Q8. Could there be a custom faction option where u can create ur own army types from the ones available for fun.

That's it for now. Thanks for reading. Once again some may seem trivial but I haven't had the time to read the other posts so sorry for double posting etc.

I'll read the rest later and maybe post a few more q's, critiques and suggestions in 1 more post.

Brother Victor!

[Epistolary Richard]

Okay, this is from the last FAQ:

Q: The one faction I'm most excited about in the demo is supposed to be unplayable. I was so looking forward to fighting off the saxons and saving the native britains from thier enventual absorbtion by the saxons. Will the Romano-British be playable as easily as the unplayable factions in the RTW?

A: We did debate about making them a playable faction, but they could only be said to exist from around 410AD (when the Emperor Honorius sent them a "Dear Brits... don't bother me... yours sincerely..." letter when they asked for help). With a starting date of 363 for the campaign we would have been pushed to include them so early - and it would have weakened the Western Romans inappropriately. As the Romano-British are an emerging faction (controlled by code to emerge when a certain set of conditions has been met), its not simply a case of making them playable in the same way that you would a faction in RTW. In the not-too-distant future we plan to make a Romano-British save game available for download.

Question
This code of which you speak (the code that controls the emergence of the Romano-British and other emergent factions) will this be editable or will it be hard-coded ?