So ...

[Jambo]

YEah, sometimes campaigns in BI seem to play very differently from each other.

My first as the Saxons (H,H), I made a few really bad mistakes - using an assassin on the Franks when they were allied making them go to war with me when I was already at war with the Burgundy, WRE and Celts. This number of foes proved unsustainable eventually.

Second as the Goths (H,H), I got trampled on by the Vandal and Hun hordes. Eventually my own horde ended up where the Saxons start - mainly as a result of running as far away from trouble as I could! Eventually this campaign had to be given up.

Third and my current campaign as the Alemanni (H,H). With the knowledge of the previous two campaigns and avoiding making the same mistakes, I've now got a fairly good foothold in central Europe and look well on my way to an easy victory. Without wars on multiple fronts I've been able to simply rip into the WRE and like people have reported before me, there seems a major lack of any worthwhile and sizeable stacks anywhere. I can only assume that many of the other factions are simply bankrupt?!

The support costs are high and barring the large starting treasury, money is incredibly hard to come by for building significant armies. It's possible the support costs are just a little too high in BI (and RTW?) as there really aren't any major stacks/battles anywhere on the campaign map other than those belonging to and relating to factions in horde mode.

Cheers
Doc

[frogbeastegg]

I swapped my drivers for older ones, and went to start a new game as ERE. I was immediately greeted with this:

Yes, the world was flooded again. This is ... I think the fourth time I've seen this now. The map doesn't scroll smoothly like this, and as I scroll mountrains and other unidentifiable artifacts appear and vanish all over the screen. Alt-tabbing out of the game and back fixes this, until it appears again after a battle or when I load the game back up after a break.

Here is the drugged up campaign map I get after battles roughly a third of the time:

Scrolling the view so the messed up part of the map is hidden, then returnnig to that area fixes this problem.

Also, anyone else using 1280X1024 as a strat map resolution? If so, is half your interface fuzzy, like this:

Not the best of pictures, I'm afriad. The fuzziness is bad enough that it's hard to tell which buildings are what. I know it's an unsupported resolution, but in RTW it worked without a hitch, and I'm wondering if the fuzziness here is related to the resolution or to the other problems I'm having. I tried the map in 1024X[whatever it is] and the interface was pin sharp, as it was in RTW. But the rest of the map was not.

I did a repair install of BI, and still the problem persists. BI was installed fresh onto a clean install of RTW which wasn't even a minute old. Nothing is modded, except the resolution, minimal interface, and no green arrows, and they are all mods I had working without issue under RTW's various versions.

Anyone got any ideas? Anyone else experiencing this?

The only thing I can think of is that my video card might have been damaged after all when my PC got fried, but if so it's very ... strange, give how the errors are not consiatant and fix themselves if the game is prodded a bit. Other games work properly, DX diag reports no problems, I'm not installing drivers over old ones, or anything obvious which might give me a helping hint here.

Oh - I keep forgetting to ask, but can anyone else disband assassins? I couldn't get rid of my unwanted Saxon one when I decided I didn't want to pay his upkeep. There was no disband button on him.

[Garvanko]

That is just plain weird.

Sometimes the sea turns black for me on the campaign map, but Im suspecting this is something to do with night battles, though im not sure. Whenever that happens, I am offered the option of a night battle.

[Kraxis]

You know I had that fuzziness in RTW but now it is gone. So it seems we are exactly opposite there.

Just for info, the WRE starts out with 1000 denarii and an empire in the red. No surprise they haven't got any armies to speak of you go about capturing their provinces.
In my ERE campaign they took a nice long time before they began to compete with me to the advanced spot, so time will help their economy it seems.

[gmjapan]

Nope, no assasin disband option. I just sent mine into missions with horrible odds hoping to get slain by bodyguards.

This showed me something I was impressed with - their attributes can reduce for poor performances! They used to just escape with their lives.

Also, in battles, what is this ctr+t you are using? Decrease speed? I just press 'p' when the phone rings. p = pause.

[frogbeastegg]

Big, big, big froggy grin here! Weee!! Take a look at this, turn number 4 from my new Saxon campaign:


Here's the WRE, attacking in force the settlement I captured just last turn with a small, dashed together army scraped out of my starting units. I'm outnumbered roughly 3:1, and half of that army is hunters, and so a bit crap in a stand up fight. By the way, the Roman general is far better than mine.


And here are my lazy, good for nothing, never attacks or tries to expand neighbours, beating me to the siege of the other rebel town. No idea what troops they have, because my spy is now trapped inside that city. That second army of mine consists of 3 levy spearmen and my faction leader, i.e. every unit I've just built and my only other general.

I think I'm in trouble My medium and short term plans just went down the toilet Oh, goodie, goodie, goodie!

I didn't get a screenshot because I had no chance, but while I was besieging that rebel town I was attacked by a second rebel army I didn't even know was there. I survived that only because I managed to kill one and turn about to face the second army, fighting them individually. That's why there is a famous battle marker next to the town.

Now this is more like it! I've saved the game (sadly out of time to play it now) but I'm going to continue this one. My other Saxon game has gone in the bin, saved deleted so I can't confuse them. This is all I wanted I hope it continues this way.

So now I must abandon that second rebel province to the purple people, and go and try to stop WRE before they take my second town. If that fails, I'm going to be doing last ditch defences of my starting city. Erm, I find myself wondering if the Saxons can horde ...

Why a second Saxon game? Bored curiosity to see if it would be any different. What did I do differently in this game? Er ... nothing much. I've built levy spears instead of keels, which makes my armies marginally bigger in terms of men. I think I am going after Campus Chattii a turn earlier, maybe. The only big difference really is that I haven't had to attack the AI non-rebel factions, because they beat me to it.

Now if only I had got this on my first game, not my second.



Alt+t is the time acceleration hotkey.

[Doug-Thompson]

Big, big, big froggy grin here! Weee!! Take a look at this, turn number 4 from my new Saxon campaign: ...

I think I'm in trouble My medium and short term plans just went down the toilet Oh, goodie, goodie, goodie!

That sound you hear, even those of you across the seas, is me breathing a sigh of relief.

Edited P.S. I haven't checked the tech help forum, but the video issues brought up here deserve attention. Tech saavy folks, the fact that an LCD screen was in use here couldn't make any difference, could it?

[Geoffrey S]

I'm afraid I can't help with the biblical graphical glitches, but I can confirm the building icons and the like were fuzzy in RTW under 1024x768. Haven't the foggiest what causes it though.

Now this is more like it!I've saved the game (sadly out of time to play it now) but I'm going to continue this one.

Good job that load/save bug is outta there!

[chilling]

Frog, your graphical problems?

What size is your LCD monitor. They usually have a native resolution that they will run best in, generally 1024x768 for smaller panels (15"/17") and 1280x1024 for larger panels (19+"). As you're running at 1280x1024 I pressume you have a larger panel that has this as it's native resolution. If not that could be the cause of the blured images you get.

I have a similar setup to yours but have a 9700pro card. It runs without any graphical problems. Your video card could be overheating, try running the game for a while with the side of your case removed. Also you could try the Omega drivers that you can get from here. http://www.omegadrivers.net/ I've always used them and find them to be extremely stable.


Tsunami Total War, now there's an idea.

[TinCow]

Those are definitely video related problems. Since you have no issues in other game or programs, I'm almost certain it's the drivers and not the card itself. If you can't get the official drivers to work properly, try using Omega Drivers. They can often fix what the official ones cannot.