oh no... is it really this easy?

[parcelt]

Let me start with a little disclaimer: I'm a big fan of the series, having played everyting from the original STW including all XPs and a number of mods. And although I have my gripes with RTW, including BI (see below), I continue to play it every chance I get.

Having said that, BI (after a weekend's almost non-stop playing), has dissappointed me. I agree that many things have improved - graphics far better and smoother, tactical AI noticably better - but the campaign is key for me, and it simply sucks. I tried 3 campaigns (all vh/h), and all three made me quit feeling dissappointed.

First with the ERE. A total cakewalk where all you need to do is be consistent on religion (replaced everyting pagan for churches) and build up trade. Attacks are few and weak. In fact, all that ever happens is the blue guys from the east (what's their name?) attack Antioch every 3-4 turns or so with a bunch of skirmishers and the occasional heavy cavalry. They are easily repelled with my much smaller garrison of mediocre troops. The hunnic horde paid a visit to Constantinople but after 7-8 battles (all virtually identical) where I sallied from the city to attack the single stack he had sieging me, while the rest was standing around aimlessly. Once that was over, nothing really happened and I quit after about 60 turns. Of course, I could have taken the fight to them, but aren't the Barbarian Invasions supposed to make me shudder and fight against impossible odds to hold on to at least some of my empire? Well, not in this campaign.
On a side note, the WRE did even better then me, its AI did not seem to have any problems in over 60 turns with either rebellions nor barbarians coming in. It was just one campaign, I know, but still it was on VH and I expected the romans having to fight a little harder.

So, I then tried the WRE (again vh/h), since it is supposed to be the hardest faction. Yawn again. As described in other threads, it really is just a matter of organization. Loot and give up on a few outlying cities, consolidate your holdings, built up trade where you can, and you'll be fine. Again, the supposedly ferocious barbarian hordes didn't really hurt me. Their actions seem uncoordinated and they hardly ever make use of their advantage in numbers. Quit the campaign after about 45 turns.

Ok, I thought, let's try a barbarian campaign then. So I picked the Allemani, who start out with a single settlement in the middle of the map, right above the alpes. I figured that with such a central location they were bound to get into trouble. Actually I did have to fight quite a couple of opening battles. Unfortunately, the WRE armies that were close were really no match. My spearmen can hold the line against pretty much anything and a few units of cavalry or fast nightraiders are enough to flank and kill. So I quickly conquered the two closest roman settlements (one south and one to the north-west), then moved on the roman town just south of the alps. Again, hardly any resistance. I began to wonder what the WRE was up to (they sure weren't too concerned about me picking off their cities one by one), so I lifted the FOW. Turned out they had more than 4 full stacks busy conquering the rebel towns in the north-west of europe..... those stacks could have easily turned on my homelands and crushed me forever. So much for strategic AI. I then conquered the last city before Rome itself, again way too easy. Interestingly, I then saw movement coming from the east, with the ERE sending two full stacks (no family members though), apparently to help defend Rome. Too bad they almost completely consisted of archers and eastern archers, and were easily dispatched. So, I am about 20 turns into this campaign which starts you as a lowely barbarian tribe without any holdings to speak of, and taking Rome (almost no garrison at all) is just a formality. Oh, and the hordes coming from the east apparently like me because I had a few passing through my lands but all chose to leave my lightly defended cities alone. Again, yawn and quit.

Well, not sure what my point is..... just that having played 3 campaigns with different factions I had to quit each time because of pure boredom. That didn't happen (so fast) with RTW. Surely, unless this was a bad twist of randomness and in my next try (again, I am playing on VH mind you) I will be utterly crushed on the campaign map, what is the point of the expansion? The (free) patch itself would have sufficed.

[caesar44]

What they are doing there at CA ? Damn !!!

[Bob the Insane]

I don't know what to say but I am having a pretty cool campaign as WRE. I managed to keep the empire together by mainting the exsisting religion of the provinces. I defeated the couple of revolts that appeared and managed to balance the books to start making money and being able to rebuild.

The campaign became a little quiet at that point. Lots of building up and slowly developing a couple of legions for defence and dealing with rebels. A lot of monitoring the seetles to keep public order in chack and keep the taxes flowing.

The years have flowed by pretty quick and the empire is growing strong again. Harassment from the Berbers and the Celts have been dealt and the ERE have broken their alliance with us and attacked. They have been thrown from the wall a couple of times with no shortage of luck involved.

Recently the Vandels have turned up, overrun a small army I had defending the Danube crossing and attacked a walled city. Dispite my preperation the city fell to an assault and that was pretty exciting (god I wish you could save campaign battles).

Personally I find the BI campaign starts with a bang and then going quiet for a while and then the real fun kicks of... Just my experience so far. The the ERE armies that attacked me? Archers, legionaries, cavalry and generals (sometimes)... I have only survived by destroying their siege equipment...

SOrry, should have said this is Hard/Hard...

[Doug-Thompson]

parcelt

Play the Huns and tell me what to do here. Tactcially, they're simplistic, but I'm befuddled over where and when to settle down.

As for the rest, I have to say that my "blitz" style of playing Total War games is completely shot. Eliminate a rival faction in the opening moves and they turn into a horde.

[Conqueror]

As for the rest, I have to say that my "blitz" style of playing Total War games is completely shot. Eliminate a rival faction in the opening moves and they turn into a horde.

Isn't the horde supposed to head *away* from the faction that gave them the kicking, though? So they would be sent rampaging through other peoples lands. I don't really know how it works since I'm waiting for my copy.

[Doug-Thompson]

Isn't the horde supposed to head *away* from the faction that gave them the kicking, though? So they would be sent rampaging through other peoples lands. I don't really know how it works since I'm waiting for my copy.

Maybe it depends on whether they have somewhere to run. I conquered a city that was one faction's last remaining settlement, and they took it back the next turn with a horde.

[TinCow]

Well, it's probably just chance but I've been struggling for the first time ever in RTW on my current WRE VH/VH campaign. I abandoned about half my territories on the second turn when I realized they were all going to revolt. After contracting and spending some time getting my finances back into the black, I managed to assemble three operational armies. My main army is defending northern Italy and is composed of the finest troops I can recruit. My second army is in southern Gaul acting as defense against the WRE Rebels and to grab territories when able. My third is a purely defensive force holding Carthage for trade purposes.

While the WRE Rebels haven't done much to me since my raze and flee decisions left them with nothing to build but peasants, the Hordes have been a major pain. So far I've had three in the area. The Sarmatians arrived very early with a four stack horde in Northern Italy. They attacked, I defended and after several battles (some won, some lost) I managed to whittle their forces down and finished them via family death. This gobbled up a large amount of my reserve finances though and crippled my Northern Italy army for a while. The second horde was the Goths, who came with a massive six stack army and marched right through Northern Italy again. I was so depleted from the Sarmatians that I gambled on letting them walk through. It worked and they went through the western Alps and took a WRE Rebel city for their new homeland. I signed an Alliance with them to keep them away from me.

When the Goths moved in I took advantage of the WRE Rebel defeat in the area to recapture a city I had abandoned to them earlier. This I did with ease with my frontier army which I kept in the city on garrison duty along with my second best general and another family member. About 3-4 turns later, the Vandal horde arrived five stacks and laid siege to this city. I beat off the first assault by a single stack, but it vastly depleated my garrison and I was beseiged again before I could repair my walls and reinforce my units. Two turns later, I was assaulted by all four remaining stacks at once. They didn't even use reinforcements, all four stacks entered the battle at once, with city completely surrounded on three sides and five breaches in the wall from the first battle. I did my best, but I was slaughtered to the last man. This coincided with the death of my Emperor to the plague and since he had superb management and influence, I went into about 5-6 years of debt. I just got back into the black and am currently scrambling to rebuild my second army because I cannot sufficiently protect all my territories in Europe with one force. If another horde comes through or the Vandals press their assault on my other cities (they have not done this so far) within the next 10 turns I may well lose this game.

While the battle AI is still easy to beat in 1:1 or 2:1 odds, I simply cannot field enough of a force as the WRE to withstand multiple hordes of chosen horde swordsmen, horde spearmen and horde horse archers. I've pulled off some miracles with my small force in Carthage, but I've had several battles with major armies in Europe where I knew I would lose and my goal was simply to whittle the enemy forces down as much as possible. I've never had this happen to me in RTW before.

[Doug-Thompson]

Wait a minute.

Parcelt, if there weren't any hordes attacking you and your empire was stabilized, why weren't you well on your way to meeting the victory conditions and winning the game after 45 turns?

Yes, I understand you were bored at that point, but going over to the offensive is not as trouble-free in BI as defense.

[Husar]

Eliminate a rival faction in the opening moves and they turn into a horde.

Very interesting, in my campaign as the Franks I have already eliminated the Alemanni and the Saxons and they were both just...eliminated, no horde, no nothing. I was actually afraid to attack them at first to not get overrun, but it was way easier than I thought.

[Doug-Thompson]

Very interesting, in my campaign as the Franks I have already eliminated the Alemanni and the Saxons and they were both just...eliminated, no horde, no nothing. I was actually afraid to attack them at first to not get overrun, but it was way easier than I thought.

Which factions can horde and which can't?

[Orda Khan]

I am in a Hun campaign like Doug and my hordes have yet to settle too. I just sacked Constantinople and a few other nearby ERE cities, mainly because I needed the plunder. I will probably take Constantinople from the rebels and settle there to see what happens next. During these early years I have attacked the Goths, Vandals, Roxolanni and Longobards, sending them all in search of a new homeland. The Alemanni attacked me and were destroyed. There have been many rebellions reported in both WRE and ERE and all this is on medium settings.
Incidentally, how do you activate FOW? I have never done this and I am curious now to find out what the AI is doing

.....Orda

[[DnC]]

Orda Khan,

Press ` (tilde) and type in toggle_fow to activate and deactivate FOW.

[gardibolt]

Is the toggle of FOW unlimited under 1.3?

[[DnC]]

Don't think so. I've used toggle_fow several times in the same gamesession.