Where to start? (Newbie)

[buteo]

Hi everyone.
I just finished loading the game. I have installed patches 1.3 first and then 1.5
I am at the moment configuring the game to my system.
Next I plan to read the manual and the Quietus Guide.
I would like to know what I should attempt first (ie campaign, battle, etc) that would help a beginner like myself.
Thanks in advance for any help.

[Ludens]

Hi everyone.
I just finished loading the game. I have installed patches 1.3 first and then 1.5
I am at the moment configuring the game to my system.
Next I plan to read the manual and the Quietus Guide.
I would like to know what I should attempt first (ie campaign, battle, etc) that would help a beginner like myself.
Thanks in advance for any help.

Welcome to the Org, Buteo .

Rome: Total War comes with a tutorial campaign (the Sons of Mars) to help you on your way. If you finished it, start an imperial campaign with the Julii. The Roman factions are the best equiped and the Juli have the easiest early campaign, provided you expand aggresively.

[buteo]

Thank you Ludens for the welcome and advice. I will definitely start with the tutorial campaign and the imperial campaign with the Julii seems like a good starting point after the tutorial.

buteo

[econ21]

I would recommend starting a campaign with a Roman faction. You may have to do this anyway, unless you want to search this forum for info. on how to prematurely unlock the other factions. Romans have had the most love put in by the designers, so you get longer pre-battle speeches for example. I also found the senate missions very useful in giving some direction to another wise dauntingly free-form campaign map. Roman factions also have strong units and a good strategic position (3 allied factions watching your back). Personally, I would recommend Julii as their opponents - the Gauls - are near and weak.

If you have never played another TW game, the hardest thing will be to master the tactical battles. The controls - especially the camera - were not very intuitive when I first learnt to play with STW but I think they are more straight forward in RTW. Practice with the tutorial, focussing on knowing how to work the camera and alter the facing and depth of your troops.

Once you can master the game controls, the tactics and strategy are fairly intuitive and "realistic" IMO. For example, at a strategic level, it's often good to build up your economic buildings and also upgrade your starting towns so you can recruit higher tech units. At a tactical level, the Romans can't go too far wrong leading with heavy infantry (hastati, principes and triarii) and trying to turn one or both flanks with cavalry (or more heavy infantry!). Flanking is especially important against phalanxes, but again that's intuitive.

If you need more guidance, there are some interesting faction specific threads in our guides sub-forum as well as a very professional general guide to RTW by Froggbeastegg.

Have fun! And if you are a "hardcore" strategy game player you may find it gets real easy soon. If so, raise the campaign difficulty level to Very Hard and download some of the amazing "realism" mods - especially Rome Total Realism (www.rometotalrealism.org) and Europa Barborum (links in the sub-forum on this site).

[buteo]

Thanks Simon.

I am not a hardcore strategy game player at all. I have never played strategy games before. This game is a christmas present from my wife.

I am a hardcore First Person Shooter. My favorite game is Far Cry.

When I started looking around on the web for information about this game I was very impressed when I arrived at these forums. You are all very helpful and informative.

You are right about the controls. As an FPS player, they are going to take some getting-used-to.

Anyway thanks again for the welcome and the detailed strategy advice.

buteo

[Taurus]

Welcome to the .org buteo, enjoy yourself.

Starting with a Roman faction would definatly be the best way to go as others have already stated. But personally I find the most enjoyable part of this game to be the multiplayer side, battling against human opponents is far better than fighting against the AI in my opinion, even though the campaign is really fun.
Hope to see you online.

My favorite game is Far Cry.

Same.

[buteo]

Thanks Taurus for the welcome. I think it will be a while before I tackle multiplayer. It took me a long while before I was adept enough at Far Cry to go to Multiplayer. With this game (and probably all strategy games) I truly am a newbie.

Buteo

[Monarch]

Hello Buteo :)

First of all welcome to the Org! I thouroughly suggest starting on easy/easy mode. It's not like nobody will expand in easy so it will be fun with some competition (especially since your new at this), but you shouldn't be pulling your hair out worrying about defending your capital like you might be on a more difficult difficulty option).

You will want this thread> https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=36846

In terms of strategic help. But I do suggest you attack the Gauls within the first few terns (Patavium and the one with the weird name beggining with M). Also you'll get a senate mission to take Segesta, this is well worth doing as it's rebel held and doesn't involve declaring war on anyonr and thus diverting your attention away from the Gauls.

Good luck and happy playing :D

Edit: Oh yeah, and if you didnt already know the senate will try to spread you thin with their mission, giving you missions you logically cant do. Dont try to do them if they seem too dificult. As Julii the people should love you even if the Senate are to busy loving those pescy Brutii :P

[Mamba]

I would recommend starting a campaign with a Roman faction. You may have to do this anyway, unless you want to search this forum for info. on how to prematurely unlock the other factions.

Why bother searching?

TO UNLOCK ALL FACTIONS ON ROME TOTAL WAR:

Step 1: Click through folders.

I installed RTW to drive C:, so mine went something like this:

My Computer -> Local Disk C: -> Program Files -> Activision -> Rome-Total War -> Data -> world -> maps -> campaign -> imperial_campaign -> descr_strat

Step 2: Modify the document

This step can be tricky. Make sure the document looks EXACTLY like this:

campaign imperial_campaign
playable
romans_julii
romans_brutii
romans_scipii
egypt
seleucid
carthage
parthia
gauls
germans
britons
greek_cities
romans_senate
macedon
pontus
armenia
dacia
scythia
spain
thrace
numidia
end
unlockable

end
nonplayable

slave
end

Step 3: Save the file

If you experience problems with the game, by all means change it back to the way it was, or copy the document.

Hope this helps give you more options.

[Alexanderofmacedon]

Farcry? Farcry?!?

Lol, Mines Halo and Halo2. Very good games.

Anyway, Welcome to the forums man!

I think you should do the tutorial first, but don't do what I did. Once I finished the battle part, I quit and started a campaign. It was actually fairly easy to figure out anyway, but I think it would have been easier to figure out if I had done the whole thing.

Also, after you have some fun with RTW, and get bored (which you eventually will), you should look into some great mods. I personally play Rome: Total Realism, which is a mod based more on historical accuracy and goes more in depth than RTW. There is actually a forum dedicated to said mods on these forums.

I hope you find RTW to your liking. You're so lucky to have a wife who'd give such great presents!

[buteo]

Hi Alexanderofmacedon. I am going to take your advice and do the complete tutorial before doing a campaign. Yes I am very lucky.
Thanks for the welcome.

buteo

[ajaxfetish]

Just a friendly warning, Buteo. You might want to try grouping thanks or other replies like that in a single post in the future. Quadruple posts (or double or triple for that matter) aren't looked upon very favorably, and I'm sure your gratitude would be appreciated just as much without quite so much individual recognition! You can keep an eye out for the next spam thread if you want to get your postcount up, though! (for the record, you didn't hear anything from me ).

And more importantly . . . Welcome to the org!

Ajax

[buteo]

Thanks Mamba. I just might try unlocking the factions after my first campaign.

buteo

[Monarch]

Thanks Mamba. I just might try unlocking the factions after my first campaign.

buteo

If you win a campaign, I believe you should unlock the standard factions anyway. It'll just require editing for factions such as the Spanish.

Oh and just in case you installed the game somewhere difference to where Mamba did and thus cant find the file to edit, find desc_strat.txt just search for it in my computer other than going through all the folders.

[Mamba]

If you win a campaign, I believe you should unlock the standard factions anyway. It'll just require editing for factions such as the Spanish.

True. It's also worth mentioning that if you get a more recent patch (1.3-1.5), you will have to edit the descriptions for the factions that are initially listed under the 'nonplayable' faction.