Variation in animation is fine but it will increase the greatest problem with Total War, what I like to call:

"Go on my son!" Syndrome. Thats when you sit peering intently at your screen watching one hard-arsed bastard with a war axe outnumbered ten to one and when he finally dies you look up to realise the rest of your army are dog food.

There was nothing wrong with RTW, the historical accuracy wasn't all that bad in a general sense, as said above, Gladiator has defined the Romans for this generation. So we have to live with it.

MTW2 will rock, even if you have to fight Dragons.