Yet another chance to ask CA some questions.

[Myrddraal]

In the near future, we hope to be organising some interviews with CA devs (many thanks to The Shogun for this opportunity). So I have a basic idea of what are the most pressing questions for the community, but I thought I'd give you all a chance to add your own input anyway.

I'm not making any guarantees here. There may be questions CA don't want to answer, in which case we won't ask them, and we can't ask for everything so no guarantees.

Just take advantage of this situation, but don't get upset if we don't ask your question.

[Martok]

Well obviously, a big question is how much has the AI (both combat AI and empire AI) been improved? Will it avoid obvious mistakes like charging cavalry head-on into spears/pikes? Will it manage its armies better so that we fight fewer but more decisive battles (instead of a bunch of minor skirmishes against little 2-unit stacks)? Will the AI take into consideration the overall strength of a faction before attacking it, instead of only looking for immediate weaknesses? (In essence, will it be able to take the "long view", as it were?)

Have the unit walking speeds been toned down from Rome? (And if so, by how much?) Has the penalty for "stacking" units on the battlefield been re-instated?

Are civil wars and factions re-emergences in?

Will there be an option to disable the "New World" portion of the map?

What happens to Crusade/Jihad armies that are beat by another faction to that province? Do they simply disappear? And does the faction leader lose Influence as in the original MTW (if the Crusade/Jihad fails)?

[Leet Eriksson]

Are Eras in?

Will there be Early, High, Late eras?

Will it be possible to play the mongol factions? (timurids, golden horde, mongols)

[TB666]

Are Eras in?

Will there be Early, High, Late eras?

Will it be possible to play the mongol factions? (timurids, golden horde, mongols)

Only in MP and no(not without modding them so they are there at the start of the game)

[highlanddave]

in the entrance hall i started a little thread on this subject. can we get ca to make a modding disk?

i would buy a disk on strictly modding if ca would be so kind to make one. especially since the new m2tw will bring on new opportunities and difficulties compared to the last total war games. the disk might include some instruction and some tools for modifying the game. tools like a battlefield tool, a unit painter/modeler, a map maker, etc. modification is a selling point for total war games and it would be nice if more players were given an opportunity to try their ideas.

[The Blind Samurai]

so i cant play them in skrimish mode

will the english get muskets

who will get the rocket lanchers

[Ignoramus]

How will feudalism be implemented?

[Furious Mental]

Modding. Everything about modding. What can and can't be changed? Will they ever make any tools?

[Luciano B]

Modding possibilities.
Some time ago I read about a number of faction slots brought up to 30... is it true? ...is it possible to add more (9) factions to the 21 provided by the "vanilla" game?

[alexrugr]

Since artillery will have more segnificant role in MTW2,will it be possible to deploy cannons/culverins on walls? In RTW if you have catapults and under siege in a city with stone wall they are practically useless..

[Zatoichi]

I have a few random questions:

Can you dismount units prior to a battle, or are the dismounted versions of units seen so far recruited separately as foot troops?

Will there be faction reemergence, or has that feature gone?

Will you actually have to 'crew' towers/turrets in order to make them fire on the enemy during sieges, or will this be automatic again?

How will the introduction of gunpowder be handled - will it be as a result of building prerequisites being met, or will it be an event tied to the number of years/turns played? Or a combination of the above?

That's all for now - I'm interested in the modding side of things as well, but those questions seem to have been asked already.

[Leet Eriksson]

Only in MP and no(not without modding them so they are there at the start of the game)

No mongols is immensely lame, but i won't complain, hopefully we get them in an expansion i know it can be modded to have them in, but preset factions are very pretty much more fleshed out than factions modded in.

[Duke John]

Will CA support the modding community by providing a model/animation importer/exporter tool?

[Myrddraal]

No mongols is immensely lame, but i won't complain, hopefully we get them in an expansion i know it can be modded to have them in, but preset factions are very pretty much more fleshed out than factions modded in.

I think they will be in game, just not playable unless you mod them in...

[Bob the Insane]

If they will answer specific gameplay questions I would love to know how crusader armies will interact is boats... Can they get on them, do they retain their movement bonus if they do?

My second question is whether faction re-emergence is going to be in the game...

That will do, I'm not greedy...

[Jambo]

Myrddraal, when is this scheduled for?

Anyway, here are a few of my burning questions:

Campaign map questions:

1. Has the AI been improved in terms of defending its cities/castles? More specifically, with all the new and impressive fortifications, will the AI defend them with more than one unit of militia and a general, say?
   
2. Related to the above, how will sieges tie in with the new recruitment system? i.e. will it be possible for the AI to raise an army prior to or during a siege for the purpose of siege defence?
   
3. When attacking will the AI try more multi-stack attacks?
   
4. Is auto-resolve be tied to battle difficulty or will this still be tied to campaign difficulty?
   
5. What will change as the difficulty level is increased (campaign and battle)?
   
6. What steps, if any, have CA taken to raise the challenge as the game progresses and the human player's faction inevitably becomes the powerhouse?

Tactical battles:

1. What steps have CA taken to improve AI army cohesion, how the missile troops behave and the general timing of the cavalry charge?
   
2. Are there any changes to how the general behaves as part of the AI army?

That concludes my short selection. ;)

[Dutch_guy]

Will you be able to save battle replays fought on the campaign map ?

[Templar Knight]

Will you be able to give titles and land to your generals?

[Dinsel]

I could not post a new thread, I suppose thats because I am too new to the forum to have that privilege.

So I decided to ask my question here because its kinda related.

RTW had play by email option. That allows you to play the campaign mode with other humans. I never played it. But I heard one player plays 1 turn. Then he sends the files to another player then he plays he's turn.

My question is. In this type of gaming are all the battles auo-resolved? Or can they be fought between the player and AI, or the other humans?

Second question is. Can play by email, be played only by yourself. Everytime you play a faction. You send the files to yourself. Then load them. Then play the other factions turn?

The third question is, Is there a mod that allows you to play all the factions in the campaign map with no AI at all (apart from rebels, and inside the battle).

And of course the fourth question is can we have that option included in the game?
Would it not be awsome for all factions to be controlled by the same intellegence? YOU.
Or maybe you could pick the amount of civilisations you can play as a human with the rest being AI controlled.
I would like that in the same campaign I control one faction, my brother controls another, and my other brother controls another. With the rest of factions being AI.
Could we have this option please?

[Martinaz]

wow
Can CA say some or alot of samples how far the AI is improved from rome?

[Myrddraal]

RTW had play by email option. That allows you to play the campaign mode with other humans. I never played it. But I heard one player plays 1 turn. Then he sends the files to another player then he plays he's turn.

My question is. In this type of gaming are all the battles auo-resolved? Or can they be fought between the player and AI, or the other humans?

Second question is. Can play by email, be played only by yourself. Everytime you play a faction. You send the files to yourself. Then load them. Then play the other factions turn?

The third question is, Is there a mod that allows you to play all the factions in the campaign map with no AI at all (apart from rebels, and inside the battle).

So actually none of this is official. It's all provided by my Hot Seat mod...

[Tamur]

There has been some talk in game design communities about the shift of strategy games to include limited RPG content as a longevity hook and market demographic broadener. Is there movement in this direction for the new post-Rome engine beyond the current VnV/ancillary system?

[Marius Dynamite]

Whats coming after MTW II and again after that? In the Video I saw from the Eras pack, it says they will be making TW games for a long time and if they run out of Historical periods, they will move onto Sci-Fi. Surely they must have an Idea of what will be up next.

[Martinaz]

Whats coming after MTW II and again after that? In the Video I saw from the Eras pack, it says they will be making TW games for a long time and if they run out of Historical periods, they will move onto Sci-Fi. Surely they must have an Idea of what will be up next.

Well remakes like ME2tw?
And the world has alot of different times man.
time in 1600, 1800, 2004 iraq, woII asia invasion, 1900-2010 invasion of america
world domination, middle ages, China, England, France, Spain, south africa.
En SCI-FI man thats really boring...
lightsables ftw....

[Martok]

Will you be able to save battle replays fought on the campaign map ?

Good catch, Dutch_guy. I forgot about that one.

[Mount Suribachi]

Venice are down as one of the 5 starting factions. I assume this means they will have extra features compared to other factions. How is its Republican nature implemted? On one of the preview videos it appears to show a land-bridge between an island Venice and mainland Italy. Venice was immune from sea attack due to the narrow & shallow waters surrounding it which only the locals knew how to navigate. Is this simulated in the game?

[Marius Dynamite]

Originally Posted by Marius Dynamite

Whats coming after MTW II and again after that? In the Video I saw from the Eras pack, it says they will be making TW games for a long time and if they run out of Historical periods, they will move onto Sci-Fi. Surely they must have an Idea of what will be up next.

Originally Posted by Martinaz

Well remakes like ME2tw?
And the world has alot of different times man.
time in 1600, 1800, 2004 iraq, woII asia invasion, 1900-2010 invasion of america
world domination, middle ages, China, England, France, Spain, south africa.
En SCI-FI man thats really boring...
lightsables ftw....

I was asking CA what will come next and after that. I never said what I like. They can only make one thing at a time and I want to know what will be up next.

[antiwup]

one thing i noticed about rome total war was its lack of battlefields to fight on in custom battle mode. in med2 will there be many fields to chose from like in the original medieval and will there be a custom map mode too?

one thing i would have liked to have seen is a fortification mode where during a battle you can dig in or create improvised defenses like stakes or small wooden ramparts or trenches.

another thing i would like to see added is a video cut scene for naval battles

i think ambushes should be better like you can ambush an army in a camp or hit them while they march in column down a road.

i would also like to see a mode where you can sit an army in a town after it lost men in battle and fill its ranks over turns but lose skill points. a regiment lost 120 men than moves into a town sits for a turn or two and recruits 120 replacements but loses some skills dropping it down in experiance.

any way no matter what, this game will kick ass!

one more thing cannon on top of elephants is stupid and should not be used heavily hek it shouldn't be in the game! next thing you now there will be unicorns and ogres if there are cannon on elephants that should be kept to a rare minimum.

[CountArach]

Will the AI support you in a war if you are allied? If so, will AI factions take into account your alliances before attacking you?

Also if you break an alliance/an AI faction breaks theirs will everyone trust them less?

[Soulflame]

I can answer some of these from the preview event;

one thing i noticed about rome total war was its lack of battlefields to fight on in custom battle mode. in med2 will there be many fields to chose from like in the original medieval and will there be a custom map mode too?

Yes, there will be more battlefields and yes there will be an (unsupported) battlemap editor

one thing i would have liked to have seen is a fortification mode where during a battle you can dig in or create improvised defenses like stakes or small wooden ramparts or trenches.

Not sure, but the english longbowmen might be able to put stakes in front of them (at least in the historical battle they were there)

another thing i would like to see added is a video cut scene for naval battles

i think ambushes should be better like you can ambush an army in a camp or hit them while they march in column down a road.

No idea about these

i would also like to see a mode where you can sit an army in a town after it lost men in battle and fill its ranks over turns but lose skill points. a regiment lost 120 men than moves into a town sits for a turn or two and recruits 120 replacements but loses some skills dropping it down in experiance.

This was already in Rome; if you retrained a unit, the experience (and armor if the original unit had some upgraded things not available in the settlement where you retrained) got dilluted.
So it's a safe bet to say that's in like in Rome.

one more thing cannon on top of elephants is stupid and should not be used heavily hek it shouldn't be in the game! next thing you now there will be unicorns and ogres if there are cannon on elephants that should be kept to a rare minimum.

I actually did ask about it and they said they wouldn't have put it in unless there were at least some referances to them in history.

Will the AI support you in a war if you are allied? If so, will AI factions take into account your alliances before attacking you?

Also if you break an alliance/an AI faction breaks theirs will everyone trust them less?

The diplomatic AI will be taking into account more things, although I'm not sure if it takes these into account. It will look at economic and military strength, your relationship with them, and some others.
I'm heavily speculation here, but it might be nice and possible that if you are allied, part of those variables are added up (ie military strength is your own strength + some factor * allies strength). I have absolutely no idea if this is true, but it would be nice and at least seems like a reasonable idea.