The Good, the Bad and the Ugly - initial impressions from an English campaign

[econ21]

I just encountered the passive AI bug. I thought the bug was when the AI is out-gunned, but in this case, we had 700 men a piece but the Danes were definitely superior as they were almost all dismounted Feudals and Huscarls. I had a balanced force of spears, billmen, longbows and cav. The Danes just stood there and my 3 longbows, 1 archer + 1 crossbowmen killed 90% of them. Bows are definitely not underpowered, but the trick is getting the enemy to stand there and get shot. Their rate of fire is so slow, I am pretty sure they will only get a volley or two off before the enemy close. Thankfully, the AI obliged in that battle but am not confident it will in others (or after a patch).

[IceTorque]

I just encountered the passive AI bug. I thought the bug was when the AI is out-gunned, but in this case, we had 700 men a piece but the Danes were definitely superior as they were almost all dismounted Feudals and Huscarls. I had a balanced force of spears, billmen, longbows and cav. The Danes just stood there and my 3 longbows, 1 archer + 1 crossbowmen killed 90% of them. Bows are definitely not underpowered, but the trick is getting the enemy to stand there and get shot. Their rate of fire is so slow, I am pretty sure they will only get a volley or two off before the enemy close. Thankfully, the AI obliged in that battle but am not confident it will in others (or after a patch).

Would you really prefer turkey shoots with missiles virtually winning the battles and melee type troops relegated to auxillaries?
Is it not more realistic and maybe more challenging for the emphasis to be placed on melee units to decide a battles out-come?
I know which I prefer, perhaps the rate of fire will be moddable so those that prefer arrow rain can play the game that way too.

In STW and MTW I relied on my archers to soften/decimate a large part of the AI's soldiers before they reached my battle line. This made most battles a bit too easy, repetetive and boring. Considering that many complaints were about the battles being too easy, I suggest that the slow rate of fire is not an oversight but is an intended design decision to make TW battles more challenging. Seems as though archers would be best used to skirmish on the flanks, and positioned to fire on the flanks and rear of pinned AI units. For those factions and players that rely on and/or prefer missile heavy armies, imo the slow rate of fire combined with the large battlefields does'nt create any problems, but merely sets the conditions for some very interesting, challenging and dare I say memorable battles.

As for the passive AI bug, that was also evident in RTW. {maybe because I modded missiles to fire from their max range) I hope the patch returns things to how the AI reacted in the original MTW, which if I remember correctly, the response was an immediate charge en masse. That required I drastically reduce the number of missile units in my attacking army and usually resulted in a very bloody and costly battle.

As I don't yet have the game, there are a couple of things I am keen to know. Does the AI still show their back sides to reform it's battle line? and What is the average ratio of inf/cav/missiles per AI stack?

[econ21]

I'm a little further with the campaign and am coming round to the archers. They remind me of MTW arbalesters - they seem slow firing, but they do kill. Playing as England they are my main edge over the AI. Cavalry can also provide another edge, although it's not something I rely on much. On reflection, I am happy with the balancing of cavalry and missiles.

Does the AI still show their back sides to reform it's battle line?

Occaisionally, yes. But it's not so common, it bothers me.

What is the average ratio of inf/cav/missiles per AI stack?

It varies a lot by faction and by army within a faction. The Danes came at me with an army almost exclusively made up of heavy inf (FK and Huscarls), and more generally tend to be almost all inf. I fought a French stack that was almost all cav, more often they are a mix. The Scots were also mixed. But in most cases, inf are the bulk of the mix.

To generalise, AI stacks seem mainly inf but with some cav and archers. Typically I'm fighting half stacks or so. They usually have one or two cav, and one or two missiles, sometimes more. They seem reasonable. I'm not seeing the "all archers" or "all peasant" type armies I recall from early France in MTW.

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EDIT: Martok asked me how immersive M2TW was - whether it come match the atmosphere of STW; and whether you felt you were just playing a game. This is my reply:

M2TW has a bit more chrome than RTW and MTW, but does not have the striking style of STW. Some of the voicework on the campaign map is nice - the prisoners begging for their lives; even the cheesy foreign diplomatic voices are fine by me. The music does not grab me as much as any of the earlier titles. I identify a bit more with the characters than in earlier titles, but they still don't have distinctive "characters" in an RPG sense. The pre-battle speeches don't do much for me.

I think it's pretty close to MTW in the "feel". The campaign seems pretty tense and cerebral, so presently I am caught up in stuff like (a) trying to get my crusade to the Levant before it deserts or another faction; (b) trying to fend off all three neighbouring factions who are all out to get me;(c) trying to understand why the Pope hates me when I show him nothing but love; etc etc. It's very close to MTW, so far, to be honest. Not so immersive you forget you are playing a game (I'd need to play System Shock 2 or something for that); but a good game nonetheless.

[blahblahblah]

so Econ, bottom line is, is STW better or M2TW better so far in your opinion?

[dar25]

Based on the dev blog, the pacing of battle now heavily depends on unit size selection. Normal sizes (40-70) the pacing feels similiar to RTW, but on Large (60-110) the pace feels quite a bit slower and positioning matters more as you cant get away with quick troop redeployements particularily in tight quarters on city streets.

[Gustav II Adolf]

Heres my good, bad, ugly

Good
I really like allot of the new features.
1. Castles and cities gives very interesting strategic implications. If you take a settlement far away with heavy units you will have difficulties retraining and defending if it remains a city. A castle will give you little money for it.

2. The ai are much better in both campaign and battle. This game is harder then all previous games, at least for me.

3. Allot more campignmap units. merchants give new dimensions to the game and needs to be handled with care. A merchant cost 550 and will generate 5-20 per turn. This can grow over time if he is kept alive. If you start loosing your merchants from competition it will be more costly to build than what they earn. Get a trained assassin in to help you.

4. sound and graphics is wonderful.

5. Killrates are perfect for me. they can be very high in a perfect charge and fairly slow in a head on infantry engagement.

6. Gunpowder from both canon and infantry is wonderfully to use (and look at) without being overpowered.

Bad
1. Cavalry! My greatest disappointment. Whats up with it. It is very difficult to perform a good charge even of you pull your horses away and reform. Often the animations look poor with twitching and slowmoving men. In close engagements you will lose many men against everyone. I charged a unit of rebel peasant archers with feudal knights and didnt lose any in arrowfire because the enemy unit was reforming and couldnt shoot. My knights didn't really charge but wandered in and started melee. I lost six knights before enemy routed.

2. sieges are better and worse. I got smacked really hard by a rebelsettlement in my first mtw2 battle. I was expecting rtwtactics to work but lost hard. You cant capture towers anymore and they can shoot fast in all directions. In the early game you must capture the only building you can, the gatehouse. Since ai have all infantry on walls you will suffer heavy casualties when on walls from towers. They say towers dont shoot when no ai units are near but they can be far away still the unstoppable towers machinegun you to death. Sieges are almost too hard. At least we should be able to stop the towers by conquest. This make me autoresolve most sieges.

3. placing units in cities is almost not possible. This is almost like a bug. The game wont allow you to place units around in streets. You can only place them in wide areas. This almost made me stop playing the game.

Ugly
1. I agree with econ21 that the campignmap doesnt look as good as the battlemap.

2. Twiching animations reduces the great feeling.

My bottom line is that even if the game have some problems it is a wonderful game that is a good mix from previous games and also new at the same time. I got blown away and will play it, mod it and enjoy it.

G

[Zatoichi]

3. placing units in cities is almost not possible. This is almost like a bug. The game wont allow you to place units around in streets. You can only place them in wide areas. This almost made me stop playing the game.

G

This can be annoying, but you can use hold down the rght mouse button to stretch the units out to 'fit' on the paved streets - it takes getting used to as there is a buffer zone that wasn't there in RTW. Admittedly, I've had some issues with placing cavalry units where I want them, but 99% of the time I can get them there or thereabouts.

One feature I really like in the new sieges is that routing infantry actually run away off the walls rather than standing there waiting to get whacked! This alone has improved my enjoyment of the game.

I also prefer the new system for towers and the town centre, where it seems to be based on the number of soldiers contesting the area as to who is deemed to be in control.

[Maizel]

Heres my good, bad, ugly

Good

1. Castles and cities gives very interesting strategic implications. If you take a settlement far away with heavy units you will have difficulties retraining G

Just to add to that.

Have you guys noticed that you can't prepare for a siege when you're sieged im a settlement?

[econ21]

so Econ, bottom line is, is STW better or M2TW better so far in your opinion?

STW was never really "my thing" so I am not sure that's a suitable benchmark for me. I've never tried MP - which seems to be the focus of STWs greatest fans. And the SP game had a lot of charm, but was a little too battle-heavy for me. I preferred the variety and freedom of later TW titles.

So far, I'd say M2TW successfully combines many of the best things about MTW and RTW.