Hello All, and a Major Question

[M_is_D]

Hello all from Portugal! I know I should have introduced myself in the proper forum first, but I was extremely eager to ask this...

Well, ever since I bought the game (M2:TW) I managed to pick up stuff about Campaign and right now I don't consider myself to be as bad as I used to be. However, and you might gasp at this, I always auto resolve my battles. This is because the tutorial thaught me only battle controls and nothing about how to actually fight a battle . Since I have no idea how, I always auto resolve so I won't end up worst than I would if I actually fought them.

What are the basics of fighting a battle and battle strategy? Cuss all you want at my horrible noobness and immaturity

[Odin]

Hello all from Portugal! I know I should have introduced myself in the proper forum first, but I was extremely eager to ask this...

Well, ever since I bought the game (M2:TW) I managed to pick up stuff about Campaign and right now I don't consider myself to be as bad as I used to be. However, and you might gasp at this, I always auto resolve my battles. This is because the tutorial thaught me only battle controls and nothing about how to actually fight a battle . Since I have no idea how, I always auto resolve so I won't end up worst than I would if I actually fought them.

What are the basics of fighting a battle and battle strategy? Cuss all you want at my horrible noobness and immaturity

the real simple answer is use units as designed and you should be okay for the most part. dont charge with archers and dont persue with dismounted armored knights.

Also combat in the totalwar system (against the AI) is normally a matter of using common sense. An archer is better suited to shoot arrows while ontop of a hill. A unit that charges down hill has more momentum, woods provide natural cover for arrows.

Just take a common sense approach to basic command option, and jump in there and take some lumps ! Believe me my first time in STW that I had a bridge battle and saw the AI had 1 unit defending it i sent in all my units and was summarily handed a gruesome defeat !

Dive in !

And welcome to the org.

[Hollerbach]

I would recommend not worrying too much. Maybe play some custome battles to get a feel for things or play a campaign on lower diffuculty settings. The best way to learn is just have a go! You will make mistakes and get beaten at times but you'll learn from your mistakes and improve! That's the luxury of the computer game, if your empire is in ruins just start a new game

Once you've played a few battles you might have some more specific question you can ask here, which should give you better help than a very broad "what the hell do I do?" kind of question

Good luck

[M_is_D]

I would recommend not worrying too much. Maybe play some custome battles to get a feel for things or play a campaign on lower diffuculty settings. The best way to learn is just have a go! You will make mistakes and get beaten at times but you'll learn from your mistakes and improve! That's the luxury of the computer game, if your empire is in ruins just start a new game

Once you've played a few battles you might have some more specific question you can ask here, which should give you better help than a very broad "what the hell do I do?" kind of question

Good luck

Oh, but I have, I've fought both siege and field battles. And sometimes while I had numerical advantage, I would only get a close victory, while I would get a heroic victory if I auto resolved in similar situations. Immediatly I realized I was doing something wrong, so that was why I came for help.

[KARTLOS]

generaly speaking you are more likely to suffer lower losses if you ai a seige when you are attacking (not if you are the defending party). this is becasue the autoresolve doesnt seem to take into accout the walls etc very well and calculates as if it was a field battle - if you have more soldiers you will normally win. there are other issues like for example normally when you are layingh seige it is necessary to kill virtually all the enemy troops as they will retreat to the town square and stop routing. the autoresolve seems to calcualte that the army will rout - so if you look at the losses on each side they are quite low, but when you take a settlement all the enemy troops automatically die.

in field battles however there should not be any advantage to autoresolving. it often results in undesirable outcomes such as losing significant numbers of your top quality soldiers, as oten you just seem to lose a percentage of all your soldiers, when if fought out you wqould ideally not lose too much nights for example.

[vonsch]

Are you playing Portugal? If so, you want to learn to use jinettes. They are mighty fine units once you learn to use them properly. See this guide on mounted missile units for a lot of good info, but focus in on the sections on jinettes especially. In the early going they are simply battle winners, and they remain useful a long time with upgrades. They give you a hit and run force (if you need to inflict casualties out of proportion, then withdraw in strategic defense situations) that is cheap to maintain, can build up a lot of experience and become very powerful, and make great general killer units.

When I play Portugal, I use a few spear units as an anvil line, put a line of archers or crossbows in front or a bit behind, use jinettes to drive the enemy nuts around the flanks and rear, and use my general or some mailed knights as the hammer once the enemy is stuck into my spears. If you have archers (as opposed to crossbows), some aptly timed flaming arrows just before a charge crashes into the enemy unit, can result in an instant rout (and loads of impact casualties from the charge). One of those can trigger a mass rout if it's a good enemy unit. (Routing junk units is less useful, since the better ones turn their noses up at the fleeing riff raff and just soldier on.)

But, I admit, I auto-resolve a lot too. I don't play out many offensive seiges, for example. For some reason my multiple rams tend to get burned up before they reach the gates, though when I auto-resolve, they seem to never fail. And I don't enjoy the assualts on fortifications as much as more open and fluid field battles. I will play defender in a seige though, as I find I can often do better than auto-resolving.

As others have suggested, take a break from the campaign to try some custom battles. If you have a situation that's new to you in the campaign game battle, make notes of the forces and the terrain, save, go set up a similar custom battle and play it a time or seven. You'll find you can do MUCH better than the AI once you get some practice. The AI isn't very good at manipulating morale on the field. Morale is 2/3 the battle. I think the guy who said that campaigned in Portugal too.

Good luck.

E si e portugues, bem vindo!

(now back to killing the French...)

Ooops, I mean to link this thread on horse "archers"

[Hollerbach]

Oh, but I have, I've fought both siege and field battles. And sometimes while I had numerical advantage, I would only get a close victory, while I would get a heroic victory if I auto resolved in similar situations. Immediatly I realized I was doing something wrong, so that was why I came for help.

I think this might be your problem, don't base how well you do in a battle by comparing what you can do to the auto-resolve! It's very unpredictable and gives some odd results at best. The only battles I auto-resolve are when I can't be bothered crushing yet another badly outnumered band of rebel peasants. The auto-calc seems to do pretty well for these battles, often losing less troops than I would have (though that's not why I auto-calc, these types of battles becoming boring very quickly) but I don't take that to mean I'm a poor general, just that the auto-calc code isn't perfect (and why would you expect it to be?).

As I say, battle more, worry less and you'll be fine

[Erik Bloodaxe]

I think Auto resolving battles really removes a huge part of this beatifull game mate, no matter how bad you may think you are, practise makes perfect=) Just make sure you only fight when you are sure you'll win and when you outnumber your enemy in the beginning=)

[Philippe]

M is D, I envy you your predicament. My biggest worry about the game system is that I lose so few.

I myself have a ghastly suspicion that auto-resolving battles probably gives a more "realistic" result, whatever "realistic" means in the context of a TW game.

Part of the fun of the game system is learning the best way to handle any particular unit on a battlefield. And one of the nice things about the campaign game is that you don't start out with very many types of units, so learning how the inter-relate (or don't) won't be all that complicated.

I've never worried much about what the game characterizes as the extent of my victories. I care much more about what the consequences of that victory are in terms of my overall campaign. I'm usually much more concerned with making sure that the enemy army disbands at the end of the battle, or that one or more of my units got some battle experience, than with the adjective the battle attaches to my win. For all I know this aspect of the game (heroic vs. non-heroic nomenclature) is totally bugged, and I couldn't care less. The little crossed swords on the map are fun to look at, but I'm usually more interested in knowing that I deflected that horde of Huns that was bent on sacking Constantinople, and they're now headed for the Dalmatian coast.

Maybe if you described one of your battles you could compare notes on how other people would have fought it. Your basic question is pretty vast and reads a bit like an invitation to re-write Sun Tsu.

[vonsch]

For all I know this aspect of the game (heroic vs. non-heroic nomenclature) is totally bugged, and I couldn't care less. The little crossed swords on the map are fun to look at, but I'm usually more interested in knowing that I deflected that horde of Huns that was bent on sacking Constantinople, and they're now headed for the Dalmatian coast.

I now think it IS bugged. I just can't see a clear pattern in what's a clear, crushing or heroic victory. And I see about 20 clear victories for one of anything else. I sent a general with 19 men (20 total) against a spear unit with 75 (76 with the captain). I lost 1 man, killed 72. "Clear victory." In RTW or MTW that would be at least crushing. Either it's not based on numerical proportions as in the prior games, or it's bugged. If it's based on proportionate "strength" as judged on the pre-battle screen, it's still weird.

That said, I got all the heroic victories I've seen so far as the Russians. That seems similar to RTW where horse archer-based armies saw more high-end victories. That is, with land battles. For whatever reason (or lack thereof!) I went three for three in naval battles in the Baltic that same game start. Three heroic victories, that is. And in those cases the power bar was way against me, so maybe that is the key. I think it may have been in one of the border slaughters of Poles too.

Maybe forcing the enemy to disband plays in too. Not sure that I did in the great Pole extermination though. I think some of their horse archers got away.

I went back and tried RTW again to see if I was remembering wrong. Three heroic victories later I decided I was not. That was in about 10 battles. A few more were crushing. There is something different in play.

Probably a bug.

Oh, and I mostly agree on it doesn't matter much. Except when I need new generals badly. I
m getting better at avoiding that need. Good breeding will show!

[dismal]

I now think it IS bugged. I just can't see a clear pattern in what's a clear, crushing or heroic victory. And I see about 20 clear victories for one of anything else. I sent a general with 19 men (20 total) against a spear unit with 75 (76 with the captain). I lost 1 man, killed 72. "Clear victory." In RTW or MTW that would be at least crushing. Either it's not based on numerical proportions as in the prior games, or it's bugged. If it's based on proportionate "strength" as judged on the pre-battle screen, it's still weird.

We had a long thread on "Heroic" victories back in the RTW forum.

If I had to guess, I think Heroic's require all of the following:

1) Troop strength is worse than 1:1
2) You kill a high percentage of enemies killed (>75%?)
3) You have a low% of your army killed (<75%?)

If you score an amazing victory against incredible odds but most of your troops are killed you will get a close victory.

I'm not sure of the exact numbers, but I think you'll find these 3 things are a pretty good predictor of Heroic victories.

Edit: Horse Archers get lots of Heroic Victories because the BattleOdds calculator doesn't give them nearly enough credit. You'll routinely be rated the underdog against armies you can kill in your sleep.

[vonsch]

We had a long thread on "Heroic" victories back in the RTW forum.

If I had to guess, I think Heroic's require all of the following:

1) Troop strength is worse than 1:1
2) You kill a high percentage of enemies killed (>75%?)
3) You have a low% of your army killed (<75%?)

If you score an amazing victory against incredible odds but most of your troops are killed you will get a close victory.

I'm not sure of the exact numbers, but I think you'll find these 3 things are a pretty good predictor of Heroic victories.

Edit: Horse Archers get lots of Heroic Victories because the BattleOdds calculator doesn't give them nearly enough credit. You'll routinely be rated the underdog against armies you can kill in your sleep.

Yeah, that's how I was assuming it works. That pattern isn't holding here. I routinely have those sorts of victories and they result in nothing more than "clear victory" in most cases.

You'll note the one I described meets those criteria easily. 1:3 odds, 95% of enemies dead, 1 trooper (under 5%) lost: clear victory.

There may be a minimum number of troops involved restriction on heroic victories. But I still don't see how this one is a plain "clear victory." It should at least be a "crushing victory."

[dismal]

Yeah, that's how I was assuming it works. That pattern isn't holding here. I routinely have those sorts of victories and they result in nothing more than "clear victory" in most cases.

You'll note the one I described meets those criteria easily. 1:3 odds, 95% of enemies dead, 1 trooper (under 5%) lost: clear victory.

There may be a minimum number of troops involved restriction on heroic victories. But I still don't see how this one is a plain "clear victory." It should at least be a "crushing victory."

BattleOdds is not the ratio of troops. It's the strength ratio you will be quoted in the screen before you go into the battle.

In the case of a general versus a spear militia the odds I believe the odds will be strongly in your favor.

[HoreTore]

Had a fight against a crusade army outside Constantinople about a couple of hours ago, and got a heroic victory.

Now, I don't remember the pre-battle odds, but I sincerely doubt they were less than 1:1, as the enemy were pretty much the same as all the other crusade stacks I've whacked, and they've all had odds of 2:1 or 5:2 in my favour. My army is completely the same as it has been against all of the others. This one was a milanese one, and so had italian milita and pavise crossbowmen in addition to all the normal crusader units, so it may be rated a bit higher, but I doubt it would have been much.

The results were 90% kills, and 45% losses. Now, the thing is, they didn't break until I had killed 80% of them. I think that was the reason why I got a heroic victory, the game may only count enemies actually killed, not the ones captured.

Regarding the small battles were you kill say 100 troops and lose only a couple, I think there is a minimum number of soldiers on the field to be able to get a heroic victory...

There is absolutely no evidence to back up the claim that this part of the system is bugged, as we don't know how it works...If we did, we would find out wether it is bugged or not.

On the "famous battles"-thingy, I wish they would be awarded when you've lost a LOT of soldiers in a big battle, like 60%+ with more than 1000 troops. Those battles are the ones you'll remember, you'll be proud of, and you'll want to remember...