Handgunners in Expert difficulty games

[Noir]

Originally posted by History Geek
I think we should either close this discussion or move it to a topic called "expert vs. hard"

Apologies for going so far off topic - it developed rather... unexpectedly.

By the way there are plenty of things to do if you play without the upgrades:
1. Diplomatic dealings (marrying, closing alliances and breaking alliances in order to benefit powergroups that benefit your cause objectives)
2. Subterfuge (assssinations, rebellions, religious dealings etc)
3. Develop your provinces as logistic centers (army production) depending on the layout and objectives of your faction.
4. Develop your economy in the provices and choose, take over and safeguard trade routes and trade partners.
5. Managing the internal power levers of your state. This currently amounts to managing your dynasty and the loyalty of your generals to your kings, that is assuring the right heir gets to the throne and assuring that civil wars don't happen or happen to a good cause.

Parts 4 & 5 i find incredibly fun, although somewhat underdeveloped in TW (especially in the newer games mind you). The game could include more features outside the players control inside his kingdom, and some of them coming to the hand of strict/effective rulers or drifting off the hand of ineffective ones. The Pope is one such force for the catholics, that may turn your own poeple against you if you get excommunicated.

I agree that the game (MTW) should have more strategic options that it currently has - but that's total war: a tactical battle game in a strategic shell. The direction RTW and M2 took it are not examples of extra strategic options BTW IMO. I think that TW has not "evolved" almost at all in these games - just bells and whistles were added, that you can play with but make little difference as strategic options/tools.

Originally Posted by IronSide
So... you regularly use 0 morale (base) spears? Try 5 hobilars vs 4 spearmen outside a forest sometimes.
Or steppe cav vs UM and peasants.

Vanilla spearmen (i mean the unit called spearmen not generally spears) have 0 morale but they often fight with much higher than their base morale due to the general's stars (and other parameters). The problem with spears in MTW is that they get a massive defensive bonus against cavalry (+1/+4) - that makes their confrontation against it one of endurance that they win only if they are not flanked - the 5 hobilars would win as they have ample time to outmaneuver and flank the much slower spears in your example.

You probably also mean that the spearmen break too soon and run - however that shows a flaw in the game design (spears not effective as anti-cavalry) and its irrelevant in the point i try to make above - that is that most units get too high a morale past 30 turns. I can see where you are coming from (small initial morale in some units to compensate for the upgrades), but that isn't working as intended and morale gets anyway too high in the game, all the more so with expert on. Vanilla MTW further complicates the thing by giving a choice of various units that are (no secret) badly balanced - what i like in the Medmod IV is that all factions get at least one decent unit in every role in all periods. Although 0 morale is admittedly low, 2 is relatively ok for the role spears hold in SP, i think.

I agree that "lowly units" have a somewhat too low morale without any upgrades - however as i mentioned is to compensate for the upgrades that will happen inevitably in SP. Its a fair point that lowly units should have a base morale (especially if one fights without upgrades as say in MP) in order to be useful if they play with only it. Spears in MP MTW suffer from a low morale for example - pretty much as you mention and upgrading money is worth spending in swords, that led to the sword cavalry armies dominating.

BTW most other spearmen other than the lower class ones (and two others) in vanilla have a base morale of minimum 2 (that i used for the comparison in the above post) - so the case you are bringing up is rather not the norm.
(https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=31444).

Peasants i do not use at all even in the early days i was playing vanilla so i can't comment on them.

Originally posted by Ironside
Or to put it otherwise, you shouldn't base those modifications on the unmodded game as the morale bonuses are accounted for with too low morale for some units to withstand a cav charge. Would end up as RTW...

No it wouldn't, i think. In RTW the chain routing element and the "losing badly"-kill rates element are too high (my guess) as well as the cavalry charge being essentially unstoppable - but in MTW chain routing well in a campaign is simply not an issue (not a gameplay element) due to the upgrades/command stars with relatively reasonable opposing odds. Units fight well and to high spirits wether they are mutually supported or wether they are not usually. Battles in RTW were designed to be fast in order to catch up with the average attention and click speed associated with a more action oriented a more "fun" notion of the general gaming public and also with the increased amount of battles per campaign that the new pseudo"3D" map was now offering. For example in MTW there are chances to rally your troops once chain routing happens, in RTW there are practically none - the confrontation deteriorates fast one way or the other - a balancing point is hard to find. That's really bad gameplay as you imply (no time for flanking, essentially even no time for match ups - just a set up and a charge - at most a flank attack) - but it doesn't mean that too high morale is the asnwer.

The beauty of battles IMO using the old engine is that there is a range of morale for each unit class/type that produces a combined arms approach (RPS principle) as a necessity: that is units (and teams of units) need to cover each other at all times in order to fight in full potential (no routing) during a battle. Some units need more "covering" and others less, and detachments of units as well as the whole army needs to be taken care of in that respect. However the design of the campaign tilts the balance of the morale scales towards a more arcadish gameplay that units stay to fight with high opposing odds - essentially match ups matter less and combined arms also.

There is more slack if you want in the gameplay - its more forgiving to tactical mistakes that make winning possible by playing less "optimally" in the sense of good combination/coordination (that can be achieved through various battle tactics maneuvers etc) with the units in hand. This is why i am saying that the battle gameplay is not good like this.

There is another repercussion of "expert" though - generally speaking AI factions play more to get the player than be concerned with their situation and rushing in the campaign prevails. That's good and fine initially again, until there are 4 mega-factions and about 20 in the reapperances bin. That also detracts from campaign enjoyment as the only strategy that works is to do the same - kill or be killed. Even making trade routes is becoming somewhat of a chore because AI factions with naval access simply spam boats - the 3 turns boat production rate may as well mean that you may never take over the seas until that faction seizes to exist. The gameplay is unflexible and unicolored with conquest rushing as the best bet. In hard factions play more concerned with their well being, than the destruction of their neighbours and there are more ways to play the game strategically including conquering rushes/sprees.

Hard, has conversely the same weakness: if you rush the AI factions early on, the rest of the campaign is bound to be most likely easy. However if you let the AI factions alone and turtle for 20-30 turns (or even better click on the menu in the mini map and let the AI manage your everything and you just do the moving around and fighting) then you will really get your money back as the AI factions have financial and military substance and they are not dry twigs that snap easily. To put it otherwise rushing comes with a risk regardless if its succesful or not (you become vulnerable during the "consolidating phase") and the gameplay is more enriched as this is not the "single winning recipee" anymore.

Many Thanks

Noir

*edited for clarity and an inaccuracy*