Going to war is like taking a walk

[Patriote]

The thing I dislike the most about the TW series is the fact that players or factions can go to war any time they want. This isn't just realistic or possible and extremely frustrating to have cities being sieged turn after turn by an "army" of 2-3 depleted unit of the enemy.
It usually took a long time (depending on the situation and nation) to assemble armies, collect the required food and equipment, send emissaries when needed and prepare war plans.

I remember that in either STW or MTW you were sometimes informed that this or this nation is preparing for an offensive at spring or that kind of information (although not always true, which is just normal) by sending a spy at one of the enemy province on the strategic map while you could build watch towers and border forts (giving you both information about neighboring provinces such as troops and buildings as well as giving you protection as hidden agents)

Also, in MTW, players could, if the Pope did not call for a Crusade, if playing catholic factions, "build" crusade counters costing money and then send it to war like in M2TM but with some differences.

Here's my question (after a lot of talking I know ) would it be possible, with the M2TW engine and the modifications we can do to it, to mod something what would represent military preparations of a nation for war (meaning time, money and information it gives to the enemy) in the form of "crusades" ? Either MTW or M2TW crusades

And to make "war counters = crusades" preferable if not required, maybe units basic movement could be reduced or movement penalties could be given if units are moving in enemy territories and are not part of a war counter or whatever possible others possible rules to simulate military campaigns.

So here's my idea so feel free to comment it whatever it is possible or not to implement it.

Thx

[Centurio Nixalsverdrus]

Preparing for war already takes longer in EB than in reality in my opinion. For example, marching speed is much slower, mostly due to AI-dumbness and inability to make proper moves. Then you can only train one unit at the same time, so building an army takes you some turns. Forts, watchtowers, spies and diplomats exist too, so where is the problem? I mean, why do you need an advise "Nation X is preparing for war"? If you have a spy in place, and see a couple of full stacks crossing the border, you'll most likely notice the present danger of war.

As to collecting foods: Due to the fact that there were no freezers, food couldn't be kept well and so, the foraging had to be done underway.

War plans: What do generals do in times of peace? It's not that you sit around, doing nothing and then suddenly somebody has an idea and says "Hey, why not go to war with nation X? Marcus, you collect the food; Decimus, you make the plan; Gnaeus, you go and take a look if these pointy things are still in the magazine..."

So I quite don't understand, sorry. It already costs time, (lots of) money, and brain activity to prepare for war.

[Patriote]

Of course, EB, compare to Vanilla RTW, did a great step in improvement that but do not forget that it is possible to recruit 2 or 3 units at the same time in M2TW without calculating the mercenaries available. This will reduce by a lot the time required to create armies. If you ever played Egypt in M2TW and saw the emerging of the Mongols, you know for sure what is it to see 5-6 full stacks of troops, including some of the best cavalry in the world appearing in your territory. IT MEANS that mass production of troops must begin and you can't stop until you're defeated or the enemy is (at least you think he is until 5-6 new stacks arrive on your lands again)

A lot of people have complained about the AS sending stacks after stacks of troops turn after turn(named the Grey Death because of that) War in the Antiquity, as far as I know , was not like modern war, well at least not as close for sure, where you could churn out weapons and men and keep sending them at the enemy (like the Russians during WW2) until victory is attained. But the problem is not the players I'm pretty sure, but rather the AI although I don't know how he would react to my idea. Would he use or not the war counters if it would be possible to implement them.

As for the examples I gave, I think you took them too straightforwardly but your part about the "war plans" was funny I agree with you that TW level of simulation is above having players do the preparations by himself so building a war counter would easily replicate that . However, this wasn't my main idea at first but I think that would be that, if you have a good spying network (either in the enemy capital or the big city near the frontier) players could be informed about the intentions of the enemy and so would be able to deploy their armies in the field, set ambushes and build forts, semi-permanent or cheap ones before the enemy invades instead of having to learn that one of your city is under siege. As for the others examples I gave, well yes food was taken with moving armies although that's true, they do relied a lot of acquiring more of it while moving especially foraging for horses. However, carts and animals to pull them, arrows, javelins and etc were all kind of equipment that were needed and had to be made or buy then distributed.

Just like you said yourself, military campaigns are not like: "Hey, why not go to war with nation X?" Hey, Great idea! Charge! Even armies with troops already fully trained and equipped had a great deal of preparations to do before launch any military operation or campaign.

That what was my idea was all about, avoiding the AI to have a tons of "armies" with 2-3 units going everywhere all the time, besieging your cities, stopping the recruitment and construction in this city (although it could be a good idea to detach some units from the main army "mean the war counter) once inside the enemy territory depending on the situation: besieging a weakly defended city instead of using the whole army, assuring supply lines to not be disrupted, acting as rearguard defense, etc) That was the main goal of my idea, just like people preferring to always use family members instead of captains, as for the role-playing of the game. I just tried coming up with some ideas for that. However, I don't know if some or any of my ideas would be doable

Anyways, thanks for your time writing me back

[Ritterlichvon86]

The AI should only want to leave their own soil if their stack is at least 10 units or of a certain strength.
If it goes less than that, it shall stay in homelands or retreat to its homelands if in enemy territory.
That way you won't have bogus armies trying to siege alexandria and its 7 stack army of the same size within.

Playing mtw 2 camptaigns in hotseat modus I realised that all human players generally act that way. Why not the AI ?

[Patriote]

Sorry I really cannot help you about your question, I do not even know what is hotseat modus anways

But I sure like what you say, that there should be a minimum number of units required to besieged and then assault cities. That number could change depending on the level of the walls of each city. It does make sense because during the seconde punic war, Hannibal remained undefeated in the fields by the Romans for like 18 years but still, he never managed nor tried to besiege Roma.

I do not know if this could be done but that could be a cool idea.

Anyways, just doing some brainstorming here, I will come up a list of ideas hoping that they might inspire more ideas from you guys.

P.S. I think I was wrong when I said that Ancient warfar was not like Modern Warfare about churning out men and weapons.

War in the Antiquity, as far as I know , was not like modern war, well at least not as close for sure, where you could churn out weapons and men and keep sending them at the enemy (like the Russians during WW2) until victory is attained

I read something over the internet concerning that and warfare in general and I though it was great quality.

Here a quote:

The military revolution of the Iron Age qualitatively increased the combat capabilities of ancient armies to levels never seen before in human history. Yet, what distinguishes modern warfare from ancient warfare is more than its level of military capability and destructive power. The key defining element of modern war is strategic endurance, and this quality is a function of the total integration of the social, economic, and political resources of the state in support of military operations. After the fall of Rome it was not until the Civil War (1860-65) that the West once again began to fight wars requiring the total integration of all social resources in support of the combat armies in the field. Quite naturally, the various elements of the supporting strategic infrastructure became necessary targets of military attack. Thus, the battles of the Civil War were won and lost as much in the factories and on the farms as on the battlefields themselves. The emergence of this level of warfare in the 19th century was not new. Total war had been a major defining characteristic of armies of the Iron Age more than two thousand years earlier.

at:
http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/...z/gabr0011.htm

and here's the link for the main page:
http://www.au.af.mil/au/awc/awcgate/...z/gabr0001.htm

So maybe you guys could also give me your opinion about all the information written in this study, thanks again, this time for educating me

[MRY6]

Going to war IS like taking a walk...a walk through Jurassic Park that is.

[Patriote]

what do you mean ?

[Ritterlichvon86]

That means totally awesome dinosaurs will come and chew you up

[Patriote]

Wathever... maybe my title was not the best choice for what I meant but at least, I am trying to come up with ideas to improve the future EB2

By the way, I've always wonder how come it is possible that fleets' admiral gets traits and retinues but not captains, could some modding be made to used converted admiral as captains, which could then have skills? It is possible or not ?

Just let me know

[Hooahguy]

when i gear up for war, i make the stacks, then hold them in reserve until i know exactly what my enemies are up to. for example, i had 3 stacks prepared to attack the Avernii, but when my spies saw 6 full stacks of Sweboz coming my way, i turned them towards my northern border, but kept one in reserve if any gallic armies came my way. i also started making another stack ASAP to deal with the sweboz. so when i go to war, it takes me at least 8 turns, if not more.
so if you play wisely, it does take a while.

[Patriote]

yes you're right about the time frame to raise armies, although M2TW allows even more troops to be recruited at the same time, with some tweakins about elite units and recruitment pool, that will give a great result.

Anyways, I prefer Ritterlichvon86's idea over mine, about setting (if it is possible) a minimal number of soldiers to besiege a town, depending the fortifications. Thus, small marauding armies would be unable to disrupt huge towns and only really big military expeditions would be able to conquer.

I know that reply a lot, it's just that I am doing other work on my computer and I check the forum from time to time. I just like debating ideas and finding new ones. Hope this is going to help in the end.

cheers

[WImPyTjeH]

Got a question: I may have missed this is EB 8.x so it may not belong here, but how does the AI 'handle' the rationing system (traits) ?

W

[Foot]

AFAIK, they don't get the traits. We hate the AI losing morale as it is.

EDIT: Oh, and this is for EB on the MTW2 engine. I imagine it will be a similar system, but these types of questions are better posted in the main EB forum, ie EB for RTW.

Foot

[Ludens]

AFAIK, they don't get the traits. We hate the AI losing morale as it is.

They do, actually. In my Casse campaign the Balroa stack in Cassemorg went to starving because they refused to move to rebel territory. Glad it did, though, because I had trouble enough routing them.

[Patriote]

The logistic aspect is a great idea and also highly realistic and historical. Having read, Supplying War, a book from Martin Van Creveld, I can tell that the system you've incorporated in the game(within the limitations of the game engine) is really close to what reality was concerning logistics for ancient and medieval armies. Armies were able to bring some supplies with them and get some more from their homeland but ultimately were forced, as they went deeper and deeper into enemy, to live on the country. So having stacks resupplying themselves when they devastate a tile, when they pillage a town or when they get back in friendly territories is really realistic.

I'm simple curious to know, is it to possible for an army to stay on the same spot and keep on resupplying itself even though the tile has already been devastated?? Also, what is the most severe penalty a stack may receive if it stays for a really long time without supplies ?? Because so far, of what I have seen, the only penalties I saw were moral penalty, is there like famine and disease penalties included already or planned for EB2 ??

[Foot]

We can only do what the engine allows us. We cannot put famine or disease on a army at all. The best we can do is a morale penalty. AFAIK, this applies in MTW2 as well.

Foot

[Patriote]

OK geez.... Yeah that's true, armies have never been affected by plagues, if one of your cities has plague, just move all none required troops outside the city.

Then what about armies reaching a certain level of out of supplies reaching starvation would begin to suffer from desertion (such as a crusade) or if that could be done, suffer attrition damages just as the besieged army.

Well, has EB developer team though about anything that could make siege warfare more realistic ??? Would be nice to know your ideas, thx

[Centurio Nixalsverdrus]

Could it be possible to remove soldiers from a unit that, say, ends its turn in a desert? Or in a snowy area of the north in winter? That would be cool.

[Patriote]

Yeah like during that "legendary" walk when Alexander ther Great had his army coming back from India (grosso modo) by taking a "shortcut" (to make a long story short) through the desert and lost a handful of men. I guess that more soldiers have been lost because of non-combat casualties in the history than to combat casualties (if not, then it must be very close)

So if you be realistic if something could be done about that.

[Ludens]

Yeah like during that "legendary" walk when Alexander ther Great had his army coming back from India (grosso modo) by taking a "shortcut" (to make a long story short) through the desert and lost a handful of men. I guess that more soldiers have been lost because of non-combat casualties in the history than to combat casualties (if not, then it must be very close)

So if you be realistic if something could be done about that.

Realistic, indeed (and it was certainly not unknown for an army to lose more men to disease than to enemy action), but it's impossible in R:TW, and probably impossible in M2:TW as well.

[I Am Herenow]

Besides, guys, this is meant to be a game - however educational - and I think there will come a point where you stack on too much micromanagement and rules and such, and it simply won't be fun to play if one third of your army randomly dies every turn. Moreover, no matter how nice features like settlement assimilation, complex traits and logistics are, the Total War games are, at the end of the day, about watching loads of little men kill each other. And if you could only get to the epic battle you want three times out of ten, well, where would be the fun in that?

[Patriote]

Then you might as well go play any RTS such as Starcraft, Warcraft and that kind of game, where you can create a lot of units and have "epic" battles why without having to care for logistic, assimilation of wathever or traits acquired by characters (if there's any anyways) To me, TW is meant to replicate history and past battles as closely as possible to the reality of the past. If I can move my armies without end in the desert and snow, conquer 20 cities with them and carve out an empire even bigger then the one of Alexander the Great without breaking a sweat, what's the fun into that?

P.S. I think most people are trying to avoid micromanagement anyways and have rules, simple rules, easy to learn and apply that would well simulate a lot of realities missing from most vanille TWs.

[blank]

Then you might as well go play any RTS such as Starcraft, Warcraft and that kind of game, where you can create a lot of units and have "epic" battles why without having to care for logistic, assimilation of wathever or traits acquired by characters (if there's any anyways) To me, TW is meant to replicate history and past battles as closely as possible to the reality of the past. If I can move my armies without end in the desert and snow, conquer 20 cities with them and carve out an empire even bigger then the one of Alexander the Great without breaking a sweat, what's the fun into that?

P.S. I think most people are trying to avoid micromanagement anyways and have rules, simple rules, easy to learn and apply that would well simulate a lot of realities missing from most vanille TWs.

RTS games are actually very far from epic, since even with a big army you'd have about 10 big guys beating each other

[mrdun]

You all have a point but all what you are saying, Patriote would make CA lose many fans (the Casual Gamer section) who want a kind of realistic game but TW already has famines, plagues, earthquakes etc which are pretty annoying enough with out for example being egypt and having all your troops snuff it in the heat before they can get to the next settlement to actually invade someone, what you are proposing would make to game FAR too complex, what you started off saing, about preparing for war was a good idea but even that had gone a step too far, design your own game for gods sakes and stop trying to ruin TW for your own gain.

[bovi]

Ruin TW for his gain ? He's got different views than you on what makes a good strategy game, that's all. He's not "ruining" TW for you, he's not even addressing CA, but EB, which already has made the game a lot more complex. I'd prefer to have attrition myself if it was possible. You're right that casual gamers may be put off by realistic management, but EB doesn't have to cater to that group.

[Zarax]

Well, AOR alone puts a big strain on logistics, sending back armies to retrain can be a serious pain...
I once devised a system where you could have all units available from the start but with extreme recruiting time.
Barracks and smiths wouldn't give bonuses but rather reduce training time and cost.

While it worked in reducing somewhat number of battles and limiting elites it also gave the player an unfair advantage since retrainig takes always the same time and AI doesn't do it...

[Patriote]

Thanks for coming at my defense Bovi

I laughed a lot when I saw this accusation of "ruining" TW. I am simply trying to come up with ideas (although most are impossible to implement because of the game engine) to improve CA games indirectly and also EB.

You are absolutely right when you said that different people have different views on what do a great strategy game and I am always looking for games which are as close as possible to reality. I when people ask me what kind of games I liked and then got replied after saying war games: oh like Medal of Honor...

I have an old DOS game named Stalingrad from World at War series, which has a unbelievable game engine to represent the "reality" of WW2. A lot of "realities" of the war have been included in the game such as logistic(both supply lines and units' remaining stock) disorganization, fatigue, weather, temperature, strategic and tactical move rate and a lot more forcing players to use their forces wisely and keeping all those factors in mind although every thing is managed by the computer (General Staff) although the player is able to "delegate" some duties to his Staff (like planning air and artillery strikes, ground attacks and moves, setting the level of supply level depending on the tonnage available) One weakness of the game, besides ugly DOS graphic and music, is the lack of control over huge formations (having the give orders to every battalions and regiments in the whole battle of Stalingrad is a daunting task!) forcing players to do a lot of micromanagement. That's where new game engines come in and help us about that !

If they could do all with a DOS game, I don't see why they would be unable to do it nowadays technologies. So, I think that if CA and/or Sega were willing, they could do great games which could incorporate options allowing players to customize the level of realism they want in their game (such as the latest game of Battlefront, Combat Mission: Shock Force)

[Phoenician Soldier]

Since EB is practically perfect in every way I don't think I have much to add to this conversation. I would however like to see supplies implemented properly either in EB2 or in the next TW game.

I think the present situation is ridiculous in that armies can march as far as they want for as long as they want with very little draw backs.

At least in EB you don't have the crusades being used as a bread basket with 1 army decimating the middle east for 50 turns making millions of gold and totally propping up your economy.

I really do want to see something put in place that stops armies being able to wander willy nilly through ememy territory and sit there for 20 years doing nothing without suffering desertion and starvation.

I would also like to see money being made by destroying armies and capturing supply trains like it would happen in reality. Also, having treasury cities might be a good idea with some cities in your empire being designated as storing large amounts of money for the treasury, making capturing them a priority for your enemies.

My ultimate incarnation of TW would be when we can have 100,000+ men on the screen, supply trains for every army reaching from designated cities, proper diplomacy where the computer actually sues for peace when he has lost the war, lucid sea battles on the battle map and being able to pick your battle ground in advance of battle i.e. being able to zoom right in and pick a location for any battle to be fought by a specific army that turn.

Anyway, this is not achievable by the community and we will have to wait for CA to see the light :).

In the meantime EB has kept me playing TW longer than any other incarnation, it's difficult, beautiful, wonderfully strategic and consistantly challanging as well as being amazingly historically detailed.

Keep up the good work.

[KuKulzA]

Since EB is practically perfect in every way I don't think I have much to add to this conversation. I would however like to see supplies implemented properly either in EB2 or in the next TW game.

I think the present situation is ridiculous in that armies can march as far as they want for as long as they want with very little draw backs.

At least in EB you don't have the crusades being used as a bread basket with 1 army decimating the middle east for 50 turns making millions of gold and totally propping up your economy.

I really do want to see something put in place that stops armies being able to wander willy nilly through ememy territory and sit there for 20 years doing nothing without suffering desertion and starvation.

I would also like to see money being made by destroying armies and capturing supply trains like it would happen in reality. Also, having treasury cities might be a good idea with some cities in your empire being designated as storing large amounts of money for the treasury, making capturing them a priority for your enemies.

My ultimate incarnation of TW would be when we can have 100,000+ men on the screen, supply trains for every army reaching from designated cities, proper diplomacy where the computer actually sues for peace when he has lost the war, lucid sea battles on the battle map and being able to pick your battle ground in advance of battle i.e. being able to zoom right in and pick a location for any battle to be fought by a specific army that turn.

Anyway, this is not achievable by the community and we will have to wait for CA to see the light :).

In the meantime EB has kept me playing TW longer than any other incarnation, it's difficult, beautiful, wonderfully strategic and consistantly challanging as well as being amazingly historically detailed.

Keep up the good work.

well said

how long is a turn in M2TW?
if you have a governor of a city... commanding his noblemen to gather their elite troops, his local militia to assemble, and his own cavalry to train... you can easily have several groups of soldiers trained in half a year. It is unrealistic that you CANNOT train more than one group of soldiers in a city in that time. However I recognize your concerns... i do not have any real suggestions for how to deal with the prospect of a faction pumping out soldiers like ants and overruning others because they can train and not worry about supplying their supper stacked armies...

perhaps we should make upkeep a fluid thing?

the closer the unit is to home, the upkeep will be minimal, add a little for every province further away the unit is... so say you are Saka Rauka, and you have a Early Saka nobles unit. It has an upkeep of 400 within Saka territory... but this changes to 420 when you go to Marakanda. Then when you go to Nisa it is 440... etc.
Just a thought... it'd take more money to supply an army far away from a controlled region right?

[fluffyunbound]

I think that some sort of logistics system adds to the game.

If it can be implemented in a way that doesn't require a lot of micromanagement.

EB1 had a nice little "touch" of logistics.

Before the modern era, there were lines of advance where an army could be supported by forage and lines of advance where an army couldn't be supported by forage. This was a big part of grand strategy, because it created choke points. If only it was possible, a terrain modifier attritting your forces if you went "off the beaten path" would probably be the simplest, least micromanagement prone, and most effective way of representing ancient era logistics.