New player questions about MTW

[ArtistofWarfare]

Well diplomacy is *always* an issue in the Total War games, so it really depends on what you mean by that question. Diplomacy in MTW is fairly simplistic when compared to Rome and Medieval 2, but it's still more elaborate than in Shogun.

MTW has princesses, which you can have alliances-via-marriage. It also opens up the possibility of being able to claim lands from a faction that dies out and/or fractures into civil war, which is always interesting.

In addition, Catholic factions must deal with the Pope. And love him or hate him (usually the latter ), he can be -- and often is -- a major factor in the game's political-diplomatic arena.

Yeah, it's basically "pick your poison" in regards to diplomacy in Total War games.

MTW had it's own set of problems...same with RTW, and so it goes with M2TW...Empires will no doubt have it's fair share of issues.

That said however, I personally really always did regard MTW:VI diplomacy as...well, maybe not the "best" as I don't really know how that title would be assigned, but my favorite.

All of the complexities of diplomatic strategy are in place...and they tend to matter more in MTW than any fellowing editions of the game (read in my thread from September "Original MTW Lives On!!"...regarding coalitions and superpower alliances). Yet still, the diplomacy is extremely straightforward: Allied, at war, neutral.

From what I've heard from some people who play M2TW like 5 hours a day on average since the holidays, a newly patched/expanded M2TW has now reached the point of easily having the most in depth/least fickle diplomacy yet in a Total War game. Still though, for every new layer of depth it adds, that's only one more layer of problems that do occasionally surface.

Bottom line though- I don't think you'll have any glaring issues with the diplomacy. The simplistic nature of it in MTW can be rather deceiving...as this only leads to a higher level of importance being placed on the diplomatic decisions you do make. Example: You want to "make nice" with the Almohads so you try to form an alliance. If you are doing this to avert war, you really need them to accept that alliance. You can't simply gift them with money and hope this makes them happy, you need to form a full blown alliance or keep relations at entirely neutral (or less than neutral if things were already going down hill, so to speak).

Either way, welcome to Medieval: Total War. From what you've written, I'm almost positive you'll enjoy the game tremendously. This forum is unbelievably active and helpful for a game this dated (probably more so than any other game 5+ years old at this point...really) so certainly don't hesitate to make it a regular stop for yourself on the internet. It's always worth it. Additionally, if you have a high level of interest in warfare in general, or even just specifically pre-modern warfare...I don't think you'll find a better group of people to chat with on the web. Just check out the new battle strategies thread put up here in the past week or so and you'll see what I mean.

Welcome...