Has anything really changed from CA?

[Owen Glyndwr]

The diplomacy can certainly use some improvement, but I still think it's a great deal better than in RTW and M2TW. Contrary to the OP's statements, I tend to be able to get peace treaties from many AI nations. Sure, many of them declare war again a few turns later if they are still adjacent to you, but peace is certainly possible at least for short periods.

I think one of biggest problems isn't that the AI declares war too often, it's that it declares war at the wrong times. I'm currently playing an Austria game, which is very different from my previous post-1.2 games due to a total lack of trade income. At the start I was only able to afford about 1 army stack and I had a devil of a time fending off Poland. If ANY other nation had declared war on me, I would have been in serious trouble. No other nation did however. I was able to finish off Poland and consolidate my position shortly before the Ottomans declared war on me. If the Ottomans had declared war while I was still invovled with Poland, they could have wrecked me. Instead, I am able to beat them by focusing on them alone.

Europa Universalis 3 deals with this situation very well IMO. In that game, the more wars a nation is involved in, the more likely that other nations that dislike them will declare war on them as well. It's a typical human strategy that works well: strike when your enemy is pre-occupied elsewhere. CA needs some kind of coding like this.

Yes definitely. You also see dogpiles like that in the Civ 4 games. Where one nation would be put under by 1 or two civs, and all of a sudden it was a 5 on 1 venture.

What I would love to see is diplomacy AI which works more like Civ 4. It looks like CA made some attempts to make their diplomacy more like this (With the "friend o meter" and the ability to immediately open negotiations). However it sounds to me like the AI in Civ 4 acts more logically. Sure there are certain leaders such as Shaka and Monty who are often perfectly sporadic, but there are other who make perfect sense (Such as Isabella, who can be your best friend if you share religions, and your worst enemy if you don't). The funny thing about Civ 4, actually, is the human player is the one who ends up looking more like the AI from this game (They develop a long standing relationship with someone and then just up and betray them out of the blue with no warning). Also in Civ 4 there are certain signs that a civ is about to go to war (The We Have Enough on Our Hands Right Now note in the diplo screen tells the player right away that that civ is preparing for war, and to start checking the relations screens to see if it might be them).

Sure a lot of people say that the game is more interesting when the AI is "unpredictable", but unpredictability does not equal humanlike. Ever since I started with R: TW, all I've really ever wanted to see is allies who I can feel somewhat emotionally connected to, all I get is factions which I may try to befriend now, but just know that someday they are going to attack me, and I will have to kill them (Kind of like the feeling in all those zombie movies where the protagonist's best friend/girlfriend/mother gets bitten, and they know that they will turn eventually...)

Sorry for the long rant, I hope at least some of it makes sense to someone...


*EDIT* Also in Civ4, I really like the fact that going to war is no laughing matter. Your economy (Military upkeep), and city happiness (War Weariness) take such a big hit from the declaration itself that the player really has to consider the options, and figure out, not just if he can win, but if he'll be able to deal with the implications of winning (higher upkeep, changed political status, science affected) It's really neat actually, I'd love to see things from Civ4 implemented in these games (But with the neato battles, and minus all the complicated micromanaging and math...)

[Didz]

I agree Owen. There are so many games on the market that do the diplomacy thing better, you would have thought CA would have been spoilt for choice on which system to adopt. Instead they seem to have opted for no system at all, which is really 'dumb'.

[Mooks]

I played RTW, MTW, and Shogun for 50+ hours on each indivisual game. I stopped playing RTW because it felt like I beating up a bunch of retards. Until threads like this turn into threads saying how hard the AI is to beat (something that did happen on MTW and Shogun, less so on Rome) im never buying a TW title again. My hope is by 2015 the AI will be competent, then that will make for a kickass game.

[Dayve]

Ah, what i wouldn't give for this game to have the AI quality that MTW had 10 years before it. The AI in MTW may not necessarily have been any better than this game, and I've said this before, but it had the illusion of being smarter due to the way the map was laid out and the emptyness of the map. Each province had one thing in it, a city, and there was only one aim, to conquer it, and damnit the AI knew how many troops you had in any given province, and would NOT move troops in unless it outnumbered you and had a good chance of winning. It also knew to wait and attack on a weak front, and it knew how to use its victories and keep up the momentum.

[GFX707]

Here is a perfect example of one of the big problems, the suicidal AI, from my current game.



They have no allies, they are feeble and destitute, I am terrifying and spectacular. They are already at war with many countries, I am not. So obviously the perfect climate for a fresh campaign!

[AussieGiant]

That's pretty funny commentary GFX707. Made me laugh.

[Didz]

Just reload from the Autosave and it will probably go away. You don't have to accept this sort of crap.

[Owen Glyndwr]

Here is a perfect example of one of the big problems, the suicidal AI, from my current game.



They have no allies, they are feeble and destitute, I am terrifying and spectacular. They are already at war with many countries, I am not. So obviously the perfect climate for a fresh campaign!

lol, my reply? "So be it"

[GFX707]

After playing a little while in 1.3, I have come to the conclusion that ETW is now becoming more like M2TW with every patch, i.e in 1.0 the AI countries were "Passive" but they would at least accept peace. Now in 1.3 everyone you have a border with declares war on you no matter how weak they are compared to you and will never accept a peace deal no matter how badly you are beating them, stubbornly refusing to accept peace even when you are sieging their last province. It looks like we are back to the M2TW cycle of everyone around you taking turns using the player as a means of suicide.

So, in essence, with every patch the game is moving backwards. I wouldn't be surprised to see the troops wearing plate armour and using arquebuses in 1.4.

[Barkhorn1x]

Here is a perfect example of one of the big problems, the suicidal AI, from my current game.

They have no allies, they are feeble and destitute, I am terrifying and spectacular. They are already at war with many countries, I am not. So obviously the perfect climate for a fresh campaign!

Yes, that makes no sense. The strat AI is hopeless on the army assembly level as well. What is with the numerous 1,2 unit captain commanded stacks always milling about, going to and fro' but getting nowhere? Why can't the strat AI be programmed to group units into high count stacks under generals, much like a human playwer would?

I am playing as Prussia and I took West Prussia from Poland, followed by the inevitable DoW from Poland, Saxony and Courland. Then I took Warsaw a few years later. And the Poles just mill about in low count stacks at the periphery waiting for me to crush them. What has saved them - up to now -is my deliberate style of play and the taming of the Polish province, which takes some time. But, guess what? I now have that province well in hand and am almost done absorbing Saxony - and then it is party time in Eastern Europe and I doubt that the Poles can do anything to stop me as spread out as they are.

Finally - what is not debatable is that the game was released half finished. And while the support has been very good to date the AI (pick ANY level) is just not that good. And promises were indeed made that THIS TIME it would be different. Sorry, nope.

[Yun Dog]

(Such as Isabella, who can be your best friend if you share religions, and your worst enemy if you don't).

(Kind of like the feeling in all those zombie movies where the protagonist's best friend/girlfriend/mother gets bitten, and they know that they will turn eventually...)

Sorry for the long rant, I hope at least some of it makes sense to someone...

Dont trust Isabella man!!! that stabs you in the back

perfect sense

good post

[resonantblue]

The sense of entitlement is obscene. You bought the game. You were not forced to buy the game. You bought the game knowing full well that in every TW game they promise the AI will be better (which it is), but fails to meet your expectations.

Seriously, if you take one step back and look at what you're doing it's a self-written comedy.

[nafod]

The sense of entitlement is obscene. You bought the game. You were not forced to buy the game. You bought the game knowing full well that in every TW game they promise the AI will be better (which it is), but fails to meet your expectations.

Seriously, if you take one step back and look at what you're doing it's a self-written comedy.

Yep I agree. It's funny that I bought ETW expecting it to be somewhat challenging and enthralling and ended up with a nicely decorated toybox.

I guess what isn't funny is I've told everyone of my friends (with much smaller gaming budgets than me) who have inquired to pass on this one despite the media generated hype.

[Didz]

Likewise, we usually buy three copies in our family. But only one this time.

[GFX707]

The sense of entitlement is obscene. You bought the game. You were not forced to buy the game. You bought the game knowing full well that in every TW game they promise the AI will be better (which it is), but fails to meet your expectations.

Seriously, if you take one step back and look at what you're doing it's a self-written comedy.

You might be right, but there are laws against describing a product incorrectly.

Plus, they had FOUR YEARS to fix the AI. Four entire years. At the end of that four year period we have worse campaign AI than RTW. At least in RTW the AI would frequently invade by sea. In 1.3 every single thing that was bad about the AI in RTW is present in the ETW AI. Stupid suicidal war declarations (actually much worse than RTW because the AI is usually feeble and in about 5 wars already when it declares war on you) and never accepting peace.

So I shall ask you: Do you think it was unreasonable or stupid for us, the TW fan, to expect CA, in a period of four years, to make *some* improvements to the campaign AI in their game?

[ReluctantSamurai]

I'm afraid the bottom line for CA is summarized here:

"Week one sales of the title were nearly double those of both Rome: Total War and Medieval II: Total War, and is the first in the series’ to claim the Top 40 top spot. It also becomes the first PC exclusive title to reach the top since Football Manager 2008 in October 2007 – another Sega PC title."

[from a March report posted at IGN.com]

"If you make a hit game, you make good money out of it. But you only need to fail once or twice in a row and you're dead."

[a quote from Mike Simpson, the creative director for CA as quoted by the BBC in a March interview]

Obviously, with sales at the top of the charts, I don't expect anything will change anytime soon.....

[Didz]

That doesn't surprise me, because unlike their previous titles they are finally tapping the Napoleonic Wargame market, the single biggest area of historical interest in the world with millions of potential customers, who like me have been waiting for a decent historical computer wargame for decades.

Problem is, if your going to tap that market and keep it then your game better damned well be historically accurate, because these guys are going to rip it to shreds if its not, and once the word is out that your a bunch of ignorant idiots who can't be bothered to do your research then you won't get a second bite of the cherry.

[ReluctantSamurai]

and once the word is out that your a bunch of ignorant idiots who can't be bothered to do your research then you won't get a second bite of the cherry.

Judging from the increase in sales of ETW over the previous two releases, a lot of folks disagree with that. Don't get me wrong.......I'm of the same sentiment as you. I just think it's going to take a competitor to step in and do something better for people to compare to.

While I fully appreciate that CA is in the business to make money (and oh, btw, here's a game for you folks to play), and that it is impossible to please everyone, one would think that after all this time, and with the experienced garnered from previous releases, that a more flexible game could have been produced.

By that I mean more option settings that actually determine gameplay. I design campaigns and scenarios for an old WWII game that has a much less complex game engine, and far fewer resources available for a modder to work with. Yet I, and others like me can create scenarios and campaigns that are fulfilling to all players both n00b's and veterans.

I just can't understand why CA cannot do something similar with a much more advanced game engine and a horde of experience from previous releases