Rome II: Total War

[Grip]

Gotta buy a new computer if I want to play this game, which I really want to. It looks good so far, but looks arent everything..Keeping fingers crossed that the AI will atleast be decent, not expecting the level we saw with MTWI but still better then vanilla RTW..

[WrathOfTinyKittens]

6850 isn't bad but is probably not strong enough to run RTW2 on highest settings comfortably.

Looking at the specs for Shogun 2, you're at about the minimum for CPU required and below it for recommended. Your GPU is in the recommended range, but again it could use an update.

From what I read, Shogun 2 performance was bottlenecked by the CPU in melee even for high-end systems because it used only 2 cores at most, usually just 1. This means that theoretically you'd be fine with a very fast (probably above 3 Ghz) dual-core CPU. However, since we won't know the real minimum specs until next year, it's all speculation. Not to mention that their new engine plus DX11 or maybe even DX12 might be much better at optimizing multiple CPU cores.

Anyway, you're going to have to upgrade your CPU, which means a new motherboard too (unless you buy a Core 2 Quad), but the good news is that by the time the game comes out, the new Intel Haswell chips will be out, and buying one of those will set you up nicely for several years.

[Kouran]

I never could understand why one would play the Total War series instead of the EU series from Paradox.

[White Walker Texas Ranger]

I never could understand why one would play the Total War series instead of the EU series from Paradox.

The EU games definitely have a better strategic and diplomatic aspect, but controlling thousands of guys and telling them to charge at thousands of others is fun.

Some people also like the simpler strategic options, especially given the "Spreadsheets of Iron" reputation that later Paradox games have.

[Corvinus85]

I never could understand why one would play the Total War series instead of the EU series from Paradox.

I recently tried playing Crusader Kings II. I was totally lost and eventually gave up. The Total War series focuses more on military strategy, battlefield tactics especially, and that is fun.

[Revan Baratheon]

I never could understand why one would play the Total War series instead of the EU series from Paradox.

I don't think anyone's ever bought total war games for their "brilliant diplomacy system"or managing your country, economy etc. it's for the FUCKING BATTLES ofc!!!

I think it's a bit unfair to compare 2 totally different types of games..

[Revan Baratheon]

The EU games definitely have a better strategic and diplomatic aspect, but controlling thousands of guys and telling them to charge at thousands of others is fun.

More than fun dude, I get an erection at the thought of killing thousands of enemy soldiers and then forcing that nation to bend their knee and become my protectorate(even though they hate me they have no choice) HAHA!!!

[Sivin]

More than fun dude, I get an erection at the thought of killing thousands of enemy soldiers and then forcing that nation to bend their knee and become my protectorate(even though they hate me they have no choice) HAHA!!!

One of my big gripes about Total War is that I can never seem to get a nation to accurately assess the ass beating I'm giving them in war. Far too often I have had Austria offer peace with me if only I'll give them money and territory... and this offered as my armies march unopposed towards their last remaining capital. Nobody seems to accept the gravity of my awesome martial abilities, and I'm forced to slaughter everyone time and again. It's actually kinda depressing. I want to force a country to sign my own version of the Treaty of Versailles, and then watch them renounce their existence due to the crushing war-reperations they are forced to bear.

[Grip]

Its fun to watch though when, in Rome say, you control basically everything and Carthage is down to just one province/city and you offer peace and they refuse..I usually try to be nice and avoid attacking them until absolutely nescessary and yet sooner or later that one province send their one army to attack, it cracks me up everytime..The AI is thick as a castle wall for the most part. Oh and I love the EU games aswell as Crusader Kings and yet play the TW games for the battles, they complement eachother well imo...

[Revan Baratheon]

One of my big gripes about Total War is that I can never seem to get a nation to accurately assess the ass beating I'm giving them in war. Far too

often I have had Austria offer peace with me if only I'll give them money and territory... and this offered as my armies march unopposed towards their last remaining capital. Nobody seems to

accept the gravity of my awesome martial abilities, and I'm forced to slaughter everyone time and again. It's actually kinda depressing. I want to force a country to sign my own version of the Treaty of Versailles, and then watch them renounce their existence due to the crushing war-

reperations they are forced to bear.

Kay siege on their capital for a couple of turns. If say, there are 5 turns till surrender, then at the 4th or 5th turn they will desperately counter attack, defeat them but don't destroy them completely unless u wanna annex them. Now u can go to diplomacy and can compel them to sign any treaty u want :)

I once offered Spain peace(using above method) in exchange for 2k gold and ALL their current technologies( like around 6-7), as well as becoming my protectorate and it worked perfectly...good times :D

I don't think AI can get bankrupt though, atleast not on hard/hard mode.

[Castel]

One of my big gripes about Total War is that I can never seem to get a nation to accurately assess the ass beating I'm giving them in war. Far too often I have had Austria offer peace with me if only I'll give them money and territory... and this offered as my armies march unopposed towards their last remaining capital. Nobody seems to accept the gravity of my awesome martial abilities, and I'm forced to slaughter everyone time and again. It's actually kinda depressing. I want to force a country to sign my own version of the Treaty of Versailles, and then watch them renounce their existence due to the crushing war-reperations they are forced to bear.

The diplomacy is what they really needed to fix. In Rome 1 people had to resort to creating scripts that allowed you to force the AI into diplomacy. If I fought someone and they had one city and no army left I would just force them into protectorate status.

Also, there better be no realm divide mechanic or it should be optional.IT's a shitty way of dealing with the fact that their Strategy AI sucks. It seems hella annoying in Shogun, I can only imagine how bad it'd be in a world like Rome 2's.

I don't think AI can get bankrupt though, atleast not on hard/hard mode.

Nope. Pretty sure that they get a ton of free money. I'm probably going to go Normal/Hard for all games in TW from now on. Fuck that noise. Hopefully they let you ravage the lands like in Shogun (I think that Rome 1 had some version of this) and blockade trade routes and such.

I am excited about some of the features though. I hope that they don't speed up build times. That way most battles will be between armies of 20 units or so but you can control your reinforcements, I don't like handing troops to the AI.

I'm not sure how I feel about their new siege mechanic though, I'll have to wait till I see some more.

The EU games definitely have a better strategic and diplomatic aspect, but controlling thousands of guys and telling them to charge at thousands of others is fun.

Unfortunately CA seem to own this market. I can't think of anyone else who works on their scale. Sad really. A better mix of strategy and tactics might have happened if we had more people working on the system.

[Sivin]

Kay siege on their capital for a couple of turns. If say, there are 5 turns till surrender, then at the 4th or 5th turn they will desperately counter attack, defeat them but don't destroy them completely unless u wanna annex them. Now u can go to diplomacy and can compel them to sign any treaty u want :)

I once offered Spain peace(using above method) in exchange for 2k gold and ALL their current technologies( like around 6-7), as well as becoming my protectorate and it worked perfectly...good times :D

I don't think AI can get bankrupt though, atleast not on hard/hard mode.

Hmmm... I will attempt this in the near future. Thank you.

I hope that in the not-too-distant future, the genius' behind Total War will make one of their games true real time. It's a daunting prospect, but it would make online campaigns feasible, and I think that added with a tweak or two to the economics, it'd create the perfect game.

I describe Total War as having taken the best parts of Tom Clancy's Endwar, and Cid Meyer's Civilization. But they keep both parts seperate in the gameplay... Imagine if they were unified! It would be glorious! Although, it'd take some hellistic soft/hardware to run it effectively with that many constantly moving parts.

ETA: It occurs to me that one of the issues with diplomacy in Total War is that when you capture a city, it is immediately annexed. It is a forgone conclusion that you now own it, whereas in real life, you'd hold it until the end of hostilities when it would become a baraining tool. It's one of the reasons that peace treaties cannot be properly affected. I don't want to waste the lives of the men it'd take to capture Vienna. But I've spilled so much blood getting to this point, I can't walk away effectively empty-handed. Sure, I've beaten Austria, but I already control their lands, so them surrendering means they can't give me much.

[Alex.]

More than fun dude, I get an erection at the thought of killing thousands of enemy soldiers and then forcing that nation to bend their knee and become my protectorate(even though they hate me they have no choice) HAHA!!!

Having read this and that end of the world thread, I have to agree that you should probably get laid before the apocalypse

E: that probz came off a bit bad. Meant no harm by it...

[Werthead]

Not to mention that their new engine plus DX11 or maybe even DX12 might be much better at optimizing multiple CPU cores.

DX12 isn't on the horizon yet, as far as I know, and when it is will be a Windows 8 exclusive platform. This is not a good thing. Rome 2 will be DX11 as far as is known at the moment.

I never could understand why one would play the Total War series instead of the EU series from Paradox.

The military component of the Paradox games is severely lacking, just as the strategic component of CA games is often lacking. However, Paradox's lack is more annoying: seeing a military invasion that should have come off with no problem fail for no apparent reason and being unable to take direct control of the battle is irritating. The sometimes-oddball strategic moments in the CA games are more easily borne, since they are not the primary focus of the games.

[Werthead]

CA have been announcing the playable factions for the game. As of today, we're up to six, with two to come. The announced factions are:

Rome

The Arverni

The Iceni

Macedon

Carthage

The Suebi

My guess is that the two final factions are Egypt and Parthia (or possibly Seleucia, depending on the time period). In addition to the eight playable factions there will be numerous smaller, AI-only factions (likely accessible with mods though). The game's map is supposed to be larger than Rome's, extending further to the east.

[Galactus]

That's... Less than Rome 1.

[WrathOfTinyKittens]

They have to have those two, no doubt. But no Greeks, no Scythians (or similar), no Nubia, nothing at all in Spain, and none of the states of Asia Minor? Seems incomplete. Though I guess I could see them making the Greeks into several smaller states.

[sToNED_CAT]

More than fun dude, I get an erection at the thought of killing thousands of enemy soldiers and then forcing that nation to bend their knee and become my protectorate(even though they hate me they have no choice) HAHA!!!

You know, I thought the same and then I realized I skipped battles every time in TW. I only fought on tactical screen when outnumbered.

I recently tried playing Crusader Kings II. I was totally lost and eventually gave up. The Total War series focuses more on military strategy, battlefield tactics especially, and that is fun.

And CK2 is relatively simple... Try to play Victoria. I really wanted to play 19th cent. strategy, but it is really horribly complicated.

That's... Less than Rome 1.

Dumbing down and making everything simpler... I reallz hope it would be modable.

Its fun to watch though when, in Rome say, you control basically everything and Carthage is down to just one province/city and you offer peace and they refuse..I usually try to be nice and avoid attacking them until absolutely nescessary and yet sooner or later that one province send their one army to attack, it cracks me up everytime.

Yes, I would really love not to resort to genocide every time. No need to make the diplomacy so complicated as in Paradox games, something like in Master of Orion or similar 4X games would be enough. And please get rid of diplomats, merchants, princesses, assasins and all those unites that just clutter the map and slow down the gameplay.

[total1402]

Apparently there are only two more factions to be released. :(

So far they have

Rome

Carthage

Macedon

Averni (Gaul)

Iceni (Britons)

Suebi (Germans)

So many more potential factions have been cut. :( There has to be at least one eastern faction and a hellinistic faction IMO. Most likely would be Parthia and Egypt. Armenia n Pontus were very important but weren't in last time either as playable. Whilst Parthia becomes the major eastern superpower that faces Rome in the east. Unless they are a hoard which arrives off map they have to be in I've heard they're doing a bigger map, maybe even all the way to India. If thats the case, they simply can't add the Seleucid empire and make everything else balanced; they're just too big with as many territories as all the other factions combined. Judging by the start positions of Rome and Carthage it seems to be set around 275BC after Pyrus is defeated like last time. That was when the seleucids were MASSIVE, owning most of syria, mesopotamia, Persia, bits of central asia and asia minor right up to India. Egypt is possible because of the whole Anthony cleopatra thing and because its fairly well known. We'll probably be getting a lot of faction DLC for this game. :( :( :(

Seriously though I do not like that we might not get Armenia, Pontus, Thrace, Spain, Dacia, Scythia, Seleucids, Greek cities, egypt, parthia and Numidia. Some of those like Armenia and Pontus were hugely important historically with their clashes with Rome; more so than egypt or the seleucids in fact.

[Jon AS]

Seriously though I do not like that we might not get Armenia, Pontus, Thrace, Spain, Dacia, Scythia, Seleucids, Greek cities, egypt, parthia and Numidia. Some of those like Armenia and Pontus were hugely important historically with their clashes with Rome; more so than egypt or the seleucids in fact.

That's just a list of playable factions, though, isn't it? Most of those you list were not playable in the unmodded first game, either.