Rome: Total War

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This game is the real deal! I got it two days ago and have been playing non-stop. It seems like someone have finally managed create a good union between turn based strategy and RTS. Many have tried but Rome:TW seems like the first truly succesful attempt.

Have anyone else given it a chance? They even have a tiny little RPG aspect to the game which is somewhat interesting. One of my generals happened to be forced to put out three uprisings in a row and the towns were of course put the sword for their bad behaviour, after the third city being butchered my general gets the cool epithat "Butcher". Cool! One question though, where hte hell is Numantia?

 

I made a thread about this game awhile ago... nobody commented

Numantia? Gods there are so many places I can't remember the names off by heart.

 

I've only played the demo, which I found very entertaining. Strategy games aren't really my thing though, so I gave it a miss.

 

I thought I remembered such a thread Abomination but it must have dropped off the first page because I couldnt find it.

I finally found the town of Numantia, the last Gaul stronghold after being lost in the frigging territory for several turns without finding where exactly the city was. Now Gaul is nothing but a province in my empire!

 

@joacqin: a few useful hints - spies spies spies! They can prove VERY useful when assaulting cities considering they offer about 40% chance to open gates on average.
As Romans though you'll learn to fear cavalry as you won't have any good anti-cavalry units till you aquire Triari or Auxilirary infantry after the reforms.
Never attack anything in phalanx formation from the front, put a unit with a high defensive value facing them and flank them with something.
When using cavalry order a charge then after the initial impact order them to run away from the enemy, reform then charge again. Repeat the process for maximum effect. On the note of cavalry, always save one unit till the end of the battle to ride down the enemy who flee, even equites or skirmisher cavalry when [Alt+right click] is used.
Don't bother with skirmisher infantry. Wait till you have archers if you want to use ranged troops. Only use skirmishers if you know you're going to be fighting elephants or chariots but considering you're the Julii the only chariots you'll ever face will be British.
As Romans, abuse the fact that you heavy infantry beat the crap out of any other form of infantry. Never double click when you want to charge, make sure you double click when holding alt, otherwise your men will charge, stop to throw pila then probably be charged themselves.
Beware of elephants, they beat the crap out of ANYTHING.

 

Hmm, I am playing on the easiest difficulty to get a hang of controls and the like so nothing have been overly challenging as of yet. The administrative skills beaten into me by countless hours of civ playing have been useful though. My tactical skills on the battle field wouldnt mind some improvement.

I have fought elephants once during my Carthagian campaign and they were not all that impressive which is probably due to the patch which main feature seems to be a down toning of the elephants.

As for the various units under my command I really have no clue, I use my true and tried strategy of making sure I outnumber the enemy before committing to battle at all times. I am a decent strategist but a crappy tactician. I let my generals do most of my fighting. Those auxilirary missile cavarly seems to suck a lot though, completely useless. Legionary cavalry on the other hand is completely wicked. I am a bit annoyed that I never been able to position my heavy infantry in positions which let them shine, their main contribution to the battle fields have been to control siege ecquipment.

 

There is a standard formation that won't see you wrong.

Cavalry on flanks, infantry in middle, ranged behind infantry and general behind ranged. Don't try to 'position' your cavalry before the battle since the enemy will just adjust. March the cavalry up with your infantry then make them run to attack the flanks of an enemy when the battle starts.

For positioning infantry, just throw them straight at the enemy infantry. Heavy infantry shine by simply 'holding the line' so that you cavalry can strike the infantry from their flanks while the enemy infantry are busy taking care of your heavy infantry.

One time when my Roman legionaries really shined was when a german axe warband charged them, my legionarys released their pila and the germans retreated after the first barage. Took out about 33% of the entire enemy unit in one volley

Auxilirary missile cavalry should be used at the very start of a battle. They are very handy if you are attacking since they will often bring the enemy onto the offensive and you can then take the roll of the defender. Use them to just harass the enemy lines before a battle and make them run away before the enemy closes with them. This way you can draw enemy cavalry right into your own spearmen since the enemy cavalry will pursue your missile cavalry.

Elephants are good line smashers, use them against large clusters of enemy infantry by simply charging into them, running away then charging back again. Each elephant will take out about 10 men each charge.

 

I had my first victory last weekend, with House Julii, pretty quick too if i may say so. Victory- 127 BC.

 

Great game. The only thing that annoyes me is the governors, I prefered the system as it was in medieval: total war. Now it takes very long time to send a governor to the cities which are away from your capital, not to mention the lack of them. I'm playing as the Greek cities and I have at least ten governors of non-greek origin since bribing it's the only way to overcome their lack.

PS. And something else, Lamda was the emblem of Sparta not of Macedonia (it stands for the word Lacedaimon, the ancient name of Sparta) and Spartans warriors wore red cloaks not red robes.

 

You do know that a city can govern itself without the presence of a governor, don't you ?

Just change the settings at the start of a campaign. If you do so, you can build and recruit without having a governor in town. It's not cheating, otherwise the option wouldn't have been there. It's merely making things a little easier for yourself, since your rivals don't seem to have a problem recruiting either. The first time i played RTW, i played without checking that option, and i was crushed by my Roman counterparts of House Brutii, who had at least 10 times as many troops as i had. The map was literally crawling with his armies, making a succeful ending for me impossible.

I do have a problem with rioting citizens in some of my cities though, it keeps going on and on and on.... it's driving me nuts sometimes. Every penny i make has to be invested in retraining the town's garisson and restoring damaged buildings. If you play a Roman faction, and you have occupied cities like Carthage and Thapsus, you have your work cut out for yourself, it's full of hooligans, who keep revolting at every possible turn.

 

Oh yes, Carthage and Thapsus, is it ever possible to make those two cities productive? I made the mistake of not putting the citizens of Cartage to the sword when I took the city and now I have to cuddle them at every turn. They are not overly angry just that I have to have them on the lowest tax and lots of games so the city is going in the red big time. It is a good recruiting ground though.

When do the civil wars start? Or do you start them yourself? The bloody senate has been giving me frigging impossible missions lately propelling me into a war with the Greek states I had no interest in at all. Those frigging Brutii doesnt seem capable of handling anything on their own. Now I am stuck in Sparta with a battered army and a dead general (natural causes) and with Athens without a governor and a decent army but a throng of Greeks outside the gates. Oh, and my main forces, three complete armies led by my best Generals are finishing off the Spanish so they wont arrive in Greek in time for my next objective which is a Greek city on the main land which if I want to reach it have to batter my way through the Greek heartland. Oh, and one of generals died just as I was about to attack the Spanish capital so I had to complete the siege without a general. Jolly nice. Damn old farts cant keep alive for another season.

I never checked any settings but I can still recruit and build without governers, cities without governers arent nearly as efficient as those with and are more prone to temper tantrums.

 

Word of advise: don't blindly follow every order the senate gives you, always follow your own agenda. If you know how this game is going to end, you'll agree with me that it's wise to have a compact piece of land before all hell breaks loose. And with compact, i mean that there's no possibility of suddenly having to face enemy armies in your back.

For example: the senate ordered me to get a trade agreement from the Spanish. Instead i went and conquered Spain for myself. The senate was not pleased, and when i entered Spanish lands, they ordered me to retreat. I had two turns to do so, but i gave em a big fat finger.

So now i had Spain. Before that i conquered the whole North african continent, deep into Egypt territory, and later i conquered Gaulle, Britannia, and a piece of Germania. That's the whole left side of the map, leaving no room for enemies to flank me or attack my back. With strong armies positioned along the entire borderline with my trusted Roman allies (yeah right) i was ready for the onslaught to come.

Meanwhile i ignored all orders from the senate to go to war with the Greeks and Dahcians, and kept them happy by doing other stuff for them like blocking Gallic and Spanish ports.

 

@Pac Man

You don't have to choose this option in order to recruit or build without a governor. Also, I chose this in the tutorial campaigh and it really sucks because it builds armies and buildings continiously and it leads you to bankrupcy. Also, governors sometimes (depending on their traits and abilities)have a negative effect in puplic order and productivity.

Btw does anybony know which is the secret that senate threatens to reveale if you don't complete some of its missions?

 

Well, the bloody senate now has me entangled in Greece but I wont committ to the conflict. One general must suffice and Athens and Sparta are advanced enough to train the reinforcements needed to do what is nescessary.

I control all of Gaul, North Africa (not the Sahara provinces which are Scipii) and next turn I will finish my conquest of Spain. It is annoying that you have to keep so many troops, after every city taken you have to leave half your army there to keep order, and I am playing on the easiest difficulty, I shudder to think how it is on normal. My next project will probably be to strengthen my central provinces in the north of Italy so they can be a staging ground for the upcoming civil war. Oh, do anyone know what is the deal with Mediolauneum? No matter what I do that city is a severa drainage on my economy. I have also been thinking about doing a quick conquest of Dacia as it is just next door and my relations with the Germans are for the moment quite good. I cant wait to kick Senate ass though, the bastards tells me to do battle and lose many men and they give me a frigging barbarian infantry as reward. ****heads. They like me a lot though, two thingies from full senate luv but the plebs column is only half.

I am wondering if there is any way to keep allied troops out of my territory? I have had several Brutii armies chilling in my heartland for around a century or so now and it annoys me. Cant they build boats?

This game is really awesome!

 

Can't you have one of your diplomats bribe them ? If so, the whole army disbands and is no longer your concern. Even though they are allies for the moment, it's still annoying to see them march through your lands as if they own the place. Whenever i see a diplomat of another faction roaming through my provinces, i bribe them off and have them work for me instead. Either that, or i set an assassin on them. If you let them do their thing, they will be bribing your newly recruited troops and they will become turncoats.

@ BOC

Dunno, it happened to me as well. I wouldn't be surprised if it had something to do with incest, Romans didn't have much of a problem with that.

 

Really started getting into this game. I conquered France, Spain, all of the Mediterranean islands except Cyprus, some of Germany, most of Greece and a single province in northern Africa. Then the Senate feared my popularity, and insisted that my faction leader kill himself, so I rebelled and captured Rome. Now the other two Roman families are trying to destroy me, along with the Thracians, the next most powerful race, and the almost-defeated Macedonians and Greeks.

I don't fight the battles though - I always found them tedious because of my bad graphics card slowing it all down. With my nice new one though, I may try them again.

 

That is another of the great points with this game! It doesnt take a super computer to run smoothly! My computer is so-so with the cheapest 3d card on the market and the battles still run smoothly and with no problems.

I will look into this bribing thing, in general I havent done much of anything with my agents except what the senate has asked of me.

 

I played Medieval: Total War and was absolutely stunned by it. I played Rome and grew bored very quickly.

No civil wars, no faction re-emergences, idiotic AI (even at its very best) which seems to have huge difficulty doing *anything* effective on the strat map, strangely over-powered wardogs and chariots (when chariots were supposed to be firmly on the decline), a shuffle-right feature for pikes which means they mash themselves into walls when they're supposed to be defending gates, triarii who don't actually have spears (according to the data files, even though the games says they're spearmen), *ecclesiastical* Latin prounciation (!), Australian advisors (!), a Carthage which is absolutely laughable in power, Egyptian axemen who are both shirtless and heavily-armoured, a testudo formation which is seriously bugged, numerous other nasty bugs including siege ladders not appearing, men throwing themselves off bridges for no reason and siege tower drawbridges which don't touch the walls (meaning all the men leap to their deaths as they disembark), awful multiplayer support, very disappointing diplomatic options (also, protectorates are hideously bugged), and a frustrating lack of moddability from a supposedly highly moddable game. Oh, and the bribing rates are stupidly cheap.

*takes a deep breath*

There's so much potential here. IMO, very little of it was realised. A deep disappointment after nine months of waiting, I think RTW is a sad triumph of style over substance.

It's back in the box until either a very comprehensive patch or a very good expansion pack.

 

Now now.....tell us how you really feel.

 

Ooh, I can agree with it being a tad too cheap to bribe and there should be some risk of rejection or the faction you bribe from being a big upset. Same with assassinations but there the success rate is just right. I just bought myself two full armies full of legionary cohorts and Roman cavalry from the Brutii for the bargain price of around 10k denarii for both. Sacking Greek cities really pays off.