Well, yes and no. While the overall strategic AI is generally better, that is, its decisions on wars, allies, targets for expansion etc. seem generally more reasonable, the new more detailed map means that it frequently screws up troop movements, especially in large empires like Carthage. They also almost always make one bad decision at the start of the game: To attack the Greeks on Sicily. This leads to them getting overrun there very quickly, as the Greeks defeat them, and then the Romans defeat both weakened parties while the Carthaginians typically get into two or three more wars. The Scipii then usually invade North Africa within ten turns, take the colony just south of Carthage itself, and then siege Carthage off and on while the Carthaginians just dick around, their still substantial forces effectively neutralised due to bad AI.
Diplomacy in general is handled a lot better. Alliances seem generally stable.
I guess as a follow on question for alliances, is it any easier to actively participate in an alliance now or is it still pretty much a means to attempt to reduce the number of empires actively likely to attack you?
For example in M:TW your co-operative play was pretty much limited to breaking sieges of allied territory whilst the PC AI was able to send armies to assist your attacks (or potentially hijack the spoils if they sent greater forces). A lot of this seemed to result from the fact that you always had first turn and once you’d committed to the end of the turn that was it, the moves and resulting actions that came about were totally outside your control.
For your to participate yes, but the reverse doesn’t seem to be true. The AI ally rarely commits forces to assist you. I say rarely only because I am willing to give this game the benefit of the doubt; I have yet to recieve any military assistance from an AI ally.
I’ve never played a Total War game before and since I’ve seen several people in this thread mention that the manual isn’t as fleshed-out on all the gameplay mechanics as it could be, I’m tempted to pick up the strat. guide from Amazon for $14. Has anyone had a chance to look through the book to determine whether or not it’s worth the money? I probably could just stick with the online Gamespy guide, but the bibliophile in me still prefers books.
Total War Center is umm… the extremely hardcore of the TW hardcore. A good forum but they’re as likely to shut up about their pet peeves as the moon is about to stop orbiting the Earth.
I think we discussed the Prima guide earlier in this thread: it’s garbage.
The manual is a little unclear on game mechanics but it’s nothing you eventually don’t figure out, but if you’ve got specific questions, shoot away. I can answer quite a bit by now :)
OK, they’re generally more stable. In fact, I’ve had alliances last almost the entire game. When I was the Brutii in my first campaign I allied with the Thracians because I just didn’t want to worry about that long border, and the Thracians were plenty busy with Dacia and Scythia, later Germania and Briton.
However, allies are pretty useless when it comes to helping you in your battles. Even if you bribed say the… Gauls to attack the Carthaginians, unless they shared a border, no battles are likely to happen. The AI is also very likely to tell you to piss off when you ask it to attack another nation. Finally, certain alliances, even if forged, cannot last. Seleucids - Egypt, Macedon - Greek Cities, Seleucids - Parthia, Carthage - Numidia, they’re all examples of alliances that are all but sure to fall apart.
Incidentally, if you’re going to play a non-Roman campaign, I wouldn’t recommend Gaul, Carthage, Greeks or Seleucids. The first three have the face the considerable might of the Republic early on in the game, and the Seleucids get gang-banged by Parthia, Egypt and often Pontus as well.
The gamespy guide is decent (linked earlier in the thread) if you can stand having it split up on 5 zillion pages and intersitals in between each page. (or you can block all the ads and cut and paste it, comes out to 44 pages printed with a decent sized font -works for me)
The purchasable strategy guide is horrible. Really the ingame tutorial is quite nice and afterwords the advisor advice on high is genuinely interesting and useful.
How do you all manage outlying cities? I don’t have enough govenors to go around, and some of my captured cities seem to be in constant revolt. I’ve tried some basic happiness buildings, but they still riot. Do such cities pretty much need a govenor to quell things? I’m having too many of my soldiers tied up in garrison duty.
I’m also having a lot of problems with squalor, despite building bath houses (sewers, aqueducts, etc) the moment I have access to them.
This game is wicked awesome though. I love how my general gives speeches: “Omens be damned! I want to bathe in their blood!!!”
Garrisons help. I find if I remove too many troops from captured cities they go into rebellion. So you have to fiddle around to find the right number to keep there as a garrison.
Build temples and coliseums, maintain a garrison, and if necessary, set taxes to Low.
You can’t do anything about squalor, it’s the way the game ultimately controls the population. Once a city hits a certain size, the squalor limits further growth.
Personally I think that, and issues like “Order due to law”/“Order due to happiness” are unnecessary complexities.
Large cities are governable. I finished a campaign as Brutii and Seleucids with maxed-out cities that didn’t grow any more. Full improvements, normal tax rate.
I had 49 provinces, and then I bribed one of the SPQR generals that stood outside Rome. I got his entire army (??), sent in a spy to Rome, so I assaulted, the spy opened the gates, and there was one unit of Hastati in there, they died, I take Rome easily, I win.
I shall forever be knows as Alexander the Cheaply Victorious, I guess.
Bribing your way to victory is pretty easy, especially when you exterminate populations.
I am playing the Battle of Raphia at the moment and am mildly annoyed about how they have committed themselves to the anachronisms that they have strewn throughout the campaign game. In the Time Commanders TV show, they had Raphia portrayed very accurately - even the way it played out wasn’t too far off base. Seeing Ptolemy IV running around like he just walked off of DeMille’s Ten Commandments and completely elephant-less is a little silly.
