if I didn't like Napoleon total war, would I also not like Rome Total war?

[Bluehotdog5]

I have NTW and I don't like it that much, i mean it's not so much the gameplay as it is a combination of the lag on my medium end PC and the sluggish battles.

the only way it'll run on my computer is it I dull it down to where it looks like crap.

and the battles are way too sluggish for my taste.

but I've tried and tried again to like it. do you think I'd like Rome total war any better if I didn't like NTW?

also I do like Strategy games, it's not that. I use to play AoE II all the time and I still actively play Sins of a solar empire.

[Codine]

medieval 2 is the best in the franchise by far. They dumbed down a lot of the cities in empire and napoleon. Rome and medieval 2 are amazing games. I easily spent 100s of hours on both of them in campaign modes alone.

Also Even high end pcs chug on napoleon, the game is just bad. They fixed it in Shogun2 but medieval 2 and rome are the best.

[MilitantCactus]

The battles in Rome (and most of Medieval 2) aren't as gunpowdery as in Empire/Napoleon so they do play quite differently but whether or not you'd like them I can't say.
I loved AoE II and Sins and I rate Total War's campaign alongside them FWIW, especially Medieval 2.
And if your machine's capable of launching N:TW then it should have no trouble with either Rome of Medieval 2.

[lobbotekka2019]

Originally Posted by Codine

medieval 2 is the best in the franchise by far. They dumbed down a lot of the cities in empire and napoleon. Rome and medieval 2 are amazing games. I easily spent 100s of hours on both of them in campaign modes alone.

Also Even high end pcs chug on napoleon, the game is just bad. They fixed it in Shogun2 but medieval 2 and rome are the best.

I believe Rome is better than Medieval 2. Medieval 2 looks better but Rome has better gameplay. I also find Medieval battles far too easy and predictable (rock, paper, scissors format). So here goes:

-Knights are underpowered (odd that in the Medieval age they are meant to be dominant).

-Religion is is awkward and could be better. They basically ignored the whole structure for Islam when it comes to religion. (I believe the Sunni and Shia differences back then played a significant role in politics)

-Merchants are tedious and could be better

-Diplomacy seems worse

-I miss the Senate

I could go on.

Rome and Medieval 2 have some really good mods that add extra flavour so it is worth the risk. I just bought the Rome pack and I have owned Medieval 2 at least 6 times.

[Chrissd21]

Originally Posted by lobbotekka2019

-Knights are underpowered (odd that in the Medieval age they are meant to be dominant).

-Religion is is awkward and could be better. They basically ignored the whole structure for Islam when it comes to religion. (I believe the Sunni and Shia differences back then played a significant role in politics)

Current events still say Sunni and Shia differences are a deciding factor as to why the world is still in one piece. Namely, they hate each other and can't get along well enough to unite against the evil Westerners. A repeat of the Golden Horde would be annoying even today. The Turks are really the only people to have successfully united all the factions, which was by systematically wiping them out when they tried anything. Worked wonders and led to a five hundred year empire. Then the Brits kicked their butts, gave the land back to every nomad and war chief around and the land broke apart into squabbling groups each trying to lord it over the other.

Shia and Sunni differences amount to very little yet so very much. It should lead to outright war between them, with a "The enemy of my enemy is my friend" type of deal. So Sunni Muslims will be at odds with Shia Muslims unless they are both threatened by French or English crusaders in which case they revert back from Hostile to Wary, temporary ceasefire with a lasting peace being impossible. Befriending one should lead to hostility from the other faction, then when you defeat them you get destroyed by the faction you sided with since the enemy of my enemy is now my only enemy.

In a video game though, they have a hard enough time differentiating between Catholicism and Christianity let along something simple like Shia and Sunni. Sad but true. They just apply the simplest possible solution and we enjoy the game afterwards.


Historical events say heavy cav dominated until ranged units were employed efficiently, see the Battle of Agincourt for what I'd call the turning point. I don't have a degree, just get bored easily and like knowledge. :P

Simple tactic which is based on a very small idea.

:Ranged units will always destroy melee units since the melee units can't hit back.

:Mobile units will always destroy ranged units since they can close the gap and ranged units are generally terrible at melee.

:Anti-mobile units such as pikemen or squads with AT weapons will always destroy mobile melee units do to their tactical advantages.

:Mobile ranged units will destroy melee units but will generally go down against ranged infantry since the infantry carry heavier weapons. Longbows or crossbows instead of shortbows for instance.

So, a group of ranged infantry guarded by anti-mobile infantry will always win a battle, even against a numerically superior enemy.

During the Crusades (I think, tactic could also have been employed by the Mongols.), heavy infantry destroyed the light infantry of the opposing side but were destroyed by mobile ranged units. This led to a lot of circling about firing arrows at heavy infantry which couldn't fight back. The simplest solution is to have ranged units for yourself.

Historically speaking, knights were good against peasants which is what they were usually up against. They grew even more powerful when their armor was strengthened to allow for defense against trained archers wielding longbows, then died out when crossbows took over and peasants could take on armies with little training. No more spending all your money recruiting and training knights and archers, just give half your peasants crossbows, the other half some sort of long weapon like a pike or halberd to stop a cavalry charge then put your own men out as officers telling people when to fire, reload, etc. To hell with the Church, you were taking over the world here. Besides, Protestants didn't damn you for using a crossbow. lol

tl;dr

Ranged infantry + anti mobile infantry = battle outcome of "yes". You win no questions asked, it's been that way since people realised that ranged means not getting hit back with sharp, heavy objects.


Most games dislike having a thousand factions so it's usually Catholic, Muslim and that's it. Europa Univeralis III will give you a lot more, but even then I don't think they have Shia and Sunni. Again, sad but true. You could mod it yourself into the game, but effort. Whose got the time? :P

[Chrissd21]

Originally Posted by Bluehotdog5

the only way it'll run on my computer is it I dull it down to where it looks like crap.

and the battles are way too sluggish for my taste.

also I do like Strategy games, it's not that. I use to play AoE II all the time and I still actively play Sins of a solar empire.

Not sure what you mean so here's two answers.

Are the battles sluggish because of your computer or sluggish in the tactical sense? If it's sluggish from your computer then Rome will be fine. Napoleon can tax some computers to no end. Even high end computers can struggle with it so a switch to a slightly older game should fix your problems.

If sluggish as in the battles, is it the pace? So set musketeers up behind cover, shoot for a bit, move your cannons in and fire them off to open a hole in their lines, send the cavalry through, move up, repeat. Is that the sluggish part you're talking about?

If you dislike the battles for the tactics and/or pace then you'll probably dislike Rome Total War since the battles are fairly similar. Instead of musketeers you have archers, cav are still cav, instead of cannons you have catapults and such. You'll use them to disrupt lines then send cav in for a charge, pull the cav back to make the enemy advance into range of your archers who are shielded by anti-cav infantry.

Or flood the area with Hastati to get a morale bonus then charge in your cav, use archers to hit them before the battle and as they flee. Depends on your units, but this definitely isn't AoE II. Age of Empires is more like Command and Conquer Generals. Well, most of the C&C games actually, I just like Generals the most (Tied with Red Alert 3 but less people play that, something about OP psychics. Not sure what they're talking about, there's only one psychic. She is OP though :P). Same general idea, mass units and send them in. Change the units you send in to get a bonus, so flying units against infantry and tanks for example, snipers against infantry, light and inexpensive cav agaisnt priests (AoE 1, Babylonians were fun to play, horrible to verse lol), but mostly not too much to it.

Should probably define this to make it easier.. Feel free to stop reading if I read sluggish wrong since what follows is a breakdown of "RTS" which you could already know.

There are several sub genres in a Real Time Strategy game.
AoE/C&C/Star Trek Armada type: Massed units which you upgrade and send in, maybe chuck in a few other units to help. Various tactics can be employed but on the whole it's not too hard. You'll see 250 units for your entire population, armies of around 50 units clashing. A macro game more than micro, make sure you have food/gold/wood coming in by assigning twenty villages to collect them then get on with the battle.

Total War/King Arthur: Very much a strategical game, tactics are definitely in Simply charging your units at an opposing force will lose you the game. You also need to take care of what appears to be extraordinarily boring minutiae such as the happiness of your population and the health of the city. Armies can be up to 5,000 strong, possibly more depending which iteration of TW you're playing. Populations are massive, just a much bigger scale than AoE. Micromanagement of the resources is needed, upgrading buildings, etc but not to the same extent as "graph games".

Company of Heroes/ Dawn of War II: This is what they call real time tactical, more battle tactics instead of overarching strategy and small amounts of units. If you have 500 units on the board something's off, in this case it's more armies of 20 clashing. More often than not you might have ten units total (total soldiers, not total units) against ten of theirs with a tank. Smallest in terms of scale but also one of the hardest for macro players due to the amount of micromanagement needed on the fly. Still macro going on, but to a different extent. In this case it's managing attacks on five fronts, a fake retreat on another and setting your mortars up in the background while calling in paratroopers.

Graph games are Europa Universalis (EU), Caesar, Grand Ages: Rome, Port Royale would probably fit. Vicky is, as well, but like Hearts of Iron it's by the same guys who make EU so probably doesn't count. Oo, Vicky as in Victoria if you don't play these games. This is where the minutia become big. You're dealing with inflation, taxation, etc. Taxation becomes a simple slider with four points to exact financial plans. Think doing your taxes but for fun (May sound weird but it really is fun even without the casual jacket :P). Or being a politician, reading through an economical report then crafting a well thought out plan no-one understands but agrees it's good since you're so persuasive. There's levels to that of course, EU would be up top, Caesar/Cleopatra/Zeus/Grand Ages: Rome is more building cities, kinda like the Sims but with no people. Port Royale is close to Zeus but easier.

Then there's Total Annihilation/Supreme Commander: They may get their own category since there's few games quite like them, Sins might be going by the store page. Massive amounts of units but not in the Total War historical anachronistic accuracy way. This is Age of Empires if you changed the pop cap to 100000000000000. Huge amounts of units, never ending resources and destructive capabilities the likes of which even Generals didn't give you. Mad fun, but can be infuriating getting used to resource management going from AoE. Sins should help though, it's looking more like this and less like AoE.

If you hate the historical pace (slow) and want more action then I'd say you're definitely in the AoE category and Total War is not for you.
If you want exciting, flashing colours, lots happening then go for Company of Heroes.
If you like arranging your lines of archers just so with pikemen in front, archers behind, cavalry on the left flank ready to go in with units of light infantry on your right towards the center of the battlefield then finishing up with a quick dose of "What does my population want today then Total War is where it's at.
If you like armies instead of squads clashing but aren't really one for historical strategy, more "You, charge, you, you, and you retreat" then AoE/C&C.
A mix between AoE and CoH would be DoW 1, a nice intro to tactical while still keeping that C&C Generals feel.
If you adore the minutiae and think battles are less fun to control the individual troops then something like Europa Universalis is more where you should be. Lots of graphs and charts, less individual soldiers or battalions and more armies.

If you want a strategy game and AoE is the subtype you want, then Command and Conquer should be on your list. Red Alert 3 man, parachuting polar bears vs transformers and a psychic from Akira, how can anyone not like this game? Except for said psychic of course but just because a little girl shredded your base with a wormhole doesn't mean it's a bad game. Just horribly unbalanced. :P

If you're getting into AoE and want something new but hate the pace of TW yet still want to go big then try Supreme Commander. That's on Steam, Total Annihilation is on Good Old Games (gog.com I think, just GoG into Google) if you want large armies with faster paced gameplay. Sup Com is the spiritual successor to TA, better graphics but not too much change. I like the nuclear method but I'm biased from Defcon, experimental mechs and mortars work too.

Originally Posted by Codine

Also Even high end pcs chug on napoleon, the game is just bad. They fixed it in Shogun2 but medieval 2 and rome are the best.

I can run Napoleon fine but I can't even get to the splash screen/main menu in Shogun 2. Got the grandmaster edition too. ;_; Nice chess set though.

[Xander86]

Originally Posted by Chrissd21

cut

nice post dude rep++

[miller3492]

i loved napoleon, it is my fav total war game. i love 18-19th century tactics.