Rome II

[MengJiao]

We will remember this.

My next campaign will be either as Carthage in the new DLC or Sparta in the main campaign.

  How armies work in the campaign game is very different from how they work in the online multiplayer battles.  For one thing the online armies tend to have very elite troops and specialized gear like elephants and ballistae, for another, what happens to your allies tends to have a lot more impact than it does in the single-player world.
Anyway....for online battles, Carthage seems to have the most balanced force (good cavalry, infantry, elephants and artillery).  Since I cannot stand to stand on the defensive, I've been taking the most offensive armies I can find (Steppe Barbarians, Macedon, Selucids, Parthenians).  Maybe I need to be more flexible.  I guess I'll work on that.

[Gusington]

By destroying the Iceni your armies.seem to be offensive enough to me.

[MengJiao]

By destroying the Iceni your armies.seem to be offensive enough to me.

  It was kind of strange.  I've been checking on what armies are recommended for online use and only the Averni amongst all the barbarians are recommended.  Steppe Barbarians are not recommended at all ever.  Apparently in multiplayer, Spartan Pikes and Egyptian royal guards trump all, so barbarian versus barbarian games are getting more popular since there won't be any Spartans or Egyptians BUT most players are used to having those pikes to hold off the cavalry.  The barbarians do have spear troops but in barbarian battles the Oathsworn swordsmen types apparently are considered the best,so the Iceni showed up with as many Oathsworn as possible and two sets of spear troops and a mass of horsement guarding the flank (it was a 3v3 battle so for the Iceni I faced there was just that one open flank to start with).  After the horse archers slaughtered the Iceni skirmishers and the spears and iceni horse blobbed into a mess under massed horse archery, the rest was pretty easy:  jsut keep pulling the Scythians back and the charging and repeating.  I started with 1200 men and lost half of them.  The Iceni started with about 2000 and lost 1800 or so and their leader in about 15 minutes.
  But I now see this was a pretty unusual online battle since Steppe Barbarians are considered the worst online force.  Since then I have seen the Pikes and whatnot dominate the battle field and I find I must curb my horse archer habits.

[Nefaro]

I was a bit disappointed with many of the Gallic troops, in the vanilla game.  Really wanted to play a campaign with them but haven't done so yet.  I don't think the Caesar in Gaul DLC added much to them either, did it?

[MengJiao]

I was a bit disappointed with many of the Gallic troops, in the vanilla game.  Really wanted to play a campaign with them but haven't done so yet.  I don't think the Caesar in Gaul DLC added much to them either, did it?

  It may have, at least from the multiplayer point of view.  Apparently you can only deploy troops you have paid for either in the base game or by DLC.  My fellow Parthenians wondered how good the Steppe Barbarians might be.  Surely a natural question from one Parthenian to another.  Maybe there is a Steppe Barbarian DLC and I have purchased it? one wonders.  It seems the only Rome II DLCs I don't have are those for extended gore and more vicious animals  Which might be another reason the Iceni had no idea what hit them and why, possibly, just now, the Carthegenians are all the rage online.

[Gusington]

I was slightly disappointed with the Iceni roster too. I had some mods running to boost it a bit but I always wanted it to be a bit more exotic than it was.

[Sir Slash]

I gave the "Trait, Talents, and Toadies" mod a try and it adds quite a bit of character choices and developments/skills to choose from as they level-up but with a Radious mod save, it wipes clean your army and general skills. So pretty much a new campaign must.

[Gusington]

^Ouchie.

[mikeck]

It's a great mod. Only issue is armies can become a bit too powerful with some of the buffs.

[MengJiao]

I was slightly disappointed with the Iceni roster too. I had some mods running to boost it a bit but I always wanted it to be a bit more exotic than it was.

  Exotic can be so helpful in Rome II.  Last night after being trounced horribly by Bactrian armies 2 times, I became a Bactrian.  So there we were in the slightly woodsy hills above a lovely bay looking down on a Roman army and an Etruscan Army (!).  The usual Pontic forces were our ally and they eventually did the Pontic thing and vanished after beating up the Romans and Etruscans a bit.  The Etruscans remained stoic and philosophical down on the beach but the Romans were unhappy sitting down in the plains and taking ballista and archery for a few long minutes.  They wondered if artillery and elephants were even permitted in the game.  "Guys?" asked the Romans.  There was no answer from the gods.  Since the Bactrians had wiped me out with elephants only a game earlier, I indeed had some elephants and the ballistae had in fact killed only one Roman that I could see.  At one point a ballista bolt knocked over a few Romans, but they all got up.  So I brought in the elephants and after about half an hour of difficult fighting, the Romans and Etruscans were routed, giving me my only win of the night (one win, two loses).

[Nefaro]

The war elephants are like armored bulldozers.  Overpowered in Rome 2 IMO.  I think they have too much staying power and should break & run faster, especially when being pelted with javelins or being jabbed with spears for a time.

[MengJiao]

The war elephants are like armored bulldozers.  Overpowered in Rome 2 IMO.  I think they have too much staying power and should break & run faster, especially when being pelted with javelins or being jabbed with spears for a time.

  Many of the online battles exclude elephants and they definitely mess up the game.  Not only are armored Bactrian Elephants armored and probably easier to handle than African Elephants, but they seem to go nuts less often and they can be rallied after stampeeding or even going nuts.

   So yes, the elephants are pretty extreme.  On the other hand, Spartan and Egyptian Elite Pikes are immune to everything except (I'm guessing) stampeeding elephants and pointblank ballista bolts.  So if you exclude elephants and Artillery you just get Spartan or Egyptian pikes -- actually any pikes or elite infantry will do pretty well.

    So if you want an interesting online game you need to have some way of reducing the tendency of most players to get lots of heavy infantry (usually pikes, but Elite Romans are similar) and form a square and wait for a draw.  I'm going to experiment with forested terrain, barbarians only (kind of unfair since I will bring the despised Steppe Barbarians) and allowing Elephants and artillery.  I suppose I could get lots of heavy infantry myself but that seems likely to make the game even less interesting.

[Gusington]

If you are into exotic units and factions, try Bactria with the Qin infantry unit mod.

[Nefaro]

Yes, the Macedonian-style pike phalanxes are nearly impervious from their front.  But they're slow when in phalanx formation and don't have a terribly high kill rate.  So all things being equal in terms of phalanxes locking each other up in the middle, it all comes down to what you have on the flanks and how you use them.

This being appropriate since it's how the Macedonian armies were meant to fight - lock up most of the enemy army with their pike phalanx anvil while the Companion Cavalry and more mobile Greek-style phalanxes on the flanks could be the hammer.  So if the pikes are quickly steamrolling in Rome 2, they need to be toned down.  Of course.. everything steamrolls rather quickly in vanilla TW games so I tend to only play single-player with a mod that slows down the combat.  A couple I have tried make the pike units a slow grind, as they should be.  Vanilla TW combat just moves so fast that the difference in damage (aka kill rate) isn't as pronounced as I'd like.

[MengJiao]

Yes, the Macedonian-style pike phalanxes are nearly impervious from their front.  But they're slow when in phalanx formation and don't have a terribly high kill rate.  So all things being equal in terms of phalanxes locking each other up in the middle, it all comes down to what you have on the flanks and how you use them.

This being appropriate since it's how the Macedonian armies were meant to fight - lock up most of the enemy army with their pike phalanx anvil while the Companion Cavalry and more mobile Greek-style phalanxes on the flanks could be the hammer.  So if the pikes are quickly steamrolling in Rome 2, they need to be toned down.  Of course.. everything steamrolls rather quickly in vanilla TW games so I tend to only play single-player with a mod that slows down the combat.  A couple I have tried make the pike units a slow grind, as they should be.  Vanilla TW combat just moves so fast that the difference in damage (aka kill rate) isn't as pronounced as I'd like.

  The Online battles are different from battles in the single player game in some ways.  You can essentially win some battles in a minute or two when your foes realize they are getting wiped out and quit the game and get a draw.  Or the thing can go on for quite a while as your foe forms a square of pikes and goes for a draw.  I don't particularly mind either case, but I would like more options since nobody (but me) ever seems to use pikes offensively and yet the online game is full of pikes (and Pretorians) meaning its full of players who resort to a static defense at the first sign of trouble and when I play there are signs of trouble (one way or another) pretty fast.  So I end up looking at a lot of pikes (or Pretorians) in squares.
   Anyway....hence my temptation to use elephants and artillery.