Rome II

[Gusington]

That is awesome about the differences between the Prologue and the real game. If i am intrigued by the Prologue I will love the rest. Just wish I could figure out how to use rams and where my siege ladders are, then I can win and move on.

And yeah W8 the Prologue is defintely not hard if you have played a TW game before. And even then...if you've played an RTS or TBS, you should feel at home.

[Sir Slash]

The Auto-resolve for battles is quite a bit different. You can now choose between different stances for your army to take, each with a predicted outcome as to how you will do. Tactical AI on "Normal" difficulity is pretty good. So far no susicide charges by the enemy General. Slingers seem to be over powered, with their Precise Shot skill activated they're deadly even against armored opponents.

[W8taminute]

That sounds great guys.  Thanks for the feedback.  Ok you've all managed to convince me this is a must have game.  Especially for a TW gamer like myself.   ;)

[Gusington]

Yeah I definitely dig the new info in autoresolve.

So you getting it now W8?

[MengJiao]

One criticism of the game I saw was that it offered no interesting choices -- and yet everything the reviewer said implied if anything an over-abundance of interesting choices

My impression from reading reviews and watching a few lets play videos last night, isn't that there isn't any interesting decisions, it that those decisions are few and far between at times. Given the streamlining that CA seems to have done, it seems there isn't that much to manage. Most of the reviews I've read hit them pretty hard on not having enough to do, and with the AI turn time supposedly taking 2-5 minutes mid to late game (Think I heard it mentioned there was 100+ factions), there seemed to be just a lot of waiting around.

My impression from reaching 241 BC as Pontus in Easy Mode is that there is a tremedous amount going on.  Well, actually there was a lot of stuff going on (really -- not just as an impression -- but actually there was a lot going on).  The first few turns I built up the army and crushed Cappadocia while allying with or trading with Athens and Bythnia and Trapezios.  In the next few turns I defeated the Galatians and made them a satrapy of Pontus.  Then I made a lot of money helping Athens and Sparta and the Selucids defeat Egypt.  Then I blew my wealth making Epirus a Satrapy and plunged into economic chaos (flooding in the home provinces didn't help).  So as my economy began to collapse I had a proto-Imperial domain extending from the Straits by Brindisi (lots of Romans in view there) across Greece and the length of the Black sea all the way to the Armenians in the Caucausus.  I pulled back my over-extended forces and let both satrapies fall (one to Macedon and one to the Selucids).  I was able to rebuild quickly and smash the Armenians in a campaign that has gotten pretty chaotic (I stirred up unrest and now there are two rebel armies out there making life difficult for everybody).
So there really is (at least potentially) a lot going on.  And I agree with the logic of the basic design decisions that limit the number of independent commands and other limitations.  What that does is make the huge array of decisions much more managable and meaning full so that (for example) instead of having scores of armies in transit, you have (as I do at the moment) say 1 admiral and the battle fleet, One reserve or sea or strike army, one support or reserve or strike army and one main army.  Everything you do with these forces (4 of them in this case) is crucial: forced march? Fortify?  Recruit? Reinforce and/or back up a Garrison?  Go to sea? Set an ambush?  Diplomacy requires roughly 2-3 crucial decisions a turn and technoloy and construction require another 2-3.  So that's around 8-10 crucial decsions a turn any one of which might cripple you or give you a huge advantage.

[MengJiao]

I really want to get this game.  What's stopping me however are two points mentioned here.

1.  Prologue seems to be ludicrously hard but if you don't play it you won't know how to play the game. 
2.  Battles seem to be short in time duration compared to previous TW titles.  Please don't tell me that a battle feels like a COD round where the mediocre player dies a thousands deaths in a round in under 60 seconds then rage quits.

1.  The prologue is not hard.  Not sure where you heard that.  I was able to win it very quickly.  Perhaps I won by exploiting weak and/or scripted strategic AI, but I still won it quickly nevertheless.

2.  The battles were very quick in the prologue campaign, but I have thankfully not experienced this is the full campaign or in the custom battles I have played.  Most of my complaints as to gameplay have been redressed by the standard campaign.  For whatever reason, the prologue campaign plays a lot different from a new campaign game.

Yes Ive seen some pretty lengthy battles in the Campaign game.  There was one in the rain with half-a-dozen forces and allies coming in from all sides.  I had to scout with mercenary horsemen, and try to keep my two Pontic commanders from riding into obscure, but very angry, mobs while the Galatians and the local garrison stood off the desperate Cappadocian Noble Cavalry.  It was touch-and-go, everything was at sixes and sevens until the Pontic Hopolites arrived and saw the Cappadocians off.

[Sir Slash]

I'm having a much tougher time as Pontus on "Normal". Took the first city from the Capps, then had to wait for Public order to rise before moving on. Meanwhile the Galatians declared war and the Capps sent an army against my eastern city. The Cappadocian army beat mine but then was defeated by my city garrison and withdrew. I have been able to direct my allies, Bithynia and Trapezios to concentrate against the Galatians and soon hope to go on the offensive again. I'm also at war with Cimmeria but they've only sent ships across the Black Sea so far. It's fun even if I'm completely sure what the hell I'm doing.

[MengJiao]

The Auto-resolve for battles is quite a bit different. You can now choose between different stances for your army to take, each with a predicted outcome as to how you will do. Tactical AI on "Normal" difficulity is pretty good. So far no susicide charges by the enemy General. Slingers seem to be over powered, with their Precise Shot skill activated they're deadly even against armored opponents.

A well-timed storm of precision shots can be absolute murder.  Against the big Eastern Armies with lots of cavalry, I've used buildings and farms to channel the enemy charges in to killing zones where one hopolite backed by spearmen and inspired by the commander stops the charge and the slingers and javelinmen kill heaps of the elite of Asia.

[MengJiao]

I'm having a much tougher time as Pontus on "Normal". Took the first city from the Capps, then had to wait for Public order to rise before moving on. Meanwhile the Galatians declared war and the Capps sent an army against my eastern city. The Cappadocian army beat mine but then was defeated by my city garrison and withdrew. I have been able to direct my allies, Bithynia and Trapezios to concentrate against the Galatians and soon hope to go on the offensive again. I'm also at war with Cimmeria but they've only sent ships across the Black Sea so far. It's fun even if I'm completely sure what the hell I'm doing.

  The normal world must be very different from the Easy World.  We the easy Pontics salute your alternative cosmos!  Unfortunately, in an Easy World, I was tempted to dabble in Egypto-Greco-Macedonian politics and as a result all my satrapies fell and the Armenians crushed Trapezios.  Even in an Easy World, the Armenians can be serious trouble.

[besilarius]

Think of what Cher (an Armenian) did to Sonny.

[Bison]

I just built some temples and left an army in the city for a few turns.  Eventually I only left a token 4 unit army in Bovianum to put down the eventual riots along with the town's garrison.  It also seems to have deterred the AI from attacking as I moved my other two armies toward the capital and victory.  Looting and razing requires a very heavy price in unrest, so I never did it.

Question. Did you create a seperate army with a general to garrison or is there a way to construct things that create garrisons? It seems some of my cities have garrisons listed (5 plebs, 6 spearmen, Eric) hate to waste a general just to garrison EVERY CITY

No every city gets a garrison based on city level and buildings in the city.  The reason why I put a general with a small army 3 units total is two fold.  1 I had I idea how big or what type of units the rebels would field, so I wanted extra muscle.  2 cities with a garrisoned army receive a reduction to the unhappy number.

[Bison]

The prologue is nice In that it slowly introduced features and with the limited area allows you to focus on smaller bites of data to learn basic mechanics.

[undercovergeek]

That is awesome about the differences between the Prologue and the real game. If i am intrigued by the Prologue I will love the rest.

+1

have played very sporadically due to work - it will receive a full battering this weekend

[MengJiao]

Think of what Cher (an Armenian) did to Sonny.

  Hardly a day goes by when I don't reflect on that.

[W8taminute]

Armenians have always been pretty good fighters.  Look what we did to the Azergayjans in Nagorno Karabakh.