Rome II

[Bison]

LB I think your right on the div vs mil trees.   Also I think the barbarian tribes really need to maximize in their horse bonuses.

[W8taminute]

I downloaded the Beta 3 patch straight away before even playing the game and I haven't run into any map scrolling or video performance issues.  I have yet to fight my first in campaign battle but I suspect that it will be enjoyable and challenging. 

I pretty much agree with you guys, can't seem to understand why everyone over at TWC and angry Joe are so hateful of this beautiful game.  Now to go get some more time in!   :)

[Nefaro]

I downloaded the Beta 3 patch straight away before even playing the game and I haven't run into any map scrolling or video performance issues.  I have yet to fight my first in campaign battle but I suspect that it will be enjoyable and challenging. 

Some people have been reporting crashes on entering or exiting tac battles.  I've not played enough the last few days to get into a battle to see how well it runs there, but the campaign map performance has been increased by a huge amount in the Beta 3 update.  Be happy you missed the crappy performance in the original release.

I pretty much agree with you guys, can't seem to understand why everyone over at TWC and angry Joe are so hateful of this beautiful game.  Now to go get some more time in!   :)

Because the game's AI was fatally flawed.  Even CA came out and said that it was unfinished and "missing" stuff to make it work properly.  I still don't think it's all that great, but if you're using the latest updates then it's a good deal better than the previous versions.

A major complaint I still have is that nearly all of the battles are siege battles.  I've had almost zero open field battles against a comparably-sized enemy army.  Hell... any-sized enemy army in the open.   This should happen quite regularly if the sizes are anywhere near.  But, no, the AI just holes up in the cities all the time.  On some occasions, they may come and initiate a siege battle against you.. but it's still a siege battle.  This long series of siege battles makes it dull rather quickly.

If CA can start getting the fights out in the open, then it'll be a lot more fun. 

[undercovergeek]

My time with the game is much less than yours but I'm 3 battles deep into a carthage campaign and they've all been in the field so far - 2 interceptions on the way to a seige and an outright open field battle

That and if I'm outnumbered 3 to 1 I'm afraid I'm going to stand behind my big ass walls too and let you die trying to climb in

[Bison]

The early game siege battle are now down right brutal.  I haven't even dared to attack a walled city without two armies of 15 to 20 units.

[mikeck]

I've got about 10 hours in with beta and had no crashes. My battles are about 50-50 seige v open. I raid the enemy territory and usually and army will come by. Of course, if I was outnumbered 2 to 1 by a professional roman army, I'de hide in the city too.

I mean, if you look at Ceasar's Gallic Wars, many of his battles were sieges of towns as well.

[W8taminute]

I've got a little over 2 hours of campaign under Beta 3 and have one siege and 3 or 4 field battles.  Yes the Ai is not too smart in battle however a series of misfortunate events during the last two field battles have left my 3 city empire financially bankrupt and 2 of my three armies broken. 

I hang my head low due to the shamefur dispray of my troops who panicked when my general was heroically killed on the field.  Time to start another campaign methinks but I'll give my current one a turn or two more just to see what happens.

My next campaign won't be so short now that I grasp the city and tech management a little better. 

Conclusion:  The strategic ai seems to be pretty good but the battle ai needs a little work.  Not too bad though that it's a game breaker. 

[mikeck]

Yeah, battle AI in TW has never been great (although it was pretty decent in S2). I'm happy when it doesn't do anything stupid...which it generally doesn't in my Rome 2 experience. Pretty low bar but whatever...you know what you are getting. When I want to have a challenge, I play AJE

[LongBlade]

Holy moley my Germans need to stay out of the desert. I took ~25% casualties in one turn from attrition in the desert. To take a well-defended town I may need three or four full-sized armies. Two is nowhere near enough with that kind of attrition.

[Bison]

I haven't pushed into the desert yet.  Just now took my first city in Spain.  It'll be many turns before I get to Africa, but I'm going to make sure I max out my attrition and siege techs first.

[Bison]

Played a little more.  I can feel the momentum really starting to turn in my favor and am now just waiting for my max number of armies to increase.  The one thing that really slows down the Arverni is the requirement for razed/pillaged cities.  I just occupied the city as Rome.  I saw no benefit to do any other action.  The need to raze/pillage just really slows down expansion because it forces you to leave an army to occupy the city.  Otherwise the unhappiness is just too much and you'll end up spending time and armies hunting down rebels. 

[LongBlade]

Played a little more.  I can feel the momentum really starting to turn in my favor and am now just waiting for my max number of armies to increase.  The one thing that really slows down the Arverni is the requirement for razed/pillaged cities.  I just occupied the city as Rome.  I saw no benefit to do any other action.  The need to raze/pillage just really slows down expansion because it forces you to leave an army to occupy the city.  Otherwise the unhappiness is just too much and you'll end up spending time and armies hunting down rebels.

As the Suebi I only razed a town in extreme circumstances. Mostly I occupied and adjusted them. Early on this meant occupying them for a longer period of time, but that goes away as you hold a province. I think you only need to hold one town in a province to gain the occupation bonus. That makes it easier to expand.

[Bison]

Do the Suebi have a military victory condition tied to raze/pillage?  The Arverni have to have like 60 or something like that for military victory.  So I've been occupying walled cities and razing/pillaging the non-walled cities.

[LongBlade]

Do the Suebi have a military victory condition tied to raze/pillage?  The Arverni have to have like 60 or something like that for military victory.  So I've been occupying walled cities and razing/pillaging the non-walled cities.

I have paid zero attention to victory conditions. I just want to pwn the map.

We do get some bonuses for looting and raiding, but I'm not focused on that. So far it looks like the Macedons are the last big power against me. Based in north africa I am going to have my work cut out for me.

Interestingly, I'm at war with about half a dozen factions. However, this is largely by choice. The AI was really good in setting up a few military alliances 50+ turns ago. Then they started springing attacks on my allies and asking if I would support them. Before I know it, I'm at war with a bunch of countries that I don't have direct contact with.

At a strategic level I have three fronts going on, and I recognize the potential hazard of Germanic tribes fighting on three fronts. I'm pushing into the Iberian peninsula, trying to figure out how to manage north africa, and chipping away the mess of peoples just south of Turkey.

[Bison]

Carthage has already fallen in my latest campaign.  I hadn't even uncovered the fog of war in their region yet.  Carthage has been knocked out early in every game I've played so far.  Sort of sad to see one of the two big empires knocked out within the first 20 turns or so of a campaign.