29-09-2004 12:01									#91
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I'm on medium difficulty and I've only conquered south of france. Its about 240 BC for me by the way. Different speeds for different folks I suppose. I'm slowly working my way through the gauls now. I don't like leaving the cities on auto governor so I'm running into problems with not enough family. Need more babies.

	29-09-2004 18:28									#92
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I read somewhere that you can adopt into your family, think it was on the Total War site !!

That would help to ease the situation of not enough babies not sure if thats right though but Im sure Ive read it !!

	29-09-2004 18:43									#93
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Yes, you can adopt new members into the family.

Of particular note is that if you play a battle with a captain rather than a family member and you win a "heroic" victory, that captain becomes a general and a family member (and typically gets a command bonus in the process ).

That gives you an incentive to go after those straggler rebels and brigands with a few spare units, just to see if you can pull off a major victory and get a free general.

	29-09-2004 18:44									#94
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Oh, and someone wanted screenshots...

My Brutii armies marching through a Gaulic town (this one was in Northern France, I think).

Keep in mind for this shot that I'm playing the campaign with a lower number of men per unit because I started the campaign before I realized I could even increase it. Oh well, everything else I've done is at "large" or "huge".

Attachment: rome4b.jpg
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	29-09-2004 18:46									#95
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quote: Originally posted by Arnelos Yes, you can adopt new members into the family. Of particular note is that if you play a battle with a captain rather than a family member and you win a "heroic" victory, that captain becomes a general and a family member (and typically gets a command bonus in the process ). That gives you an incentive to go after those straggler rebels and brigands with a few spare units, just to see if you can pull off a major victory and get a free general.

WHAT!! Woot I'm going to have to try this. I just had a nice little battle against the Gauls where my faction leader crushed the Gaul King, kind of neat. It even left behind one of those sword icons that signify that a famous battle took place there.

	29-09-2004 18:48									#96
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Campaign map for a good while back. Right now, I've already conquered Rome, but back when this shot was taken, these were my holdings in Greece, Macedonia, and Southern Italy as the Brutii.

NOTE: All screenshots had to be shrunk to 800x600 to fit on Apolyton and are originally 1024x768. If things look a bit blurry, that's why.

Anyhow, this is what the strategic map looks like (if a bit more blurry than the real thing):

Attachment: rome3b.jpg
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	29-09-2004 18:53									#97
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

Now, when you fight a custom battle and turn up the unit numbers to "huge"...

As for context on the image, I set up a siege of a Gaulic town much like the one I'd fought with Brutii units at some point a while back. I set up this one with Julii (red) Romans because they're easier to distinguish from the green Gauls and red Romans just look cooler, to be honest.

Anyhow, total units in this battle were just under 6000 (about 3200 Gauls and 2600 Romans). I bombarded the snot out of the Gauls with heavy onagers (with fire shot) and archers before entering with the legionaries and finally with cavalry.

Anyhow, first shot of that battle of the legionaries marching over where the archers' work was visible:

Attachment: rome5b.jpg
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	29-09-2004 18:58									#98
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A few very brave (but exceedingly stupid) Gauls...

Attachment: rome6b.jpg
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	29-09-2004 19:03									#99
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Seperate Battle. Romans vs Germans in a snowy pine forest.

------------

You know... Roman Triarii are only useful if their spears are faced toward the oncoming cavalry...

Attachment: rome9b.jpg
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	29-09-2004 19:15									#100
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Ok, last screenshot.

This one is as much of a wideout shot as I could get from the Rome vs. Gaul batttle I posted further above. You can only see about 1/3 of each army here (well, you can see the majority of the Gaullic Army, but most of those are lying on the ground dead).

A key for those not familiar:

White Unit Shields: A unit in rout. Those are all Gaullic units running away, of course, with a few still hanging on (barely) as the Roman legionaries march forward being covered by massed archer fire from behind them.

Blacked Corpses: That's where the heavy onager fire shots landed. Yeah, those things do some serious damage if they actually hit something (they generally just wildly fly into random trees or patches of ground).

Anyhow, the Gaullic rout:

Attachment: rome7b.jpg
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	29-09-2004 19:15									#101
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Dammit, Greece is rich.

Those Cohort selections, do you get them when you group the units or something? I don't use them too often.

quote: red Romans just look cooler, to be honest.

Which is why I chose the Julii.

	29-09-2004 19:19									#102
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Final stats of the Rome v. Gaul battle with the screenshots above:

Romans
Men Deployed: 2605
Survivors: 2408

Gauls
Men Deployed: 3277
Survivors: 0 (100% casualties actually aren't all that unusual in sieges, but are relatively unusual for field warfare)

I have to admit that I stacked the odds, though. The Gauls aren't so great with missile fire and I fielded a Roman army with LOTS of archers and artillery. Even giving the Gauls a bit of a numeric advantage didn't help in the slightest.

	29-09-2004 19:29									#103
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quote: Originally posted by Kassiopeia Those Cohort selections, do you get them when you group the units or something? I don't use them too often.

I use them pretty extensively, especially as the Romans. The main utility is that it saves time and it keeps your lines (of multiple units) straight. The first (saving time) is always useful. The second (keeping things orderly) pays off if you're playing the Romans because legions fight better when they're in that box formation (at least until they run out of pila and they aren't under threat of missile fire.

That said, there are some extremely annoying characteristics to the unit grouping. The most annoying of all is that if your group of units is facing north and you tell it to move south, the units on the left and right sides will cross each others' paths in order to end up on the left and right sides going the other direction (rather than just turning around and letting the formation be a mirror image).

That's normally not so bad, but with slow-moving, bulky, and obstacle-forming artillery units, it's an absolute pain.

	29-09-2004 19:57									#104
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quote: I use them pretty extensively, especially as the Romans. The main utility is that it saves time and it keeps your lines (of multiple units) straight.

Oooooh. Gotta try it.

quote: The first (saving time) is always useful. The second (keeping things orderly) pays off if you're playing the Romans because legions fight better when they're in that box formation (at least until they run out of pila and they aren't under threat of missile fire.

My legionaries are pretty often running at the enemy, and then formation isn't too big an issue. I do box them up when they stand behind a gate or a wall that's about to go down, but only a single unit'll fit in the space and the unit is usually pretty easy to line up on its own.

	29-09-2004 20:15									#105
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quote: Originally posted by Arnelos That said, there are some extremely annoying characteristics to the unit grouping. The most annoying of all is that if your group of units is facing north and you tell it to move south, the units on the left and right sides will cross each others' paths in order to end up on the left and right sides going the other direction (rather than just turning around and letting the formation be a mirror image).

You need to use change unit facing with the < and > keys.

	29-09-2004 21:54									#106
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Ack! I had a unit of equites returning from a scouting trip to a frontier city governed by one of my old fogies and great Gaul crushers, Decius the Mighty, who had 4 in Command skill and got +3 when attacking (!). From the past tense you can already see what happened - the equitees had just parked outside the city, out of movement points, when the Gauls attacked. I got control of the 100 or so equites while the AI ran the massive army from the town to my aid as "reinforcements". My courageous equites managed to kill twice their number of enemies before their morale broke and they fled, all the while the AI squandered my beatiful troops.

I've never felt as helpless in my life as when I watched the AI charge time after time with the General's crack cavalry unit at the enemy... they broke away after only eight were left, and the General was one of them, yet they charged back at them, and I screamed at the screen "DO NOT ATTACK!" but it was too late - Decius the Mighty perished in battle at the ripe age of 56.

Even the AI managed to win the day with the infantry, but at the cost of one of my best Generals.

	29-09-2004 22:18									#107
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Yay. I had an army run by a Captain crush a rebel army - he had 550 men, the enemy had 650 (first time I've ever seen naked fanatics, btw - and they're NOT naked ), and dear Captain killed every single one of them for a Heroic Victory, and I could adopt this "man of the hour". I love this game

	29-09-2004 22:29									#108
	Put an end to popups!

Thanks to all for posting the screenies, I should have my copy this weekend, and will hopefully be firing it up for the first time saturday


Dont think the wife and kids will see much of me this weekend

	30-09-2004 01:38									#109
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I had exactly the same situation against the germans but my general survived (not Decius). My "Decius" was "the mad". He was a pretty good general too so I used him to punish the germans with a cav army.

	30-09-2004 03:59									#110
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ooo How do you get "the mad". Hmm I suppose I have a guy at the moment that could probably qualify. I'm just leaving him in charge of one of my good cities, hopefully he can't do too much damage to it.

quote: (100% casualties actually aren't all that unusual in sieges, but are relatively unusual for field warfare)

I can usually get very close to 100% casualities in field battles. I try to keep my equites out of battle till the enemy is routing, then I chase and kill every single enemy with my fresh and eager equites. Its an excellent way of getting rid of any reinforcements for other enemy armies. Well this works well with Gaulish armies anyways, haven't managed to fight others yet. I'm very slow at this game.

Thanks for the tip about Captains being promoted into Generals. I rarely use Captains cause when I did once he got bribed and disappeared, after that I've always questioned their trust.
How do I adopt people into my family? I take it there's away besides Captains into Generals to get more family?

	30-09-2004 04:23									#111
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Adoptions happen either by well performing Captains like described, or completely at random (you get a prompt with a "yes" and "no" button and info on the candidate). The random adoptees tend to be utter losers (no points in any skill), but there can be some gems, fortunately you know before you decide. I've adopted several generals with a natural command skill of 2 or 3, nice to build up on that.

	30-09-2004 07:24									#112
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quote: Originally posted by General Ludd Anyone know what exact;y unlocks the different factions? After playing as the Julii and wiping out the gauls I can now play as them. I'm just wondering if you have to fight the last battle against them as they are wiped out, or if there is some mroe complicated trigger?

An alternative to winning the campaign is just to use the hack (mod) that unlocks the other factions.

	30-09-2004 07:27									#113
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quote: Originally posted by Flip McWho ooo How do you get "the mad". Hmm I suppose I have a guy at the moment that could probably qualify. I'm just leaving him in charge of one of my good cities, hopefully he can't do too much damage to it.

He just appeared that way. I was looking over the family tree and there he was as heir. When I looked at his traits it said he bit people. Needless to say, I named another 'heir to the throne'.

	30-09-2004 07:34									#114
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I started a new game as the Julii on hard/hard difficulty. Much mroe fun. The enemy seems to build more variety of troops and is more aggresive or pro-active on the map. I've had the computer succesfully break a siege of mine, and launch some good attacks of their own. They also perform much better on the battlefield.

	30-09-2004 07:38									#115
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Oh, and Chariots are ****ing cool.

	30-09-2004 08:48									#116
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The generals' personalties seem to develop based upon their actions in-game (beyond what they start out with randomly or by inheritance). So if you have a general that you give a particularly nasty post and you have him using lots of troops to quell riots, he might turn into "the harsh" or "the cruel" or even "the mad".

Most of the time, it looks like the generals' personalities do indeed respond to in-game situations. What exactly goes with what is not entirely known to us (still under the hood), but I think they did a pretty good job of it from what little I've seen of action-reaction so far.

	30-09-2004 11:59									#117
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Yeah I agree.

All my generals that become the faction leader usually end up "the Mighty", I don't tend to field much in the way of armies as I don't like leaving the city management up to the AI.

	30-09-2004 12:57									#118
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quote: Originally posted by General Ludd I started a new game as the Julii on hard/hard difficulty. Much mroe fun. The enemy seems to build more variety of troops and is more aggresive or pro-active on the map. I've had the computer succesfully break a siege of mine, and launch some good attacks of their own. They also perform much better on the battlefield.

You mean difficulty levels do not mean the enemy getting just more and more troops, the AI itself actually improves?

	30-09-2004 15:26									#119
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If so

Could just be that because of more numbers, the AI becomes more aggresive.

	30-09-2004 16:11									#120
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The strategic map looks cool. If only they had implemented some citybuilding aspect like Caesar II. The game would have been complete then