Rome II : Total War

[Simulacrum]

I would love for a game to properly implement the C3, command, control, communications, "fog" faced during such time periods. Don't recall a game, off hand, that has done it very well if they even try.

If you wanna talk real-life problems, that's an insignificant problem.

The biggest problem is that you're the one in charge, and you're immortal. Even if your faction leader dies, you'll still be in charge of the actions of the new one, and since you're essentially a godlike genius thanks to your knowledge of how the game works, that means every single faction leader you ever have will also be at that level of genius. Even having your avatar stabbed to death on the senate floor wouldn't stop you!

Where as in real life, when the old ruler dies you basically roll the dice on your new one and hope you get an Augustus or a Trajan rather than a Nero or a Caligula, while we in-game get a non-stop chain of Agustus-level leaders who all share a singular vision cross-generations. If rome had been that lucky in real-life the empire would probably still have been standing to this day.

Anyway, pretty hard to replicate in a game. Even the ones that try, like Crusader Kings, still leave you with the problem that, even though your faction leader has different stats, you're still the one guiding every successor's actions, so after you've dealt with any instability resulting from a change in ruler (which is easy tanks to game-knowledge), you're right back on track.

[Faldric]

actually, in reality there would be many increasingly severe problems with expanding an empire that big in pre-modern times. but most of these problems are hard to implement into a game in a way that isn't just incredibly annoying and/or boring.
.....
and that's just one issue

You are right of course. I just wanted to state that if you managed to conquer 90% the remaining 10% wont be as hard as it was to get to that point. Which goes in line with your statement as well. Thats the problem with strategy games "End game", most of the time its boring since you reached the point where you have won much sooner than you actually get to read "Victory". At this point everything gets a chore and is just a delay of the inevitable.

I am interested how the senat missions will play out. Hopefully they have more impact that the missions on shogun 2 and shift the focusfrom spamming armies and mindlessly attack your neighbours.

[Sy]

If you wanna talk real-life problems, that's an insignificant problem.

The biggest problem is that you're the one in charge, and you're immortal.

that's obviously a problem, but i don't think it would be as severe as you think. because a game that properly simulates the "c3" would take the direct control almost entirely out of your hands: the 'person' (ai individual) who manages a city's laws is not the same as the one who makes sure the finances are well, is not the same as the one who decides what buildings to construct when or where, is not the same who makes sure armies have proper food supply, is not the same who makes sure new units are recruited and properly equipped, is not the same as the one planning the military strategy on an empire level, is not the same as the one planning the military strategy on a local level, is not the same as the one actually leading troops into battle (and planning tactics with the help of advisors) is not the same as the officers giving orders to their men on the front line.

as a result, while you're right that the faction leader would magically always be a strategical and tactical genius, he/she would still rely almost entirely on the skill, knowledge, opinions and intentions of those actually following and passing on any given orders.

also, there are two ways to easily solve the potential immortal leader issue in a game: either you just focus on a conflict that didn't last longer than, say, three decades (the boshin war in which the fall of the samurai expansion of shogun 2 is set only lasted one year and three months historically, i think the game campaign starts eight years before that) or you create some kind of fantasy universe that has an immortal ruler (or simply a long living one, like pretty much any elf in any fantasy setting ever) while still relying on traditional pre-modern warfare and communications for the most part.

depending on the particular setting, that might or might not solve problems like the example you gave in which the ruler is murdered during the conflict. but it's not like that kind of event has to be a game mechanic, it just often is to add depth and variety - and at least on the depth side of things, i think a proper c3 simulation would already have enough :P

Thats the problem with strategy games "End game", most of the time its boring since you reached the point where you have won much sooner than you actually get to read "Victory". At this point everything gets a chore and is just a delay of the inevitable.

definitely. just wanted to point out it (usually) wasn't that way in reality^^

I am interested how the senat missions will play out. Hopefully they have more impact that the missions on shogun 2 and shift the focusfrom spamming armies and mindlessly attack your neighbours.

agreed.

[Simulacrum]

that's obviously a problem, but i don't think it would be as severe as you think. because a game that properly simulates the "c3" would take the direct control almost entirely out of your hands: the 'person' (ai individual) who manages a city's laws is not the same as the one who makes sure the finances are well, is not the same as the one who decides what buildings to construct when or where, is not the same who makes sure armies have proper food supply, is not the same who makes sure new units are recruited and properly equipped, is not the same as the one planning the military strategy on an empire level, is not the same as the one planning the military strategy on a local level, is not the same as the one actually leading troops into battle (and planning tactics with the help of advisors) is not the same as the officers giving orders to their men on the front line.

as a result, while you're right that the faction leader would magically always be a strategical and tactical genius, he/she would still rely almost entirely on the skill, knowledge, opinions and intentions of those actually following and passing on any given orders.

But the best emperors sort of did do all that, and the very best ones would sit down to basically micromanage the rulebook for the entire empire to an even greater degree than we have control over in-game. It's what emperors do. Assuming you have an emperor that actually does something anyway, and not one of the lunatics who spend their time playing games with the members of their court, which is more a byzantine-thing than a roman-thing.

He'd obviously be limited by where he could be at any given time, but while he can't be personally leading legions in one part of the empire while directly deciding how to deal with civic issues in another, he can decide who does those thing on his behalf, and what rules they'll be following when they do. And if they don't follow them, they'll answer for it. It's not like we really decide anything more than that in-game either. Deciding what buildings to build where, or what troops to put where and how many, is exactly the sort of things they could be doing, even if the minutia of how to accomplish this wouldn't always be under the emperor's direct control (unless he wanted it to be).

Of course, historically they had just absolutely huge problems keeping their subordinates under control, and the empire was divided into multiple parts on several occasions out of necessity, since when it was all controlled by one man then it was just too large for him to personally go deal with every conflict that erupted, and when you gave proper armies to other men to control, those men weren't always loyal and would often decide that they'd make a rather better emperor than the one in charge then lead their legions in revolt.

But with a line of emperors that are all the sort of genius that we represent in-game, maintaining the loyalty of the legions wouldn't have been a big long-term problem, because you wouldn't have to deal with a chain of incompetent emperors, of questionable legitimacy, coming into power and constantly bribing the legions, thus irrevokably increasing the power of the legions (good luck surviving if you're the emperor who decides not to bribe your legions, when there's this other guy over here who will bribe them), to keep the legions loyal directly to them, while simultaneously degrading the legions' loyalty to the state to the point where they ultimately weren't loyal to anyone but the person who could get them the most money or the greatest spoils of war.

The only thing I'd really call unrealistic is the direct control we have over all the soldiers everywhere, but the game would be kind of boring (not to mention annoying to deal with) if we could only control stuff under the direct control of the faction leader. I also kind of dubt the AI would be up to accomplishing the sorts of orders we'd need to give it for the game to be enjoyable to play if we needed to give up this level of control.

[SirRobin]

Well I didn't plan too but, I preordered. Greenman has a coupon that even with the sales tax I get from them that I don't get from Steam? Is still eleven bucks cheaper than Steam's preorder and also includes the Greek DLC. Now to keep my fingers crossed, hoping that my rig can handle it as well as it handles Shogun II.

Only two months to go.

[Ettan]

I never had any issues with the "End game" in previous total war games.
On the SP side I understand the problem. But if you want endless content try the Mp side out, trust me it never gets old.
There is plenty of tournaments & ladders out there both official, semi official and a vide array of guild hosted ones.
You dont have to go super serious either, nothing wrong just playing for fun with mates.
Control skill & battle overview has a limit; but the tactics and army compositions they are ever evolving, it never gets stale.

[Sy]

[stuff]

i still think you're underestimating the amount of work and power that historical emperors had to give out of their own hands, but you make some good points.
the two game solutions i gave would still work though, even if the leader would have as much direct control as possible.

the game would be kind of boring (not to mention annoying to deal with) if we could only control stuff under the direct control of the faction leader.

in total war or pretty much any existing strategy game, absolutely
but i was talking about a theoretical game that would take these very issues as it's core game mechanics and build upon them, creating a completely different kind of strategy/simulation game.

I also kind of dubt the AI would be up to accomplishing the sorts of orders we'd need to give it for the game to be enjoyable to play if we needed to give up this level of control.

agreed. can't see that kind of ai happening anytime soon, at least not in games, especially since such a title would probably not appeal to a huge amount of people and only be played (and bought) by some grand-strategy/simulation fans.

Now to keep my fingers crossed, hoping that my rig can handle it as well as it handles Shogun II.

good luck then!

I never had any issues with the "End game" in previous total war games.
On the SP side I understand the problem. But if you want endless content try the Mp side out, trust me it never gets old.
There is plenty of tournaments & ladders out there both official, semi official and a vide array of guild hosted ones.
You dont have to go super serious either, nothing wrong just playing for fun with mates.
Control skill & battle overview has a limit; but the tactics and army compositions they are ever evolving, it never gets stale.

that only works for having challenging battles though, which isn't really what we were talking about. having multiplayer ladders for battle tactics does nothing to make the end-game of a campaign more strategically challenging.

[Verdugo]

What's your specs? Do you have an AMD 4100 cpu?

I have intel core i5 650 (yeah kill me, its not custom PC), although I doubt it has anything to do with it as I was able to run it year ago without any problem.

[SirRobin]

I have intel core i5 650 (yeah kill me, its not custom PC), although I doubt it has anything to do with it as I was able to run it year ago without any problem.

Yeah, may just need to be reinstalled?

[Verdugo]

Yeah, may just need to be reinstalled?

I dont want to risk it when everything else runs properly, besides on their official forums they were recomending everything, including updating sound drivers and disabling certain browser plugins

[SirRobin]

I dont want to risk it when everything else runs properly, besides on their official forums they were recomending everything, including updating sound drivers and disabling certain browser plugins

Yeah, it can end up being a case of whether trying to fix it, is worth the hassle.

[Nerraw]

http://wiki.totalwar.com/w/Rome_II_Recommended_Specs

Minimum:
OS: XP/ Vista / Windows 7 / Windows 8
Processor:2 GHz Intel Dual Core processor / 2.6 GHz Intel Single Core processor
Memory: 2GB RAM
Graphics:512 MB DirectX 9.0c compatible card (shader model 3, vertex texture fetch support).
DirectX®:9.0c
Hard Drive: 35 GB HD space
Screen Resolution: 1024x768

Recommended:
OS: Windows 7 / Windows 8
Processor:2nd Generation Intel Core i5 processor (or greater)
Memory: 4GB RAM
Graphics:1024 MB DirectX 11 compatible graphics card.
DirectX®:11
Hard Drive:35 GB HD space
Screen Resolution: 1920x1080

[Confined]

35 gigs HDD space O_O DAYUM!

[Deleted]

Time to shop for a new processor me thinks.

[ParanoiD84]

New panoramic screenshot released.
http://tww-data.s3.amazonaws.com/panorama3/index.html
Can't wait.

Looks amazing, cant wait for it and i love the pyramids in the back. Playing Roma Surrectum 2 now until release as Rome and one as Pergamon.

[Benggaul]

Looking forward to it, but I'll be waiting for the inevitable "Game of the Year" edition that includes most/all of the DLC. I've never been a fan of buying games piecemeal.

[Sy]

http://wiki.totalwar.com/w/Rome_II_Recommended_Specs

seems like graphics is higher than in shogun 2, but otherwise they are identical.
obviously if they work as well in practice remains to be seen, but nice to have developers actually care about actual performance and not only about preview graphics that no normal pc will be able to show at a decent frame rate.

35 gigs HDD space O_O DAYUM!

actually even shogun 2 says 32gb, yet it only takes 23 on mine - and that includes fots.
so i'm guessing the 35 are only in case it gets much bigger than they intend it to actually be, so people can't complain

New panoramic screenshot released.
http://tww-data.s3.amazonaws.com/panorama3/index.html
Can't wait.

wow. awesome!

i'm usually skeptical about 'screenshots' from the developers/publishers, as they have a habit of beautifying the actual pictures taken in the game and/or use ultra video settings that no home-pc can handle.
but: looks incredible! and would still look impressive if the actual game is a little below that^^

also, i remember when i bought the original rome with a friend, starting it the first time and we were both like "woah, imagine how cool it would be if the actual game battles looked like this" during the intro video xD
needless to say, minds were blown a little later that day.

[Airlick]

i'm usually skeptical about 'screenshots' from the developers/publishers, as they have a habit of beautifying the actual pictures taken in the game and/or use ultra video settings that no home-pc can handle.
but: looks incredible! and would still look impressive if the actual game is a little below that^^

I don't think CA does that. They don't have to. You're right, though, handling such graphics is impossible for an average PC, even if it's a high end PC. You need a custom and very expensive setup for that. But still, this level of details is definitely reachable without beautifying the screenshots. Shogun 2 already had extremely good graphics, especially during mist/rain, and they surely made a few steps forward with Rome 2.

[Sy]

i agree, i doubt rome 2 (or total war titles in general around release) have any need for artificially enhancing graphics in previews.
and it's not like there are any strategy games that even come close anyway, unlike with fps where there is a lot of "look, ours looks better! look!!"-competition^^

and if current pcs won't be able to handle it with, like, 16x anisotropic filtering and anti-aliasing, i guess that's fine too. that would only make a tiny difference (in comparison to 4x or 8x) and it eats a lot of processing power.
so far every total war game i've played looked stunning in comparison to any other game i was able to run on the pc i had at that time.

i've just gotten used to not taking everything game previews say and show at face value. and i'm hyped enough as it is, so a little skepticism towards rome 2 is just healthy

[sinilaid]

New map thing