First Impressions

Well, I've downloaded it now, and played it for about an hour and a half.
Being an oh-so-imaginative and original person, I decided to try out the Romani campaign first. Now I've played other mods that use that campaign map before, so nothing new there. But on looking at my starting position, I see 2 full stacks of rebel troops near Capua. Worse, they not only outnumber me but also hugely outmatch me. And they're positioned right next to one another. I'm not attacking that. Hell no.
I also see that my finances are in a sorry state. Despite the units not costing much in upkeep, I will be bankrupt within a few turns unless I capture, say, Cannae, pretty damn quick. And I can't do that without leaving Capua open to attack. God dammit. I decide to build a port; anything to get money in over the long-term. And that will allow me to disband my navy once it's built, saving a bit of money every turn.
So I pull my armies together into one stack, then set about drawing every available unit from my cities to make up a full army. Capua's population doesn't like me much, now. But they'll live with a one-unit garrison for now.

I want a better idea of troop movements in neighbouring regions, so I build a watchtower at my south-eastern border, overlooking Capua, then move my stack back to near Capua to defend it.

Oh, happy surprise! The AI sent one of those stacks to capture my watchtower. I hadn't expected that, but damned if I'm not going to take this chance. The enemy stacks are now divided. I attack.

I deploy quite far back, expecting the enemy to come at me with their superior units, despite the fact that I attacked. They don't. Instead, they position their entire army on the downward slope of a ridge, in the centre of which is my watchtower! It's positioning has created a very steep hill, below which the enemy force is staying put. Wonderful, I think. If I can just put most of my army at the top of the plateau created by the watchtower, then maybe I'll be able to provoke them into an attack. I'll be fighting downhill and will grind up their units as they throw themselves on my line!

I move my army to the ridge. Rorarii in the centre backed up by one Triarii. Hastati and Principes on the flanks. Missile units behind. Two cavalry on the right, one on the left (all general's bodyguards).
A side effect of being so much higher than the enemy is that my missile units can shoot and throw away to their hearts' content and receive little to no return fire. I kill almost 20% of the enemy through skirmishing alone, receiving not a single casualty myself.
I then use my cavalry to draw the enemy into a battle, throwing in more and more troops to counter their reinforcements before sweeping my left flank down the line, routing the enemy as I do so. My cavalry chase down the routers.

Heroic victory. Aaawww yeeeaaah! 1800-and-something kills to two hundred-and something.

Back to the campaign map. I see that I am in the red by the third turn. I return my army to Capua and watch the money jump. Clearly, the traits have a key role.

I'll keep playing, see how it goes.

Sounds like its almost on par to Arthurian total war when it comes to economical difficulties. Thanks for the impression! I'm going to attempt a Pontus campaign, I might upload my first impression if that's aright with you. You should probably add in the 4tpy...roleplaying the generals is way easier.

In fact i never considered the "RPG" aspect of the game, but someone in the team is about to make new traits, i hope that will cope with it.
@nasher
Thx for your detailled impressions. In fact, although the campaign is not scripted at all (vanilla scripts are called in 280, mostly for events), the romans are facing the samnites, during the third and last samnite war. That's why you see so many "rebels", threatening capua, an ally of rome. In fact these are Gellius Egnatus armies.;)
Good luck with them...
ps. what do you think about their linen legion ?:tongue:

I'm the guy who is making the new traits. I'll listen to any recomendation posted here. Right now I was doing basic traits (imo) like patrician/plebeius and such

Don't you feel that camilan hastatii are far too nerfed? I mean, I do know they are not even close to elite but... having only 7 of defence (3 armor 1 defence skill 3 shield) is just umbelievable, specially when rorarii got 12.

Balance is being worked on...we have some very good idea's going for balance one outlined by myself here

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...aign-Balancing

And a second by Hanti here

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...ce-proposition


It will likely be something in between what I suggested and Hanti's suggestion. A major portion of my time will be spent perfecting the battlefield experience while Anarchon's is spent on the strat map experience. But we will get together for the big endeavours!

I will aim for balance (and a fun experience), while striving to attain realism and enhance the AI's capabilities and accurately represent tactics used at the time. We don't plan on rushing this version and we are going to do our best to prevent bugs that have previously existed before. E.G. missing shield stat on a unit that has a shield or something along those lines. I will be working on the units parameters based on what the histories say on them (with Anarchon's help here) and what their skins look like. There will also be much balancing to do in terms of cost which pertains to the strat map. It will be a lot of work but worth it I believe.

If you have any suggestions on what you think would make for a more interesting mod let me know. Feel free to start a new thread and list your idea's there. I do take feedback into account. ;)