What dissatisfies you in XGM?

[Zarax]

Like every good product manager, I'm always interested in user's opinion.

We all know why we like XGM, but let's think about the opposite:

What is that after a while gets boring/annoying/repetitive/whatever in your campaigns and makes you wanting some "freshness" (aka other mods)?

I'm looking for ideas/constructive criticism so we can make XGM a better mod than it is today, which is no small task.

[James Cook]

Just dl a few days ago, made a few changes my self....
And so far I am enjoying the mod, The first thing that caught my eye
was, that the game play is differnt than that of TE, a lot faster concerning
the barb factions...IMO
eg...schytia are the one that kick ass for real, compared to other mods
never seen that before

But as I said....played the mod for 1-3 days dont remember...????????????

keep up the good work

[TM Is Back]

Well, as you know, I love XGM.

There are some points of improvement though. For exaple the special temples. They do not function as they schould, Pantheon Paradise To Daphne in Antioch which says +1 armor etc, playing as GCS, + a Foundy, which means +2 armor etc, only makes units having +2 armor etc.

The Orakel to Apollo? In Thermon IIRC, or that city north-west of it, turns when you make it a Pantheon in a normal Pantheon to Dyonisus.

An other thing is the Trait system. Not that I don't like it as it is now, I like that the familty members get boosts easily, it's just that I don't like my family diing because of concubines.

More? No. It is just some checking things that needs to be done, the rest of the mod is perfect.

[Froggie5]

I have been playing XGM for several years now off and on (I always come back) and probably the biggest thing that irks me is faction balance. On the whole I have been well pleased by variety in different campaigns - sometimes Rome becomes a juggernaut, sometimes not, sometimes Armenia becomes a great power, in recent versions Thrace has been consistently one of the top 4 factions, etc.

However, I have always been annoyed by the uber Scythians - I have abandoned a number of campaigns simply because I didn't feel like fighting endless stacks of horse archers (autoresolve is usually a losing proposition). Hopefully the changes DBH made in the latest versions will tame the Scythians a bit.

I have also been disappointed that neither Carthage or TSE ever seem to do well in the dozens and dozens of campaigns I have played. Carthage always starts strong but invariably falls to Spain. In most campaigns by 100 turns or so Spain has all of North Africa and the Gallic lands. I would love to see Carthage do well once in a while. Same for TSE.

This is obviously my favorite mod and I am very appreciative for everyone's hard work, so please take this as constructive feedback. Thanks again for everything.

[Dog Fart]

How about some new animations for the phalangites. I normaly transfers the XGMD animations when installing a new update. I never did like seeing my troops holding an 18 foot pike with one hand. Just doesn't seem realistic. A new animation for 2hand units would be nice as well. Our 2hand units just kinda stand there shuffleing their feet. They dance around and rarley swing their axes. Something more dynamic like the berserker animation would be killer.

Thats all I have for now. The updates we've had this winter have covered about all of the problems I used to have with this mod. Instead of having complaints I have ideas. But I'll keep an eye out.

[gaius_caesar]

i don't like the hoplite animation though they are historical. I do like the Hoplite Animation from Res Bellicae cause it looks 300ish

[Stella]

I think Scythia should be toned down as well...it just isn't very fun fighting them. Give them some decent infantry so they don't just build horse archers. Might not be historical but historicity has to take a back seat to fun in some cases.

[RedFox]

What is that after a while gets boring/annoying/repetitive/whatever in your campaigns and makes you wanting some "freshness" (aka other mods)?

The reasons why I decided to start my own mod, instead of helping you guys out with 'awesome' stuff:
>> Unit Stats - Unbalanced, rough. Not fun. What I'd like to see is unit prices and upkeep that matches unit performance. Overall, the stats were all weird and dissatisfying.
What I also didn't like was how fast the units died in combat. Sometimes I couldn't even bring my cavalry about to the flanks before the combat in the middle was already over.. That just plain sucked to be honest and annoyed me to no end. In xgmD, unit stats get a major defense skill boost that makes them harder to kill from the front, but prone to flanking. Even militia units in xgmD start with 19 defense (XGM hoplites had 17 and those raped most stuff en masse..), only the attack is lower and is what makes them less useless.

>> Unit Rosters - what still annoys me to no end is the shameful disrespect the Diadochi get in XGM. Sometimes I feel like no attention has been given to them (which of course isn't true). That alone left the most significant force of the era unbalanced. I was also annoyed by Hypaspists in Greek rosters! God. I've never felt better deleting ownerships. Greeks are just too.. Hollywoodish. I know xgmD isn't extremely accurate either, but by all means it is leaps and bounds ahead of XGM. So please. I really wish to see Pantodopai, Deuteroi, Pezhetairoi and Argyraspidai in the next big release (by all means, get them from xgmD with unit cards and descr).

>> Faction Expansion Balance - ever feel like this mod is "the Scythians could rule the world" ? Ridiculous. Faction balancing is awful. Bonuses are too extreme and skyrocket the AI expansion. Rebel settlements are small and puny - should be big and powerful to be interesting to conquer. In xgmD, 60 turns in, there are no major superpowers roaming the lands. In XGM though, you can count on most smaller factions to be wiped out in half that time. I feel like balancing the AI bonuses to give weaker nations a better chance and leave meaningless nations such as Iberians off from conquering the whole world should be given top priority.

>> Campaign AI Balance - You know, I just loved the Seleucids in XGM 3 (yeah, I haven't played XGM for a while, so this is kind of 'in remembrance'). I think I never had as much fun wiping out stack after stack after stack of Seleucids in my campaigns. How about, instead of making sure the AI recruits endless stacks of Eastern Infantry you focus on few stacks that consist of Heavy Pikemen and such. In xgmD (yeah, awful comparisoning again, but this reply is to explain why I work on xgmD in the first place) I specifically gave the AI +2 exp recruitment bonus in monuments. The barracks system is also designed so that lower level units disappear in higher level barracks. It was just all to common to see Seleucid cities with Royal Barracks and recruiting Levy Pikemen. The lowest level unit in xgmD lvl 5 barracks is Pezhetairoi (which is a pretty awesome unit to have IMO, since Deuteroi is quite regular).

>> Campaign Start Balance - Well, I just found it a tad bit too easy to wipe out the Macedonians in 3 turns. How about you make situations like that impossible? I always play on VH/VH and I'm not sure about the latest version, but this is a bit ridiculous. If you consider the AI's murderous bonus policy, you could say that XGM forces you to blitz so that you can live to die yet another day. And please tone down Scythia and Iberia. They were ridiculous even in XGM 3 and it seems to be getting worse.


Things that are really not that important, but I felt like adding them anyways:
>> Map Textures - The vanilla textures are mostly rather unappealing. The campaign map especially. I found myself incapable of playing XGM without the new textures from xgmD. The battlemap isn't better either. My first version of battlemap textures was kinda dark, which is mostly the fault of my old monitor, but I have ever since improved them (not released yet in xgmD). Giving this as an extra download option (30mb) would be good and it doesn't modify any vanilla files.

>> Skies - Well, if you're a graphics nutcase like me, you might want to replace the awful vanilla clouds with new ones. This isn't very important but is still a nice feature. The downside is that they are rather big in size (50mb).

>> Music - harr, vanilla isn't exactly awful, actually vanilla soundtrack is downright awesome. But alas, Gladiator and Alexander are just epic.

>> Animations - like mentioned above, some improved animations such as fs_phalanx_pikemen (2h pike) and fs_large_swordsmen (units that have huge round shields need a hoplite style grip on the shield) could be ported over from xgmD.

>> Misc Graphics - Faction symbols could really use a remake, but wouldn't be a priority. Some new cool loading screens wouldn't hurt either. Unit cards are mostly good, so no problems with that, although some could indeed have a slight remake.

>> Pathfinding - I acctually made a fix for all greek settlement plans to improve AI pathfinding. Barbarian 1-3 level settlements though received a huge improvement in pathfinding. Such that you just cannot live without.

This really isn't to offend anyone, it's just my harsh opinion on XGM 3-5. XGM is definitely one of the best mods you can find for RTW and its simplicity completely dominates over sluggish mods like EB. But that doesn't mean it can't improve even further. I know I haven't played XGM 5.8 or anything, but it still retains some of its problems. xgmD branches off of XGM 3, so there is indeed little in common, but I feel that there are many things that XGM could learn from its small submod.

[Dog Fart]

Wow.

I just started a Gallic campaign and I can't express how boring it got. I wanted hang myself after my seventh spear warband battle. And tiny battles kinda suck. I could scale the starting conditions myself but I really don't like modding very much these days. The two new Gallic units are awesome but the vanilla barbs suck. I never liked playing and recently fighting barbs because, well, they suck. Spear warband after spear warband.

As RedFox mentioned, better settlement development and at least a few extra units on the start would be nice. Though growth bonuses may need to be toned down so the game doesn't excellerate too fast. And the XGMD recruitment system is superb in XGM. The ai will give you one hell of a challenge. I can vouche for that.

But, I like the Greeks in XGM. The main reason is because they are just fun. The second reason is because I've been using those units for over three years and I'm too attached to them. I would shatter if they were replaced. I still miss the Athenian Marines and Thessalian heavy cavalry.

[Maraxus]

The barbarians need more love, the new skins are great but I still never get excited about playing as the Gauls or Germans, they need some thing to make them standout from the other factions, it feels like they are just stripped down "primitive" versions of the "civilized" factions. Perhaps reworking their recruitment scheme to have all units available right away since they don't really require a lot of infrastructure (since they really didn't have any) or something, I'm just brainstorming here.:hmmm:

[Dog Fart]

The mercanary Thracians have some cool tatoos. But the Thracians themselves just have blue hair. But my point is, a simple skin job like tatoos, blood and gore would make the barbs fun. Not to mention better weapons instead of damn spear and shield. Iberia usually dominates the west because the have proto-legion style troops which goes a very long way in auto-resolving. I dont see why barbs can't have something like a heavy peltast with slightly stronger melee stats than the others to balance this. Makeing berserkers go berserk and having them in the gov buildings instead of that damned spear warband helps alot too. Not to mention the barb ai is ferocious with berserkers instead of spear armed peasants. I'd like to see the barb roster half heavy and half crazy psycho hillbilly looking. Right now it looks like a half naked pajama party in Key West.

[CaesarVincens]

It's good to ask questions like this, probably the best way to improve something, but perhaps we should narrow it down.

I'd ask these two questions:
1: What do you think XGM does best? Or what is the best feature of XGM?
2: What do you think XGM does worst? Or what is the worst feature of XGM?

And part of what needs to change depends on where Dime wants XGM to go, whatever direction that is.

[Zarax]

Ok, keep the thoughts rolling as this is starting to get quite interesting...

[parysatis]

I have played XGM for several years now. I keep coming back over and over again. I really like the Greek units and warfare within the Greek world generally. I also like the feel of the Carthaginians and the Romans. I also really like the temples and the rich character trait system.

However, in my opinion, the barbarian factions (except perhaps for Thrace) are mind-numbingly boring to play and generally irritating to have in the game (Particularly the Germans and Iberians and Scythians). I would rather see them replaced by other factions. For instance, I rather miss Numidia. In fact, basically, I think the mod would be much better without the top third of the map and with more famous cities spread throughout the "civilized" world.

However, by far the worst part of XGM (though I stress here that I love this mod and fully intend to keep playing it for as long as you work on it) is the speed with which the NPC factions kill one another off. The game often feels like it quickly degenerates into fighting the same battles over and over again against either the Seleucids or the Scythians. I would really like it if the npcs killed one another off 2-3 times more slowly.

[Suppanut]

An other thing is the Trait system. Not that I don't like it as it is now, I like that the familty members get boosts easily, it's just that I don't like my family diing because of concubines.

This thing seem to be main problem of the my work on traits as htismaqe also told me recently which made me need to revised and looking for a way to made character attribute to

1) no longer Influence spam
2) Character should have specialization in Command or Management but not both
3) Management should harder to gain from traits(since two head usually better than one and need three to beat the genius Kongming)
4) Ancillaries capped to 1 gain per turn

I think I must act quickly as playtester like htismaqe is not easy to find.

[TM Is Back]

Well that solves one of the "problems" then for me Only some small bugs remain.

[Dom9127]

I haven't played XGM for a while but here are the things I didn't like;

1. Some factions (Armenia, Gaul) have really boring rosters, and still maintain the poor quality vanilla skins.

2. 2d work was quite good in terms of the Unit cards, but almost non-existent for faction symbols and loading screens.

However these things can be sorted out (In terms of number 1 its probably already achieved with the post-Marius project) these problems don't require a large amount of work to get right and just small changes from vanilla (i.e different shield designs, no more naked Thracians) would be satisfying.

[TM Is Back]

1). Gaul is already updated and pretty well now.

[Spartan198]

My likes: The main thing about XGM is the simplicity of it. It takes vanilla and makes it what it should have been. It's historical (at least, enough for me, as I tend to look past little things such as lorica segmentata Legionaries and corinthian-helmed Spartans), but without sacrificing gameplay and fun factor (*cough* EB *cough*). I don't have to hunt through the factions when I want to play with the Parthians, for example, because they're simply named "Parthians", rather than Pahvla, Perthia, Parthicaria, or some other unfamiliar name. And instead of "psdhklytrcbhghgmjgjhgfm'shgmkj" () in the AoR roster, we have simple "Militia Spearmen".

My dislikes: Well, I've said before that I miss the Greek Armored Cavalry and Athenian Marine Archer units.
The Greek AoR Hoplites seem kind of...bland...if that's the right word. I kind of miss the Armored Hoplites skins (both the vanilla version and DBH's custom version), so I'd personally rather see one of them substituted for it.
Two-handed animations for phalangite units would definitely be a plus.
I'd love to see the IGCS replaced with a dedicated Epirus faction.
THE NEW INSTALLER IS CONFUSING AND I CAN'T SEEM TO MAKE IT WORK RIGHT!!!!
Scratch that last one, problem solved with 5.8.13. Many thanks, Dime.

[Froggie5]

My likes: The main thing about XGM is the simplicity of it ... It's historical ... but without sacrificing gameplay and fun factor (*cough* EB *cough*). I don't have to hunt through the factions when I want to play with the Parthians, for example, because they're simply named "Parthians", rather than Pahvla, Perthia, Parthicaria, or some other unfamiliar name. And instead of "psdhklytrcbhghgmjgjhgfm'shgmkj" () in the AoR roster, we have simple "Militia Spearmen".

amen