CIVILISATION VS BARBARISM: Which factions do you preffer to play?

[Captain W. Handberg]

As of yet, I've played around 100 turns in as Vandals and 20 as the ERE. So I guess I'm a bit of a double-agent!

[AnonMilwaukean]

Wow, I am surprised by the vote results at this point. 10 more people, as of 3/15/2015, 6:00pm CST in the USA, voted for the 'civilized' sides.

Which is great, not complaining about it, but just honestly surprised. I mean, there are only 3 'civilized' factions: WRE, ERE, and Sassanids. And of the three, WRE and ERE don't really feel all that different when I've started a campaign just to play for ~50 turns as each. Sassanids are really, really different in many ways from WRE and ERE, but are a little on the easy side (beat a full campaign on Hard already with them).

Then with the 'barbarians', you have at least the Franks/Saxons, the Great Migrators, and the Huns. And for many people, you might also have the Norse and the Longbeards.

So right away, I thought that the vote would skew towards the 'barbarians' because they are simply more numerous. Moreover, the Huns are a truly nomadic faction, while the migrators are a blend, while the Norse factions have fairly different factional/cultural abilities, etc. So all the 'barbarians' feel a bit more different from each other (though they, too, have a bit too much roster overlap within their cultural groups).

But the icing on the cake is that, right now, Attila as a whole is a fair amount harder than R2, meaning that those Roman factions are actually quite challenging this go-round to play as.

In the end, I prefer the Huns for the same reason I preferred Parthia in R2 (cavalry heavy side with interesting roster/start)... so I went with 'barbarians' in the vote, and assumed I'd be in a majority due to the 'barbarians' simply having more factions to choose from.

Like I said, just surprised, though by no means negatively so.

[Azrien Fox]

I have not played that much campaign, but I would think it would be better to go with a civilized nation, instead of like a horde faction.

[Gronndar]

I have not played that much campaign, but I would think it would be better to go with a civilized nation, instead of like a horde faction.

Playing as a horde is a nice change of pace, when compared settled factions. Just going somewhere opposite directions, not following campaign advices. As alans I went pillagin spree across ERE and other horde went to Armenia. Pillaged sassanid core regions, then I went to Egypt and made my base there. Then ERE and sassanid decided to unite against me and drove me off. Need to try to salvage that campaign or start new one, with pillaging ere&persians, but settling in wre lands

[Huberto]

I always play as France in Napoleon, almost always Rome in TWR2, West Rome in Attila...in ETW though I think I tried them all at least once.

[Darios]

I'm fine either way, as long as the barbarians are well developed and depicted in an interesting and accurate light (unique culture, strengths/weaknesses, the ability to develop, etc.) I love civilized factions as well, but I never truly enjoyed playing as "the proverbial civilized faction" - Republican-era Rome (in Hellenistic Era/Republican themed games such as RTW and Rome II) because there tends to be a bit too much focus on them and you end up with sub-par barbarians. I truly get the impression that in Rome 2, CA spent ages developing the Romans and Carthaginians (ex: that Siege of Carthage video), then ran out of time and did lesser quality work on the barbarian factions. That is not okey.

Attila emphasizes the barbarians far better, and as a result I enjoy playing with the ERE, Alani, Antes, Axum, and a sleuth of diverse factions.

[Lucem Mundum]

Overall I prefer the barbarian factions even though I tend to suck with them lol. My most successful campaign as a barbarian was the White Huns, where I managed to wipe out most of the Sassanid vassals, and raze all the Sassanid regions except for two. They are tough to play with but challenge is part of the fun, which is why Attila is my favourite TW game.