Fans suggestion thread for future releases

[QuintusSertorius]

Do you also adjust faction/general symbols from the "epirote dog" to a more appropiate symbol once you finished your submod?

No, I don't do graphics, only code/text. If someone else wants to make something up, it would be welcome.

[Lusitanio]

Oh right, guys, after playing +420 turns with Carthage this is what I have to say:

-Amazing game, beautiful units, and cities (waiting to see the changes made for 2.35). The game still manages to be very challenging after so many turns.
- Very few pirates navies, in the last 150 turns I have seen around 2 fleets of pirates, not enough for that time and rendering my navy a bit useless.
- Besides the Numidian raid script, some occasional rebels and one faction that hoarded to my African cities, causing caus there, Africa and Iberia are heavens right now, peaceful piece of lands. I would suggest making some scripts for rebellions in Africa (more raids from the tribes in the south) and in Iberia (especially taking into consideration that the Romans took more than 200 years to conquer Iberia due to revolts). For example, a scripted revolt in Africa if Atig and Adrumet have the taxes set in Very High after something like 6 turns.
- AI units revolt to often, especially when a faction reapers and it destroys the faction. Maybe you could reduce it or make it nearly impossible for AI units to revolt?
- Sometimes factions are destroyed by killing the FMs in battles, despite they still have almost all their cities. It happened when I was at war with Roma, did a battle in one of the northern Italian cities, in which I end up killing four FMs and accidentally destroyed the Roma faction. This was a bit game breaking because I was expecting more challenge from Roma and after that, it was just mopping up operations on the rest of their cities (even Roma). For this problem, I suggest hiding one FM in some place of the map (copying what TATW DAC does). This would avoid factions to be destroyed too early in the game despite they still have most of their cities and it could be done for other factions.
- Battles have few blood, again you could copy a bit of TATW DAC blood, where units really get covered in blood and do seem to have been fighting.
- More scripted garrisons in the cities (tired of conquering important cities that only have few units). I also suggest making something like TATW DAC where there is a building that gives garrison units even for the player with units that disappear after the battle (and they are great, bringing some sense of reality, like if the population really came to arms).
- Check the allied rules constantly getting bored and Ennui traits, it should be corrected.
- The Barcid trait never appeared after the first FMs that had it. I also suggest making the nomination of a War leader available again after some 10 turns or something, mostly because I end up with leaders that have been war leaders forever because I'm always at war with other factions (when factions start a war with me, the option to select a war leader does not appear anymore).
- Connect the Roman reforms with the Carthaginian reform. It does not make very sense when I'm attacking Roma with reformed units (in which the reforms were based on Carthage fighting Romans) and they are still with Camillian units.

That's all for now. I'm having an awesome time with this mod, thanks for all your work guys!

[COMIS -3- ΠΑΝΙΩΝΑΡΑ]

I don't know if possible,but can you add a crusades mtw2 type event in case that a greek capital conquered by "barbarian" culture faction ,the other greek culture factions try to recapture it?

[Genghis Skahn]

Yes, it is possible. No, we have no plans to do so since nothing "crusade-like" ever happened in this time period. Not to mention that crusade mechanics are kind of overpowered IMO.

[Dargaron]

The scripting of the Macedonian campaign could be made significantly more fair. For example:

1: In order to Restore the Kingship, you need to build coastal defenses, but those are locked behind a 14k Port Upgrade. If you want a cash sink requirement, wouldn't repairing the Aigiad tombs make significantly more sense? Is there any particular evidence that Antigonus spent a significant amount of time rebuilding the Macedonian fleet and/or merchant-marine in the process of reestablishing control over Macedonia?

2: There's no warning that conquering Athens triggers an immediate war with Epeiros. This could REALLY use a pop-up event like Sinope/Messana. In my case, I had an alliance with Epeiros at the time, and this came as a complete 180. Also, why would conquering Athens trigger a scripted response from Epeiros? They're just as hostile to each other at game start as they are to each other.

3: If conquering Athens is supposed to trigger war with Epeiros, there should be some way to neutralize the KH threat without conquering Athens. I had already annihilated four(!) KH full stacks in Attike, killing almost all of the KH FMs with Biographies in the process, and the KH still wouldn't accept peace, even when I offered them Corinth. Simply leaving Athens independent wasn't an option, since the AI would often recruit a quarter stack of mercenaries in one turn, meaning that I needed to leave most of my army nearby in order to plug the tide of angry Greeks.

Unrelated to the campaign scripting, but it's particularly irksome that your agents start in really pointless spots: why on earth would I want my one starter diplomat in Syria? What is my spy doing in Mysia?

Also, all of my starter FMs (including the ones who were underage at game start) got the Misellen trait, even the one whose biography mentioned him administering Greece successfully for years. All he's done is defend Corinth from one Epeirote army, and govern Corinth on low taxes, neither of which seems like it should give the Misellen trait.

EDIT: Finally, even though I'm at peace w/ the Ptolemaioi, they're still funding mercenaries to attack me. That's...weird.

[Genghis Skahn]

Also, all of my starter FMs (including the ones who were underage at game start) got the Misellen trait, even the one whose biography mentioned him administering Greece successfully for years. All he's done is defend Corinth from one Epeirote army, and govern Corinth on low taxes, neither of which seems like it should give the Misellen trait.

Probably because Makedonian ethnicity traits also predispose one to misellenism, my guess would be. It's could be intentional, to a degree. You could also just have bad luck--I played a 180ish turn campaign with Makedonia once and didn't see the trait that much AFAIK.

[tentaku]

T
Unrelated to the campaign scripting, but it's particularly irksome that your agents start in really pointless spots: why on earth would I want my one starter diplomat in Syria? What is my spy doing in Mysia?

in my game as Macedonia, it prevented me from negotiating with either Greeks or Epirus in the early few turns. I guess that might be the reason.

[wojtekimbier]

How about more units that are untrained use horde (circle) formation instead of a rectangle? I've tried modding it this way and it seems to work alright

[TheJackinati275]

My thoughts on what would be pretty cool additions, though I imagine this could be done a lot further down the line.

Things which I think would be great:
*Have some Greek units play Aulos, similar to the carnyx from this version.
*Change or replace the sound of some projectile weapon impacts sounds with better versions.
*Additional battlefield combat sounds might be a cool improvement, if it can be done.

Things that don't necessarily need to be changed, but would be awesome anyway:
*Change the sound of high-level sling projectiles to have a 'Whrrr' or 'Bzzz' sound to represent the usage of glandes or biconicals. I am not sure if you can do this or not, but it would be a historically-aesthetically accurate option for Sphendonetai.
*Bow sounds could use some improvement, in my opinion, particularly concerning the bow loosing sounds. I have no problem with arrow flight sounds though. (I imagine it might be hard trying to find good sound sources for both sling and bow sounds)

Of course, I might be a little biased towards the sound of sling projectiles because I have personal experience with them (Though I am largely a novice), and lead glandes sound god-damned terrifying when you get them to spin. (Same for bits of quartz or flattish rocks or pebbles, which sound like WWII aircraft in flight). Circular and ovoid rocks or clay balls don't really make much of a sound even if you can impart a rifle-esque spin to them, so for the lesser slingers you don't really need to change the sound, though I should note that biconical clay projectiles when they are spinning do make a sound not unlike a WWII rotor as well.

[jermagon]

I downloaded the mod couple of days ago and it brought me to play M2TW after along time. the game is great no doubt and the graphic is fabulous. but what I didn't like about the game is the huge numbers of rebels everywhere, for example I played SPQR and the rebels were everywhere in sheer numbers. OK I was able to defeat them easily , however they are very dummy they neither invade your territories nor attack your cities.

the Carthaginians were pathetic, I defeated them easily because simply Sicily was swarmed with massive rebel armies, so they couldn't expand, same problem encounter the Greek and the Gaulish factions, they are not able to expand . the game has to be more challenging.

[Maroslav]

My suggestion is to decrease aggresion by AI in future releases. Last version i have played before 2.3 felt definetely better, where AI sometimes ocasionally attacked stronger faction, but what it is doing now is suicide. The game feels almost like deathmatch with absolute 0 of diplomacy. The AI is utterly uncapable take into consideration with who is already in war and their strenght and who they are going to attack. it also feels little dump to me, like litteraly every faction, no matter if civilised one or barbarian, is intterested in capturing island cities, but i understand that AI is can be scripted just uniformly. When strenght of all waring factions is somewhat balanced , then there is situation of half world being stuck because no one dare to attack and just hoard nearby cities, fighting occasional traitor stacks. Also as someone not long before me mented, it would be great even more decrease a chance of AI stack going to defect. And, ofcourse as i am playing Carthage now i wish to see their traits being repared( Barcid/ antiB. , choosing War leaders and Rab Mahnet etc.)

Just my thoughts. On the other hand,i have to congratulate team for polishing the game into level, that i get almost none CTD anymore. Still the best mod for mt2 for me.

[Jurand of Cracow]

I'm curious what campaign difficulty you're playing?
My experience is just the opposite: at the Hard difficulty the AI doesn't attack the human player, it attacks very rarely the other AI factions, it honours the alliances completely etc. In comparison to the aggressiveness of the SS-mods, this is rather EBII-Mostly-Peace TW.

[Maroslav]

I am playing H/H and i talk about agresivity mostly between AI factions. This version really feels like deathmatch. Most senseless wars are arround black sea. Prevailing greek faction fights all the middle east factions because off rhodos/crete. Many factions are at war because of one of their cities turned to other faction city instead of eleutheroi. All barbarian world, which has access to mediteranean sea is at war CARTHAGE/ whoever has sardinia/ corsica. And all those factions are at war with their "normal" enemies so yeah. Diplomacy is off here and it often leads to "hoarding" situation described above. This was the case even in earlier releases, but here it is extreme. I really wish, that an Ai factions aim their attention to the cities/factions needed for winning conditions. Then on other cities. i really doubt that getai should want to have Rhodos/crete, or Iberian/celtic factions Corsica/sardinia.

To adition, i wish that every faction have at least some form of culture conversion administrative in the final version( excluding FM's influence). The Takshashila is a good example with their 30% pre-reforms administrative.

[Genghis Skahn]

OK I was able to defeat them easily , however they are very dummy they neither invade your territories nor attack your cities.

Actually the rebels will do both of these things on both Hard and Very Hard difficulties. Repeated tests have conclusively shown as such--it's not really up for debate, the rebel CAI WILL occasionally besiege your cities on these difficulties if they feel they are strong enough to do so. But yes, the "dummy" part of the rebel CAI is a very real and hardcoded thing--the rebels have a stunted CAI when compared to regular factions. Nothing we can do about that.

the Carthaginians were pathetic, I defeated them easily because simply Sicily was swarmed with massive rebel armies, so they couldn't expand, same problem encounter the Greek and the Gaulish factions, they are not able to expand . the game has to be more challenging.

Actually in 2.3 there's no real issues with the AI's expansion AFAIK, and if they don't expand it's often due to mapping concerns or simply failing in auto-resolve against the rebels temporarily. Give them some time, and they'll expand plenty. Also, a faction's success often depends on a campaign by campaign basis--sometimes during one campaign a faction will be doing horribly, but on a different campaign they might be a world leader. Lots of screenshots of AI empires have suggested a lot of variability in who is successful during what campaign. At any rate, the rebels aren't the problem here, especially if you decided to conquer Sicily within ~50-100 turns: chances are the Carthaginian CAI, which has MANY targets to choose from(and doesn't always pick Sicily first), won't have conquered Sicily that quickly(except perhaps on VH campaign difficulty, but I doubt it). At most they may have gotten Messana in time. More to the point, cities like Syrakousai were highly independent and powerful, and were never historically conquered by the Carthaginians--it would make absolutely 0 sense to make Syrakousai an easy town to conquer with a weak garrison; it would go against EBII's whole mission, probably.

You have to remember that the AI rebels are there to both represent independent communities which never ended up conquered by AI factions historically, but more importantly to slow down AI expansion in order to prevent superpowers from quickly forming. The rebels in EBII aren't supposed to be just fodder for the other factions like in vanilla M2TW, for example.

Finally, while I like blitzing myself, z3n our AI lead, has repeatedly stated how the CAI simply can't properly respond to blitzkrieg tactics(especially naval ones where you sack a city in 1-2 turns and then just sail away). It's just not possible for the M2TW CAI. If you want more challenge from the CAI, you also have to give them the proper time to respond and build up, since blitzkrieg tactics will utterly crush them, since they won't be able to respond fast enough.

[Kull]

in my game as Macedonia, it prevented me from negotiating with either Greeks or Epirus in the early few turns. I guess that might be the reason.

That is exactly the point. The AI will accept peace immediately and it messes up the reality-based dynamic built in to the first few turns of the Mak-Epeiros-KH triangle.

[tentaku]

That is exactly the point. The AI will accept peace immediately and it messes up the reality-based dynamic built in to the first few turns of the Mak-Epeiros-KH triangle.

Yeah and now I am having a very exciting time due to this. Constantly running and hiding from Pyrrhus while preying on weaker detachments from KH, it's a cat and mouse guerrilla warfare. My only regret is that the Greek peninsular is not bigger on the map. It is where everything happens and every city is next to each other with little room for maneuver, while out in the far east nothing happens and you have huge swaths of land of no action and no city. Personally if the map was made unrealistic by enlarging action heavy areas of Greece and such, and squeezing the east wilderness, I would have no problem.

[Rad]

Suggestion:

Armor upgrades for existing units, especially light and medium tier ones - where ever there is enough historical basis for it. Nothing radical, just a helmet or two here and there, maybe a new body armor on some units etc...

Reasoning:
1. It will give older units a fighting chance against newer, usually heavier troops
2. After 200-600 turns, small changes would help refresh the visual experience of the game
3. There is a historical tendency for armies to be better protected over time, as already shown in game
4. There is a restriction on the number of units (I think it is 500), so why not make the most of it?
5. It is fast compared to creating new units.

Yes, yes, yes, Ive heard it all before - ya folks are busy making new units
But please, consider the idea. Id be happy to see it comes to life, even it makes the cut later on.

[tentaku]

I wonder if there is a mechanism that allows mercenaries to come with existing experience levels. Makes sense right, these guys are pros.

[Rad]

Suggestion:

Armor upgrades for existing units, especially light and medium tier ones - where ever there is enough historical basis for it. Nothing radical, just a helmet or two here and there, maybe a new body armor on some units etc...

Reasoning:
1. It will give older units a fighting chance against newer, usually heavier troops
2. After 200-600 turns, small changes would help refresh the visual experience of the game
3. There is a historical tendency for armies to be better protected over time, as already shown in game
4. There is a restriction on the number of units (I think it is 500), so why not make the most of it?
5. It is fast compared to creating new units.

Yes, yes, yes, Ive heard it all before - ya folks are busy making new units
But please, consider the idea. Id be happy to see it comes to life, even it makes the cut later on.

I am an evil man and I am necroing my post into the next page.

@Tentaku
I believe Rome 1 allowed you to recruit some units of mercenaries with both one and two chevrons of experience (while unit experience actually meant something) - ofc, the 2-chevron version was more expensive than the 1-chevron version.

It would be cool to be able to recruit mercenaries with actual high levels of experience (3-4 chevrons), just for roleplay reasons.

[tentaku]

I am an evil man and I am necroing my post into the next page.

@Tentaku
I believe Rome 1 allowed you to recruit some units of mercenaries with both one and two chevrons of experience (while unit experience actually meant something) - ofc, the 2-chevron version was more expensive than the 1-chevron version.

It would be cool to be able to recruit mercenaries with actual high levels of experience (3-4 chevrons), just for roleplay reasons.

Whaaaght Rome 1 had those experienced mercenaries... I must have missed it since it was so easy getting multiple chevrons with all the Mars Temple getting me superman cohorts with three chevrons from the start hahaha. Seriously the experience chevrons in Medieval 2 is so weak...