Ahoy.

[saienga]

Hello. Been lurking for a few weeks now, having downloaded SPQR for a change of pace...

And what a change!

Two questions, the answers for which I have searched, but not found.

1. How do you use the kill sheet?
(Record every battle? Alt-Tab between SPQR and the spreadsheet? does this cause system instability?)

2. I noticed oodles of discussion about the shield wall formation in the tactics thread, which I've subsequently figured out how to use...but do y'all use it against Carthage? It seems the discussion was limited to Gaul and Germania when it came to the shield wall.

You see, I'd like to use the kill sheet, for fun, because it's awesome, but I don't want to jimmy my rig all wonky.

Aaaaand when it comes to Carthage, I've restarted 6 times or so (trying to observe houserules) and all you guys are like, "Yeah! I whipped Hannibal, 4:1 K : D..." and I'm like, "Holy crap! I finally beat him with a 1.2:1." I know that besmirches my generalship more than anything, but dear God! Y'all talk about looong battles...the first battle with carthage is always a bum rush! I set up and they set up and here they all come!

Not to mention I was giving Hesus' 15 turn survival guide a try, and I did it all to the letter...and Hannibal went straight for Reghion. It's like the dirty bugger knew I was following instructions .

Oops, third question:

3. Are the 4 turn-per-year script and garrison script tied together? AKA, do you have to turn on the garrison script to get 4TPY? I ask because I play on a decent laptop, but it won't handle huge settings, and I doubt it'll handle ridiculous city battles without giving birth to kittens.

Thanks in advance!

[Raglan]

hey welcome to SPQR

so several questions,

1-yes thats exactly how you use the killsheet - it shouldn't give any problems if the in game res is the same as your desktop res - althought i find it slows my com down (have the game running as well as the spreadsheet - not the windowed game)

2-this seems to be in two parts so
shieldwall this gives a tighter fomation - the reason we use it agaist barbarians(gaul + germany) is that it allows you to hold the line for longer and not get pushed back
agaist a 'civilised' nation like carthage or greece it has disadvantages because of the close spears your facing - walking into a row of spears is a bad idea and its even worse if you dont have room to dodge lol

second part was about fighting Hanibal - this just takes practice i'm fairly into my campaign now and i am used to fighting carthgians so i could probably manage a 4:1 win agaist Hanibal if i restarted but believe me i didn't first time round (i didn't beat him he gave my legions an arse trashing)
also Hesus guide is great but only deals with absolutes in the first turn - after that the ai can do whatever it wants and often does

3-4TP and garrision are conected you can't have one without the other
they are both turned on at the sametime
the golden rule to this though is always play with it or without NEVER do both as this can give you some weird annomalys

if your computer can't handle big try playing on just large or even normal unit size - it won't give the same experience (i love the epic battles) but you won't miss out altogether - and don't forget the video options you can always play around til you find a level that works

don't hesitate to ask if you have anymore questions or if any of this is unclear

[saienga]

Thanks for the clarify. It makes sense now. I've been trashed by Hannibal and Theophanes 3 times each.

I wish I could play on Huge...I discovered something when I tried: you can actually cover space really well. I.E. I thought normal v. large v. huge was just an issue of eye candy...but then, during a city battle, I realized it's not. When a single Town Watch clogs a street the invaders have to fight through the troops, as opposed to swamping them. I was able to hold and withdraw my other TWs and velites to the square (no walls on this town, it was my only hope) and actually do some damage to the Gallic swarm before they won.

My problem is this...I've fiddled with the video settings as much as I can, and --

Oops, stream of consciousness, I just figured out my solution.

Because my computer chokes on huge particularly when I'm down at ground level, all I need to do is turn the unit banners back on and stay up at pie in the sky level. That was my issue. With the unit banners off I couldn't find my units quickly enough (in the melee) to respond quickly to changing battlefield conditions. So I get a handicap to offset my computer.

Thanks, self, that was a great idea!

Also, for real, thanks Raglan.

[Ejergard]

About the killsheet, I use a combination of both. I scribble down some with pen and paper, but I also have the killsheet on in background.
Check out the faq how to run the game in windowed mode (will still look like its fullscreen if you use the same resolution for game as your desktop), then you won't have any stability issues at all when alt-tabbing, and it goes just as fast as alt-tabbing between two explorer windows, instead of the slowpoke mode with fullscreen. Alt-tabbing if you run the game in fullscreen may cause issues. Atleast I had a few crashes that way.
Alot of the stuff ingame can be tuned down without making a big impact on visuals, but gives better performance. For example, these are the settings I use:

Resolution: 1440x900x32
Anti-Aliasing: Low
Terrain detail: Medium
Building detail: Medium
Grass: None
Unit scale: Huge
Unit detail: High
Effects detail: Medium
Vegetation detail: Low
Battle map shadows: Off
Smoke/dust: On (slight boost with off, but i manage well with on)
Reflections/glints: Off <--- HUGE impact on performance for me, with little sacrifice on looks!
Desync animations: On
Unit shaders: On

With these settings I manage huge settings with upto 12k ppl at the same time before it starts to lagg. Also most stuff still looks pretty good. I've also noticed that some programs cause excessive laggs for me. One of those programs is my hotkey-program from Asus for my laptop. So identify and terminate these helped alot for me.

Hope you found something helpful

[Kaelikk]

One of those programs is my hotkey-program from Asus for my laptop. So identify and terminate these helped alot for me.

Hope you found something helpful

Which program is that exactly? I have an Asus and am looking for ways to improve its performance

[czePowerslave]

Killsheet instructions.
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...ight=killsheet

You might want to check the new FAQ thread for upgraded killsheet which uses extra list for auxilia legions. There is a small readme on how to use that.

[Hesus de bodemloze]

Yes check the SPQR index sticky there are some useful threads. Also to other members if you think you found a useful thread PM me the thread address maybe we could add it in the Index.

[Ejergard]

ATKOSD2.exe
It's some updated version of the ordinary atkosd-file that gives some better graphics etc. I deleted this one, and it only uses the ordinary atkosd file now. Doesn't look as fancy, but it doesn't interfere with anything now
Btw, this one handles hotbuttons, like raising or lowering volume and changing contrast etc.