Third Age: Revision - Discussion

[Korsan82]

Right, I've been away from TATW quite a long time now. What I want to discuss is if you'd like a gameplay shift in TA:TW.

For now the game is too "arcade" for me. Means all that counts is gathering provinces and unrealistically expanding even into wastelands to get a working economy. The overall geographic features of Middle Earth and the factions living in it change too much in just too short period of time withing a campaign.

I am not much of a lore "nazi" but I think life on Middle Earth isn't that fast paced. It seems the game is too much influenced by the impressions the movie gives the audience and not the true story and especially not the timeline. The movie itself looks like all events happen in a short time and thus create an atmosphere of a hectic rush when those events in movie in "reality" took months or even years.

It takes months for an army to cross from one place of the map to another. Even the way from Rohan to Minas Tirith takes ages in reality. In TA:TW we can not only pass the same distance but also siege and occupy every settlement on our way. Personally I don't like this.

What I'd like more is static factions with marginally changing borderlines but the ability to send armies without attrition or the risk to lose them into the theater of war, namely Minas Tirith, Isengard or any other place where the evil guys attack. The idea of having to take every settlement on your way seems just unrealistic to me and completely changes the gameplay.

In order to achieve this (marginally changing borderlines) we definately need more provinces. I'd say with ease we need at least 4x the provinces we have. This way a war between to factions might last for years but the borders only marginally change in its outcome. Only a true overwhelming force could cause big changes in geo political situations.
I'd suggest to split every province we have so far in different areas (like north,south, west and east) from which every single one is a new province. Also we need to get rid of the total control idea of middle earth. It simply is not possible to control that big empires in such a short time. Even roughly populated areas become full-fledged provinces with according population growth and settlements - This compelety breaks the immersion and atmosphere. Some areas of middle earth shouldn't be controlable by any force (like fangorn, parts of the misty mountains, Dead Marshes and many others). They should be wastelands which can't be occupied but only be passed. No settlement, no illusion of control over that area. That's what makes it right.

Another point I'd change is like I mentioned the whole economy as it compelety relys on owned provinces. It seems like before the player begins to start a game those people in middle earth done nothing to their country. Their whole economy need to be built up from scratch which is plain wrong. When the player starts playing the game he should take control over a working economy able to maintain more armies without the need to build those most standard buildings that a thousands of years old world should have by now, like roads or farms.

Also I understand the player's demand to control some kickass units from the books and from the movies. But I really think those severely destroy gameplay and also they got somehow degraded into some sort of pets. Some creatures in Middle Earth should be exceptional and not controlable, like the Balrog for example. I think having the ability to recruit Balrogs especially in 8 men stacks makes them lose all their charm and especially their mysterious appearance. By giving the player the chance to control those you take away this aspect which like i mentioned degrade exceptional units into something common which everyone can posses and play with.

Initially I had some more ideas in mind.. I'll pass them in as soon as I remember them I'd like to have a serious non flame discussion about this

[Liamar]

I believe that number of settlements is limited. And it would just be too boring with any more of them to conquer or defend.
Allso, it's not based on film, it's just how TW engine make's it.
And game takes many, many years. Every four turns make up a year I believe :p.
Yes, roads and farms schould be present in most non-rebel provinces. At least basic buildings.

There's avesome idea in "TA: Total Dull..." thread on second page. It would intensly change gameplay especially on campaign map. Check it out.


Edit: And yes, trolls schould most definatelly not be able to climb on walls.
But I compensate by making them weaker.

[Southern Rider]

I must say that I agree with many things I just read over here, and, even though I really love this mod, and already find it great, I still think it could become MUCH better, especially throghout a healthy discussion, as was told in the beggining of this thread.

The point that I most strongly agree with is that sometimes things seem to be a little too much based on the movies. I sometimes see people annoyed when somethings are not EXACTLY as they are on the movies, but do not seem to care half that much when some things/suggestions go against the lore. It seems like the movies are almost "priority" over the books, and I don't agree with this, especially because the movies have a number of features/changes that are there because the main purpose of the movie was making money, and to make the movie more accessible to "non-Tolkien-fans", and this mod give us the great oppotunity to correct these things, as it is definitively not made for profit.

A good example of this are the way HE are portrayed. Peter Jackson's HE, appear only very briefly to give us a relly good idea of how the HE army should look, are way too similar amongst them and are quite different from most images of Tolkien's elves I have found, all of this plus the thing with curly swords and the wrong impression given from the movies that elves are frail and that ALL of them favor the bow.

Other issue that I agree is the fact that the game is a little too much "Arcade", with just battles and LOTS of battles, and with a system in wich expansion is fast, besides the culture system that slows it a bit. A better diplomacy would help, since that, as a consequence of the "locked diplomacy" system, diplomatic aspects are almost non-existent, or at least much less than with normal AI. I Do not know how far can diplomacy be modded, but some time ago custom settlements were told to be impossible, so maybe why can't the diplomatic system be improved?? Also in this matter, I see a linear progression in this mod, from a beggining with armies made of militia troops + generals, to a VERY short middle-phase where some mid tier units are used, to a late phase, were there is an unendig wave of stacks made only of elite units that should be really "elite", in short numbers and powerful (like Mordor's Uruks or Harad's Serpent Guard), but instead are used en masse, especially when concerning the Evil Factions. If there is a way of limiting the recruitment of these units and "force" the AI to use mid-tier troops more often, it would be nice. I think that giving evil medium troops slightly better stats (so that they would be able to face better "good" troops), and also giving elite troops a little better stats, but severely restrict their recruitment (only in some "homeland" areas) and their replenishment rate could do it, perhaps.

About trolls, I know that there are endless threads concerning them, and I agree that they shouldn't climb ladders, but there is no way to change this so far =/. Concerning their morale issue, I think that only Olog-hai should have locked morale, for it is known that Sauron has a sort of special link with them, but standard cave trolls or mountain trolls, even with training, are little more than beasts, perfectly capable of fear and running from the battle in terror. Some say that they are basically the only decent thing the or factions have, but then I again suggest some better stats for regular units and less powerfull and reallistic trolls than the actual awful morale regular troops + blitzkrieg trolls, for a more balanced game.

For the last (FINALLY!!!) I'd like to know what you guys think of a large scale AOR system. What I have in mind is something like Orcs can only recruit orc units in certain regions, where it is known that there are orcs, like the mountain regions, mordor and some area of the north, while in the other regions, they would only be able to recruit some generic lower-tier evil men units, thus forcing them to expand to areas that orcs would be more likely to expand. The same would work to represent the Elves as a fading race, with very few regions having an elven population to fuel armies, while most of the conquered regions would only allow for some low-rank edain troops, some sort of vassal for the elves, perhaps? I understand that the AI probably would have issues to deal with that, but it is bizarre to imagine Dale Yeomen being recruited at the Black Gate (Yes, I once achieved this) or Trolls and Uruks being recruited at Caras Galadhon. From what I know from LoTR and the Silmarillion, many regions that were conquered by Morgoth and Sauron weren't "colonyzed" by Orcs, being rather given to Men loyal to them or left abandoned, Orcs remained to breed only in areas suited for them, such as mountains. That would also help to represent the Dominion of Men and the fading of the other races, considering that men (both evil and good) would be the less restrained factions with a system of AOR sorte like this.

I hope I had made my point and I didn't insult anyone or broke any rules of this forum. Comments as "you don't like this mod you shouldn't play" and alike will be gladly ignored but critics and suggestions based on ARGUMENTS are largely encouraged

[Korsan82]

For the last (FINALLY!!!) I'd like to know what you guys think of a large scale AOR system. What I have in mind is something like Orcs can only recruit orc units in certain regions, where it is known that there are orcs, like the mountain regions, mordor and some area of the north, while in the other regions, they would only be able to recruit some generic lower-tier evil men units, thus forcing them to expand to areas that orcs would be more likely to expand. The same would work to represent the Elves as a fading race, with very few regions having an elven population to fuel armies, while most of the conquered regions would only allow for some low-rank edain troops, some sort of vassal for the elves, perhaps? I understand that the AI probably would have issues to deal with that, but it is bizarre to imagine Dale Yeomen being recruited at the Black Gate (Yes, I once achieved this) or Trolls and Uruks being recruited at Caras Galadhon. From what I know from LoTR and the Silmarillion, many regions that were conquered by Morgoth and Sauron weren't "colonyzed" by Orcs, being rather given to Men loyal to them or left abandoned, Orcs remained to breed only in areas suited for them, such as mountains. That would also help to represent the Dominion of Men and the fading of the other races, considering that men (both evil and good) would be the less restrained factions with a system of AOR sorte like this.

I really like this. Maybe the "culture" from vanilla could be used here as well. Means Minas Tirith's population gets a certain culture name (dunno what it is) where only units for that culture group can be recruited. Might be pretty much the same what you meant but this way you could also simulate the different populations of Middle Earth.

[Edit] Didn't know that the troll thing is still in my signature but it wasn't part of my original post

[Liamar]

I really like this. Maybe the "culture" from vanilla could be used here as well. Means Minas Tirith's population gets a certain culture name (dunno what it is) where only units for that culture group can be recruited. Might be pretty much the same what you meant but this way you could also simulate the different populations of Middle Earth.

[Edit] Didn't know that the troll thing is still in my signature but it wasn't part of my original post

Faction = 1 culture.
In "TA: Total Dull..." thread we are presented with avesome idea to implement population-based gameplay. Namelly recruiting units will consume population, and disbanding them will increse it, while all settlements with high enemy culture will rebel instantly forcing player to exterminate every population.

It will make expanding extremly challenging and fun, and allow for in-depth differentiation between different races like elves, which will be allmost unable to expand while having very strong, but how few units. Whilst orcs will have no problem in expanding at all.
At least it's how it might be done.

[Rykoth]

If there would be any revisions:
- Adjusting things to be slightly more lore accurate. None of these events where dwarves are suddenly friendly with orcs. Having good vs. good is also stepping on lore a bit, but at the same time, is a bit more believable then good siding with evil.

- Historical events. Remove Legolas/Gimli/Boromir/Aragorn from play, and instead track the fellowship. If you're Mordor, once the Fellowship is discovered, make that an extra goal. If you play as say, the Silvan Elves, an extra goal would be to protect them when they escape Moria, etc. Instead of an invasion on Edoras, have an invasion of Helm's Deep.

- Movement speeds. As it is, it takes me a long long time just to get from point A to B with an army. Frustratingly so at times, because I feel like early on, I'm just constantly ending my turns without much action.

[Liamar]

If there would be any revisions:
- Adjusting things to be slightly more lore accurate. None of these events where dwarves are suddenly friendly with orcs. Having good vs. good is also stepping on lore a bit, but at the same time, is a bit more believable then good siding with evil.

BS. Souron might have corrupted the dwarves, just like Theoden. And if not, dwarves are greedy little bastards and would sell all punny little elves and men to Sauron for few blink-blinks.
And they allready can't break alliances.

- Historical events. Remove Legolas/Gimli/Boromir/Aragorn from play, and instead track the fellowship. If you're Mordor, once the Fellowship is discovered, make that an extra goal. If you play as say, the Silvan Elves, an extra goal would be to protect them when they escape Moria, etc. Instead of an invasion on Edoras, have an invasion of Helm's Deep.

BS. Nobody will take Aragorn from me!
And seriously dude. Don't you think that this has no sense, since freaking hobbits can siege black gate and have a pye on top of Barad Dur???
This is Third Age;TOTAL WAR.
Not "Ultimate-J.R.R.T's.-lore-reincarnation."
And you allready have Fellowship campaign.

- Movement speeds. As it is, it takes me a long long time just to get from point A to B with an army. Frustratingly so at times, because I feel like early on, I'm just constantly ending my turns without much action.

That's the purpose of turns. I find myself fight 10+ battles every turn, and just constantly end my turn without getting anywhere.

[Liamar]

The point that I most strongly agree with is that sometimes things seem to be a little too much based on the movies. I sometimes see people annoyed when somethings are not EXACTLY as they are on the movies, but do not seem to care half that much when some things/suggestions go against the lore. It seems like the movies are almost "priority" over the books, and I don't agree with this, especially because the movies have a number of features/changes that are there because the main purpose of the movie was making money, and to make the movie more accessible to "non-Tolkien-fans", and this mod give us the great oppotunity to correct these things, as it is definitively not made for profit.

There was no point about this so far with which you could agree. Only misconception about time-scale of gameplay, combined with rather ignorant statement supported by wrong reasoning.

I have never seen anyone annoyed by missing elements presented in the movies.
But there is a huge bunch of Tolkienists who are ready to go on crusade against King Kong himself for blapshemy against J.R.R.T.


And what exactly are thoes features? Other then, some very resonable visual changes like the Great wall of Minas Tirith being white, there are mostly only elves in Hornburg, whom were present there to pass onto viewers rather deeper message then just blink-blink pointy-ears. But that's only for people who can see between the verses, or visual effects for that matter.

It's not for money, but, allthought in as much cohesion with lore as possible, this mod is seposed to be "non-tolkienist fan-girls" friendly. And only things from the movies present in TA, are visuals. Mainly concept art, which is astonishing.

A good example of this are the way HE are portrayed. Peter Jackson's HE, appear only very briefly to give us a relly good idea of how the HE army should look, are way too similar amongst them and are quite different from most images of Tolkien's elves I have found, all of this plus the thing with curly swords and the wrong impression given from the movies that elves are frail and that ALL of them favor the bow.

The concept of High Elven army from the movies is amezing, and I just love it. Don't like it? Make your own concept art, and pray someone will mod it if you can't texture and model yourself.
(It's not "don't like, don't play". Coming up with concept art is very hard, and I'am glad that movies were used for that purpose.)
The only moment, that gives a slight idea that elves are frail, were the dramatic scenes in hornburg where they over-did death scenes of elves without their wooki-washi-flashy death-dance. But that's how it was meant to be. To show the last sacrifice, very sad sacrifice of elves. Whom are epicly avesome.

And most elves do favor the bow, and all of them are master-bowmen.
Besides, where the hell did you get this impresion? The only elves presented in the movies were Silvan sentinels and Galadhrim Archers, who defended sieged Hornburgh. I have not seen one High Elf holding a weapon, other then BoTLA.

Other issue that I agree is the fact that the game is a little too much "Arcade", with just battles and LOTS of battles, and with a system in wich expansion is fast, besides the culture system that slows it a bit. A better diplomacy would help, since that, as a consequence of the "locked diplomacy" system, diplomatic aspects are almost non-existent, or at least much less than with normal AI. I Do not know how far can diplomacy be modded, but some time ago custom settlements were told to be impossible, so maybe why can't the diplomatic system be improved?? Also in this matter, I see a linear progression in this mod, from a beggining with armies made of militia troops + generals, to a VERY short middle-phase where some mid tier units are used, to a late phase, were there is an unendig wave of stacks made only of elite units that should be really "elite", in short numbers and powerful (like Mordor's Uruks or Harad's Serpent Guard), but instead are used en masse, especially when concerning the Evil Factions. If there is a way of limiting the recruitment of these units and "force" the AI to use mid-tier troops more often, it would be nice. I think that giving evil medium troops slightly better stats (so that they would be able to face better "good" troops), and also giving elite troops a little better stats, but severely restrict their recruitment (only in some "homeland" areas) and their replenishment rate could do it, perhaps.

Go to "TA:Total Dull..." thread. An exelent idea was presented there, on how to make expansion harder and overall game much more challenging and satisfieing.
As too elite units. Play with RR/RC. It all is allready implemented in it.

About trolls, I know that there are endless threads concerning them, and I agree that they shouldn't climb ladders, but there is no way to change this so far =/. Concerning their morale issue, I think that only Olog-hai should have locked morale, for it is known that Sauron has a sort of special link with them, but standard cave trolls or mountain trolls, even with training, are little more than beasts, perfectly capable of fear and running from the battle in terror. Some say that they are basically the only decent thing the or factions have, but then I again suggest some better stats for regular units and less powerfull and reallistic trolls than the actual awful morale regular troops + blitzkrieg trolls, for a more balanced game.

Find file dscr_units and edit trolls however you want. Give them 4/5 HP most preferably.
And as to their morale. Trolls are too stupid to fear. They only get angrier. Especially since they do not turn into stone in sunlight.

For the last (FINALLY!!!) I'd like to know what you guys think of a large scale AOR system. What I have in mind is something like Orcs can only recruit orc units in certain regions, where it is known that there are orcs, like the mountain regions, mordor and some area of the north, while in the other regions, they would only be able to recruit some generic lower-tier evil men units, thus forcing them to expand to areas that orcs would be more likely to expand. The same would work to represent the Elves as a fading race, with very few regions having an elven population to fuel armies, while most of the conquered regions would only allow for some low-rank edain troops, some sort of vassal for the elves, perhaps? I understand that the AI probably would have issues to deal with that, but it is bizarre to imagine Dale Yeomen being recruited at the Black Gate (Yes, I once achieved this) or Trolls and Uruks being recruited at Caras Galadhon. From what I know from LoTR and the Silmarillion, many regions that were conquered by Morgoth and Sauron weren't "colonyzed" by Orcs, being rather given to Men loyal to them or left abandoned, Orcs remained to breed only in areas suited for them, such as mountains. That would also help to represent the Dominion of Men and the fading of the other races, considering that men (both evil and good) would be the less restrained factions with a system of AOR sorte like this.

Again, go to "TA: Total Dull..." thread, where very good idea on how to deal with thoes issues is presented.
What you propose here, makes absolutelly no sense. Beside the fact that this is TW mod, orcs are perfectly capable to breeding every where. They are like cacroaches.

[Russian Gondor]

In my opinion the mod is actually too slow. The thing I think is important though, is to make defending cities a priority for AI. I HATE the fact that the AI sends their stacks out leaving 1-2 units and finally, after battling 3-4 stacks, I get to their city with my beaten down armies, only to find a fresh garrison script. All hail trolls popping out of nowhere.

I also think major cities must be a significance. I mean, really, for Isengard, I took Edoras and Helms Deep but the enemy doesn't care, they just keep sending stacks out and conquering more territory. Lore wise if Edoras and Helms Deep was lost then Rohan would be in ruin.

[Southern Rider]

In my opinion the mod is actually too slow. The thing I think is important though, is to make defending cities a priority for AI. I HATE the fact that the AI sends their stacks out leaving 1-2 units and finally, after battling 3-4 stacks, I get to their city with my beaten down armies, only to find a fresh garrison script. All hail trolls popping out of nowhere.

I also think major cities must be a significance. I mean, really, for Isengard, I took Edoras and Helms Deep but the enemy doesn't care, they just keep sending stacks out and conquering more territory. Lore wise if Edoras and Helms Deep was lost then Rohan would be in ruin.

Totally agree, perhaps limiting elite units to a few homeland territories (not all) would solve this, as taking Edoras and Helm's Deep, for example, would leave Rohan unable to recruit their best units. This works pretty well on Europa Barbarorum, I was once able to beat the Seleucids, wich are pretty much the most badass faction of EB, by taking their capital and surroundings. They still had most of their empire (which was way larger than mine), but weren't able to recruit elite troops anymore, so it got way easier to beat them.

[Isack Citees]

Besides some of th gameplay issues mentioned above, I personally think TATW should remove the plate armor from the game.
I do not ever remember full plate being mentioned in the books and I think mail would give the mod a better feel.
Who else is tired of archers in full plate shooting just as far and just as fast?(as the lighter armored ones)

Maybe armor upgrades for certain factions too. Longbowmen as dale for example.

[Liamar]

Besides some of th gameplay issues mentioned above, I personally think TATW should remove the plate armor from the game.
I do not ever remember full plate being mentioned in the books and I think mail would give the mod a better feel.
Who else is tired of archers in full plate shooting just as far and just as fast?(as the lighter armored ones)

Maybe armor upgrades for certain factions too. Longbowmen as dale for example.

I will never understand what you guys find soo repulsive about plate armor.
Plate armor make's gondor unique, and it looks avesome. It allso gives a feal of time passing, and change that comes with the passing of the elves.
But it looks odd indeed when it comes too archers.

[Korsan82]

My core statement was: Middle Earth can not be entirely controlled. The game gives us the illusion it can.

I wan't areas that can be populated and areas that can simply just be passed. I find it really annoying to annex any province on my way to mordor to be able to have a fight with them. Thus I mentioned more static borderlines and a limit to where factions can expand. All faction could be surrounded by uncapturable "wasteland" with no settlement in it which can only be passed. Those areas should also have an increased amount of rebels rising (means monsters or bandits).
I'd really appreciate any official or even modded solution for this.

[Liamar]

I might be wrong, but If I remmember correctly this game is called Total War.
And AI most probably would have problems with passing throught such zones, which are completly unnecessary.
Besides, during campaing quite a lot of time passes. A houndred years? So I bet ME can be controlled fully.

Again, there is a new thread announcing new submod which will adress most issues TA faces "conquest" wise.
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=413092

[Louis Lux]

If you start to limit the standard total war gameplay this will stop to be a total war game and people won't play it anymore. Rusichi, one of the best mods for medieval II was ruined by limited gameplay.

The way to go is to introduce more scripts like the Arnor reemergence, Baron Samedi's compilation also has a lot of worthwhile scripts.

[Korsan82]

No I don't want to limit the gameplay.
I'm just saying that conquering all of middle earth is impossible in such a short time period. My suggestion was wastelands which the AI won't have any problems with as they are part of vanilla campaigns as well. A non-settlement area around the settled areas would only fit the need to make the game more plausible. You can of course add some border lands which are rebel and can be conquered - all I'd like would be some definately non-conquerable areas. The game really is too arcade and looks like the "War of the Ring" part from Battle for Middle Earth 2. I never like to see High Elves conquering an entire map, or Gondor or Dwarves doing same. It's simply not plausible and changes the gameplay too much to "grab all you get before someone else grabs them" - like Monopoly.

If you heavily dislike this at least "non core" provinces should be real hard to hold in your hands unless you exterminate the population and make the province worthless.

[Ixor_Drakar]

Scout's Extended Edition sub-mod has changed Fanghorn and The Dead Marshes as well as other territories so that you cant build in the settlements. You could however do an EB and just put those territories cities in an unreachable part of the map so they cant be conquered.

[Liamar]

Korsan, look at http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=413092 .
It is exact thing you would like to look forward too.

And I allready linked this...

[Louis Lux]

If you try to think of a game too much in terms of realism it will ruin the experience for you.

[Incan]

sorry if this was mentioned in above posts(dont want to read it all )
but more scripts should be implemented, baron's mod is neat being able to turn on/off whatever you want. Also more missions with an overall quest is what I believe it needs. ie: the reunification of arnor.

currently i think eriador is the only faction who is rebuilding something and gets a "tangible" reward of sorts. Its not just a series of council missions to reconquer the area but the generally the overall goal of the faction to become arnor again. this makes them a very fun faction to play...until you accomplish that of course. Other factions need these, ie: the dwarves to retake moria, the silvan elves to retake mirkwood, gondor to remake the city of minas ithil, harad to take dol amroth, the orcs of gundabad to remake angmar, etc...

It is also important that along the way there is lots of in depth quests that make the faction feel more alive, especially after their main mission is done.

TW games in general lack the depth in game necessary to keep the player enthralled, though empire was a step in the right direction. I think one of the biggest issues is that this game is all about battles, yet units are all vanilla in comparison to each other. Veterancy is nothing more then a chevron, stat boost and maybe a skin change. CA needs to implement a dawn of war style unit progression system that makes each unit unique the more battles it fights in. imo of course