Questions to EB veterans about the mod's endgame and the effects of it's changes

[RantingHeretic]

I've been playing EB lately, as well as RTR and RS, to get a real feel for how the mods differ and what makes them unique.

Choosing between these three, in so much as you have to choose, is like a daily question that gets asked here and on other TW forums, and I want to be able to answer people with something more concrete then "play them and see."

So while EB's commitment to historical accuracy, depth, and it's policy of sharing the love for every faction obviously make it unique, what I'm interested in is how the mod actually plays, at the mid and end game periods. I haven't really reached them yet, and what little experience I have is dwarfed by those of you who have been playing this mod for years.

1. What do you think are it's best and most unique features of it's game-play?
2. How long does it take to reach that point where you are simply so powerful that conquering becomes more a matter of attrition than survival or necessity?
3. What impact do you feel the trait and economic and political systems have on the campaign? Are you constantly making hard decisions, or are there are clear right and wrong ways?
4. How do you find battles in EB? In terms of lethality, battle length, unit responsiveness, ability to employ actual tactics, units routing and reforming?
5. How do you find the pacing of the campaign? Many people complain EB is slow...honestly, I think it's faster than RTR, and it's so fun I really don't care.
6. What is the endgame like? A few, powerful dominating empires giving you hell? Scattered isolated factions that didn't expand well enough?

So far I feel, EB's incredible historical value aside, that EB has a really fun, challenging campaign, bolstered by each faction's depth. The political decisions, reforms, trait systems are very cool and give EB shades of an RPG or grand strategy title. I found battles to be somewhat shorter than RTR's, with units routing more easily but reforming more easily as well, giving battles an ebb and flow. I've also found that in EB, more than many other mods, there are significant differences between different tiers of troops.


So what do you think? Are my observations matching what you know or am I totally out of my mind?

[smoesville]

1. The massive amount of buildings as well as the rpg element of deciding what government style an area has. It makes it very immersive and diverse.
2. It usually doesn't take long for me to reach equilibrium (40 years?) that is where i may not be anywhere near conquering the map but i'm almost certainly won't be defeated. However that doesn't mean it's a grind by then, my Roman campaign continued long after i was safe from eradication. It remained fun because i was able to wage different campaigns, in Greece, Egypt, Palestine. Each time it became like a mini campaign within a campaign since the armies had to operate over extended supply lines and had to use locals to bolster their forces.
3. I actually only pay attention to the traits like Consul and Proconsul but in an rpg kind of way. I don't know, i'd say my economy probably suffers a bit but too much micro management bores me.
4. I find EB battles to be both fun and realistic where there are no supersoldiers and there is a way to beat any enemy if you have the troops.
5. I think it's perfect, i tend to turtle somewhat to start which allows the factions to expand into rebel regions. The regional AoR system means that even as the same faction your army evolves to suit the troops available in your current area of operation. As Rome, my armies in greece used more greeks as the armies were depleted and in my Baktrian campaign my Northern armies took on a very steppe feel with loads of light horse and HA while the armies that went West slowly evolved into a Greek army as we reached the homeland.
6. Large empires do grow towards the middle or late game (in my current Baktrian campaign, the Ptolomies have taken most of AS but most of the rest of the map seems quite fluid) but so long as i can fight several factions it doesn't get tedious as well as the regional troops in EB means even such an empire will have a good mix of armies and troop types. Usually a few of the northern regions in Russia are ignored but otherwise the factions have borders (and wars) with each other. The only thing that irks me is i've never seen Rome do well.

[RantingHeretic]

Awesome guys, this is exactly the kind of thing I'm looking for! Reading this just makes me want to fire EB back up... Alas, it'll be a few days.

1. The only thing that irks me is i've never seen Rome do well.

We ought to make a submod to encourage that somehow, maybe something like RS II does...

I've heard regarding RS, for example, which is apparently designed only around the player being the Romans).

This might have been true of earlier RS, but not for RS II. What it actually does is have separate campaign files for each faction, which allow them to re-balance every campaign, i.e. playing as Rome, your units are normal, but playing against Rome, Rome's units are overpowered, virtually ensuring that they expand and are terrifying to fight against.

[QUOTE=Entropy Judge;11785212]

I can't seem to invade Spain without it killing the mood entirely, because Spain is Attrition Central Park, population currently dying.

[QUOTE]

Always! Even in Medieval II, to an extent. My very first game of RTW, like back when it came out, I actually 'lost' the game (hit the turn limit) because of those Spanish Bullmen. They were kicking my ass.

[Entropy Judge]

What do you think are it's best and most unique features of it's game-play?

Not having played any other mods, I don't feel I'm qualified to comment too much on this; that said, I think one of the best things about EB is the fact that you can play any faction without having to rebalance anything (something I've heard regarding RS, for example, which is apparently designed only around the player being the Romans). But like I've said, I can't say anything about "unique," because I don't have any other experiences to go by.

How long does it take to reach that point where you are simply so powerful that conquering becomes more a matter of attrition than survival or necessity?

Depends on the faction. With the Casse, it's pretty much after getting 1-2 settlements, because the AI can't launch naval invasions to save its life (using vanilla .exe). With the Sweboz, against other Barbarians, it's once I've got a steady economy (for example, my current game has had a steady war with the Getai for at least 5 years now, because they won't accept peace even after I've burnt at least three of their major towns and captured two more ... but now the Makedones are starting to get involved ....); against civilized factions, however, it's when you can actually start outproducing them - which is difficult, because the Sweboz don't have a great economy On the other hand, as the Romans, I can't seem to invade Spain without it killing the mood entirely, because Spain is Attrition Central Park, population currently dying.

What impact do you feel the trait and economic and political systems have on the campaign? Are you constantly making hard decisions, or are there are clear right and wrong ways?

There aren't any clear "right and wrong," except possibly with regards to Temples (because some of the bonii don't work [Morale ...], and other temples are just way too good compared to others [Law and Trade are strictly superior to Happiness and Tax, for example]). Pretty much everything is a matter of choice. However, I wouldn't say I'm constantly making "hard decisions," because so many 'decisions' don't have major effects immediately, only 2-3+ years down the road, and I'm a terrible planner.

How do you find battles in EB? In terms of lethality, battle length, unit responsiveness, ability to employ actual tactics, units routing and reforming?

I love them. Most battles are fairly quick once the engagement occurs, barring sieges, which usually turn into a slog. As long as you've got decent units (IE, not .1 Lethality levies ...), length and lethality are high enough to keep units dying at a quick rate, and actually employing tactics - primitive though they may be - can multiply this quite spectacularly: A battle may normally take 20-30 minutes, but if you can manage to hide some shock cavalry on one flank and Fear troops on the other, and envelop the wings at more-or-less the same time, then you can collapse the entire army via chain-rout in just a few minutes. As for units reforming after routing, I've never had a problem with it unless I don't have the units to actually consolidate a victory (IE, using 2-4 cavalry units to take down 12+ units).

How do you find the pacing of the campaign? Many people complain EB is slow...honestly, I think it's faster than RTR, and it's so fun I really don't care.

It's fairly slow to start with, because you have little-to-no access to really interesting and powerful units ... but then, I like Civ III specifically because it lets the inner Builder come to the fore, and so I love the early management-heavy period. After you've teched up for a few years, one of two things tends to happen (in my experience):
1) A slow and steady expansion, adding a new territory every X years (on average) and developing it before moving on - this tends to lead to the steamroller effect.
2) A quickly-expanding, near-blitz campaign relying on Plunder for continued expansion - the AI has trouble dealing with this, so I don't like using it, but it's great for crashing your economy! If you start expanding like crazy, building a horde of troops off of captured gold and not developing territories more than absolutely necessary, if you suddenly lose a couple armies, you suddenly have no cash inflow and are at the mercy of your enemies. Very nice experience, except most places you can't experience it (if you want a good experience, do this as the Sweboz or Aedui/Arverni, then send your armies into the Alps ).

What is the endgame like? A few, powerful dominating empires giving you hell? Scattered isolated factions that didn't expand well enough?

I've never gotten into an endgame proper, but usually by ~200 (when my barbarian campaigns start hitting juggernaut attrition), there's usually a few big kids on the block, and maybe some factions that have managed to survive (like KH, which in my experience tends to get kicked out of Greece and has to rely on rebellions to get back in the game).