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Thread: Rome II Praise Thread

  1. #1
    Legio's Avatar EMPRESS OF ALL THINGS
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    Default Rome II Praise Thread

    In order to facilitate reasonable discussion and keep the forums clean, Moderation Staff is opening a Total War: Rome II praise thread. This thread will work similarly to the 'complaints' thread and a previous Empire: Total War praise thread. Moderation Staff will use its discretion to merge 'praise threads' with this larger thread. Moderation Staff can and will remove any posts that it deems necessary to prevent disruption, derailment, and other unsuitable behavior. Questions and concerns about should be directed to a Moderator or Administrator, or posted in the Moderation Commentary Thread.

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    Last edited by Legio; August 01, 2013 at 05:09 PM.

  2. #2

    Icon14 Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    As the release date draws ever closer, and more and more worrying little details emerge, I decided to list a few of the more positive aspects of the footage released today for my own enjoyment. I used this Gamespot review as my source.

    (Already posted) The battle starts around 9:00 http://uk.gamespot.com/total-war-rom...ation-6412318/ The battle starts around 9:00

    I will list my thoughts about the footage here.

    It seems like the Romans do not become a formless mass after engaging with the enemy, and they seem to hold their line pretty well. Not perfectly, but well enough to create immersion.

    Tracers still unfortunately appear, but they are toned down quite a lot.

    The AI seemingly tries to flank the player a couple of times, and manages to give Al a moderate challenge, even though his playing was terrible (no offence). However, the prologue was most likely scripted, but it gives a lot more positive picture of the AI, when compared to the battle of the Nile preview. Now it actually looks like it will go down with a fight.

    When engaged, slingers and javelinmen appear to cause a rout pretty fast, but the melee combat between infantry actually takes some time to finish. Even though it is still a little too fast for my liking, it is a lot slower than in Shogun 2 in any case. Reminds me of Rome or Medieval 2 speed.

    Overall, I am very impressed about the campaign map. I like everything I see, and I am happy to see that campaign gameplay will be a lot more complicated than before, instead of the usual city rushing.
    Last edited by Augustus Scipius; August 01, 2013 at 04:57 PM.

  3. #3

    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    I'm fine with the routing speed. It seems perfectly normal. They weren't meant for close combat. They're basically fodder once ammo runs out.


    ​Scoodlypooper Numero Uno

  4. #4

    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    Only thing I am worrying about are the Phalanxes.
    We have not seen them in full action yet (Battle of the Nile showed little.

    But as for the rest I agree with you.
    It is going to be a long and hard month.

  5. #5
    Hattori's Avatar Citizen
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    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    The AI in the IGN video displays some good stuff too, the player actually loses the battle.
    http://uk.ign.com/videos/2013/08/01/...per-commentary

    I already posted some observations in another thread. These included:
    AI set up an ambush with the skirmishers behind the hill, they sent a decent varied force ahead of the main army and have no problem disengaging combat to relocate somewhere else on the battlefield. Also they kept pursuing the general as their own general stayed safe away from the battle.

    Carefully optimistic.

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  6. #6
    Wilder's Avatar Senator
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    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    Quote Originally Posted by Augustus Scipius View Post
    Even though it is still too fast for my liking, it is a lot slower than in Shogun 2 in any case. Reminds me of Rome or Medieval 2 speed.
    Sorry, not to nitpick, but Rome 1 had the fastest combat/movement of any TW game, way faster than shogun 2. I'm pretty sure that is just those rose tinted glasses you have on there. That said though I agree that it is an improvement, I won't be totally happy until they bring back the movement speeds of the original medieval.

  7. #7

    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    Yes, but then again the play was just bad. Rubbish use of camouflage and line of sight system made it possible for Rome to lose. Considering the massive amount of cavalry this should be an easy win ... What I also did not understand was that in the "fortify-stance" the player can use fire balls, pikes, ... etc. but for some reason Al did not use these options.

  8. #8
    Hattori's Avatar Citizen
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    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    Quote Originally Posted by Vlaanderen Vrij View Post
    Yes, but then again the play was just bad. Rubbish use of camouflage and line of sight system made it possible for Rome to lose. Considering the massive amount of cavalry this should be an easy win ... What I also did not understand was that in the "fortify-stance" the player can use fire balls, pikes, ... etc. but for some reason Al did not use these options.
    My impression was that the AI were the ones attacking so they could not use these things. If you mean the romans I assume that you need specific units to deploy these items? They did have some kind of fort set up, that can be useful for defense.

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  9. #9
    babydoc's Avatar Semisalis
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    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    Quote Originally Posted by Vlaanderen Vrij View Post
    Yes, but then again the play was just bad. Rubbish use of camouflage and line of sight system made it possible for Rome to lose. Considering the massive amount of cavalry this should be an easy win ... What I also did not understand was that in the "fortify-stance" the player can use fire balls, pikes, ... etc. but for some reason Al did not use these options.
    Wasnt he playing and answering questions at the same time?
    You know that its hard to do ?

  10. #10
    Primicerius
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    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    Quote Originally Posted by Wilder View Post
    Sorry, not to nitpick, but Rome 1 had the fastest combat/movement of any TW game, way faster than shogun 2.
    I disagree. TWS2 was faster. At least at release. Haven't played it since. The recent video shows a battle speed similar to many realism mods I've seen such as RTR. Probably a little faster but it's way better than the Battle of the Nile. Closer to NTW I think.
    Quote Originally Posted by Vlaanderen Vrij View Post
    Yes, but then again the play was just bad. Rubbish use of camouflage and line of sight system made it possible for Rome to lose. Considering the massive amount of cavalry this should be an easy win ... What I also did not understand was that in the "fortify-stance" the player can use fire balls, pikes, ... etc. but for some reason Al did not use these options.
    In Al's defense he was talking and playing at the same time. With LOS he couldn't just try and encircle the enemy straight away because he didn't actually know what the enemy had. Overall, I think I could have come up with a better result, though. The AI did pull off some good moves. It tried to counter Al's moves and it did successfully flank him.
    Last edited by Dan113112; August 01, 2013 at 01:57 PM.

  11. #11
    dom385's Avatar Senator
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    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    I thought the combat speed and unit morale etc seemed much better in this footage, I think the fact that formations still looked a bit iffy at some points was because of how much al was mving his units round. Which brings up probably my only real complaint, which is that units turn way too fast, this might be due to the fact that rather than wheeling like in previous games, they just sort of blob and then reform in the new direction. The only other thing I can think of was that in some of the footage, sprites loaded in really close, so the soldiers became garish masses of colour.

    I wonder when this test build was made, because projectile trails, especially with pila, still seemed quite prominent. Although the animations for throwing and actual projectiles seemed more visible, which was nice.

  12. #12

    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    Not excactly. RTW vanilla unit speed was the higher of the whole saga. Shogun II infantry speed was good but the cavalry seem to fly ... I'm very surprised to see RTW II units pace in the recently last videos quite acceptable I would appreciate anyway even more formation cohesion during melee...
    Last edited by T-Duke; August 01, 2013 at 02:06 PM.

  13. #13

    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    I wonder if this battle was scripted or not. If it wasn't, then that was a really cool use of the AI's skirmishers. I've never seen them send out light infantry for a little pre-battle engagement before. Usually they just charge their whole army at once (if the AI is attacking).

  14. #14
    General Maximus's Avatar Vicarius Provinciae
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    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    I hope next time they use someone else instead of Al to do their gameplay. Someone who can actually play the battle. Al just keeps making mistakes and forgetting units

    And he just keeps stuttering the same words again and again, adding 'You know...' in every sentence. "You know..." "No sir, I don't know anything, why keep saying I know" would be my answer if I met him there.

    And in overall, his sentences were "You know, it's it's it's...it's a game. You you you know...[enter some sentence explaining a feature] and it's it's it's al alright. You know...the the the [enter name of unit] and and and [enter that unit's description]. They they they are they are....meant to be like this this." Or something like that.

    As for the gameplay, it doesn't seem bad. The thing that was bad was the experience of the player playing it. Absolutely horrible, worse than some newbies.

    I like the battle speed. It works great. I hope it stays the same, since modders will be able to customize the battle speeds to any other flavours of the players easily.

    He should've made use of that fort, he could've won the battle in a lot better way. And because of his stupid tendency of forgetting units after he orders them somewhere, the fort would've not required any such action and thus make him play the full potential of his army.

    As for the campaign, it looks gorgeous except the hideous cliffs on the coast. And I don't like the horse-animation, it isn't eye pleasing or looks any good. It must be slowed down if it is to look proper.

    For the UI, it is bland as always. But unit cards and their icons are totally horrible, they are all eyesores.

    Missile-trails don't look good either, I hope they allow us to turn them off.

    Al is great, but he should improve.
    Last edited by General Maximus; August 01, 2013 at 02:20 PM.
    सार्वभौम सम्राट चत्रवर्ती - भारतवर्ष
    स्वर्गपुत्र पीतसम्राट - चीन
    महाराजानाभ्याम महाराजा - पारसिक

  15. #15

    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    Skirmishers still seem kind of useless in that skirmish mode steel seems to be completely ineffectual. When the enemy charges at them they don't actually book it out of there but instead confusedly futz around and slowly jog letting the charging enemies get WAY too close for comfort and losing some men in the process.

  16. #16

    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    Quote Originally Posted by Hattori View Post
    The AI in the IGN video displays some good stuff too, the player actually loses the battle.
    http://uk.ign.com/videos/2013/08/01/...per-commentary

    I already posted some observations in another thread. These included:
    AI set up an ambush with the skirmishers behind the hill, they sent a decent varied force ahead of the main army and have no problem disengaging combat to relocate somewhere else on the battlefield. Also they kept pursuing the general as their own general stayed safe away from the battle.

    Carefully optimistic.


    Phalanx Pike Mercs confirmed, Al Bickham is a horrible player for using cavalry to hit spearmen from the front, what else is new?

    Ha.

    Hastati using testudo? Thought it'd just be a legionnaire thing.
    Last edited by IGdood; August 01, 2013 at 02:24 PM.

  17. #17

    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    Looks cool, but I'm a little worried.

    The Samnites attack in a big 'blob' of infantry, rather than a cohesive line. The only reason they didn't do a ton worse was the sheer incompetence of the player by losing so much of his cavalry to inattention, not setting up his ambush properly, and letting his own units kind of 'blob' rather than sending each individual cohort on its own attack vector. Was also a little annoying how fragile he treated his general - he's heavy cavalry, and should have no trouble smashing through 'levy slingers' chasing him with daggers.

  18. #18

    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    I noticed the general had a 'mount' option, hopefully that applies to all cav units. The lighting effects were great too with the lightning flashes.

  19. #19

    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    Melees of heavy infantry are actually pretty long!

  20. #20

    Default Re: Roman Hastati maintain cohesion, battles aren't over in five seconds, and AI does not seem to be completely rubbish

    Yeah combat looks way better than in Battle of the Nile. Pretty content with the battles now.

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