Has Rome 2 Vanilla now reached the level of Rome 1 Vanilla

[Canaris]

perifanosEllinas ... I love bro , full homo.

And answering Op :

Has Rome 2 Vanilla now reached the level of Rome 1 Vanilla

No because RTW 1 has working AI . Not brilliant, not awesome and but basically working . This is something RTW2 has yet to achieve , despite tons of DLC and 9 patches.

[kujirakira]

Arguments based on CiG aren't valid. The discussion is about Rome2.

[♘Top Hat Zebra]

Rome 2 vanilla was superior to Rome 1 vanilla, on release.

Other than sieges, every complaint so far has been subjective. "I don't like floating armies! I don't like the music! I don't like the atmosphere! I don't like the building system! I don't like the trait system! I don't like the faction diversity! I don't like the animations!" and so on.

I mean, don't get me wrong, I agree with a lot of these. Rome 1 (Or, rather, M2TW) has a number of features that I consider more fun. That does not mean they are better, that just means that I LIKE them better. There is a difference.

The building system is more complex. Not necessarily better, nor does it make sense (Why do my people hate an Inn so much?) but it is more complex from a gameplay standpoint. The AI is OBJECTIVELY superior, both the BAI and the CAI.

I just reinstalled Rome 1, so that I could try out EB finally (I don't get what's so great about it? The music is nice, and the unit descriptions are nice, but the gameplay is as bad as any Rome 1 mod) so I am rather refreshed. Rome 1 was my first Total War game, but as soon as I had a computer that could run M2TW, Rome was uninstalled. Vanilla is just plan horrible, and even with mods it's impossible to get past just how incredibly tedious that game is. In recruitment, in battles, in building, in conquering, you name it, it's just boring. M2TW fixes the worst of these, and EB 2 will be great, I am sure, but I digress.

It's great that people like Rome 1 vanilla better than Rome 2 vanilla. I don't even slightly understand that, as Rome 1 vanilla was a steaming pile of horse , but whatever, that's just my opinion.

Rome 1 is not objectively better than Rome 2. The end. You either like one, or you like the other, and either way that does not make one better than the other.

[GussieFinkNottle]

Rome 2 vanilla was superior to Rome 1 vanilla, on release.
...
Rome 1 is not objectively better than Rome 2. The end. You either like one, or you like the other, and either way that does not make one better than the other.

I love the hypocrisy in this post. Start out with an unequivocal, unqualified, subjective statement, and close by saying all opinions are subjective and none is right.

[♘Top Hat Zebra]

I love the hypocrisy in this post. Start out with an unequivocal, unqualified, subjective statement, and close by saying all opinions are subjective and none is right.

There is no hypocrisy there. You liking a game or not liking it does not effect whether one is better. The gameplay determines whether one is better than the other, and yes, Rome 2 is a better /game/ than Rome 1.

I mean, personally, that is my biggest issue with it. It's so obviously a game that it's hard to get immersed in it. So many new features make it feel kind of like a board game.

The building system, for instance, is superior in Rome 2, even though I don't like it as much. You have to manage food and public order, as every building negatively effects one or the other, requiring you to constantly have to juggle between the two. If you have a province dedicated purely to making troops, with forges and military temples and barracks, then you will need to manage to keep public order up in that province, AND have a province focused on food and money development since the military province won't produce much of either of those.

That is an improvement on the complexity of the old system. It is, for a game, a better system, as it forces a player to have to manage more things.

But even despite that, I do not like it, because it is so OBVIOUSLY only applicable in a game. Inns provide food, and negatively effect public order, which makes no sense at all to me. I enjoyed the building system in the original games better, but that does not mean they were better, as they were not. They just made more sense to me, and I enjoyed playing with them more.

[Ritmas]

There is no hypocrisy there. You liking a game or not liking it does not effect whether one is better. The gameplay determines whether one is better than the other, and yes, Rome 2 is a better /game/ than Rome 1.

I mean, personally, that is my biggest issue with it. It's so obviously a game that it's hard to get immersed in it. So many new features make it feel kind of like a board game.

The building system, for instance, is superior in Rome 2, even though I don't like it as much. You have to manage food and public order, as every building negatively effects one or the other, requiring you to constantly have to juggle between the two. If you have a province dedicated purely to making troops, with forges and military temples and barracks, then you will need to manage to keep public order up in that province, AND have a province focused on food and money development since the military province won't produce much of either of those.

That is an improvement on the complexity of the old system. It is, for a game, a better system, as it forces a player to have to manage more things.

But even despite that, I do not like it, because it is so OBVIOUSLY only applicable in a game. Inns provide food, and negatively effect public order, which makes no sense at all to me. I enjoyed the building system in the original games better, but that does not mean they were better, as they were not. They just made more sense to me, and I enjoyed playing with them more.

How that doesn't make sense to you. Plebs get drunk do stupid stuff, plebs get drunk and discuss some politics and how they are not treated fairly so they start a movement etc. Inn gets bad food and feeds it to plebs, plebs die, omg it's sign of the gods, rabble rabble. That damages public order, doesn't it?

[antred]

How that doesn't make sense to you. Plebs get drunk do stupid stuff, plebs get drunk and discuss some politics and how they are not treated fairly so they start a movement etc. Inn gets bad food and feeds it to plebs, plebs die, omg it's sign of the gods, rabble rabble. That damages public order, doesn't it?

The part that makes no sense is that inns create food. How is that not obvious? Inns should CONSUME food, not create it.

[paradamed]

This thread made me laugh. How can a buggy mess like Rome 2 be compared to RTW? RTW is uglier and Rome 2 is more beautiful, thats it, but not everything that shines is gold.

[Earl Dibbles Jr]

Gosh....where to begin. The sheer list of things missing from Rome 2 that were in Rome 1 is staggering. Credit to Riekopo on Reddit.

-taxation controls for every individual province
-roads of differing sizes and qualities were build-able on the campaign map (after all, what the real Rome was famous for)
-trade happened between settlements within a faction as well as between factions, this internal trade giving the map a more 'living' feel as your empire's commerce circulated
-unique faction intro videos
-city view for every settlement
-new engine for the game
-a range boost for missile troops on high ground
-fire at will for all units with missiles, including legionaries
-guard mode and loose formation for all units
-seasons
-set capital
-family tree and set heir
-deplete-able family tree
-permanent forts that looked like a fort on the campaign map, not a ring of spikes
-watchtowers
-towns rioted a few turns before rebellions or revolts, and rebels would be unhappy citizens, not just slaves
-some of the wounded on the winner's side recovering after each battle
-formation fighting instead of blobbing
-% of each side that were dead displayed by hovering over the balance of power bar
-diplomatic options: give region, map information, attack faction, threatening diplomacy (accept or we will attack)
-you could set the exact amount of money offered or demanded in a diplomatic transaction
-all buildings constructed shown on the battle map
-building sites on the battle maps of towns in the process of constructing something
-senate missions, with rewards including money, gladiator games or races, public offices, senate standing, naval and land units
-politics had more of an impact on the campaign (in my experience you can ignore Rome 2 politics with no adverse effects)
-contextual and lengthy pre-battle speeches
-characters last long enough to become useful before they die
--characters that become specialized based on there actions and experience, ie a system that makes sense and was highly immersive
-nicknames 'the brave', 'the mad', 'the great' etc.
-more variation in portraits: it was very unlikely you would have two generals with the same face, even though you would have many more generals
-character portraits aged and there were traits to do with age
-large developed citys being worthwhile and very profitable to capture.(In r2 you have so few buildings and you need to tear them all down and rebuild them in insane combinations, so any province or city is basically the same as any other. In rome 1 if you took a large or huge city it was meaningful.)
-more building freedom, with the ability to construct as many buildings as you liked in towns (up to about 30) and not limited to 5 in Rome itself, or 3 or 4 in minor settlements
-buildings that should be easy to construct don't require 30 turns' research, so you are less constricted in your building options
-more period-inspired HUD (not gonna get involved in the row over the unit/building cards though)
-culture specific HUDs
-historical event messages, and historically timed natural disasters
-plagues that made sense (from squalid places) and that occurred more often to liven the campaign map up as did all natural disasters
-more detailed breakdown of income with lots more factors in income per settlement
-more trade resources, multiple trade resources per region
-more detailed breakdown of public order with more factors for both positive and negative
-all three of the post invasion options gave tangible benefits, as opposed to occupy being the only viable option in R2: slaughter gave public order as they were terrified of you and instant money but destroyed the population size, occupy gave a large population but had potential public order problems, enslave provided long-term money and trade resources so was kind of a half-way house
-no crippling attrition when besieging (subjective whether this is a good thing or not, but encouraged you to build lots of siege engines for epic battles)
-casualties actually mattered as you couldn't just stand in your territory for a turn or two to replenish them for free (and replenishment is much faster now than in NTW or S2 - this one is up for debate as to whether it is a good thing, but it is a fact that you couldn't heal your armies as quickly or at no cost in Rome 1)
-unit experience decreased when fresh recruits were used to refill it, making casualties matter even more
-retrain was available in every town with the relevant barracks
-music composed by Jeff van Dyck (matter of opinion as to whether he is better, but he did win awards, including a Bafta)
-music that reacts to events on the battlefield for immersion and 'hollywood' drama
-faction specific music
-tunnelling under town walls to bring them down (sap points)
-wall sizes were not automatically changed with settlement sizes: they were built independently, so large cities could have meagre defences, and smaller ones (if maxed out) could get decent ones e.g. stone walls. This led to more diversity and different challenges between cities
-religion (especially in Barbarian Invasion)
-all buildings in towns were flammable, and those destroyed had to be repaired on the campaign map
-unit merging to refill units or balance casualties
-slower paced battles (though patches have made this much better than at R2 release)
-numbers on unit cards (same as above)
-general can be seen ordering the units about with every command you give: signalling with his sword for movements and rearing up to order a charge. Rallying also caused him to rear his horse
-no limits on armies
-military forces not glued to generals
-being able to use multiple generals in one army, IE using your nobles and there bodyguard as emergency elite troops.
-not broken up into piecemeal dlc
-pirates as actual naval forces that can be fought not percentage penalties on income (an Illyrian pirate queen is one of the R2 loading screens, and fighting pirates was the main occupation of the Roman navy - where are the pirates?)
-no automatic transports, so navies more useful
-pikemen that use their pikes
-bonuses not measly ('5% better melee attack')
-needed siege weapons for town assaults, gates couldn't be burned down by infantry, bigger walls required better siege engines
-abilities that could come from training e.g. formations and attacks, not magical stat boosts
-more land battles (as opposed to settlement battles)
-civil war actually against the other families not generic 'senate loyalists', a particularly annoying term if you want to preserve the republic
-ongoing cutscene to show senators' reaction to you
-brigands appeared on the map on rich trade routes
-scorched earth from armies in hostile territory, devastation shown on map and had public order and income consequences
-units stayed together when routing, not turning into weird massive long single-file lines, and chasing routing units was not a micromanagement-fest
-routing enemies were shown on the minimap ('radar map') so didn't require the chore of searching the battle map and examining the landscape to find them
-marginally bigger units: infantry 160 standard/240 largest, missile 160, cavalry 108 compared to infantry 160 standard/200 largest, missile 120, cavalry 80
-full page displays when needed (settlement details, diplomacy) and not obstructive when not needed (R2's massive tall empty unit cards box)
-population (and the ability to do migration tactics by recruiting units and disbanding them elsewhere)
-a more dynamic base for modding: it will be much harder to change core game mechanics with R2
-units could disengage without massive casualties or men 'locked into' time-consuming combat animations that ensured they would be caught and killed
-a video showing you the death of the general on either side, and a video showing wall and gate breaches
-more spaced units so you can see the fighting
-lots of (orangey-yellow) torches in night battles, not one weird bright white spotlight on the unit commander like in R2
-horse sound effects
-smoke trail behind torches and fire arrows
-horses try to leap over spears and shields when charging
-artillery is (realistically) less accurate
-there are 10 historical battles, compared to the 4 in R2, 3 of which have the Romans in them
-more populated cities have related problems, like squalor, and related benefits, like a large recruitment pool, unlike R2 where settlement size and squalor are not linked
-elephants have more animations and throw men into the air with tusks and trunk
-mounted units have more impact, and units look like they have more weight: the men sent flying from cavalry charges flail like men, rather than flying 10 feet like a paper doll
-there is more room for tactics: usually you can manoeuvre with infantry and skirmishers and deploy cavalry in flanking attacks, and battles progress in stages. In R2, once one line breaks somewhere, the whole battle line routs quickly and there is little room for tactics (admittedly this one is quite subjective, feel free to dispute if this is not your experience)
-banners stay on routing units so you can track them down and see their numbers and the factors affecting them
-agents have more distinct roles, less crossover between them (for me roles were more intuitive but that is only my opinion, not a fact)
-you have the option of a short campaign as any faction which is less of a long-term commitment, and can be completed in a few hours, or 1-2 days
-videos for capturing a wonder
-much less distorted map projection
-distance to capital
-map areas: sahara desert, tip of Sweden, modern day Belarus, Lithuania and Latvia, more of modern-day Ukraine and Russia
-you could zoom out much further on the campaign map
-fertility varying between regions, and the ability to get a good or bad harvest instead of a set income
-the year and faction displayed when loading a campaign
-cities with more than one culture's buildings in them
-units visibly pushed siege engines to the walls
-save battle replay saved exactly what happened
-culture-specific advisors
-animations for natural disasters: volcanoes erupted, floodwater could be seen on the map, and the ground convulsed in earthquakes

As a little aside, I'd also like to remind you of the things that have been removed that were in Medieval 2:-agent videos
-armour cleanness deteriorated over the course of a battle, troops did not start out filthy
-armour and weapon upgrades visibly changed the appearance of units' equipment
-prisoner count displayed on in-battle UI
-diplomatic options e.g. marriages

I guess CA hit the nail on the head with you fools who are claiming Rome 2 is better than Rome 1...

[Huberto]

Gosh....where to begin. The sheer list of things missing from Rome 2 that were in Rome 1 is staggering. Credit to Riekopo on Reddit.

Well done Although I never played much RTW.

[Sidious]

I really do think CAI and the campaign map in general is a step in the right direction. Allies feel like allies and it feels like there is cooperation between allies/satrapys/client states. Id love to see future games continue in this direction.

After patch 9, im back in the game and I must say I really am enjoying it (with mods though, like a lot of them). I've warmed up to the new army system, I just wish they would make us care about the generals... I know everyone hates magic boats but I'd take it over confused AI naval transports. Now R2 is not perfect but I think we've been a tad bit harsh on it.

[Okuto]

Rome 2 can never be Rome 1, they're both far different from each other in terms of design and vision.....

Rome 2 doesn't live up to it's lineage certainly.......but it's tolerable at this point, however I wouldn't be able to in good faith to recommend it yet.

[Ataegina]

I wonder how many REALLY own or played Rome 1 in reallity? Or is just the same ongoing join the current popular mob..... Rome 1 was a great game back on time, and seriously i feel i might have different version of the game as many here seem to have (i own Rome 1 and both expansions) and unless this is super heavily modded, the vanilla game is turd with make up and baton....... yes in 2004 looked great because..... we had nothing else to compare, since was the game that made the leap to full 3d..... so i would kindly ask 2 things, take photo of your Rome 1 game as evidence, show video or photo of "vanilla" Rome 1 (no mods) to show how fantastic masterpiece this is. Nostalgia is good but Reallity is better

[LordInvictus]

I wonder how many REALLY own or played Rome 1 in reallity? Or is just the same ongoing join the current popular mob..... Rome 1 was a great game back on time, and seriously i feel i might have different version of the game as many here seem to have (i own Rome 1 and both expansions) and unless this is super heavily modded, the vanilla game is turd with make up and baton....... yes in 2004 looked great because..... we had nothing else to compare, since was the game that made the leap to full 3d..... so i would kindly ask 2 things, take photo of your Rome 1 game as evidence, show video or photo of "vanilla" Rome 1 (no mods) to show how fantastic masterpiece this is. Nostalgia is good but Reallity is better

I had the good fortune to buy Medieval 2 before Rome so I could see Rome for what it really was. Needless to say, Rome 2 will likely be better than Rome in the future.

[Garensterz]

@Ataegina

there were so many pictures and videos of comparisons of Rome 1 and Rome 2 campaign design, and battle mechanics in the first month when Rome 2 was released. I think you just missed all of them.

[Red River]

I think the author ment to compare a fully patched vanillla RTW to current fully patched R2

[HorseArcher]

Rome:Total War was a revolutionary title. I remember, people were amazed to see 3D models by the thousands clashing on the battlefield. While it was hardly a perfect game (it had its own problems until a few patches) it brought a new ideas to the table. Nobody had a tactical real-time strategy sewn together with a turn based strategy on a map- type of game. While S:TW and M:TW were same, it didn't excite players due to 2D sprites used as armies, while others were playing with 3D units in RTS games (Warcraft, Command&Conquer etc). R:TW brought the hard core turn-based strategists and the RTS fans together in one game. Both groups complained about something, but at the end, it was still a solid title.
The rest of the following titles were more of the same, based in different time periods with good/not so good successes, but essentially they were still the same game and none of them managed to reach the success of R:TW.
R2:TW is no different.
Actually it's probably the first title since R:TW that takes away hallmark features and only adds a few improvements, while adds plenty of features only giving headaches but nothing new or meaningful gameplay elements.
After 1 finished campaign and tried 3 more times and got halfway through, I can't find a faction that is not conquering somewhere, or just sitting in one province with food shortages, ready to get wiped out. There are no factions focusing on trade instead of warfare; there are no factions focusing on defense due to hostile neighbors; There is no diversity of unit tactics based on factions and culture, there are no events that perhaps unite certain factions against one common and powerful enemy, and there are no enemies, who is a powerful common enemy to deal with. It's everyone against everyone with no lasting alliances, thrown into a fruit mixer and whichever has the bigger army wins, regardless of location or cultural advantage. Everyone starts with villages and no experienced armies, and everyone marches into a battle at turn 1 or 2.

Everybody is just conquering, even if they only got 1 army and 1 province.
It's like, they made the game with the idea of everyone just want to hop into the battlefield every single turn. If you refuse to attack, the AI will, even if they throw their last boat and last man in, and their province is on the brink to rebel or dying of food shortages.
Essentially R2:TW is a graphical update of R:TW, but it's made like all the other games between R:TW and R2:TW never happened and there has been no progress made in regard of Battle AI and campaign AI.
In a summary, there is nothing revolutionary about this game. They didn't add a better AI, they didn't add anything new, that works.
Province management (instead of towns) or sea battles do not count. Reduction of choices of buildings and reduction of number of armies do not count. Bigger 3D map with all sorts of effects is a graphical update,is not a revolutionary idea.
Despite all this, the game is playable (now), and many people get a kick out of the battles, perhaps with the help of some mods. Just don't expect any intruiging and deep campaign game here. That's just there to get you into a battle with someone.

[daelin4]

Same level in terms of what?

Rome2 failed not so much because it was supposed to be better and an evolution of Rome2 (it should, but it's not), but the fact that it wasn't was exacerbated by CA's hyper-marketing to appeal towards that belief.

In other words, "the food you're you're about to (pre)order isn't , in fact it's better than what you had before, trust me XDDDD!"

[crzyrndm]

-damage boost that is an opinion, this is just a list of statements, furthermore being high up in real life grants you extra range, but no more power/damage

Er...

Ok, simple version because math and midnight dont mix so well.
Destination below origin -> Object gains speed due to decrease in height
Destination above origin -> Object loses speed due to increase in height
Greater impact speed -> More energy to be dissipated -> More potential for harm (gameplay translation: increased damage)

Not that I dont agree that it should impact on range as well, just saying that altering damage isn't all that far fetched either.

[Man o' War]

A few years and 40% bigger budget to turn a classic game into an arcade game.

Building, plop a coloured tile onto a grid for your building program, collect settlements in a set for added bonuses.

Diplomacy, spot someone from sea and begin diplomacy via your CB radio. You'll even know whether they can be trusted and where their capital cities are.

Culture, there is none. You will raze (not necessarily in name) every opposition building and rebuild all in your own factions image.

Internal politics, chuck a cow on the barbecue and wait for the dice roll. So embarresing that CA are effectively deleting and preventing discussion on the subject.

Logistics, take to the water in a magic boat, if a general dies, no matter how far from home, he will be insta replaced by magic carpet ride.