Feedback after 2k+ turns

[Henri]

Greetings all,

After running a number of long campaigns and racking up a lot of turns thought I'd give my feedback on EB2 as it stands. these comments are based on primarily 2.01 H/M with v2 ai and the QuintusSertorius hotfix.

I am very aware this is a beta and as such my comments are aimed more as 'things to take on board going forwards in development' rather than knee-jerk reactions

1. Province distribution : As it stands the province distribution feels somewhat off. Too many provinces in Britannia and northern areas of Europe ~ not enough in flashpoint zones like Syria and Greece. At the moment its too easy for AS to push the Ptomolies back to Alexandria and for one of the northern factions (usually Sweboz and sometimes Lougoinnes) to dominate. I realise this is also to do with unit/building rosters being incomplete and additional factions may stop the northern problems but I think its something to seriously look at.

2. Economy : Having tried AS both in 2.0 & 2.01 the corruption values still need a little tweaking. It was definitely too high in 2.0 but seems a little low in 2.01. My feeling on this is to increase it slightly ~ about 20% more corruption should make it something that the player does need to take actions to deal with but not crippling.

The economies of Cathage and the Ptomolies in particular are horrible for 2 factions that were historically rather wealthy. As Cathage for instance with control of Northern African coastline to Kyrene, the Italian penisula and all of Iberia (+the islands) I could barely afford to maintain 3 full stacks. The fact that the free garrison units is broken atm doesn't help that either.

Finally the AI needs some tweaking ~ a 1 province minor fielding 6 full stacks is absurd and really annoying as well. People are playing with the Kings purse and looking at other scripts so this is something I believe will be resolved.

3. Traits : Actually quite happy with these for the most part. The ethnic traits and their knock-on effects means you do have to think a bit about who to use for governing and campaigning. Still some bugs to be worked out but its a beta and forward progress on these from 2.0 to 2.01 was excellent.

It does seem a little difficult to gain/maintain command stars though which can be problematic for keeping FMs loyal as this value triggers loyalty related traits.

Finally the Roman Cursus Honorium system is really cool though a bit annoying in practice ~ I agree that extra movement for FMs will help make it better.

4. Loyalty : Seems to be way too much defecting. This hurts the AI a lot as I often see their full stacks go rebel and break an AI invasion. I think there should be a big increase in loyalty for Heirs (both official and potential) and perhaps some sort of boost for AI family members. I know that historically speaking revolts and civil wars occurred but for gameplay purposes having your Heir and only field army go rebel as Bactria before you've taken a province is game-breaking (not to mention potentially knuckle and monitor breaking).

5. Combat : Not going to say much on this as I don't go big for number crunching combat mechanics. The QuintusSertorius hotfix thingy does make combat feel better.

6. Diplomacy : Awesome! The ability to finally maintain peaceful borders with other powers and play a diplomatic game is something that was so lacking from EB1 (yes I know thats down to the game engine). As an example in a Cimmerian Bosphorus game I chose to ally to everyone while I picked off rebel provinces and then as my allies started fighting amongst themselves I carefully picked which side to stay loyal too so I could grab provinces from my new enemies. It was a lot of fun to slowly become a major power controlling the entire black sea coast via creative diplomacy

7. AI Weirdness : I have seen some odd things from the AI ~ how much of this is due to the game engine itself I don't know. The AI has issues with the minor settlements and will often get stuck in a loop of entering/leaving them repeatedly or retreating into them and not leaving. Also the AI fixates on a province and will constantly attack it even if it changes hands (Rhodos is a key example of this).

So far I've got to congratulate the EB team on an awesome mod that, even in beta, feels more polished and stable than a lot of commercial game releases.

Keep up the excellent work

[Kanov]

Great stuff. I hope it is useful for the team.

Cheers.

[Col.KanKrusha]

I have similar observations but after quite a few less turns. Would like to add one

agent mortality
agents die way too easily after a failed mission. The failure rate is fine it is the deaths after that are a problem. It makes agents very frustrating yo use and a poor investment unless you are going to use them only as watchtowers


edit - biggest issue for me is the campaign pace due to the economy. The player pays too much upkeep while the AI is too easily able to recover from battle losses. I have been engage in a war against Epirus as Greece and it has taken me more than ten battles to be in a position to take one settlement. Didn't help that I was fighting Pergamum at the same time. I suppose this will be fixed withe the upkeep fixes

[Nicov55]

All roads seem to lead to the settlement distribution choices on the map...

[Thuycidides]

All roads seem to lead to the settlement distribution choices on the map...

And an implied man-crush on the Pritanoi.

[Achilles Lacedaemon]

5. Combat : Not going to say much on this as I don't go big for number crunching combat mechanics. The QuintusSertorius hotfix thingy does make combat feel better.



So... basically the most vital and important aspect of the game... Is the one that you're not going to talk about...

[Henri]

5. Combat : Not going to say much on this as I don't go big for number crunching combat mechanics. The QuintusSertorius hotfix thingy does make combat feel better.



So... basically the most vital and important aspect of the game... Is the one that you're not going to talk about...

I left that alone because a lot of people who do take the time to crunch the numbers and have a deep understanding of the underlying mechanics are talking about it.

The fact that only about half of the planned units are currently in game complicates it as well.

I will say that the QS hotfix makes a huge difference in the effectiveness of Javelin units (factions that use a lot of them like Sweboz become downright scary against a more static force like Hellenistic armies) and cavalry.

Phalangists are kinda OP without the hotfix ~ with it a heavy cavalry charge from behind will break them. Though on a 1 to 1 fight they will grind out each other and morale becomes the deciding factor which does feel 'correct'.

The Ptomolies have god awful morale in the base game which hurts the AI faction a lot I think. They need those heavy sword units (Galatians?) from EB1 to smooth out their roster.

The actual units themselves are visually superb and such a refreshing change from the clone armies of the Rome engine.

Oh and my fiancee, who recently graduated with a Research Masters in Augustian Propaganda, thinks the mod is "sexy" and refuses to play it because of the enormous timesink it would become for her

[Pakana]

My feedback after 1 hour.

One could make a nice game out of this, if they cut half of the stuff away from it

In other words. This is hard core, huge. I have nothing against it and I would like to play it, but it seems to take so much time to get into. I would love to see something like Rome 1 TW, but with Medieval 2 graphics. I always hated when they streamlined TW and Civ series, but in this case I would like to see streamlined version. English unit and building names. Remove half of the traits, I somehow lose interest in them when there is over 10 different traits on every character.

Also it feels like they are using rubber instead of iron and bronze. I beat one half naked man with 50 spearmen and he did not go down. He fought back for over one minute

Otherwise, great job and thank you for making this.

[HarkonRules]

Yeah, if you want a basic vanilla game with better graphics this mod is not for you at all and never will be, sorry... This is meant to be realistic and challenging.

[ooji]

Couple of other major points from my Bosporon kingdom campaign.
1. Having trade relations with AI slowly decreases your relations with them even if you share border with them and the trade is beneficial to both the AI and you.
2. Buildings that change cultural affinity are rather confusing. It is relatively easy for me to convert nomad settlements since I can build government buildings that slowly convert their culture into hellenic. However, I can't build similar buildings that convert the populace into hellenic in my greek settlements. That just means I'm stuck with whatever initial unrest I had due to other cultures present in my greek regions.
3. Loyalty needs tweaking. In my Roman campaign, family members had relatively strong loyalty whereas all my family members in my Bosporan campaign have 2 or less loyalty stats. One would think that core family members would have strong loyalty to the crown. I'm guessing that FL's authority have something to do with loyalty (if your FL has low authority), but my FL has nearly maxed out his authority points and I still don't see increase in loyalty.
4. Combat needs more work. Charge rarely works with cavalry and infantry units lose their formation very easily due to only first line charging or that stupid javelin throwing animation. Skirmishers throw their javelins one by one and hardly cause casualties. They usually never run out of ammo due to their slow throwing animation.
5. It is near impossible to gain command points for generals. There are way TOO MANY negative traits and way too less positive traits for my generals when it comes to command. Does building education buildings help at all? So far, my governors in cities with schools have not gained any traits.
6. Lastly, EB1 had formation where phalanx units stayed in the center and infantry units protected the flanks when lining infantry by holding right click. In other instances, spear units stayed in the center and sword units generally stood in the flanks. It would be nice to bring that back to EB2. I'm not sure if I explained this clearly.
Speaking of formation, units do not match the speed of their slowest units and end up creating gaps. This is especially annoying when depoloying phalanx units supported by others in the flank.

[QuintusSertorius]

4. Combat needs more work. Charge rarely works with cavalry and infantry units lose their formation very easily due to only first line charging or that stupid javelin throwing animation. Skirmishers throw their javelins one by one and hardly cause casualties. They usually never run out of ammo due to their slow throwing animation.

Skirmishers, and to a large degree cavalry have been sorted in my unofficial hotfix.

[Thuycidides]

Couple of other major points from my Bosporon kingdom campaign.
1. Having trade relations with AI slowly decreases your relations with them even if you share border with them and the trade is beneficial to both the AI and you.

Any relations whatsoever cause relations to decline over time. It can be as little as declining trade rights, and your relationship with that faction will sour. I made a test once where I never once ransomed or executed a prisoner, nor did I use any assassins, but relations still grew worse over time.

[Col.KanKrusha]

Any relations whatsoever cause relations to decline over time. It can be as little as declining trade rights, and your relationship with that faction will sour. I made a test once where I never once ransomed or executed a prisoner, nor did I use any assassins, but relations still grew worse over time.

There is also this bug, I dont know if it is fixed in EB2
http://t-a-w.blogspot.co.nz/2009/11/...edieval-2.html

EDIT - in response to k/t below: checked the file and yep, not fixed. so every time you occupy a settlement your standing with your allies goes down even though it should only go down if you are a baddie and sack the settlement

[wakain]

There is also this bug, I dont know if it is fixed in EB2
http://t-a-w.blogspot.co.nz/2009/11/...edieval-2.html

EDIT - in response to k/t below: checked the file and yep, not fixed. so every time you occupy a settlement your standing with your allies goes down even though it should only go down if you are a baddie and sack the settlement

Very interesting read, truly a gamechanger, have the eb2 devs taken note of this?

[Yayattasa]

Any relations whatsoever cause relations to decline over time. It can be as little as declining trade rights, and your relationship with that faction will sour. I made a test once where I never once ransomed or executed a prisoner, nor did I use any assassins, but relations still grew worse over time.

I think you are mixing relations with reputation.

[Yayattasa]

If you hold a province your neighbors want then relations go down the drain.

[k/t]

Check your file and see if it's fixed.

[muchandmore]

How do you fix the relations bug manually?

[k/t]

Check your file and find out, geez.

That article was written in 2009. The bug is not present in Bellum Crucis 6.3 (the only mod I have installed at this moment), as the whole trigger was commented out and replaced by proper M2 language:

Trigger 0101_sack_settlement_decrease_global
WhenToTest SackSettlement

FactionStanding target_faction normalise -1.0 30
FactionStanding target_allies normalise -1.0 120
FactionStanding exclude_factions { } normalise -1.0 360

;------------------------------------------
Trigger 0102_extermination_decrease_global
WhenToTest ExterminatePopulation

FactionStanding target_faction normalise -1.0 10
FactionStanding target_allies normalise -1.0 50
FactionStanding exclude_factions { } normalise -1.0 150

;------------------------------------------
Trigger 0103_occupy_settlement_increase_global
WhenToTest OccupySettlement

FactionStanding target_faction normalise 1.0 40
FactionStanding target_allies normalise 1.0 200
FactionStanding exclude_factions { } normalise 1.0 300

;------------------------------------------
;Trigger 0102_city_razed_decrease_global
; WhenToTest CitySacked
;
; FactionStanding target_faction normalise -1.0 10
; FactionStanding target_allies normalise -1.0 20
; FactionStanding target_enemies normalise 1.0 20
;

[V.T. Marvin]

IIRC this bug has been noted and fixed.