DeI vs older TW games

[Telémakhos]

So R2TW is on sale on steam... this may be when I take the plunge. I'm a longtime EB fan and have been very anxious about trying R2 and being incredibly disappointed... but this mod seems to be in the tradition of the great overhauls for previous TW games. So--my big question is to what extent other players who've played those overhauls find DeI to create a similar experience, the problems of the core R2TW game aside. I'm a huge antiquity buff, and I know the setting will go a long way toward helping me overcome the game's problems, but I wanted to get a feel for how far this mod goes toward improving things. Secondary question--is emperor edition all I'd need to play DeI, or are any of the DLCs required/suggested? (only asking since I didn't see a note about this in the download thread).

thanks!

[wrcromartie]

[DUPLICATE]

[Aethyr]

All you need is Rome II (so long as you want to play the main nations, others have sadly been absorbed into DLC) - core issues of Rome II aside, this mod for me is the only reason i consider playing the game, much like the mods in former TW titles did so it is the same spirit as them.

There is a major patch in the (hopefully) not too distant future, the initial 1.0 release of DEI, perhaps waiting for that would yield the absolute best experience thus far with the mod, but the current build is in a good place, head and shoulders above the rest, at least in my opinion, and lightyears ahead of the vanilla game.

[wrcromartie]

At ~$15 I'd say Rome2 is a pretty strong pickup now & DeI is great. The campaign changes in DeI especially make it closer to older TW games - although R2 to start is definitely less involved in terms of city management, importance of individual generals etc. vs previous TW games. I do love the convenience improvements that the R2 engine has allowed though.

After playing through several campaigns - vanilla & modded - I'm waiting for DeI 1.0 to dive back in.

The only thing I really think DeI still needs to shape up is the combat fine tuning & that's what they have said many times they are working hard to polish for the 1.0 release. I can bet it's no small amount of work.

[xisheng]

This mod has a long way to go to reach levels of RS or EB, but its not because of the modders, as far as i understand the game itself has its limits when it comes to modding freely. Anyway, they are on the right track. I played DeI since the days it was just simple battle overhaul and it has come a long way, the new version thats coming out in the near future will cement their position as the best available overhaul for Rome II. When it comes to antiquity and historical accuracy, the mod is great. For example, all the factions, unit names are in Latin. There is an amazing scripted reforms system that makes the game so much more interesting and you have a lot to look forward to. Carthage, Rome and Egypt have their territories expanded to represent how it was in the year the game starts. Theres an amazing area of recruitment system with hundreds of units available in different areas, which is awesome. Basically there are hundreds of big and thousands of small things that make this overhaul amazing.

To make you understand how Campaign AI and Battle AI works, a short story from my experience. I conquered Syracuse and now my border was with Carthage, this was like 10 turns in (4 turns per year in DeI). So, since im playing as Junii, whom everyone hates even more because of their cultural aversion penalty Carthage put Hannibal and his 20stack Brethren of Baal on my border the turn after i took Syracuse, since in this mod garrisoning troops gives public order negative, ai gets creative. After 60 turns of mind games i had 4 legions of mine standing on the border facing 6 stacks of Carthaginians, what followed was 55 minute battle on the grasslands of Magna Graecia, with me losing heavily and having to retreat and regroup in Northern Italy while Hannibal and his boys replenished their numbers and took the rest of the province, now im 150 turns in, still only took Magna Graecia back and having fleet battles with Carthage while trying to fend of Germanic Hordes from the north with 1 legion, while sneaking the rest of the legions through Massalian lands towards Qart Hadasht. Just when i thought that i had the upper hand the Illyrians attacked me and took half of Italy, so now i have to go back and help the legion i left behind.

To compare all this to my vanilla experience: by turn 100 i had Magna Graecia, Italy, Cisalpine, Africa, Libya, Egypt and Mauritania all to myself while Carthage was offering me peace and offering me thousands of moneys.

This mod is only reason i play Rome II.

[rjacko10]

...since in this mod garrisoning troops gives public order negative, ai gets creative.

Sorry for going off topic here, but I stopped playing R2 altogether in the summer and I am patiently waiting for DeI 1.0. I REALLY like the idea of armies giving -ve PO now, but how does the AI handle it exactly?

[Telémakhos]

just the sort of responses I was looking for. thanks, all. I think I'll jump in and learn the vanilla ropes until 1.0 is ready. shouldn't be anything like the wait endured for EB2, I imagine...

[Sir_Pee_Alot]

I quite playing for months now and 1.0 will give the best experience because it really change everything from UI to units to battle mechanics and what i have seen so far its really worth the wait, I could have played older versions but i want the total experience and get really immersed in to a campaign "What never happend in vanilla RTW II" The only problems i have with RTW II is the AI and no use of different formations and i do hope DeI script historical formations to generals. That would give also every battle a different feeling, But i dont know if you can connect formation scripts to generals.

[FlashHeart07]

There are some major issues with the game being hardcoded in some odd places which is quite annoying. 1.0 and versions later on will really be worth it. If only you guys knew what was in store for you

[geala]

DeI is not like EB in many aspects. I played EB for about two years. EB was great because of the different buildings and the traits in which DeI is not diferent to R2TW as far as I understand. Haven't seen a negative trait till now but I started DeI just a few weeks ago. On the positive that also prevents you from the anger I often felt when a general in EB got a totally strange trait. There are limited building possibilities in DeI and you can have only one ancilliary just like in vanilla. DeI is also not overly historically correct with some units, but contrary to common misunderstanding that wasn't EB either. In EB historical correctness of units depended a lot to when and by whom the units were made. The early units f.e. the hellenistic ones were partly badly designed in EB. Back to DeI: me playing only Greek factions DeI f.e. suffers a little bit from the over-abundance of hoplite units for the Greeks. At that late date I don't believe in elite hoplites while militia hoplites are rather probable. And I really doubt that a "thureos hoplite" unit with phalanx fighting style ever existed. But EB was not that much better in many aspects. I think EB2 will be the best concerning historically correctness but on the whole I find DeI satisfying enough. For me it's a good balance of history and playability.

I chose to play DeI instead of EB2 (which is not finished of course, I will have a look again later). I came back to TW gaming and the forums just because I looked for EB2, then I saw that in the meantime there was a unit card mod for R2TW (BullGods, I cannot play with the vanilla cards, no way) and also DeI as an alternative to the crappy vanilla and the lots of well made but small improvement mods. I gave it a try and stayed. Graphics are a lot better in R2TW. As intellectuals of course we don't care about graphics, just deeply designed content... (so nice to be a hypocrite). Anyhow, while I miss to a certain extent the traits and family trees and buildings, R2TW and DeI offer some substitution in the political and economical play. You can micromanage a lot and that's partly interesting. I prefer especially the fact that you can name and develop armies and generals much more to your liking than in EB (or EB2). I like the tech development. And I like the diplomacy much more than in EB, it's worlds apart. Frankly said most of my EB campaigns became annoying by extremely stupid AI decisions. And I regularly stopped a campaign respectively lost any mood to start a campaign because of the huge mass of stacks wandering around turn after turn sooner or later, sometimes coloured grey. When I think about it the diplomacy is the biggest factor that I would not like to play TW games before Empire so much any longer. That also makes me reluctant to play EB2 which btw for me is not that different from EB. And I never was overly pleased by the combat in M2TW and it's mods, so ...

I liked battles a bit more in EB than in DeI although DeI is much much better than vanilla R2TW. What annoys me the most is the effect of straggled enemy soldiers who often totally disrupt and delay my formations. It's funny to watch 10 archers fighting for some time against my 100 hetairoi. However battles are enjoyable in DeI. The graphical kick adds enough to prefer DeI over EB and presumably also EB2. I think the changes in 1.0 will improve the experience further. I don't talk about naval battles, there should be some work done. There are two naval overhauls for DeI/R2TW but they did not work after the last patch, hopefully they will be updated because they made naval warfare a little bit better. A last word to battles: what I really don't like are the arcade magical abilities of the generals to strenghten the troops. Although losely based on some anecdotal facts (Caesar jumping to the front comes to mind) it's just too much Harry Potter and I consequently deny to use the crap. I would like it to be removed.

[Emperor of Europe]

I'm a huge EB fan, but I must admit that even in the current DEI version my Pompey campaign was the most challenging and fun campaign I've played in any TW game.

[FlashHeart07]

The AI gets huge bonuses to PO and food since they cant handle it. So they dont got any problems with it

[rjacko10]

The AI gets huge bonuses to PO and food since they cant handle it. So they dont got any problems with it

Ah that's a shame, still going to be fighting too many settlement battles against stack + garrison. From what xisheng wrote it sounded as if AI was stationing stacks in the field now..

Also makes instigating unrest etc pointless...

[rick1063]

I have personally found that minor settlement battles are very rare when attacking, the AI doesn't tend to leave stacks in cities but even if they do and you attack they will Sally out and face you in the field 90% of the time

[rjacko10]

Ah ok this wasn't my experience in the summer. The DeI team must have worked some magic

[FlashHeart07]

Many people experience lots of different stuff. I fight alot of army+garrison sieges. The problem is that the AI have difficulties handling problems that can be posed on the player like PO and food shortage. The AI would simply starve, have rebellions and the game would be a total walk over and everyone would whine. So instead we try and make the game tougher and more realistic to the player and only do to the AI what it can handle. Also it cant handle different build times for units which also would have been nice to differ beterne levy and elite units. The game has its limitations but the team tries to do what is possible to create the most historic and immersive mod there is. But alot is still hardcoded and modding tools are missing.

[Butan]

DeI is still not done "patching" the big holes from the vanilla game... when its done, the focus of the modders will be on really adding things to Rome 2, via scripts and game-changing features. This will be the time of maturity, where unmodable things become moddable, and when you can throw hundreds of lines of codes to literally create new elements in the game.

Until then we cant compare DeI to really old and awesome mods: they had years of development, DeI hasnt.
I'm confident if DeI keep it up we will match EB in a few years. Like EB2 need years of development before coming close to its own father, EB.

[Alu10]

Wait for Populous and DeI 2.0, Rome 2 is going to be the top TW game. I have hope that CA releases more modding tools, especially battle map and campaign map edit tools, which would make the game like unstoppable. If CA then also upgrades the BAI / CAI (hopefully for attila which then might be put into rome 2) i wont play another TW game for a loooooong time.

[Dresden]

Just a note about AI bonuses - they have been toned down in 1.0 so that the AI will actually feel a bit of the crunch from various game mechanics. It won't debilitate them but they won't have the overly large bonuses they have in 0.96.