R2TR4 Changelog

[JaM]

Beta 4.00084:

- Added "fire on move" attribute to heavy cavalry and elephants. to allow them to throw javelins while chasing enemies.
- reduced shield defense bonus for cavalry
- Added -10 to all infantry thrown javelins when targeting cavalry (javelins thrown by cavalry are not impacted)
- Reduced cavalry bonus hitpoints to compensate for reduced effectivity of javelins against cavalry
- Reduced range of javelins, to compensate for much higher rate of fire they have now
- Reworked Cavalry speed and charge mechanics. Cavalry will move (walk) at Trot speed, and run at Gallop. When delivering charge, it will either use trot or gallop (based on player choice - single click trot, double click gallop). At certain distance cavalry will throw its javelins, then as it gets closer it will slow down before it enters into contact with enemy.
- Adjusted terrain penalties, removed scrub penalties ( scrub areas are quite small and insignificant compared to the penalties used)
- Reworked Imperium levels. Only province capitals (walled cities) now provide imperium points. This should significantly slow down the availability and number of agents available to player and AI.
- Adjustment to minor town trade centers. Provided food bonuses reduced, added bonus to all trading. (these buildings will synergize with trade ports/trade oriented town centers)
- Fixed missing effects for Roman tech tree in Hannibal at the Gates

[JaM]

Beta 4.00085:

- Cohesion system update - Disordered units will be less effective at blocking incoming missiles (block chance will decrease based on disorder level down to 50%)
- Fixed Roman unit composition in Hannibal at the Gates campaign. Starting armies should have proper variants of Legionary units, which are later upgradable to late units. (originally, GC variants were used, which cannot be upgraded) Applies to newly started campaigns only.
- Renamed "Reform" abilities to "Redress Ranks" for Roman Infantry units, and "Reform Units" for General Abilities.
- Tweaks to javelin ranges
- Celtic Warriors and Italic Levy Infantry armor boosted to 50
- Added 10 Armor points to all shields. Shield armor has to be defined, otherwise certain projectile calculations get nullified due to multiplying by zero.
- Reworked Diplomatic setup. Now there are three distinct diplomacy groups defined, one for minor factions, another one for major factions, and separate for Romans. Major factions (and Romans) have less forgiving attitude for diplomacy events, while minor factions tend to "forget" faster. Similarly, value of certain treaties is seen differently by Major or Minor factions..
- Increased financial thresholds for Army, Navy and Buildings, to make sure AI keeps excess money in those buckets.
- Wine trader building provides trade boost instead of culture boost
- Fixed Army/Navy stances being grayed out after short movement

[JaM]

Beta 4.00087:

- Adjusted Hannibal at the Gates script that generates defending armies to not contain Onagers (they are 4.century AD artillery, shouldn't be in 2nd century BC campaign) Instead, these armies now have War Elephants.
- Adjusted stats for all Pikemen units
- Fixed garrison unit priority for high quality units.
- Increased numbers and composition of lower quality garrison units. Towns and cities will now have 8 garrison land units by default. (increasing it further would reduce amount of garrisoned ships in coastal cities)
- Adjusted stats for Numidian Spearmen and Tribesmen. Both units are now faster, are better with javelins. Tribesmen are now cheaper garrison version of Spearmen, they are using spear instead of dagger for melee. Minor changes to their appearance.
- Horse breeder towns now also have garrison cavalry units.
- Renamed Slave Slingers and Slave Infantry into Desert Slingers and Desert Infantry.
- Increased military aggressiveness for all factions one level.

[JaM]

Beta 4.00088:

- Slightly reduced Reinforcement distances.
- Tweaks to Stance Action point requirements, now all stances require 50% of action points.
- Renamed Numidian Noble Infantry into Numidian Heavy Spearmen (Numidian nobles were usually riding with cavalry)
- Minor tweaks to cavalry maneuverability. Cavalry units will be able to change direction slightly easier, especially light cavalry.
- Added extra hitpoints to Cataphracts
- Minor tweaks to morale penalties for being attacked in the rear.

[JaM]

Beta 4.00089:

- Minor adjustments to javelin throw animation (reduced and adjusted blend in time)
- Heavy Javelins (thrown before charge) impact effects increased to 120sec instead of 5sec. Heavy javelins will now decrease shield defense bonus (-8), and reduce morale (-8). Effectively getting hit by heavy javelins will ruin the unit combat potential somewhat, therefore not getting hit by them will become important (use of skirmishers to draw enemy fire instead)
- Light Javelins, Arrows and Slingshots effects are increased to 30sec, now mostly apply penalties to morale and speed, and therefore are more useful for suppressing enemy units.
- Tweaks to cohesion loss effects, disordered state penalties more severe. (using reserves against disordered units will be a lot more effective)

[JaM]

Beta 4.00090-98:

- Removed boiling oil from game. Oil was extremely costly to be used like this, historical sources only mention it very rarely, and even then its effect is incidental.
- Reworked ship speed, now all ships use standard speed (3knots), but can temporarily increase it through ability, which lasts 40/60/80 seconds with 160 second cool-down. This ability is there to better simulate rower fatigue, and it only increases speed of the ship, so it doesn't make ship more effective in combat besides the ramming speed. At the same time, ship acceleration is now more dependent on ship weight and number of rowers on board, so smaller lighter ships will have much better acceleration.
- Ships now allow javelin throws at 360 degree around the ship to improve tactical positioning of ships in naval combat. Marines are usually better protected from front due to shields, so flanking shots are still devastating.
- Reworked terrain penalties. Forest now reduces shield block chance instead of improving it. (projectiles are harder to spot) Should make skirmishers able to ambush heavier units in forests more effectively. Forest still provides cover bonus against projectiles though, so less projectiles will actually hit the target in forest, but these will be harder to block.
- Minor tweaks to unit marksmanship bonuses, arrow damage (recurve bow more dangerous vs composite and standard one)
- Added different armor to simulate suburmalis for late Republican units.
- Further improvements to how morale impact units.
- Fixed unit cost inconsistencies for same unit for different campaigns (Grand Campaign vs Caesar in Gaul etc)
- Fixed accuracy stat UI appearing on melee units (was not supposed to be there, was added as a test)
- Minor tweaks to siege autoresolve, making it harder for attackers
- Further fixes to character skills
- Adjusted age limitations for Roman Generals in Caesar in Gaul campaign.
- Removed "hide anywhere" attribute from Gallic Hunters. Instead, they now have "hide in scrub and forest" trait, as all light infantry.
- Reworked military training research bonuses, it will now provide XP bonus to newly trained units instead of bonus to attack/defense/morale. Bonus XP is faction specific, for specific type of units. Removed XP bonuses provided by buildings and character abilities.
- Third level of agent skill will always provide parent attribute point.
- Adjusted Imperium levels for Caesar in Gaul campaign
- Adjustments to composition of Roman garrisons provided by barracks for Caesar in Gaul campaign. Garrison force is now slightly "lighter"
- Fixed excess range for Barbarian Bow hunters
- Minor tweaks to arrow long range accuracy
- Events that involve agent action cost reduction, now have much higher bonus (75% action price reduction instead of 25%)
- Unit experience events now provide +2 XP ranks
- Adjustments to technology bonuses to slow down economy boom in late game stages
- Reworked weapon and armor building bonuses. Shield bonus was removed (it was not even applying properly).
- Trade edict now also decreases recruitment slots for Army and Navy within province by 1.
- Barbarian Tribute edict now decreases political loyalty by 10.
- Adjusted stats for Gallic Legionaries, they now have better melee attack/defense than normal Republican Legionaries (but they have overall less armor)

- Fixed garrison units for Ligurians in Grand campaign and Hannibal at the Gates. (new game only)
- Fixed issue with extra Roman income in Caesar in Gaul campaign (new game only)
- added -25% tax penalty for Political Party Loyalty edict. Edict now also increases loyalty to 20 (previously 10)
- Hannibal and Scipio Africanus attribute points boosted in Hannibal at the Gates campaign. They both were military geniuses, and therefore should stand above others. Camillus in Rise of Republic also now has better stats.
- Tweaks to character traits
- Tweaks to political actions and events, mostly reducing attribute requirements to compensate for latest changes to attribute system
- Tweaks and fixes for character skills
- Spear attack values boosted
- General Authority (starting at level 2) will now provide "Inspire Troops" ability. Higher the Authority general has, more potent "Inspire Troops" gets, with bonuses to morale, melee attack and defense, accuracy and speed of movement. Inspire Troops will have 60 second duration, and single use per battle.
- Agent and General Authority, Subterfuge and Zeal attribute bonuses effects increased, Attribute points removed from skills. Attribute points now only gained through traits and ancillaries.
- Suspended replenishment outside of city or camp. Units will replenish while garrisoned faster.
- Barbarian infantry now use deeper formation
- Unit experience now does not increase unit morale. (to compensate for much bigger effect General attribute points have on unit morale)
- Tweaks to provincial initiatives, boosted recruitment, trade, taxes and festival bonuses. Added negative taxation to military and public order initiatives, added political loyalty penalty to taxation initiative
- Adjusted Province Edict bonuses, Taxation now also decrease political loyalty, Recruitment edict reduces taxation level, etc.
Fixed number of horses for Equites Legiorum in Augustus campaign
- Removed Thorakitai upgrade for Massilia, which made recruitment of these units unavailable after researching appropriate technology
- Adjusted ship costs, large ships now cost more money compared to smaller ones.
- Removed all active abilities from units, to reduce amount of micromanagement needed during battles
- Adjusted fatigue and morale effects to play better with new "passive abilities only" for units..
- Removed XP gain from characters, instead, decreased XP thresholds for Generals so they will gain ranks faster by fighting battles.
- Removed all active abilities from generals. Only kept Rally and Inspire
- Minor adjustments to unit spacing and formation depth.
- Reworked "loose formation" for heavy units, which will now simulate "tight formation" which is better suited for units under missile fire. Technically, this button now allows adopting "alternate combat formation" which might differentiate based on unit type.
- Charge values increased for long sword, reduced for spears. Charge duration increased, charge speed increased for barbarian units. They should be now more effective at it. This should make disciplined units less likely to take extended casualties from own charges against "charge reflector" units (spear men, heavy infantry), while certain barbarian units will.
- Minor tweaks to charge distances, charge speed for barbarian units, charge bonus duration, and charge morale boost.
- Removed alternative upgrade path for Socii units into Legionaries (due to game bug, it prevented recruitment of core units)
- Fixed number of horsemen in General unit for Caesar in Gaul campaign.

[JaM]

Beta 4.00099-102:

- Added Better Sieges mod (huge thanks to AveMetal) Mod changes gates into Victory points, therefore AI will try to defend the area instead of just standing on top wall and get swarmed.
- Minor Settlement main building now can be destroyed. (only province capital has to be converted). Conversion costs were adjusted to make it worth considering over just plain destroying the main building and build it from scratch.

- Increased experience thresholds, reduced experience thresholds for particular units to compensate. Melee infantry will now gain experience faster than skirmishers or artillery, taking casualties will have bigger impact on unit overall experience level.
- Minor tweaks to projectile trails, reducing their size
- Terrain penalties adjustments, Snow and Sand will now give 10% penalty to defense.
- Reducing secondary attack probability and removing outnumbered penalty to reduce AI willingness to blob all units against single opposing units to gain advantage. to compensate, melee attack interval is much shorter for fast engagements between entities.
- Demolish cost for buildings now same as build cost (to make conversion financially more attractive option)
- Occupation option to raze town now doesn't provide financial bonus, and adds -50 to public order (one time penalty)

- Morale system overhaul, flanking penalties, combat losses penalties, etc.
- Reworked unit base morale. Now, skirmishers have base morale 30, higher quality skirmishers have 40. Standard units 40, Veteran/high quality units 50 and Elite/Noble units 60. Mercenaries are now -10 from these base values. Differences are now created strictly through General attributes and skills.

- Reworked recruitment and upkeep cost for Mercenary units. They will now cost same amount as their standard counterpart. Their main disadvantage now is their morale penalty (-10 to morale).

- Tweaks to BAI mechanics, adjusted how infantry mass and ranks works, pike knockback, missiles accuracy bonus to damage.
- Adjusted mass values for infantry units
- Acceleration slightly boosted for Roman Legionaries, to improve speed of disengagement from combat and troop rotation.
- Boosted range for Javelins, as certain skirmishers were unable to throw their javelins when skirmish ability was enabled.
- Unit spacing adjusted for certain units, barbarian swordsmen will now have slightly looser formation

- Minor tweaks to character level requirements for promotions
- Minor tweaks to diplomacy and treachery values, reducing timeout for declaring war after breaking nonaggression agreement.

- Reduced public order penalty for different culture when occupying city without looting or razing.
- Looting income percentage increased
- Age requirement for Consulship reduced to 30 (Scipio Africanus was elected consul at that age)
- Minor tweaks to character skills
- Doubled XP requirements for agents

- Further improvements to cavalry morale
- Minor UI stat order reorganization
- Slightly boosted speed and damage for slings (typical kinetic energy was around 150J which is a lot more than ancient arrows had), higher quality slingshots have more accuracy and less dispersion. (Balearic Slingers, Rhodian Slingers)
- Flaming projectiles now have higher dispersion than standard projectiles