Great News: Empire Divided DLC for Rome II is about the III Century Crysis!!!!!

[Diocle]

I object to this evil and culturally oppressive decision by CA, to depict yet another Roman Empire game is an act of historical fascism. They should have made a DLC about the Persian empire instead of doing more boring western-centric games which ignore the richness and diversity of ancient history.

Apart the misuse of the word 'Fascism', I think I can understand your position: I'd be very glad if they decide to make any expansion concerning ancient Hittites, Persians, Parthians, Sassanians and/or whatever else pre-Islamic Persain civilization of the Ancient History of that wonderful region.

Today they have decided to make this new DLC, and the Persian peoples are part of the game playing indeed a fundamental role in the plot, so I don't see why you're complaining.

But, if you are complaining for some political reason: I'm with you. I'm with you as I'm with Iran, with Putin, with Hassad, with Syrian people, with Hezbollah and with all the heroes fighting and dying for freedom in Middle East, because we are gamers but we are also citizens and as citizens we have the right to express our feelings about the world around us, even talking of a ****ing PC game.

Amen.

We are patiently waiting for RO

Apart the apparent misuse of the adverb 'patiently', I'm with you on this, tomy.

[Julianus Flavius]

Honestly I'm definitely in favour of this DLC. I mean with Rome 2 they've streamlined the mod workshop to such a point that I'm completely indifferent to the innaccurate units, knowing the community will fix it. In this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0U_u3cXRpNA the Romans are able to recruit PIKEMEN for gods sake, but if a week goes by where someone doesn't change that I'd be very surprised.

[First Citizen Gallienus]

If you're talking about the first two units in Aurelian's army I thought those were just spearmen, but who knows?

[Gäiten]

Honestly I'm definitely in favour of this DLC. I mean with Rome 2 they've streamlined the mod workshop to such a point that I'm completely indifferent to the innaccurate units, knowing the community will fix it. In this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0U_u3cXRpNA the Romans are able to recruit PIKEMEN for gods sake, but if a week goes by where someone doesn't change that I'd be very surprised.

I am somewhat disappointed that there are so few units shown wearing the 3rd century helmets (Niederbieber, Buch et cet.).

[Diocle]

Honestly I'm definitely in favour of this DLC. I mean with Rome 2 they've streamlined the mod workshop to such a point that I'm completely indifferent to the innaccurate units, knowing the community will fix it. In this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0U_u3cXRpNA the Romans are able to recruit PIKEMEN for gods sake, but if a week goes by where someone doesn't change that I'd be very surprised.

Agreed on everything but the pikemen.

Well, pikemen are another tale, the matter is like one of those huge minefields in the desert around El Alamein during WW2, miles and miles of invisible death and horror just below the skin of an ocean of sand, the perfect symbol of the cruel casualty of death in a scenary of absolute fierce sunny stillness. We had, we have and we will always have no certainty about any aspect of Roman military history, but we insist! We insist exploring the minefield putting at risk our reputation, our intelligence and our brain.



Moving on into the minefield and talking of pikemen in Roman Armies, we may start saying that the matter is really complex, and, more I age, more my doubts grow and more the matter looks like the desert maze of El Alamein. The point is that nobody knows for sure how actually the Romans were armed and nobody knows for sure which kinds of weapons they actually carried. The Triarii fought using heavy and long spears, this is pretty sure. The repubblican distinction between Hastati, Principes and Triarii survived even during the imperial age and during the entire life of the Roman army, but we think that this subdivision was now just an administrative subdivision indicating the seniority of units and centurions, but ... actually .. who knows?!?!

Arrian in his "Ektaxis kata Alanoon", describing the guys of the XII and XV, explicitally talks of "kontophoroi" and of "kontoi" and we all know well that the "kontos" is the Greek equivalent of what we now call "pike", here the text:

"And the front four ranks of the formation must be of pikemen, whose pikepoints end in thin iron shanks. And the foremost of them should hold them at the ready, in order that when the enemies near them, they can thrust the ironpoints of the pikes at the breast of the horses in particular."

This is the comment you can read on the (universally known) site from which it comes my Arrian's quote:

“The kontos described here appears to be the pilum, the classic heavy javelin of the legionary heavy infantry with its bendable iron shank, rather than the two handed cavalry spear used by the heavy cavalry contarii. A generally applied Greek vocabulary for translation of Latin terminology does not seem to have been adopted despite centuries of contact with the Roman army. The word hyssos was used by several Greek authors, most notably Polybius, as the Greek term for pilum, while Flavius Josephus employed the word xyston. The use of the pilum as a stabbing weapon rather than a javelin is not unique: Caesar’s legionaries had done the same during the siege of Alesia according to the De bello Gallico. The description of the main battle formation lacks some details that could shed light on the exact dispositions of the subunits. It remains unclear whether the eight ranks of the legionary troops belong to the same unit, perhaps representing a contubernium deployed in single file, or that the two distinct groups of four diffently armed legionaries represented different subunits of the legion with the front four ranks perhaps belonging to the centuriae of the priores and the rear four ranks to those of the posteriores. Alternatively the front four ranks could perhaps have been those of cohortes I to V and the rear four ranks those of cohortes VI to X. The combination of both pila and lanceae as weapons used by legionaries is not unique to Arrianus. It is attested by Polyaenus for the army of Caesar, in Tacitus for a battle between legio III Gallica and Sarmatians in AD 69, in Josephus in his description of the Roman army in Judea and in Lucianus for the army of Cappadocia some thirty years after the governorship of Arrianus. These two different types of javelins were apparently a typical combination of weaponry for Roman legionaries.

Speidel’s identification of the four rear ranks of lonchophoroi as specialised legionary light infantry may be challenged by the fact that other lonchophoroi, probably elite legionaries, are designated as kouphoi lonchophoroi indicating that the others may have been heavy infantry rather than specialist skirmishers. The distinction made between psiloi and thyreophoroi among the lonchophoroi later on makes clear that not all of the javelinmen were skirmishers. The rear rank lonchophoroi are surely identical with these thyreophoroi and thus heavy infantry troops. It is not clear whether javelineers of both types would carry multiple throwing spears. Later sources indicate that lancearii could carry up to five javelins at a time. Another point of interest is whether the four rear ranks of lonchophoroi would be equipped with a different type of shield like the lonchophoroi in the general's guard.

The composite nature of the battle line portrayed here may have been inspired by the commander’s acquaintance with the details of the army organisation of Alexander the Great during the final period of his reign. For his projected Arabian campaign the army of Alexander was to have adopted a composite battle formation made up of ranks of pikemen, javelineers and archers, a type of deployment also employed by earlier Achaemenid armies as described in the Cyropaidia of Xenophoon, the great role model for Arrianus. There was little if any formal training in military theory for Roman commanders. There were no military academies to train professional officers and the paramilitary iuventus organisations for young members of the Roman elite primarily taught riding skills and individual weapons handling. Writings on military history and tactical treatises thus provided a guide for Roman commanders who did not have the modern benefits of field manuals detailing official army doctrine. The single battle formation of differently armed ranks was there to stay. Similar formations continued to be employed by the Roman and Byzantine armies for centuries to come. The defensive formation described here is very similar to a description of the Byzantine fulco or foulkon of the sixth century AD. Since there are various additional similarities between Arrian's Ektaxis and Maurice's Strategikon the tactics employed in this battle plan may have been more common than assumed and could have conformed to standard Roman tactical dispositions.

The depth of the battle line and the number of ranks was probably dependent on the strength of the subunits and the numbers recorded of three, six, four and eight may reflect deployment in half-files and files, the latter possibly being identical with the contubernia. The legionary heavy infantry centuriae of the hastati and principes in the days of Polybius counted sixty men as their normal establishment strength, those of the imperial army are supposed to have generally had an authorised strength of eighty troops. The multiples of three in Josephus may represent units that were understrength compared to their normal table of organisation. Ranks deployed for battle are described by Polybius and Vegetius as maintaining a distance of six foot. This interval was no doubt necessary for troops to hurl their javelins without wounding their comrades at their rear, but presumably the ranks would close in after spending their missiles for a much denser formation before physical contact with enemy formations. This certainly seems to be the case with the four front ranks of Arrian’s battle order as described later on. The rear ranks may have retained a greater distance to enable them to hurl more missiles. The primary function of deep battle lines was to preserve the morale of the troops and blocking ways of retreat of potential shirkers. The greater depth of Arrian’s infantry line appears to be due to the terrifying nature of the cavalry charge. Roman troops displayed more confidence in infantry against infantry engagements where shallow formations of only three ranks are attested.

The battle line described here has been seen as a Roman variation on the Hellenistic phalanx formation. However there is a very important difference between Arrian’s battle deployment and the Macedonian type phalanx. The troops of the first ranks were not armed with dedicated thrusting spears. As already remarked upon above the kontos is here not the same weapon employed by the heavy cavalry lancers, but should be interpreted as the standard heavy javelin with its bending metal shank, the pilum. Arrian even explicitly mentions the use of these kontoi as throwing weapons as well as stabbing spears, a feat that would certainly not have been possible with heavy pikes. That the term kontos was not a clearly defined technical term for a specific type of weapon can be confirmed by other sources on the Roman army. Josephus for instance also uses the word for the shorter stabbing spear used by shieldbearing Roman cavalry rather than the two handed heavy cavalry pike, though Arrian uses the word in that latter sense in the Technè Taktikè. Another major departure from the normal Helllenistic phalanx was that the battle-line was supposed to clear lanes for the cavalry to pass through after the enemy would have been repulsed. This supposes a great deal more flexibility of the Roman infantry formation than the earlier ponderous formation of pikemen. Unfortunately no specifics are given how this manoeuvre was to be executed. A recreation of a true phalanx formation was apparently adopted by the Roman army for campaigning in the East in the next century, a fact recorded in historians of the reign of Caracalla and Alexander Severus and given greater credibility by the discovery of the gravestone of a discens phalangarii of legio II Parthica at Apamea. These troops are described as using similia arma, including a dory makron or long spear, in an effort to authentically recreate the Macedonian phlanx of days long gone by. With a reported strength of six legions this must have been one of history's first and largest reenactment groups. Nevertheless it does not appear right to identify the kontos carrying kontophoroi of Arrian with the third century phalangarii armed with the dory makron."

Now, those 'thin iron shanks' has led us to say, with a relative degree of certainty, that Arrian was just a Roman-Hellenic intellectual and soldier, using a Greek terminology to describe nothing else than a common Roman pila, used as a pike to counter the enemy cavalry. OK, well, in any case this change described by Arrian slowly became the rule during the following century, the Romans slowly moved from the cohortal formation to the late phalanx or oplitic formation, many think the Romans did this switching of weaponery and tactics for the same reason of Arrian: the increased and increasing necessity of facing the huge amount of heavy, or extra-heavy horse fielded and thrown against them by Parthians and Sassanians.

In any case, one century later, Cassio Dio tells us the story of Caracalla and his planned Persian war, for which: "He also drilled the Macedonian phalanx" and "He organized a phalanx, composed entirely of Macedonians, sixteen thousand strong, named it "Alexander's phalanx," and equipped it with the arms that warriors had used in his day; these consisted of a helmet of raw ox-hide, a three-ply linen breastplate, a bronze shield, long pike, short spear, high boots, and sword."
Also Herodian writes of this Phalanx and of another one (4.8.2-3,9-4) but, as says Ross Cowan, observing the tombstones of these Spartan/Roman "Phalangiarii", we just see Roman soldiers, armed as average legionaries, equipped with oval shields, swords of medium lenght and even wearing segmented armors, .. and the mystery persists and the sand, creaking under our boots, is more and more deadly, at every step.

I stop here, I leave this El Alamein and its damned minefields, a maze of unstable mirages, defective memories and incomprehensible truths, but we can't forget that the adoption of the spear as main weapon, is one of the key points in the definition of the transformation of the Roman Legions of the Principate into the classic Late Roman Legions, in which the spearmen played the role of shock-troops of the first line.
So, even though I don't want to say that having Roman pikemen in the III century is a historically accurate feature for a game, I also say that the matter is more complex, more vague, more 'misty' and more dangerous than what many of us may think.

In any case, knowing that the debate about the use of heavy long spears in the Roman Army will never die, I want just to repeat here in this occasion, that, for once, I'm with Creative Assembly, with Jack Lusted and with all those nice Brit guys, who have finally decided to give us the occasion of wargaming on PC the III century's crisis and I'm with them without any doubt, without any exitation and without any regret!

ROMA VICTRIX!

[police55]

I’ve always liked the a-historical parts of TW. It makes it feel diverse and gives a rather unique taste.

[Gäiten]

Honestly I'm definitely in favour of this DLC. I mean with Rome 2 they've streamlined the mod workshop to such a point that I'm completely indifferent to the innaccurate units, knowing the community will fix it. In this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0U_u3cXRpNA the Romans are able to recruit PIKEMEN for gods sake, but if a week goes by where someone doesn't change that I'd be very surprised.

They might have taken a hint from the Phalangarii mentioned by Cassius Dio for the Eastern campaign of Caracalla.

[alhoon]

Is this a Total War Saga? Or the Total War Saga will be about something else?

Will the political factions controlling provinces also be in the main game?

[Johnadiw26]

To anyone who have play dlc, are the dlc good? Tell me because my PC don"t support Total War 2 Rome


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Diocle]

To anyone who have play dlc, are the dlc good? Tell me because my PC don"t support Total War 2 Rome


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

It will be out on 30 November.

About the DLC's quality, the opinions are different: many say it is worth the money (I'm with them), while many say it's just crap (mainly for those who were hoping for a DLC about Alexander, I'm not among them).

For my part, I've bought it. I've bought it, because I'm waiting and asking for a III century expansion for 15 years now, i.e. from the times of RomeTW-BI, as I've said thousands times, so, if I give up now, just when CA finally decided to take care of the most important period of Roman history, .. I should spit on my face at the mirror, each time I shave my beard!

Side note: with the new DLC, it also comes a new Patch for Rome2, adding few interesting (for me) new features and .. possibly breaking and killing tons of Mods built in last years.
My personal suggestion, even though I don't like Rome 2 and Attila and warscape engine applied to ancient warfare, is that you should upgrade your machine and buy the two games, but this is just a personal opinion.

[Johnadiw26]

ah thank you for the explanation Diocle, I hope this DLC worth fans money, worth your money. A new patch for Rome2, sure that a good news because I hear and read on social media, rome2 engine review is not very good. Thank you for your personal opinion, I have a plan in Q1 2018 to upgrade my old machine, so any good suggestion to upgrade? I live in Indonesia, SE Asia ( 1 USD = Rp.13.500) my current budget is USD 200. I can play Shogun 2 total war, Empire total war, Napoleon total war in high setting at 20-30 fps. My upgrade aim is to play a new Warhammer series.

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Operating System: Windows 7 Ultimate 32-bit (6.1, Build 7601) Service Pack 1 (7601.win7sp1_ldr.160316-0600)
Language: Indonesian (Regional Setting: Indonesian)
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I attach my machine spec report from dxdiag and cpu-z app.MY-PC.txtDxDiag.txt

[Gäiten]

IMHO your Memory (RAM) is very low. 8 or even better 16 MB would be more suitable.

[Johnadiw26]

thank you Gaiten for your humble opinion, you mean 8 GB or 16 GB, right?

[Gäiten]

thank you Gaiten for your humble opinion, you mean 8 GB or 16 GB, right?

Yes, GB.

[First Citizen Gallienus]

Ouch, yeah that RAM hurts . Gaiten is correct, call this overkill but I actually have 32 GBs of RAM.

[Diocle]

Ouch, yeah that RAM hurts . Gaiten is correct, call this overkill but I actually have 32 GBs of RAM.

.. I've 12 GBs installed and I run Rome2 and Attila at max setting, so, having 32 GBs of RAM means a lot, but really a lot of RAM, I suppose.

[Gäiten]

.. I've 12 GBs installed and I run Rome2 and Attila at max setting, so, having 32 GBs of RAM means a lot, but really a lot of RAM, I suppose.

Yes, 32 GB should perform a Magic smile on your face

[Julianus Flavius]

If you're talking about the first two units in Aurelian's army I thought those were just spearmen, but who knows?

If you look really closely at the units as the guy recruits them he briefly passes his mouse over the pikemen and the tooltip shows the unit name. It's not even a latin unit name or anything, just "Pikemen" haha

[Diocle]

Perhaps calling them "Kontarii", or "Kontophoroi" or even "Phalangiarii" is asking too much to the customers of CA's games, but IMO those "long-spearmen" existed! They are present even in SAJ and recruitable as elite unit at Antioch, if I still remember well.

In any case I've nothing against long spears (pikes) in Late Roman armies, if you want to counter the Sassanids there is not much you can choose to do, you can just increase the lenght of your spears! Then, if you want to call these guys "spearmen", or if you prefer to call them "pikemen" it's just to you, but from a historical perspective nothing changes: the Romans during the Late Antiquity used long spears to counter the Persian cataphracts even because there was nothing else they could do.

[BroskiDerpman]

I don't really expect indigenous names especially considering the expansion is a mainstream release (Even for Rome 1 mods people have complained about excessive adherence to certain naming nomenclatures). Should be a nice DLC however I'm probably not going to end up buying it until later if I even do so as I'll just wait for the patches to polish things up a little.