What else is to be added/ changed in EBII going forward?

[Lusitanio]

None of those reasons are particularly compelling: the issue was culture slots, which is kind of ludicrous when you consider that Rome has her own culture group set aside, while "Barbarian" extends from the western tip of Iberia to the Ukrainian steppes. Making Kush Eastern wouldn't be any more absurd.

As for "few cities to conquer before entering into contact with other factions," that clearly isn't an obstacle, given that the expansion options for a Numidian player are 1: fight Carthage and 2: Error_option_not_found. Especially when you consider that there are at least three rebel settlements on the other side of the Red Sea.

Here it is the post about Kush and why it wasn't added: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...Proposal-Meroe

Personally, I think the creater of the thread made some really good arguments for Kush still, I wouldn't go for Kush as a faction, only if we had more faction slots.

[Jurand of Cracow]

If somebody wants to play such a African faction, one may play Makuria in the Broken Crescent + Buff and Shine submod. I've learned a great deal about these lands while playing it. And you can even conquer Sokotra.

BTW - are there scripted invasions or other solutions from this region to make Ptolemaic life more difficult?

[ramsesii]

For the next patch I would prefer an overhaul for the battle mechanincs, I find them rather bland atm.
I see a some reasons for that:
1. The letality is is so low that inf charges make no difference, killing a lot of barbarian and elte flavour
2. Because off the rather low armor overall AP is a fairly useless mechanic, killing units like Falxmen and Rhomperia (among with point one).
3. the interaction between cav and infantry is slow, cavalry dies to slow when in melee with good infantry.

these are tree things on the top off my head, I think there are many more when you dive headlong in.

[QuintusSertorius]

For the next patch I would prefer an overhaul for the battle mechanincs, I find them rather bland atm.
I see a some reasons for that:
1. The letality is is so low that inf charges make no difference, killing a lot of barbarian and elte flavour
2. Because off the rather low armor overall AP is a fairly useless mechanic, killing units like Falxmen and Rhomperia (among with point one).
3. the interaction between cav and infantry is slow, cavalry dies to slow when in melee with good infantry.

these are tree things on the top off my head, I think there are many more when you dive headlong in.

That sort of bold claim needs some evidence to back it up. Which faction(s) have you played in 2.35, on what battle difficulty, and which units are you talking about specifically?

[Jurand of Cracow]

That sort of bold claim needs some evidence to back it up. Which faction(s) have you played in 2.35, on what battle difficulty, and which units are you talking about specifically?

Me and Rad (as written here), we share the opinion on point 1 (for me: Pritanoi, vh, all units).
On point 3 - well, everybody dies slowly in the EBII ;-)
On 2 I don't have a firm opinion yet.

[Marvzilla]

Actually I feel like Cavalry can be a bit to flimsy at times (though its probably due to the MTW2 engine), getting quite some losses against skirmisher like Akontistai even in prolonged melee feels wrong. Only thing Id like to see improved is the performance of axe wielding units if possible.

[QuintusSertorius]

Me and Rad (as written here), we share the opinion on point 1 (for me: Pritanoi, vh, all units).
On point 3 - well, everybody dies slowly in the EBII ;-)
On 2 I don't have a firm opinion yet.

It's certainly slow if you ignore the advice to play on Medium battle difficulty, where enemies don't rout until they've been all but wiped out.

[Rad]

It's certainly slow if you ignore the advice to play on Medium battle difficulty, where enemies don't rout until they've been all but wiped out.

This is a confusing sentence.

[Jurand of Cracow]

It's certainly slow if you ignore the advice to play on Medium battle difficulty, where enemies don't rout until they've been all but wiped out.

I understand it in such a way: if you play on Medium, then the battles are shorter since the AI troops start rooting earlier. It seems to concern the point 3.
While there's some truth in this, it's very unconvincing for me. One may always set the time at x6 ratio and speed things up without maneuvering. Both sides suffer losses and at the end there's the same rout. Otherwise, you slow things down to x1 only when there's a need to move your troops. The time difference is small.
For me, this has the drawback of inflicting few losses in the process that I've explained here.
So I'm entirely unconvinced.

[Dooz]

Few losses, especially for the victor, is historically realistic. For what it's worth.

[Jurand of Cracow]

Few losses, especially for the victor, is historically realistic. For what it's worth.

This is not the topic of this thread. This is a topic of another one, the link is here. I think it's worth debating how high the losses should be given that the EBII doesn't have a mechanism of troops coming back home and disbanding after a campaign and also no mechanism to provide for "on-the-march" losses: every army was losing men every day, for a plethora of reasons. I'm curious about your opinion in that thread.

[QuintusSertorius]

This is a confusing sentence.

I understand it in such a way: if you play on Medium, then the battles are shorter since the AI troops start rooting earlier. It seems to concern the point 3.
While there's some truth in this, it's very unconvincing for me. One may always set the time at x6 ratio and speed things up without maneuvering. Both sides suffer losses and at the end there's the same rout. Otherwise, you slow things down to x1 only when there's a need to move your troops. The time difference is small.
For me, this has the drawback of inflicting few losses in the process that I've explained here.
So I'm entirely unconvinced.

Not only that they rout earlier, but there's more dynamism to battles. They rout early, but if left unattended, will reform and return to the fight. With enough numbers to matter.

On Huge unit scale, an infantry unit that routs with 120/160 men is much more of a threat if it rallies than one that routs with 30/160 men. In all likelihood, the latter unit won't rally anyway, because it's so shattered and exhausted. When they do so early, you're often too pressed with other units to chase them up and harry, so have to let them go while focusing your cavalry on those units who haven't broken.

Routing early is the key to rallying, which means battles aren't just a grinding slog until one side is worn down. That's the difference the morale and stamina boosts the AI gets on VH make, between shorter, but more mobile battles, or else grinds.

[Rad]

No matter how you try to spin it, lowering the battle difficulty setting makes the battles easier - especially with Eb2's relatively low unit morale.

[Jurand of Cracow]

Not only that they rout earlier, but there's more dynamism to battles. They rout early, but if left unattended, will reform and return to the fight. With enough numbers to matter.

On Huge unit scale, an infantry unit that routs with 120/160 men is much more of a threat if it rallies than one that routs with 30/160 men. In all likelihood, the latter unit won't rally anyway, because it's so shattered and exhausted. When they do so early, you're often too pressed with other units to chase them up and harry, so have to let them go while focusing your cavalry on those units who haven't broken.

Routing early is the key to rallying, which means battles aren't just a grinding slog until one side is worn down. That's the difference the morale and stamina boosts the AI gets on VH make, between shorter, but more mobile battles, or else grinds.

More dynamism - I agree. But it also adds time to the battle - that makes ramesii's argument (point 3) more relevant.

Ok, I see you point and I need to think if I agree or not yet ;-)

One of the tactics I use (and may I need to have a home rule not to do so) is sending a cavalry behind the enemy lined to harass the routing enemy. This requires micro and an average cavalry (as a weak one doesn't to much damage and risks losses while fighting a recovered unit at some point).

On Morale and Stamina - I need to check how it'd play. I switched from Hard (Pergamon in 2.3) to Very Hard (Pritanoi in 2.35) and the battles seemed more exciting and inflict much more losses (I've put the numbers here). This might be related tot he strong Pergamon's roster though. Now, with Pritanoi, I'm happy with the losses but this might have a negative effect as you've described. The main difference that I've noticed was that my troops were exhausted almost instantly. Maybe I need to switch back to Hard and make a home rule that I never fight the AI if the odds are not against me? Then the losses would be more significant? I don't know...

[QuintusSertorius]

No matter how you try to spin it, lowering the battle difficulty setting makes the battles easier - especially with Eb2's relatively low unit morale.

I'm not "spinning" anything, playing on VH ruins the battle balance. I've said it plainly many times, unit stats are designed for Medium battle difficulty. If you play on any other setting, it won't function as intended or tested.

[Rad]

I'm not "spinning" anything, playing on VH ruins the battle balance.

I now play on Hard - the ai gets a small boost - not the player.
I remember one of your home rules that limits the total number of units in the stack. If the game was truly balanced on medium, you would not be doing that

[QuintusSertorius]

I now play on Hard - the ai gets a small boost - not the player.
I remember one of your home rules that limits the total number of units in the stack. If the game was truly balanced on medium, you would not be doing that

I didn't say it was "truly balanced", it's merely as balanced as we can make it, while remaining accessible to everyone. Furthermore, what is "balanced" for the Roman player isn't going to be balanced for the Sab'yn player. Different rosters have different difficulty levels, simply because of the quality and variety of units they have on offer.

Try playing a hard faction, against an easy one, on VH.

[Rad]

I went through Broken Crescent, Call of Warhammer, Third Age and a host of other mods on VH/VH - I can handle myself.

[QuintusSertorius]

I went through Broken Crescent, Call of Warhammer, Third Age and a host of other mods on VH/VH - I can handle myself.

That's nice for you, why should we deliberately make the mod inaccessible for new players?

[Rad]

That's nice for you, why should we deliberately make the mod inaccessible for new players?

EB2 is not inaccessible. Those mods I mentioned are more difficult, but still perfectly playable on their recommended difficulty settings - VH/VH. The people who bother playing mods for a game from 2006 are good at playing a game from 2006.