SURPRISED; WHY is 3K forums so DEAD relative to other TW titles?

[Live2sculpt]

3K is a good game. However the battles feel a bit arcadey with troops flying through the air and just falling over. The campaign is good but again bits of it feel cartoonish/arcady. Its a good title but I feel that they could have captured the atmosphere a bit better.

Anyone know of good realism mods for 3K?

Well that's just the point, much of that sort of modding isn't as popular or up to date as one might expect. The only two contenders for re-balancing and slowing down combat is Three Dragons and Under a Red Sky.

As for "capturing the atmosphere", I've been studying the matter a bit, and have concluded that CA have captured and embraced the unique cultural hooks of China's relationship to this part of their national history and mythology, very well. They clearly put much extra effort into their research from the concept phase forward.

The problem is that what the Chinese want to prioritize in a 3K title isn't the same as what works for westerners.

Were it for me, it would be more realistic, with a very calm Art of War, Sun Tzu, vibe. As a white male american, I'm confronted with the discomfort of NOT being catered to, for once. But that's my problem. Clearly not CA's.

I'm mostly because I'm so spoiled for a vibrant modding resource, and finding it not being represented in places I'm used to.

[M2TWRocks]

Social media has changed the landscape dramatically. Ten years ago twcenter was constantly busy and each game forum was filled with posts. It's just now very few people use forums like they used to. I stopped coming here after realizing that. It's like a ghost town. I only recently came back to pick up some old mods for ETW and NTW.

I miss the old days.

[Live2sculpt]

Indeed. The last big modding push was for Rome 2. The only remaining question is whether or not the franchise can maintain it's momentum in the market without the robust "underground" modding scene behind it. There are several titles I would not have bothered with if I didn't have modding to look forward to.

We'll just see.

Maybe the Steam Workshop and the advent of crowdfunding services will be fertile enough ground for modding to continue on.

[z3n]

Personally I see the past great gasp of modding as being the shogun 2 since the campaign map can still be changed with enough (relatively extreme) skill. Although I do not discount DeIs tremendous efforts or the Attila modding scene.


S2 campaign map modding is over the top difficult compared to M2TW. I really do not see modding on a large scale ever continuing again on later titles. Only many small tweaks and modifications without truly massive game changing and era changing over hauls which made the modding scene so popular and the TW games have such longevity.


Most of all I think people would want campaign map modding back but CA doesn't want their DLCs to be affected I would guess which more than anything is why the editor hasn't been released.

[Live2sculpt]

Personally I see the past great gasp of modding as being the shogun 2 since the campaign map can still be changed with enough (relatively extreme) skill. Although I do not discount DeIs tremendous efforts or the Attila modding scene.


S2 campaign map modding is over the top difficult compared to M2TW. I really do not see modding on a large scale ever continuing again on later titles. Only many small tweaks and modifications without truly massive game changing and era changing over hauls which made the modding scene so popular and the TW games have such longevity.


Most of all I think people would want campaign map modding back but CA doesn't want their DLCs to be affected I would guess which more than anything is why the editor hasn't been released.

Well z3n, you'd know better than most.

I'll just try to reason that the end of big mods is not yet nigh, in spite of my personal belief that major overhauls require well coordinated teams of volunteers and communication like twcenter has facilitated in the past.

Let's all hope that the next generation are just "going through some changes", and that "The kids are all right"

[Steph]

Don't be to disappointed, it's probably a lot more alive than the warhammer one.

[skillfultree]

Doesn't Warhammer have map mods for the Grand Campaign? Thats quite good. I think the same is possible for 3 kingdoms no?

[z3n]

Unfortunately those are battle map mods, which I hear are not too difficult to create compared to the extremes of IWTE (a custom built settlement tool by modders wilddog and makanyane). True campaign map modding for example is if someone was crazy enough to attempt to recreate third age (leaving aside the liscensing issue with that which nips the idea in the bud) the campaign map could not be changed to suit this new continent.

[Steph]

The campaign map is not moddable for Warhammer. Well, you could change the existing settlement a little (like add some slots), or change a region from a province to another, or change the "climate" of a region , but not move or add settlement, nor create region, change borders, and even less change the coastlines, forest, mountains, etc.

There is however a battle map editor. Which I tink can be linked to the campaign (so taht when you attack a specific settlement, the battle is played on a specific map).

[Sigma]

I've watched the modding community and TW games for a long time and it was Empire TW when the modding community hit a brick wall and started its decline. The refusal of CA (and likely SEGA having a hand in it) to release modding tools and put more features behind hard code caused a massive decline in new mods and what new mods came about were minor compared to M2TW and Rome 1 mods. Their reasoning at the time was that it would just be too difficult to make good modding tools for the Warscape Engine, but it's obvious now that the reason was because Empire is when they started making DLC packs for the games, and mods would cut into that short term revenue, from there it's only gotten worse.

Their business strategy over the years has evolved, if you look back at RTW and M2TW, when they initially gave modding tools and made the games more accessible to modders, the strategy seemed to be making a game that could be enjoyed for a long time, usually through modding, and turn a profit over long term sales. By ETW the strategy seemed to start to shift to making a game that would turn the most sales in a short period of time while using community managers to quell the anger caused by bugs and lack of modding, so the sales aren't hurt and release DLC to milk some more money, a lot of the DLC being campaigns and features that could have been done through modding back in M2TW and RTW.

Now it seems the strategy is to find an already established fandom (Romance of The Three Kingdoms, Warhammer Fantasy Battle), make a total war game that caters to that fandom and tap into it, release a PR statement about how the game is their top selling of all time, rake in the money, and release DLC to rake in more money, and maybe release a battle map editor down the road.

Now despite all this I don't think it's because CA caught the greed bug, I think it's because SEGA has been hurting for money for the past few years and because of that has changed up the strategy and are only green lighting games that will appeal to larger audiences and trying not to take major risks. So you're seeing the big teams at CA working on titles they know will generate money while sagas is getting a smaller team, smaller settings, and the less profitable ideas.

[Vardano]

Sigma, I agree with everything you said. I still think CA acts really unfair to modding community, DEI mod not only improved the base game but literally saved that title for thousands of people and at some point ROME II included many ideas from DEI mod to a base game.
If CA would have a class then we would have modding tools for a game which is 7 years old and still can be improved a lot. They have all the prove that great mods help them to sell their games and yet they pull off licence crap again and again.

[Destin Faroda]

In my oppinion, while technology advances, Total War doesn't.
We have 8 core computers, lots of RAM, the superior Vulkan API and even fancy gimmicks like AMD True Audio Next (Raytracing audio). However, the game still uses an ancient engine and is constantly dumbed down. What could be possible by utilizing the resources of modern hardware?
Moreover, CA greatly sabotages modding (no more impressive total conversions like in the old days) and delivers cut down games to later sell pricey DLCs.
R2TR seems to be dead and Attila doesn't even have a good realism mod. I didn't even care about Thrones of Britannia and 3K because this once great series has lost appeal.

[Anna_Gein]

If only TW did not evolved ... ^^

CA did made significant changes in their games. But for the worse. Lately I have been playing Rome Total War modded (IB somnium apostatae iuliani). Admittedly this is hypper modded version but still the gameplay foundations are vanilla. I am impressed by the depth of the gameplay. I never forgot entirely how good old TW games were but there is a difference between keeping the nostalgia in mind and playing it again.

Rome TW is filled with gameplay subtitles. Most of the campaign decision you make takes time to make an effect. When you do something, there are immediate result, medium term effect and long term consequences. And yet the game remains simple and intuitive (create some buildings in town, raise armies, move characters, do battles).

In opposite recent games are both counter-intuitive and with little depth. Three Kingdoms campaign gameplay is difficult to understand, punishing and yet remains limiting. It takes a lot of efforts and time just to handled "cities" with only 4 or 5 buildings. The result is once you found a working formula, you usually stick to it. First by conservatism. Secondly because whenever you decide to experiment, you are immediately blocked by a multitude of gameplay hard limit :

- How can you manage food, civic order, population wealth (with require multiple buildings to stack up bonuses), sometimes public health (depending of the TW title) when you are limited to only 5 building slots ?
- How can you variate your armies when armies are limited to 3 generals and units types are limited to 1 by general class ?

I am not saying recent TW games are horrible. I actually had enjoyable walkthrough with them. But once I won my first campaign in Three Kingdoms, I did not want to start a new one. A single campaign was enough to get the feeling I experimented all the game had to offer.

Imo the forum reflects the evolution of the franchise. Truth is there is not much to discuss about Three Kingdoms once you understand the gameplay hards limits.

[Daruwind]

Technical aspect:
-recently Wh2/3K went full 64 bits
-recently Wh2 received some Wh3 voodoo stuff making end turns lightspeed

Modding aspect:
-SFO (Wh2)
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfil...?id=1149625355
-MK1212 (Attila)
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfil...?id=1429109380

..those are not total overhauls with tons of new improvements and mechanics? Or we are not counting stuff unless map is modded? Thanks authors of those mods are not here....

About dumbing down...recently CA focused on characters. Wh, 3K..items, skill trees, mechanics..nah, I wanted to write something longer but not in mood to explain stuff again. Simply point of view. New games are selling, fantasy and 3K is new king. Old king is dead, long live the king. And I´m off to finish some orks in Wh.

[-Durango-]

If only TW did not evolved ... ^^

CA did made significant changes in their games. But for the worse. Lately I have been playing Rome Total War modded (IB somnium apostatae iuliani). Admittedly this is hypper modded version but still the gameplay foundations are vanilla. I am impressed by the depth of the gameplay. I never forgot entirely how good old TW games were but there is a difference between keeping the nostalgia in mind and playing it again.

Rome TW is filled with gameplay subtitles. Most of the campaign decision you make takes time to make an effect. When you do something, there are immediate result, medium term effect and long term consequences. And yet the game remains simple and intuitive (create some buildings in town, raise armies, move characters, do battles).

In opposite recent games are both counter-intuitive and with little depth. Three Kingdoms campaign gameplay is difficult to understand, punishing and yet remains limiting. It takes a lot of efforts and time just to handled "cities" with only 4 or 5 buildings. The result is once you found a working formula, you usually stick to it. First by conservatism. Secondly because whenever you decide to experiment, you are immediately blocked by a multitude of gameplay hard limit :

- How can you manage food, civic order, population wealth (with require multiple buildings to stack up bonuses), sometimes public health (depending of the TW title) when you are limited to only 5 building slots ?
- How can you variate your armies when armies are limited to 3 generals and units types are limited to 1 by general class ?

I am not saying recent TW games are horrible. I actually had enjoyable walkthrough with them. But once I won my first campaign in Three Kingdoms, I did not want to start a new one. A single campaign was enough to get the feeling I experimented all the game had to offer.

Imo the forum reflects the evolution of the franchise. Truth is there is not much to discuss about Three Kingdoms once you understand the gameplay hards limits.

Well said. The older games were built upon a solid and generalized system where armies, characters, cities, regions etc. all had roughly equal importance. And there was a lesser focus on specific CA designs that they want you to experience ("form THESE provinces", "Use THESE abilities") but rather a free form strategy game. I miss that design philosophy.

Technical aspect:
-recently Wh2/3K went full 64 bits
-recently Wh2 received some Wh3 voodoo stuff making end turns lightspeed

Modding aspect:
-SFO (Wh2)
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfil...?id=1149625355
-MK1212 (Attila)
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfil...?id=1429109380

..those are not total overhauls with tons of new improvements and mechanics? Or we are not counting stuff unless map is modded? Thanks authors of those mods are not here....

About dumbing down...recently CA focused on characters. Wh, 3K..items, skill trees, mechanics..nah, I wanted to write something longer but not in mood to explain stuff again. Simply point of view. New games are selling, fantasy and 3K is new king. Old king is dead, long live the king. And I´m off to finish some orks in Wh.

64-bit is the new standard, thank god.

But modding the campaign maps is still not possible, leaving out total conversion mods. Besides, personally, I don't play TW games for the RPG aspects, but to experience a super realistic battle simulator with as many parameters as possible - which is part of why I don't enjoy Warhammer games much, they don't obey the laws of physics. Units have HP bars and move arbitrarily around.

What I want is a tactical battle engine that has tons of variables influencing the outcome of fighting, enabling the use of real life thinking. Things like:

- Types of terrain (broken, marshy, sandy, wet)
- Humidity
- Unit's previous losses and wins
- Being able to perform fighting retreats and pushbacks
- Wind
- Supply status before battle

Etc. The more complexity, the better. But it must be communicated through what you see on the battlefield, not through abstracts numbers in the UI.

[Daruwind]

I can imagine a lot things and actually discussed a lot things and I would like to see a lot things in game. However I´m not great game designer thus probably my version would not be so popular...

https://www.twcenter.net/forums/show...1#post15556369

https://www.twcenter.net/forums/show...1#post15782437

tl dr;

I would love too bigger part for enviroment. Passive even active....so anything from various terrain type, dynamic weather ...to effects like dynamic fire on vegetation..Garrissonable building, buildable x destructable bridges, more deployables...

Plus bigger role for army. Actually 3K is move in my direction. Basic idea is main army leader with multiple subcommanders for particular (optional) army part...like scouting, frontguard, rearguard, main ..body, flanks, baggage train...Plus getting rid of 20 army limit. Just put there mechanics for upkeep/food consuption per turn and just good commanders with good quertermasters and skills will be able to bring around big armies..or not pay all money just for one big army.

One note. Warhammer as any other good setting even fantasy/scifi one must obey its own rules and laws because without laws it would not work. If books,films, setting are not consistent, then people are confused and don´t enjoy them...So mammoth still must have mass of tank and not weight of 50 kilo despite being real one or fantasy one. And while Dragons are supernatural creatures, good designer should probably think about all possible stuff, if they are somewhat possible or not. Like we have examples of great dinosaurs for example. And while magic is total magic it is neverthless great to have again rules. What you can, how often, to which degree.

From this point of view, I like this quote from A.C. Clarke:

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

So the real issue here is, the later TWs have problem with cavalry, mass, unit cohesion and things like matched combat. Fantasy settings is merely extending variables. After all Mammoth is just bigger Elephant. Because what is actual difference between spell (granting arrow protection for example) and Testudo ability? That the second has unit animation? First can have too....

[ParthianWarrior]

From what I can recall, there were various warnings on TWC about the impact fantasy titles would have on the Total War series, in terms of potentially causing historical titles to become less important and diluted with features carried over from fantasy titles. Right before/right after Warhammer was announced officially, these warnings intensified. I hate to say it, but those warnings appeared mostly correct.

[legate]

From what I can recall, there were various warnings on TWC about the impact fantasy titles would have on the Total War series, in terms of potentially causing historical titles to become less important and diluted with features carried over from fantasy titles. Right before/right after Warhammer was announced officially, these warnings intensified. I hate to say it, but those warnings appeared mostly correct.

I said that Attila would be the last 'historical' title that CA would produce then they would move into fantasy-historical.

[Daruwind]

Obviously for CA going fantasy was great move to grow fan base. But I would not be so sad. As they needed break from pure history, they will need break from fantasy too. Besides we have 3K and Troy which are more on history side than on fantasy. Still, in 2-3 years, with end of Wh3 life span, what else CA can tackle with main team? Another Fantasy IP? Like which one? GoT is done, Witcher is popular right now but not probably the best material for TW, Warcraft, Star Wars are off limits, getting Tolkien would be incredibly hard as well. AoS is not ready with enough lore, wihle 40K/WW1/WW2 are as well not so suitable for TW with so many vehicles, aircraft, submarines, space travel and squad based tactics while operating on way larger scales...Generic Age of Mythology is missing strong IP behind it..

We will get back to History in time. For now, I´m fully enjoying my Warhammer experience as nobody loving Warhammer fantasy just a few years ago would imagine we will have any chance to get such masterpiece and opportunity to visit our beloved yet dead setting. #AoS-is-utter-garbage-lore-wise

[legate]

If going fantasy, fantasy-historical is great for growing the fan base (i.e. more money) then CA isn't going back. Plus they have different teams working on different projects so its not a case of having a break.