Give a reason why you prefer Rome I over Rome II

[EgyptianNecrophiliac]

I didn't like a single thing about Rome 2.

[Ballacraine]

Immersion.

Especially in battle, but also even on the strategy map.

I never got that with Rome 2

[Sir Furlong]

Besides the trait system, the army limits and the building slots that have already been mentioned, I prefer Rome I to Rome II for the following main reasons:

1. Skype (or maybe Zoom in our pandemic era) diplomacy. I get why many people found the old system a chore, but I think it was much more realistic. Establishing diplomatic relations was not a simple process and embassy interception was actually a very efficient method of preventing your enemies from forming hostile coalitions. Chatting with a bald guy resembling a 2nd rate actor from a sword & sandal movie, who spouts random tough phrases through a small window, seems stupid.

2. Automatic replenishment. Logistics basically play no role in Rome II. You can attack whatever region you want, without bothering to establish a link between the expedition and your empire. Praetorians can casually replenish in recently annexed Lusitania in a matter of a few turns. Back in Barbarian Invasion, there was a long line of reinforcements, stretching from Mesopotamia Gaul, full of heavy Sogdian infantry and elephants. Also, you no more care about your soldiers. As long as the casualties do not surpass an an arbitrarily imposed percentage, everything will be fine. In Rome I, even if you annihilated your enemy, your invasion would eventually come to a halt, due to battle casualties and garrisoning, unless strong reinforcements were constantly being sent to the front.

3. Distance from capital. It was a great mechanic, affecting your income and public order in the most isolated settlements. It nicely simulated the challenges the larger empires faced. Expansion became more difficult and less profitable, which eventually led to the stabilisation of the frontier, even if the enemy was technically much weaker. In my current campaign as Persia against the Alans and the Byzantines, I am actually bleeding money, despite my outstanding victories, because of the enormous expenses and moderate profits. It doesn't matter much, because my treasury was already immense, but that problem lies with the broken economy not the distance from capital feature. In newer games, they try to implement late-game challenges through very sloppy methods, like Realm Divide, the unintentionally hilarious civil wars of Rome II and Attila the Cockroach with his ''Lazarus-was-an-amateur-at-resurrection'' Huns.

These are all such good points, needing to actually use diplomats is a bit tedious but definitely adds flavour and simulates how hard it would be to negociate with far away empires.

[Petroniu]

Population - the fact that when you recruit 240 men for a unit your town loses them. The fact that they have added a feature to remove that is showing how many people actually do not appreciate this game for its real values.
Replenishing units - you actually have to CARE about where you can recruit units, which type and how fast you can move them to your army - you know, like ACTUAL GENERALS DID! I saw mod requests for auto-replenishing - again, so many people play the later games on auto mode with everything streamlined and forget how far from reality they are (which is what made these games fun in the beginning, not magical abilities at a press of a button).
Complex and detailed building trees (yes, I find these more complex and detailed than the rock, paper, scissors from newer games) - I got to give it to 3K that they have a complex building system and I am unfamiliar to the Warhammer series as it seems too much of a lore to get into yet the other games have streamlined the building system so much that it was boring. I always knew what to build to get money and that was it. In the original game you can actually build different buildings in different cities depending where they are and you get all the buildings, including walls and all the barracks, etc, not stuff that are artificially preset by the devs because they considered only Antioch was a big enough city to have walls out of all of Syria.
Modding - I mean, this has kept me into the game until now, for sure. I have made so many personal mods, trying so many different stuff. I just love it! I do spend more time modding and testing stuff than actually playing a complete campaign.
(smaller thing but for me it matters a lot) Short campaigns - you can actually focus on your local foes and have closure at the end. Having to conquer half of the map is sooo boring, especially as the late game is still an issue for TW games because they have few options to add to make it interesting that does not kill the fun in the early game (like giving always care to the faction politics to avoid civil war or rebellions and all the other organization and administration things a big empire actually has to handle like tax systems, local governorship, proper and balanced local and central leadership representation, cultural and religious differences, etc, plus, invasions).

There are some negatives though, I have to admit:
AI - the AI is an idiot, plain and simple. Especially in battles.
Unit balancing and countering - phalanxes rape anything and those bastards can run with them in their hands without losing cohesion and can also do 180 degrees turns after being flanked by heavy cav. WTF!? A good side here is that the AI is an idiot.
Diplomacy - aaaah, they improved it in the ReMastered but having someone as your protectorate still does not count as you winning over them like in the newer games and also you are unable to recruit from them or order them to send you troops or help you around.

[sage78]

TTK is lower in Rome 1 than Rome 2. The times i tried battles in rome 2 they could take so long that i would get frustrated. It just makes the battle no fun if it takes 20 minutes for 2 units to battle it out.
Also Rome 1 has better charge physics and battle physics. Rome 2 forces in that mocap 1v1 duel stuff that might look cool but it works way worse imo.

[EgyptianNecrophiliac]

Population - the fact that when you recruit 240 men for a unit your town loses them. The fact that they have added a feature to remove that is showing how many people actually do not appreciate this game for its real values.
Replenishing units - you actually have to CARE about where you can recruit units, which type and how fast you can move them to your army - you know, like ACTUAL GENERALS DID! I saw mod requests for auto-replenishing - again, so many people play the later games on auto mode with everything streamlined and forget how far from reality they are (which is what made these games fun in the beginning, not magical abilities at a press of a button).

Agree 100%. Auto-replenishment is such a bunch of . And being able to recruit while out in the field, lame.

[Barkhorn1x]

Agree 100%. Auto-replenishment is such a bunch of . And being able to recruit while out in the field, lame.

Agree 1,000%. A real strategy game should make the player use some "strategy" to be successful.

[Kylan271]

1. The family system was missing in RTW2.
2. The traits/ancillaries make no sense, and could not find how they are triggered? I preferred RTW/MTW2 mechanics on this, it was fun adding depth to the characters.
3. Buildings in RTW I missed, as added purpose to designing your cities. The RTW2 version is limited and boring.
4. Can not have armies on their own without Generals.
5. Limited armies based on your Imperium.
6. UI for units, not as exciting as in RTW.

Good points: unit graphics and sea battles.

[Leonardo]

I didn't like a single thing about Rome 2.

In comparison to you I like the army tradition concept.

1. The family system was missing in RTW2.
2. The traits/ancillaries make no sense, and could not find how they are triggered? I preferred RTW/MTW2 mechanics on this, it was fun adding depth to the characters.
3. Buildings in RTW I missed, as added purpose to designing your cities. The RTW2 version is limited and boring.
4. Can not have armies on their own without Generals.
5. Limited armies based on your Imperium.
6. UI for units, not as exciting as in RTW.

Good points: unit graphics and sea battles.

I concur. Summarize my observations I got in RTW2.

[B. W.]

I agree with so many things that have been said here.

For me, being a turtle style player, road building on the campaign map in R2 was a disappointment. There is very little visual differences in the map look as the campaign progresses. In R1 you could see a big difference in the map appearance as you progressed.

Reason two; Rome the largest city in the ancient western world has fewer building slots than smaller cities. This is just stupid and it shows just how little effort and money went into the release. R2 was just a money grab and it used the fans desire for an updated version of R1 to make a big chunk of money. Just disgraceful! I don't buy their product anymore.

Lack of mods. You want new units; you can have new units in R2 by the truckload, but that's about all. It's a modding joke. That's what it is.

There's more I could say, but I've given too much of my time and money to R2 already.

I only wish someone would make a reliable 4 turns per year mod for R1, the original. That would make it so much more immersive.

[Dumanthis]

The one thing that I miss from Rome 1 is the barbarian warcry ability and how immersive and cool it is. There is something similar in Rome II with abilities but it is not at all as wild Otherwise than that I can't think of anything, I am DeI player pretty much

[Leonardo]

The one thing that I miss from Rome 1 is the barbarian warcry ability and how immersive and cool it is. There is something similar in Rome II with abilities but it is not at all as wild Otherwise than that I can't think of anything, I am DeI player pretty much

Doesn't barbarian mercenaries have that ability in R2TW?

[GemSignor]

Population - the fact that when you recruit 240 men for a unit your town loses them. The fact that they have added a feature to remove that is showing how many people actually do not appreciate this game for its real values.

I'm not sure if I understand your point correctly here but in case I do and you refer to Remastered: It was actually other way around. This feature wasn't planned at all, although the unit size would still suck numbers out of population but whatever your unit size was, it would count as medium for this purpose. The reasoning was that barbarian factions have a lot of 240 size units on ultra and tends to deplete populations in their cities rather quickly.
I might exaggerate now but if it wasn't for one youtuber, Jon from a Many A True Nerd channel, we might not have this feature at all. As he was on of those "lucky" few who got this game in advance and also he really liked to use (and abuse) this feature in original. So he reached Feral and first they made a mod specifically for him and then they add this feature for everybody. (I guess more people complained, tho).

See https://youtu.be/pTI-GEupRuU (at 3:08 you can see that population mechanic swith is not in the game yet) and then in this video at 28:00 he talks about it. In some later video he talks how they add this to the game pernamently.

If you were refering to something else I apologize and am sorry to bother you. ;)

[Barkhorn1x]

you refer to Remastered...although the unit size would still suck numbers out of population but whatever your unit size was, it would count as medium for this purpose.

I think Petroniu was referring to the difference between RTW and RII as RII "somehow" missed this mechanic.
You are correct regarding RTWR counting all deductions as medium units if the player sets theirs to a larger size.

[f1demon]

It's been ages returning here. Like a lifetime ago. I was in school when I first came across TWR1 at a bookshop in a mall and I've never looked back. I have so many fond memories attached to the TWR franchise I just hope the remastered edition lives up to the hype. I had a horrible experience after being one of the first 3000 people to purchase TWR2 when it first came out and when it crashed had to upgrade my entire system just for the mammoth 38 gigabytes it occupied!!

Apart from that, all the fancy graphics were pleasing at first but the most used parts of the game- battle physics, movement, buildings fell way short of expectations.

It's been ages since I played but I do remember a few things after going over some of the other replies. Many, I couldn't help agreeing with while, others I just don't remember.

So, here's my two bits fwiw:

TWR1 > TWR2

-That music! It was haunting and so well balanced. Kept you thinking of it ages later.

-Battle dynamics. The physics of the infantry battles were brought alive with the throwing of the pila. However, in TWR2 it happens in the blink of an eye as though a wind swept through! The higher res and smaller pixels really took away a lot of the excitement in that moment esp when facing down cavalry.

-Pre-battle speeches. Before every battle the speech made by the commanders were actually substantive. In TWR2 it feels like someone next door mumbling something.

-Recruitment. Recruiting new units and sending them off to join an army was sensible. Getting ambushed along the way or being able to replenish your army was well worth it. It meant waiting for new units instead of automatically recruiting new units with a local flavour to carry on the campaign. This is useful too but could've been an option instead.

-The Turn based game was a lot simpler instead of the 4 turns per year. Before you realised decades had passed with no reference to history, reality, game progress!! I mean what's the point of that?!?

The problem with both TWR1 & TWR2:

Diplomacy really didn't play a huge role. It could be a whole other game (think Europe Universalis) as well as, the spy system. Many ppl talk about the comparison to Shogun II but it needn't be that animated. A slightly better plot line or a separate battle plan of its own such as sabotaging a barracks, assassinating a foreign agent could be done with an entourage of a single unit on horseback or infantry like a regular battle only, with more interesting backdrops such as fields, hills...point being it could be more creative rather than a one sentence climax!

Civil Wars in TWR2 just don't make sense, as much as, been-there-done-that-what-next??

Building programs are also, far too predictable. Building anything was just about clicking a button with an animation following.

Marching armies from one place to another is so boring unless the Ai is smart enough to shadow you or ambush you. Instead of just showing an icon move from point A to B they could've done a zoomed-in animation of actual armies on the march say 4 abreast with cavalry following and the chatter of legionnaires, din of pots and pans etc. One could choose to stay with the marching columns or even when on a forced march over the topography of the region until they reached. When CA came out with TW Arena they had some interesting developments such as flanking manoeuvres built into their unit commands. Had expected TWR2 to incorp some of these to make battles more realistic or interesting in the event, the TWR1 movements are still time-tested and harder to control making them more engaging.

Sorry, I know I digressed back there but I really hope TWR 1 or 2 get revolutionized with some new features that send them back to the top of the list!!

[Grimmy]

Europa Barbarorum.

[douglas]

I like Rome II in the early stages of the campaign, along with a couple of the DLC updates. What really turns me off though is the crap you have to deal with with the other Roman factions. In a recent campaign I found myself spending more time and money dealing with them than with the campaign. Diplomacy is crap.

[The Noble Lord]

At risk of blowing my own trumpet, here's a list I made way back when on just this subject:

https://www.twcenter.net/forums/show...Rome-2-doesn-t

It's good to sometimes blow your own trumpet, why not
But yeah, I agree with all the points.

[zzzms]

RTW has watch towers and forts.

[Cleitus the Pink]

RomeII units and battles are spreadsheeted trash. The building isn't fun. The map models are awful. The AI sucks and a cherry on the top is that they've reduced modding potential in several ways.