tips to make the campaign more fun

[babyolja]

So lets not make this a rant thread guys. I am asking for advice on what to do to make the campaign a bit more engadging. I guess i should start, what i like to do is plan ahead if im conqering some provinces with multiple factions being affected to pick a side support the in advance and try to split the enemies settlements between me and my potential ally. This way il get a nice freindly buffer or worst case i get a much tuffer enemy later(Wich of course is a good thing because most of us are looking for a challenge. So for example when ur wiping out the Suebi let the cimbri get their backwater provinces and pull back your legions.
SO guys thoughts on this and you own ideas. discussing mods to improve the campaign is of course a good way to start. I for one think that squalor and food mod that halfes the negatives is awesome because this way im actually getting som strong factions to face. And yes it makes it easier for me too but its not like squalor and food is an issue after u get into the game...

[♠ Thomas Cochrane ♠]

Playing as Mecedon, I'm mimicking Alexander's conquests (though I did have to annex Illyria to crush those dastardly Daorsi!), so I've got Antigonas Go-nuts-as as the core Royal army, then all his greatest generals following, specialising in either cavalry, heavy infantry (pikes and swords), hoplites/mercenaries, and missiles/siege. This way you can use whole armies for specialist missions in support of the faction leader. Just last night I took all of Anatolia (owned entirely by my Pontic "friends") in 3 turns with a great lightning strike supported by the Onager-armed fleet wing supporting coastal sieges.

You're going to have a pretty stupid campaign if you did this army specialisation with the romans though

[Americanus Supremus]

I personally make house rules. No attacks for the first 5 turns, just repel attacking armies. Don't over use agents to destroy armies or cities. When I go to war with a minor faction, I will usually go to war with the whole province to provide more of a fight. Generally speaking I realize the games (many) weaknesses and I play around them so not to take advantage of them. Example being fighting all siege battles in field battle mode. I also try to support any major factions I can to encourage a bigger fight later with them. Its just the few I can think off the top of my head.

[RedGuard]

i would of thought house rules would have been outdated by now. Apparently i am more of an optimist than i at first considered. Game should be way more fun than it currently is.

[knarf1239]

i would of thought house rules would have been outdated by now. Apparently i am more of an optimist than i at first considered. Game should be way more fun than it currently is.

I have more faith in the US congress working it out, then CA living up to their promises! still a tad bitter of eberybody delcaring war on me

[Unwelcome Guest]

I'd like some chronological continuation of the storyline from Empire Total War where Switzerland ceased to exist. I like to think it was their plan all along, to make Rome 2 challenging: The Swiss appear in their historical homeland in say 200 BCE because a group of curious Swiss scientists found a time warp in 1700 CE.

Or make the Huns just appear 600 years earlier? Or the Mongols by a millennium? The campaign is so dull.

[RedGuard]

I'd like some chronological continuation of the storyline from Empire Total War where Switzerland ceased to exist. I like to think it was their plan all along, to make Rome 2 challenging: The Swiss appear in their historical homeland in say 200 BCE because a group of curious Swiss scientists found a time warp in 1700 CE.

Or make the Huns just appear 600 years earlier? Or the Mongols by a millennium? The campaign is so dull.

wasn't Switzerland the Savoy faction in ETW?

[GnaReffotsirk]

Conquer 10 regions with a single army only before the general dies of old age.

[karamazovmm]

Conquer 10 regions with a single army only before the general dies of old age.

now that is a challenge, I think I only managed that once

[Inhuman One]

Unless you get them young like at twenty or such, I just care very little about generals. Just dont remember their names or anything.

[Sithxace]

thatas true, generals die so fast u never get a chance to get to know them.

[Arimahn]

Unless you get them young like at twenty or such, I just care very little about generals. Just dont remember their names or anything.

With agents, you can at least recruit and dismiss them again in order to get young 'uns. No such luck with generals.

[Niccolo Machiavelli]

With agents, you can at least recruit and dismiss them again in order to get young 'uns. No such luck with generals.

You could always assassinate them - anyway - I just invest 30 seconds to make the campaign last 2tpy, which improves the experience a lot.

In general, I take a slow and easy going approach on legendary, use some components of radious' mod whilst trying to keep rome alive.

In all my campaigns, rome was taken over by carthage, libyans or some other african tribe whereas I want to fight a powerful roman empire later on in the campaign, so I tend to send all my available agents to rome to support them and give them lots of money (~500 000 in my current campaign so far).

Since romes AI acts like a rabid dog, keeping them alive and nurturing them to become a strong empire can provide a bit of a challenge.

The fact that accumulated standing is lost each time the campaign is reloaded prevents them from liking me too much in the long run.

[Jofoblie]

It sounds like a nice idea to ally with someone to crush an enemy, but it's IMPOSSIBLE to make alliances. No one ever wants to be friends with me on any campaign beyond a non-aggression pact regardless of circumstances. Regardless of how much they like me, how powerful I am, how many enemies they have. Is there something special you have to do that I'm missing?

[babyolja]

It sounds like a nice idea to ally with someone to crush an enemy, but it's IMPOSSIBLE to make alliances. No one ever wants to be friends with me on any campaign beyond a non-aggression pact regardless of circumstances. Regardless of how much they like me, how powerful I am, how many enemies they have. Is there something special you have to do that I'm missing?

Yea if you plan well and start destroying their enemy they will like you more. And if all else fails make them a client state or satrap. ( mod that enables evryone to satrap.) And from their help them expand. And if u then pull them into wars and destroy their new enemy they will like you more and start trading.
And for those of u who didnt read my post stop flaming the game. We are all aware of the MANY problems and I dont wna hear about them in this thread...

[carbide]

I like sending two spies to a city (prefer one with no stack army) and continue causing civil unrest until a rebel army spawns. It may take several turns (using 4tpy mod) for it to happen and the rebels get strong enough to take the city. Sometimes it doesn't happen if the fraction sends an army to take care of the problem, but if so I then move in with a stack and take the city from the rebels without ever declaring war on the previous owner.

Of course you can try declaring war on everybody you have contact with and that makes things fun and interesting lol.

[Tredlador]

Perhaps a mod where the kingdoms/empires of history that were strong and famous, become or start as dominant factions. Maybe dropping the New Carthage faction, and giving all their turf to Carthage-proper for the player after the Roman experience to fight them, like the emergency it was. It's kinda weird, for me, to see some faction I have never heard of, take the joint over.

Maybe limiting how much far-away-factions might expand would be a good idea too, so it doesn't turn into a bore to have to endlessly fight the same faction by the time you get there, but that can be fun too.

Another idea might be where tribal factions would be more aggressive with each other, but don't actually take each other over, so there's a chance to survive if your playing a tribe, or a chance to have various barbarians to dispatch as a powerful faction. Suebi are everywhere in one campaign I have going, but the Cimbri and others are all dead. Aw God! The First Reich stretches from Sarmatia to Celtica! Yawn...

Would spawning small ambuscades of locals as a player invades be fun? Probably not, but it might make entering a new territory like it would be, Oh God! We've annoyed the locals! Without some recon going on, you might get too mauled to even reach an objective let alone be strong enough to win the battle when you get there. Nothing wrong with the right kind of frustration or the odd bit of fatal error.

Also, perhaps if the tribes of an area (e.g.: Gaul/Germany/Africa/Iberia, etc.) are invaded by a different culture belonging to a powerful nation the tribes could band together a bit more, staving off the mutual enemy, and you might have a couple more armies to chop up in a single battle, or get bounced by a gang of tribes... like the underdog type of jobby; or conversely, barbarians worth separating from each other so that they can't give you as hard a time as they would when working together. I noticed they do this in the game, but not nearly enough really...

Also, I don't notice any pop up info on the wonders and features on the camp map, though there is an icon of a wonder in the province menu box - still, it's kinda easy to miss, - nothing pops up for the Colossus at Rhodes nor the Zeus's temple at Olympus, and other places. Be nice to see hover info.

I was also thinking pop up names for rivers and mountains and mountain ranges might be cool, and volcanoes, maybe forests too. It would not bring any more action to the map, but it would make it interesting to see the old names of places easily, and maybe add a little spice when entering an army into some dreadfully named wilderness. Spooky, or perhaps giving a false sense of security.

Oh, and here's a far out idea: the occasional army of mythical beasts or a singular monster to bash in battle, that you accidentally bump into on the camp map. Trrrrippeh, right? Maybe dress up an elephant as some myth-monster, or enlarge a dog, give it three heads and oh idk... ^^

Is there any way to recreate heroes on the battle map - could the champions stand in for master choppers like the sword masters of Shogun? That would kinda really rock.

[Unwelcome Guest]

Perhaps a mod where the kingdoms/empires of history that were strong and famous, become or start as dominant factions. Maybe dropping the New Carthage faction, and giving all their turf to Carthage-proper for the player after the Roman experience to fight them, like the emergency it was. It's kinda weird, for me, to see some faction I have never heard of, take the joint over.

Maybe limiting how much far-away-factions might expand would be a good idea too, so it doesn't turn into a bore to have to endlessly fight the same faction by the time you get there, but that can be fun too.

Another idea might be where tribal factions would be more aggressive with each other, but don't actually take each other over, so there's a chance to survive if your playing a tribe, or a chance to have various barbarians to dispatch as a powerful faction. Suebi are everywhere in one campaign I have going, but the Cimbri and others are all dead. Aw God! The First Reich stretches from Sarmatia to Celtica! Yawn...

Would spawning small ambuscades of locals as a player invades be fun? Probably not, but it might make entering a new territory like it would be, Oh God! We've annoyed the locals! Without some recon going on, you might get too mauled to even reach an objective let alone be strong enough to win the battle when you get there. Nothing wrong with the right kind of frustration or the odd bit of fatal error.

Also, perhaps if the tribes of an area (e.g.: Gaul/Germany/Africa/Iberia, etc.) are invaded by a different culture belonging to a powerful nation the tribes could band together a bit more, staving off the mutual enemy, and you might have a couple more armies to chop up in a single battle, or get bounced by a gang of tribes... like the underdog type of jobby; or conversely, barbarians worth separating from each other so that they can't give you as hard a time as they would when working together. I noticed they do this in the game, but not nearly enough really...

Also, I don't notice any pop up info on the wonders and features on the camp map, though there is an icon of a wonder in the province menu box - still, it's kinda easy to miss, - nothing pops up for the Colossus at Rhodes nor the Zeus's temple at Olympus, and other places. Be nice to see hover info.

I was also thinking pop up names for rivers and mountains and mountain ranges might be cool, and volcanoes, maybe forests too. It would not bring any more action to the map, but it would make it interesting to see the old names of places easily, and maybe add a little spice when entering an army into some dreadfully named wilderness. Spooky, or perhaps giving a false sense of security.

Oh, and here's a far out idea: the occasional army of mythical beasts or a singular monster to bash in battle, that you accidentally bump into on the camp map. Trrrrippeh, right? Maybe dress up an elephant as some myth-monster, or enlarge a dog, give it three heads and oh idk... ^^

Is there any way to recreate heroes on the battle map - could the champions stand in for master choppers like the sword masters of Shogun? That would kinda really rock.

I like your ideas - especially with tribal warfare. The TW system of destruction after your last town is lost, doesn't sit right with me for Germanic factions. Etruscans, sure, but the Marcomanni, no.

[Jihada]

I thought the vanilla game was terrible but after adding many mods I'm enjoying my Epirus campaign on legendary (ok I cheated and gave them some more starting money or they just wouldn't survive !).
I use Radious all in one mod,
All factions playable with individual traits,
2tpy,
God save Carthage and the mod which allows Nova Cartago (and Libya if you want) to join Carthage on turn 1.
Mercenary camp mod,
Lots of faction retextures and extra units for factions ,some may clash with Radious mod but no crashes so far after about 100 turns,
I have all settings on extreme and as with all other TW games I'm starting to enjoy it after the initial disappointment.

edit; Ofc you need to use the Mod Manager and EditSF 1.0.7.

[Tredlador]

I like your ideas - especially with tribal warfare. The TW system of destruction after your last town is lost, doesn't sit right with me for Germanic factions. Etruscans, sure, but the Marcomanni, no.

Do you mean the way a faction's remaining forces starve to death without a city in R2TW? I haven't noticed that any faction where I've taken all their turf, dies out at the loss of the last city. They hang around and bounce off of the city gates/garrison. Dumb buggers.

Be nice if they could "forage" and not lose their strength, and bide their time to retake a city, and gather as a rebel force would do... probably a big ask.

I do wonder why we can't give away a village/city anymore. That was a persistent feature in diplomacy, and I kinda used it to keep an ally or sometimes and enemy going. Pity that's been neglected/or made impossible/problematic for this game.

Be cool to give an ally who has no city, a place to go if they've been useful or somehow likeable, esp. if of the same culture.