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

I've been playing Total War titles since a Shogun demo-CD (Remember those?) arrived in my mail back in 1999.
And since 2009, I've considered TWCenter to be the HUB of all English language TW networking and modding.

But this week I bought 3K, and came directly over to TWCenter, anticipating the usual trove of community resources that 1/2 a year should result.

But TWC 3K forums seems like a ghost town!

What's different?
Is this a matter of the title's "un-modability"?
Has Valve/Steam Workshop made TWC redundant?
Is this just a reflection of the title's popularity with English speaking fans?
Am I looking in the wrong place or incorrectly?

PLEASE, no pointless remarks about bigotry or prejudice.
If there are REAL articles discussing East/West market trends worth pointing to, please use the names of the journalists or authors, and use quotes.
Thanks!

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Originally Posted by Live2sculpt

Is this just a reflection of the title's popularity with English speaking fans?

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I think this is a valid question and personally I stop playing newer TW games after R2TW, except for trying a few hours in ToB.

But that's about how much I play the newer game titles since I rather stick with older game titles e.g MTW, RTW, ETW, NTW. Note, I don't play STW, M2TW anymore, but I have play them and that was years ago.

I think the issue originates from a combination of all these factors you mention. Firstly, because of Steam and the rise of social media, the forum landscape has changed dramatically. Younger players prefer a different, more fluid format, where replies are quick and easy, while modding is now largely dominated by smaller modifications and not by large overhauls, like what happened in Medieval II or Rome I. In what concerns Three Kingdoms specifically, the crux of the matter is that mods are not only few, but are also mainly produced by East Asian newcomers, who are not very familiar with the older hosting platforms. Three Kingdoms initially enjoyed a huge commercial success, but then lost its momentum in an unprecedented scale, despite the overall positive reviews.

The situation has somewhat improved in January, thanks to the release of the Mandate of Heaven DLC, but given the limited scope of the pack, as well as the fact that it's riddled with bugs and glitches, I doubt that the reversal of the downward trend will be anything but temporary. In my opinion, the problem lies with the extreme lack of content, Three Kingdoms suffers from. Some of it is the inevitable result of the chosen scenario, but the business policies of Creative Assembly also bare some responsibility. Huge portions of the map are either empty or cut out (like Korea, Vietnam and probably Mongolia, as well), in order to be added lately as DLCs. Meanwhile, naval warfare was also removed, while visuals are quite repetitive (e.g. general portraits), despite the fact that the product was fully-priced. As a consequence of those shady practices, many customers, in spite of their initial excitement, grew bored of it and were not willing to try a second or third campaign, playing as an almost identical faction and fighting against largely similar enemies. All this probably explains why the fandom of Three Kingdoms has decreased so significantly, although the game was never a broken mess, like Empire and Rome II.

Therefore, if we take into consideration the appeal of Steam and Reddit, as well as the decline of modding overhauls and the fact that most newcomers that were attracted to the franchise by the lore of Warhammer and the appeal of Dynasty Warriors, are not accustomed to TWC, it's not difficult to imagine why the forum has become quieter. I would be very interested in sharing any statistics about the demographics of Total War, but, apart from the charts I cited above, I cannot find a more coherent and informative material.

Abduls stats are on point, people just aren't that interested in 3k anymore especially the ones most likely to create English content mods. The added issue is from CA changing locations of things for no apparent reason, it would help if they created some sort of visual guide for modders.


Theres also a disturbing trend on platforms like steam toward viewing other modders as competition for your patreon money. Hopefully that dies off. However steams ease of integration makes it perfect for small mods.

The largest downfall of steam by far is the inability to figure out if a highly rated mod is not compatible any longer with your current version and the single threaded nature of mod discussions. Those are my complaints but the ease of installation for the user seems to reign supreme.


Large overhauls, free help or resources shared without cost are less likely to happen now due to patreon and money being involved in such a normalized way. Hobbyists can't be expected to behave professionally around such a thing and it leads to a breakdown of trust and mutual help. This means larger mods are much less likely not just because the map can't be changed but because everyone wants their own pie now.


Basically with many newer modders who don't use TWC the view seems to be "If I share what I know, everyone else knows and can make competing mods".

Wow! That numbers drop is precipitous.
The Total War franchise has persevered these past two decades largely thanks to the slow burn of past titles continuing to be modded and replayed.
If their current business model is to abandon that, it might bite CA in the ass, and cause the franchise to be dropped.

I also hadn't realized it could be an age demographics issue as well.
I'm experiencing a gulf between my social media communication and younger generations. But I had always considered this older form of verbose communication to be a critical part of mod development. The short burst communication the "kids" prefer seems ill suited for collaboration or community building.

I also only just noticed the Patreon asks on some Steam mod pages for the first time. Somehow I got the idea that that wasn't allowed, but I guess I was wrong. The Medieval Kingdoms dev team schism left me with the impression that money solicitation remained a taboo. But in hindsight I guess that was an example of changing trends.

If money really IS becoming a serious thing for the modding community over, good work will find a way. But larger mods will be run almost as small studio businesses, with all contributing as paid talent. Could get ugly very fast, with the promised values of contracts and invoices under constant threat from the variables of game developer updates, hosting bans, international bank transfers, payment insurances, and other revenue interrupting occurrences, that can happen suddenly and without legal remedy.

I guess it's just the apparent suddenness of this change that has surprised me.
Attila saw a healthy amount of modding support here, and I just wasn't paying attention to any trends that might have plagued Warhammer or Britannia.

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Originally Posted by z3n

Basically with many newer modders who don't use TWC the view seems to be "If I share what I know, everyone else knows and can make competing mods".

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This remineded me of one good story explaining the problems of the Arab armies:

"On one occasion, an American mobile training team working with armor in Egypt at long last received the operators' manuals that had laboriously been translated into Arabic. The American trainers took the newly-minted manuals straight to the tank park and distributed them to the tank crews. Right behind them, the company commander, a graduate of the armor school at Fort Knox and specialized courses at the Aberdeen Proving Grounds ordnance school, collected the manuals from the crews. Questioned why he did this, the commander said that there was no point in giving them to the drivers because enlisted men could not read. In point of fact, he did not want enlisted men to have an independent source of knowledge. Being the only person who can explain the fire control instrumentation or boresight artillery weapons brings prestige and attention."

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Originally Posted by Live2sculpt

Wow! That numbers drop is precipitous.
The Total War franchise has persevered these past two decades largely thanks to the slow burn of past titles continuing to be modded and replayed.
If their current business model is to abandon that, it might bite CA in the ass, and cause the franchise to be dropped.

I also hadn't realized it could be an age demographics issue as well.
I'm experiencing a gulf between my social media communication and younger generations. But I had always considered this older form of verbose communication to be a critical part of mod development. The short burst communication the "kids" prefer seems ill suited for collaboration or community building.

I also only just noticed the Patreon asks on some Steam mod pages for the first time. Somehow I got the idea that that wasn't allowed, but I guess I was wrong. The Medieval Kingdoms dev team schism left me with the impression that money solicitation remained a taboo. But in hindsight I guess that was an example of changing trends.

If money really IS becoming a serious thing for the modding community over, good work will find a way. But larger mods will be run almost as small studio businesses, with all contributing as paid talent. Could get ugly very fast, with the promised values of contracts and invoices under constant threat from the variables of game developer updates, hosting bans, and other revenue interrupting occurrences.

I guess it's just the apparent suddenness of this change that has surprised me.
Attila saw a healthy amount of modding support here, and I just wasn't paying attention to any trends that might have plagued Warhammer or Britannia.

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Speaking from experience, long term and large scale, the only sustainable and organized way to conduct modding is via a forum. I suppose a lot of the younger modders are in fact *younger*, and aren't familiar with this concept and problem.

There would simply be no way for EB2 without the use of the forum we had, so many concepts from years gone by would have been lost in the wind without it. Discord only takes you so far, just as MSN or IRC did. Ah well. :P

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Originally Posted by z3n

There would simply be no way for EB2 without the use of the forum we had, so many concepts from years gone by would have been lost in the wind without it. Discord only takes you so far, just as MSN or IRC did. Ah well. :P

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I wouldn't put it past a team to make good use of Discord to make a mod. It offers many tools. My wife was part of a website dev team for a year or so, and Discord proved invaluable to them for being coordinated. It's all in how you use it.

I think the 'heroes in battles' format doesn't appeal very well here too. I mean, at least for me, when i see a Warhammer and/or Chinese general full of arrows killing thousand of enemies in single hits i just cringe. Would be a lot better to have many specialized roles in battle field, formations, more immersion, I dont know, seems like we backtracked.

There's another aspect that bears discussion, one that sometimes gets acknowledged. That of course being that a very large portion of this game's fanbase is in Asia.

Abdul showed off the steam chart for 3K, but it's also worth putting that chart alongside the other main TW games on steam, specifically Rome 2 and Warhammer 2: https://steamcharts.com/cmp/779340,594570,214950

If you put the time scale to 7 days, you can see that the peaks and troughs of activity are almost completely the opposite between R2/WH2 and 3K. So at the moment, while 3K's 24 hour peak is a very strong 25,000 (in thanks to the new DLC), only behind the gargantuan Warhammer 2 at 30,000, it's current players will dip to around Rome 2's 9,000-ish when most of Asia is on its off hours.

So what does this have to do with a modding forum? Well, most of the really big mods for 3K right now are Asian, specifically Korean or Chinese. Most of the big overhaul/character expansion mods like Make Them Unique, Wu Kingdaissance, Unify After Long Divide, Hooveric, TROM, CUI, and a bunch of others who aren't translated that are all originally either Korean or Chinese. This matters because most of those modders aren't really on older, English-language forums like this one. They all usually have discord channels, Steam forums, or use forums in their own languages like Teiba. That means that the players from those demographics also don't have reasons to come to TWCenter, since all their favorite mods are in other corners of the internet, which in turn means that even people who come to TWC for other TW titles might not necessarily go here for 3K discussion, you go to other Total War areas that have more of the 3K players, like Reddit, Steam, and Discord.

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Originally Posted by PrimoTw

I think the 'heroes in battles' format doesn't appeal very well here too. I mean, at least for me, when i see a Warhammer and/or Chinese general full of arrows killing thousand of enemies in single hits i just cringe. Would be a lot better to have many specialized roles in battle field, formations, more immersion, I don't know, seems like we backtracked.

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Well, the Records mode offered does nod to our preferred historical approach.
The popularity of the Warhammer product probably influenced those design choices too. And IN THAT, we at TWC might just have OURSELVES to blame. ;)
Because it just might have been our community's years long interest in Warhammer and LOTR mods, complete with magical effects, that gave CA designers the notion that expanding into the fantastical would be a viable market move.

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Originally Posted by zoner16

....This matters because most of those modders aren't really on older, English-language forums like this one. They all usually have discord channels, Steam forums, or use forums in their own languages like Teiba. That means that the players from those demographics also don't have reasons to come to TWCenter, since all their favorite mods are in other corners of the internet, which in turn means that even people who come to TWC for other TW titles might not necessarily go here for 3K discussion, you go to other Total War areas that have more of the 3K players, like Reddit, Steam, and Discord.

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I wonder whether the upcoming Saga: Troy title might bridge that gap here at TWC (just a little bit), or if that too will primarily attract western consumers.
It's expected to have legendary and magical effects, and some personality oriented play, much like 3K. Could be attractive enough for the new generation of players to draw in some of the new Asian modders. It's not as though Asian people don't have their own particular fascinations with western culture after all. Perhaps ancient Greek legends is among them. (?) :hmm::unsure:

(Cheers, Abdulmecid I)

I'm not very optimistic about Troy's ability to reverse the trend. The first and last Saga game was a failure, but, even if Creative Assembly is more careful this time, projects like this are of intrinsically limited scope and ambitions. They will only temporarily captivate public interest, before getting overshadowed by the next tent-pole title. In my opinion, they serve mostly secondary roles, as the fact that the studio of Sofia has taken charge of the franchise indicates. I'm not implying that the Bulgarian staff is less professional, but given the lower salaries (tiniest minimum wage in the European Union) and generally small expenses in the country, it is clear that CA is determined not to surpass the most budget it dedicates to the Saga titles.

The main objective of Throb was probably to appease the historical fans, after the unintentional debacle that followed the teaser for the Warhammer announcement II trailer (notice the like/dislike ratio of the video and the first comments below). Troy will probably function as a testing ground for a future game centered around mythology and planned to be released, after the DLC packs for Warhammer III and Three Kingdoms have been exhausted. The crux of the matter is that the demographics of the active Total War community evolve together with the changing nature of the games. CA was obliged to add the Record mode in Three Kingdoms, after many fans protested against supernaturally strong heroes and essentially magical abilities. However, it turned out that the vast majority of the fandom preferred the Romance mode, which is probably why CA didn't even bother to appease the "history enthusiasts" by offering a more realistic option for general abilities in Troy.

This is a trend I had noticed before as well, before the fantasy universe of Warhammer dominated the Total War market. For instance, how many players, after passing hundreds of hours in Empire, Napoleon and Shogun II, were willing to tolerate the old replenishment and diplomatic systems of Medieval II and Rome I, despite them being arguably much more strategic and accurate, at least in the context of pre-modern history? Not many I reckon and the numbers become gradually fewer as time goes on. Therefore, I'm a bit pessimist about the chances of the Total War franchise returning to its old roots and, frankly, there's no reason for such a policy, given the great profits Warhammer and co. have generated for the coffers of SEGA and subsidiaries.

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Originally Posted by Abdülmecid I

For instance, how many players, after passing hundreds of hours in Empire, Napoleon and Shogun II, were willing to tolerate the old replenishment and diplomatic systems of Medieval II and Rome I, despite them being arguably much more strategic and accurate, at least in the context of pre-modern history? Not many I reckon and the numbers become gradually fewer as time goes on.

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I would accept the old system and I have spent thousands of hours, maybe +10K hours in total, playing all three games over the years.

Which is why I still came back to RTW, ETW, NTW just to start a new campaign. As for S2TW I couldn't get myself into the game, so after only 5 hours I lost interest of learning how the game works.


Although, I admit I haven't played ETW and NTW for a while now, but soon I will when I get more restless over time of not playing them.

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Originally Posted by Leonardo

Although, I admit I haven't played ETW and NTW for a while now, but soon I will when I get more restless over time of not playing them.

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Ha! I'd STILL be playing NTW if I could have sufficiently expanded the battle sizes with modding. But the NTW engine seems firmly capped at 20,000 troops, and I've become too excited about real historical numbers to feel satisfied with such puny engagements. ;)

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Originally Posted by Abdülmecid I

...The crux of the matter is that the demographics of the active Total War community evolve together with the changing nature of the games. CA was obliged to add the Record mode in Three Kingdoms, after many fans protested against supernaturally strong heroes and essentially magical abilities. However, it turned out that the vast majority of the fandom preferred the Romance mode, which is probably why CA didn't even bother to appease the "history enthusiasts" by offering a more realistic option for general abilities in Troy.

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That trend in itself doesn't trouble me, as long as there is enough material for the modding community to work with.

It's whether there will continue to be that robust modding community to "fix" such issues in the future, that bothers me.

As you noted 3K HAS enjoyed some modding from Asian volunteers, some of it with pro-realistic/historical leanings. But much more of it seems fixated on preserving the demi-god relationships of the personalities and replicating the 3K stories beat for beat.

I guess only time will tell whether what has been nurtured here for the past 15 years will continue, or whether the further success of the franchise could carry on if it faded away.

Actually, I think CA has decided to give it a try, expanding its market towards China, where 3K is being an huge success. Most of us, in the west, barely know about China's history, even though I think many people here had already watch the movie "3 Cliffs", or heard about it, right?
I agree with those who said that doesn't make much sense a single guy beat up hundreds or even thousands of units in a single battle, but I guess it's all part of the romance involved with the three kingdoms experience, and I bet the Troy will follow the exact same path, since Troy's history is full of heroes and villains.
The same thing happens to Warhammer's trilogy (for what I heard, there's a third game about to be released, but without any date announced). Warhammer just went out of the typical way we all saw Total War, it's totally different from the way I see Total War. Even if there's many players enjoying the game, there's too many others, that are totally not interested on it, or in my case, I play Warhammer but I consider it below the historical ones.
Another thing that might cause people to be away from Total War Center is the lack of modding tools, for example, the possibility to completely make a new map for a mod, like it was possible years ago. If you didn't notice, the newer titles are less moddable, and by every release, the mods don't change the game the way they did for example in Medieval II. Rome II and Attila, in my opinion were the last ones to have the best mods and support. And I consider the mods have always given life to Total War games, just think about Rome Total War and Medieval II, old games, but still having mods updated and/ or being released.
All of that, offered a vast number of things to play, to do and to speak between us-


Sorry for my english, it's a bit rusty, there's been awhile I don't speak it and it's not my native language.

Best Regards,
HannibaL_Scipius

While a very different base is certainly part of the problem, I'd like to highlight how far the modern trend has moved on from TWC, both in 'modern' terms of the series community having other 'trendy' platforms to pick on for new games and in how the very priorities of the series have been steadily drifting. I would further speculate that the condition will increase as time goes on if both streams continue unchanged, even if they released the mythical half-life of total war, Medieval 3.

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Originally Posted by CommodusIV

While a very different base is certainly part of the problem, I'd like to highlight how far the modern trend has moved on from TWC, both in 'modern' terms of the series community having other 'trendy' platforms to pick on for new games and in how the very priorities of the series have been steadily drifting. I would further speculate that the condition will increase as time goes on if both streams continue unchanged, even if they released the mythical half-life of total war, Medieval 3.

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Encapsulated in Pixelated Apollo's critique from 2016....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=etCK4EkjyZw&t=1247s

Time to learn Mandarin so I can find all the good overhaul mods on Chinese basket weaving forums

Newer games also less accessable to people that can't afford them !

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?

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Originally Posted by legate

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?

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

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. :(

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.

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.

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Originally Posted by 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.

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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" ;)

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

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

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.

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).

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.

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.

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.

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.

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. :D

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Originally Posted by 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.

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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.

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Originally Posted by 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. :D

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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.

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 :D 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:

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Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

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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....

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.

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Originally Posted by 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.

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

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 :D

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.

I don't think that Daruwind means it in the sense of employees aiming to diversify their tasks to escape from monotony. Even if they felt such a need, it's not up to them to decide the setting of the games, they only design what their seniors have demanded from them, depending on what theme they estimate is capable of generating more sales. The multiple teams is more of an urban legend, initially created by Will, when many old fans feared (justifiably, as hindsight confirmed) that Warhammer would lead to a dilution of historical titles. Technically, it could be correct (albeit not always, it's safe to assume that there was absolutely no development of historical games in 2016 and early 2017), but these teams are not equal or otherwise Creative Assembly would bankrupt itself. There's always the core group, dedicated to designing the next tent-pole title and several satellite ones, more preoccupied with DLCs, patching and minor expansions, like the Saga franchise.

Anyway, history can come back, but, as I mentioned previously, I won't hold my breath. Warhammer much more profitable in the long-term than Three Kingdoms (the bugs the digital packs introduced didn't help either), while it has also established a very high standard of faction variety and spectacular battles, full of grotesque monsters and shiny beams. When Troy was announced, most of the criticism centered around not on the fantasy influences (supernaturally powerful heroes, single-man units dressed like the Minotaur), but actually on the lack of it: No actual Cyclops, Chimera, Hydra and etc. Honestly, there's a bunch of potential universes CA can easily exploit, from collaboration with fellow franchises, like Tolkien and Elder Scrolls to a world inspired from Greek, Egyptian, Chinese and Norse mythology. Medieval III could compete with Warhammer, in terms of pre-orders, but nowadays the gaming industry focuses more on DLCs, which enjoy a much more favourable net gain, thanks to the extremely detrimental to the consumer content/price ratio. EA's income already relies more on DLCs than the main product and I don't see why SEGA will not try to imitate this example. In this department, fantasy simply excels and does not suffer from the controversy of cut-out content. Removing the Tomb Kings can be justified with much less difficulty than locking the Fatimids or the Lagids behind a paywall.

I don´t think that ordinary employee can influence much what will be next TW but there were multiple interviews where CA people states that change to Wh was great to regain creativity and they have so much fun while doing Wh content (at least some mentions were in recent Wh AMA..about the fun part I think, rest is older :) ). Good team manager understand that doing one thing again and again is not safe not just for employees but even for market. Even Wh universe has some kind of breaking/saturation point where it will make sense to change next TW to something else. That´s why we have Wh + 3K right now. :-)

There is really more teams but they are not 1:1 on same scale or importance and mainly they have different goals, that´s all. At max I can imagine, that right now DLC team for 3K and Wh are somewhat similar, but except those all others are teams are probably varying in size and dynamically increasing or decreasing according to current plan for them. CA just have multiple projects in various stages of development so they can easily use all their resources to the best. At least that is way how I would run it in general terms. You don´t want for example two projects waiting for motion capture for example and them having empty time window for rest of year...Or team tackling engine in pre-production.

I think main question is, if CA and GW have any plan to extend their cooperation and then if CA is able to secure another strong IP. In my eyes, as manager, choosing from two projects for next tent-pole TW, I would choose TW Tolkien over Med 3..right now. Situation can be different in a few years or maybe due to continuing contract with GW.

DLC income is obvious thing but DLC income is larger, if base game fan base = number of owners is larger. :-)

I can only speak for myself - I have to admit that at some point TW series started going in wrong direction. I'm playing TW since first Shogun. Up to M2TW it was a constant amazement of how awesome those games were. Then ETW arrived and it had two things I didn't like - only 2 tpy (IIRC) and limited number of buildings (in most of cities there was actually only one building). Since I loved the ability to build plenty of various buildings in M2TW - it was a huge disappointment. I skipped Shogun II and waited for R2TW. It was also a disappointment because of how regions and cities worked in that game - to unleash the full potential of a region you had to conquer it all. In order to improve situation in Rome you had to build some building in some other city in the region (because you couldn't do it in Rome, you know - "NO SLOTS"...). Attila didn't change that and while I played it quite a lot, it was never as good and enjoyable as M2TW mods. Also games became difficult to mod and I have to admit that while TW series games are good - it is mods which unleash its true potential. I don't remember when I played TW game without mod for the last time.

And then Warhammer arrived. I have literally no interest in non-historical TW game. I was never interested in Warhammer and so I'm not interested in Warhammer TW. Just as I'm not really interested in 3K and Chinese setting.

So for me, after M2TW, Total War made one bad decision after another. Just like Civilization where Civ V is worse than Civ IV and where Civ VI is some sort of a bad joke. And SimCity which, after SC4, literally died (SimCity 2013 was another joke like Civ VI).

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Originally Posted by Aquila SPQR

I can only speak for myself - I have to admit that at some point TW series started going in wrong direction. I'm playing TW since first Shogun. Up to M2TW it was a constant amazement of how awesome those games were. Then ETW arrived and it had two things I didn't like - only 2 tpy (IIRC) and limited number of buildings (in most of cities there was actually only one building). Since I loved the ability to build plenty of various buildings in M2TW - it was a huge disappointment. I skipped Shogun II and waited for R2TW. It was also a disappointment because of how regions and cities worked in that game - to unleash the full potential of a region you had to conquer it all. In order to improve situation in Rome you had to build some building in some other city in the region (because you couldn't do it in Rome, you know - "NO SLOTS"...). Attila didn't change that and while I played it quite a lot, it was never as good and enjoyable as M2TW mods. Also games became difficult to mod and I have to admit that while TW series games are good - it is mods which unleash its true potential. I don't remember when I played TW game without mod for the last time.

And then Warhammer arrived. I have literally no interest in non-historical TW game. I was never interested in Warhammer and so I'm not interested in Warhammer TW. Just as I'm not really interested in 3K and Chinese setting.

So for me, after M2TW, Total War made one bad decision after another. Just like Civilization where Civ V is worse than Civ IV and where Civ VI is some sort of a bad joke. And SimCity which, after SC4, literally died (SimCity 2013 was another joke like Civ VI).

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I agree, if it wasn't for the mods I probably wouldn't be playing Total War much. As much as I enjoy playing the games its the mods that give them their true potential.

The games that I want - paradox style in-depth strategy with total war style battles - will probably never happen :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Abdülmecid I

I don't think that Daruwind means it in the sense of employees aiming to diversify their tasks to escape from monotony. Even if they felt such a need, it's not up to them to decide the setting of the games, they only design what their seniors have demanded from them, depending on what theme they estimate is capable of generating more sales. The multiple teams is more of an urban legend, initially created by Will, when many old fans feared (justifiably, as hindsight confirmed) that Warhammer would lead to a dilution of historical titles. Technically, it could be correct (albeit not always, it's safe to assume that there was absolutely no development of historical games in 2016 and early 2017), but these teams are not equal or otherwise Creative Assembly would bankrupt itself. There's always the core group, dedicated to designing the next tent-pole title and several satellite ones, more preoccupied with DLCs, patching and minor expansions, like the Saga franchise.

Anyway, history can come back, but, as I mentioned previously, I won't hold my breath. Warhammer much more profitable in the long-term than Three Kingdoms (the bugs the digital packs introduced didn't help either), while it has also established a very high standard of faction variety and spectacular battles, full of grotesque monsters and shiny beams. When Troy was announced, most of the criticism centered around not on the fantasy influences (supernaturally powerful heroes, single-man units dressed like the Minotaur), but actually on the lack of it: No actual Cyclops, Chimera, Hydra and etc. Honestly, there's a bunch of potential universes CA can easily exploit, from collaboration with fellow franchises, like Tolkien and Elder Scrolls to a world inspired from Greek, Egyptian, Chinese and Norse mythology. Medieval III could compete with Warhammer, in terms of pre-orders, but nowadays the gaming industry focuses more on DLCs, which enjoy a much more favourable net gain, thanks to the extremely detrimental to the consumer content/price ratio. EA's income already relies more on DLCs than the main product and I don't see why SEGA will not try to imitate this example. In this department, fantasy simply excels and does not suffer from the controversy of cut-out content. Removing the Tomb Kings can be justified with much less difficulty than locking the Fatimids or the Lagids behind a paywall.

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Very well said

I am one of those who warned you all about the scourge of TW:Warhammer and how it posed a grave threat to dev time for historical titles and risked corrupting them. It did and does.

However...

I don't doubt WH has made SEGA a lot of money but it's easy to exaggerate its success, simply because there is a large group of hard-core fans that keep playing it on Steam. I don't believe more than 10% of those folks are intending to stick around Total War when it moves on to Victoria or Med 3. Same with China and 3K (by the way 3K is the fastest selling TW ever). I seriously doubt Dynasty Warrior fans are going to get into all the other Total War titles. So at the end of the day, you still have two distinct core audiences around historical games and around Warhammer.

There are many historically themed games out there that keep getting made, why would CA suddenly dump its historical IP that to focus exclusively on fantasy? Look at Amplitude, made Endless Legend, now making a Civ style historically themed game. Look at Assassin's Creed, CoD or Bannerlord, Paradox. Historical settings and themes sell games. What we need to do is keep advocating for historical games as many already do on reddit, and oppose any attempt to combine the two. I'm doing my bit by criticizing heroes in Troy and I will continue to criticize the Warhammerization of Total War whenever I can.

I could have agreed with you, back when Warhammer was disproportionately hyped in reddit, but the situation has changed radically since then. Nowadays, the player-base of Warhammer actually forms the absolute majority of active players in the Total War franchise, despite facing direct competition from a more recent title (in terms of both tent-pole and DLC). If only a small portion of them is willing to play more realistic, historical titles, an estimation I find very reasonable, at least in what concerns retention rates, then this pretty much means that we should say farewell to history... Given how timidly the Records mode was introduced in Three Kingdoms and how even that minor compromised was completely removed from Troy, I suspect that Creative Assembly shares the same opinion. Granted, reddit fanboyism is not representative of the entire community, but, when the Troy leak was officially confirmed, most of the complaints focused exclusively on the lack of Hydras and Cyclops, not on the supernaturally strong heroes.

A factor that is often neglected is, in my opinion, that the games tend to ''spoil'' their customers. Many players have now grown accustomed to the visual spectacle of the fantasy world (Legend, an avid supporter of Medieval II, is a good example of this tendency) and cannot tolerated the more grounded approach of the historical scenarios. Especially in Three Kingdoms, where naval battles have been omitted and where Korea, Mongolia and Vietnam have been locked behind a pay-wall. I had also noticed that trend in my personal experience and in these forums with the transition from Medieval II to Empire (essentially, the rejected patriarch of every other TW game since 2009). For instance, the lack of automatic replenishment means that the player is obliged to maintain a huge line of supplies from the capital to the front, while even the cheesiest offensive ever will eventually fiddle out, due to attrition. That's no more the case, but the absolute majority would probably find a return to the older system totally abhorrent, despite its obvious advantages at strategic thought and immersion. Therefore, I'd argue that the Warhammer player-base is no more monopolised by fantasy newcomers, but by more loyal fans to the franchise, who have been converted into the universe of the Games Workshop.

Overall, criticising is an appreciated tactic, even in the echo chamber of reddit, where opposition is bullied into oblivion, but in the end, money matters and the Steam statistics don't lie, even if we assume that a considerable number of consumers plays Rome I and Medieval II on disc copies. I doubt the course can be reversed, to be frank, but I don't worry much, as mods offer a multitude of alternative options. Personally, I just downloaded Broken Crescent and right now I am having a blast as a religiously intolerant Salghurid Atabeg, although I always remain keen on commenting on shady business practices and speculating about future content! :P

The number of people playing a single game day after day on Steam and $ earned from said game are two different things. We know Rome 2 sold millions and 3K is the fastest selling game to date. I suppose CA could just go with the GW audience and try to drag everyone else along but that actually doesn't make sense because of how well the historical games sell. I'm on Reddit almost every day and the "Empire 2 when?" or "Med 3 when?" posts are VERY common. Back when I used to check there were almost always more folks playing historical than WH titles. Right now for example 20:00 US Eastern Time 41,000 are playing historical and 27,000 the Warhammers.

Huberto Huberto Huberto... still fighting pointless battles. :)

3K is fastest selling core game but what about DLC? Drop-off of players for 3K is as well the fastest from all TW up to now. The number of DLCs is meter telling how long they are profitable and in this race, Wh(s) are winning.

You forgot to add important part. Shogun 2 si for free now so current metric is off... Why else is there 14K in Shogun, 7K in Rome2 and just 4K in 3K/Med2 and like 3K in Attila/Empire right now....while 23K in Warhammer II? :D If anything it seems a lot 3K fans moved to Shogun 2 but go and check the steam graph..numbers are falling after free week. What a surprise...
https://steamdb.info/app/34330/graphs/

You are right about Med3/Empire2 almost daily posts, but the tracking they are gaining is quite poor comparing to any Wh. Or toss there remark about Tolkien. That would be a ride...

If anything Warhammer saved TW and push it into new age. Fresh breath of inspiration. But I don´t fear about history in long run. Games are changing, that´s normal. Technology changes...but wheels of time won´t stop. Question is not if history will sell but if the prospect of history game will beat another strong IP and if CA can obtain such because if not, what else they have to do? Turn back to history. :-)

1) You can milk warhammer a lot but even there are certain borders. Even with current pace, sooner or later CA will hit wall. Then what? Naval expansion? I doubt it...
AoS. Recently another company got license for RTS around 2023. Plus while there is a lot TT fans of new AoS TT, current Warhammer is caretaking to much older demographics. One that is full of sentiment and for which this is like last chance to visit beloved place. (except not so long ago even GW teased possible rework for Old World :D) This is on par with Star Wars, Tolkien fan base....we are speaking about people who played old stuff for 20+ years. These people can outbuy any history fan. Go check prices of TT models..because they care, they love, they buy.
Warhammer 40K is so different....it is like getting WW1/WW2 and lot on top of that. It would be another greal leap of faith...like Empire...like Warhammer. Major issue is, Empire/Warhammer are actually quite close to TW general formula but battles in 40K are anything but that. That would be hard, weird...even in WW1 concept of unit maneuvering is long dead. You maneuver armies, lot stuff, not single unit...

2) So another IP? Star Wars, Tolkien. Later would be even bigger hit, the fanbase is possible even larger and even more general audience might tap in but getting license is the real issue. If not those then which one? Warcraft? Witcher? GoT? Generic Age of Mythology? Look, if CA wanted generic mythological/historical setting....Troy. If would be even easier then making fantasy 3K because all the gods/mythological beast stuff in Ancient Greece.

3) So what is left? History? :) Honestly good company will try to spread the portfolio and tap in various sources. I don´t fear for history games but it will take time. Troy, Wh3, possible character base title for 3K ala Genghis Khan or another 3K based Saga..I can imagine a few scenarios for 2023. GW license extension, something ala Tolkien (that would be golden hit) or history game ala Med3/Empire2 or you know what? If not in 2023 then what will CA make around 2025/26? The wheel must turn. If they do Tolkien, they need something else then.

But if all you want is return of Med2 just in new graphics...that ships sailed and sank already.

And just closing remark. If CA was so greedy, who not release Wh3 already? Wh2 was release like 1,5 year after Wh1 but now we are nearing 3 year mark...They could easily sell game with just a few changes instead it looks like they are making deeper changes.

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Originally Posted by Daruwind

3K is fastest selling core game but what about DLC? Drop-off of players for 3K is as well the fastest from all TW up to now. The number of DLCs is meter telling how long they are profitable and in this race, Wh(s) are winning.

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Again, WH has a very enthusiastic player base of around 30 to 40 K that loves to play the game over and over again and loves all the DLC; but $60 games make more money than DLC when they sell in the millions. Total War historical games sell millions and as an added bonus for CA/SEGA there's no kick-back license fee to GW or The Tolkien estate. ;)

You raise a good point about the royalties Creative Assembly pays to Games Workshop, but I think you underestimate the importance of DLCs. Due to how grossly disproportional the ratio between price and cost (in favour of the former, of course) is, the trend of the industry is to move towards small digital packs, which offer much larger opportunities for net profit than the nominally more expensive tent-pole titles. Electronic Arts has already been gaining twice as much from DLCs than the main product since 2015, so I'm sure that SEGA and every other video-game flagship will try to imitate their example. The retention rates of Warhammer help a lot in this regard, not to mention the fact that its fandom is much more willing to spend her money on these digital packs.

Moreover, they are more easily justified and sold than their historical counterparts. Can you imagine Armenian archers from Empire or the snake catapults from Rome II trying to compete with unique lords, flying dragons and their extravagant models? Finally, although it is true that Warhammer's II performance was commercially disappointing, in terms of pre-orders, the sales probably recovered, as gradually more potential customers immersed themselves into it. Pre-order purchases matter much more than the rest, but when all these factors, when taken together, probably outweigh the advantages of Three Kingdoms and future historical titles.

Still, in my opinion, the example of Troy is the most convincing argument. Not only did Creative Assembly add superheroes and Minotaur furries, but the company didn't even bother to appease the more conservative crowd with a more historical mode. Presumably because Romance crushed Records in popularity. To sum up, the player-base has changed radically, in a similar manner it had already evolved, during the transition from Medieval II to Empire.

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Originally Posted by Abdülmecid I

You raise a good point about the royalties Creative Assembly pays to Games Workshop, but I think you underestimate the importance of DLCs. Due to how grossly disproportional the ratio between price and cost (in favour of the former, of course) is, the trend of the industry is to move towards small digital packs, which offer much larger opportunities for net profit than the nominally more expensive tent-pole titles. Electronic Arts has already been gaining twice as much from DLCs than the main product since 2015, so I'm sure that SEGA and every other video-game flagship will try to imitate their example. The retention rates of Warhammer help a lot in this regard, not to mention the fact that its fandom is much more willing to spend her money on these digital packs.

Moreover, they are more easily justified and sold than their historical counterparts. Can you imagine Armenian archers from Empire or the snake catapults from Rome II trying to compete with unique lords, flying dragons and their extravagant models? Finally, although it is true that Warhammer's II performance was commercially disappointing, in terms of pre-orders, the sales probably recovered, as gradually more potential customers immersed themselves into it. Pre-order purchases matter much more than the rest, but when all these factors, when taken together, probably outweigh the advantages of Three Kingdoms and future historical titles.

Still, in my opinion, the example of Troy is the most convincing argument. Not only did Creative Assembly add superheroes and Minotaur furries, but the company didn't even bother to appease the more conservative crowd with a more historical mode. Presumably because Romance crushed Records in popularity. To sum up, the player-base has changed radically, in a similar manner it had already evolved, during the transition from Medieval II to Empire.

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With regards to Troy, is it confirmed that 'superheros' and in-game and not just fancy dress units and is it possible we could see two game modes just like TK, historical and fantasy?

Yep, fully agree with Abdul. In my eyes, DLCs production cost vs income is way better then the ration in case of fullgame. And question is how fees are split. If GW gets more from core game or DLC....there might be a lot hidden parameters.

Anyway, Huberto is right in one thing. WH fans bought two full price games in short time and they will buy third part as well. WH1+2+3 with all DLCs..that is massive juggernaut.

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Originally Posted by legate

With regards to Troy, is it confirmed that 'superheros' and in-game and not just fancy dress units and is it possible we could see two game modes just like TK, historical and fantasy?

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No possible to see two modes at all. Gating some content or worse, making duplicit content just for one mode? (fantasy creatures vs fantasy inspired human units) We don´t see such stuff in 3K and Troy as Saga has way more limited resources.

Read this if you want. https://www.totalwar.com/blog/a-tota...saga-troy-faq/ Honestly I expect famous characters to be powerful characters on battlefield but way grounded version, not like Wh. Something like 3K but probably more suited to Ancient Greece.

"Our truth behind the myth approach has allowed us to draw from a multitude of mythology’s most renowned monsters and include them within the battlefields of Troy as realistic representations of what their true form may have been. This approach has allowed us to expand the unit diversity by including unique warriors to the roster whilst adding an extra layer of tactical versatility to the conflict."

Interesting. So no battlefield 'monsters' then.

The reason EA makes so much money on DLC is Ultimate Team for Fifa and Madden. Sports games aren't Total War.

That said, I do agree that WH is a special case for DLC, its roots are the table top models and the expensive collectors fetish that its fans have. My point is simply that there's a limit to DLC as a business model especially one based on units and lords in one setting. I fully expect CA to crank out DLC for WH for years to come but they still need to make full games unless they want to leave money on the table, and the TW games that will earn $ most dependably are historical games, like the next Medieval, with CA having invested twenty years of IP growth on developing that form. Why they would move to fantasy IP full time, or decide to become a subsidiary to GW, seems risky and/or stupid in the extreme.

I'm not saying they won't develop TW fantasy or sci fi titles in the future, I think they will, but they're aren't going to bank on it; but they are definitely going to keep making historical titles as their bread and butter.

Daruwind your love of Warhammer blinds you to the reality that those games aren't the biggest or fastest sellers and they aren't even the most played TW games when we look at historical v. WH as distinct settings. Hats off to you and WHs fanatical base of supporters, but like you said, there are limits, and like I said, historical settings and themes reliably sell TW games.

The real fight going forward is about keeping historical TW authentic for its core historical audience, i.e. keeping the dumbed down campaign, overpowered heroes and monsters/myth/romance,forced faction and unit variety out of historical games. Beyond this, we need to be encouraging CA to create new systems while bringing back older ones to make TW challenging and fun.

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Originally Posted by Huberto

The reason EA makes so much money on DLC is Ultimate Team for Fifa and Madden. Sports games aren't Total War.

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True. CA has way better altitude to make money via actual content. Wh(s) DLCs are one of best they are produced plus sheer amount of free stuff they are giving with each paid DLC.

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That said, I do agree that WH is a special case for DLC, its roots are the table top models and the expensive collectors fetish that its fans have. My point is simply that there's a limit to DLC as a business model especially one based on units and lords in one setting. I fully expect CA to crank out DLC for WH for years to come but they still need to make full games unless they want to leave money on the table, and the TW games that will earn $ most dependably are historical games, like the next Medieval, with CA having invested twenty years of IP growth on developing that form. Why they would move to fantasy IP full time, or decide to become a subsidiary to GW, seems risky and/or stupid in the extreme.

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Loyal fans. Tolkien, Star Wars IP would be able to get similar numbers and similar money...that is strong advantage of strong IP. People are taking their hobbies very seriously. Like all the Star Wars costume and such. But sadly no historical period can provide similarly hyped fanbase....

But the same limitation are there even for historical games how many DLCs you can produce for various settings... So that´s why CA will hardly turn into full fantasy or whatever. Each IP is one turn of wheel and sooner or later they have to move to next...be it historical or fantasy or scifi.

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Daruwind your love of Warhammer blinds you to the reality that those games aren't the biggest or fastest sellers and they aren't even the most played TW games when we look at historical v. WH as distinct settings. Hats off to you and WHs fanatical base of supporters, but like you said, there are limits, and like I said, historical settings and themes reliably sell TW games.

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Ha :) Honestly I love a lot of things. I like Tolkien, Warhammer, Witcher, Warcraft..Star Wars :D I love history (AoE I+II) as showed by owning all TWs up to date. Heck I even finished ToB https://i.redd.it/nlz713tnl5a41.png :D So from my point of view going Wh heck even Tolkien is no problem because i love those settings as well. So my major issue is having pointless war while I´m having fun all the time so far.

I want historical games. I want Empire 2/Victoria, Med 3. Only what I try to do is pointing out that CA is at every step choosing what seems the be the next most valuable step. But what I can see, is that any of those. I want the best game every time, jsut my scope is broder than yours... :-)

Really if they are out of GW license and will not get Tolkien, they will be fully behind Historical. Or if they are smart, they will keep making historical titles in between. Which is exactly what CA is doing. Wh, 3K, ToB, Troy...

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The real fight going forward is about keeping historical TW authentic for its core historical audience, i.e. keeping the dumbed down campaign, overpowered heroes and monsters/myth/romance,forced faction and unit variety out of historical games. Beyond this, we need to be encouraging CA to create new systems while bringing back older ones to make TW challenging and fun.

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I would change it that CA is pursuing whatever settings feels the best and doing it with the same passion they are showing with Warhammer. I´m all for naval combat, I have even some pretty complex ideas around about composite army and how enviroment and weather and dynamic changes should affect battlefields :) I like complex stuff, but for sake of fun not for sake of complexity itself.

I think you have to take into account the vision of the leads developers and where the directors want to bring the Franchise. Sells, player retention, budgets, etc, are important for sure. And CA has a reputation of being particularly pragmatic about it. Yet despite the posture some CA directors like to play, their personal creative preference still matter as they matter every video game studio.

For example the move for more visual gimmicks happened years before the Franchise made the jump to fantasy universe with Total War - Warhammer. In Rome 2 camp would appear or disappear from the campaign floor depending of your army "stance". Generals could use buff and debuff spells during the battles. Some units too could use spell like the "trample" spell of some "shock cavalry". Likewise the Franchise shift to a punishing and frustrating limited "building slot" for the campaign gameplay long before there was any dragon flying over CA digital battlefields.

Additional I think it is highly hazardous to draw some conclusion about the fanbase with Steam stats. While the numbers can be exact, the interpretation of the data can be misleading. Total War Warhammer and Total Warhammer II are objectively the best TW games since Shogun II. And this has actually little to do with the Fantasy setting itself : the map are bigs, the faction are more diverse than in Three Kingdoms (It is difficult to make it worse anyway), and contrary to everything that was released since Rome II, the game does not punish you for playing it : You can build enough structure to deal with every problem you must face in the campaign mode (especially in Warhammer II), there are less variable to deal, character don't age so you can keep the one you like and grow attached to them, etc. Lastly Warhammer II is filled with small joy that make the game all the more pleasant : many ancillaries, cool artifacts, special buildings located all over the map. So I am not surprised the game keep more players than other titles. I prefer myself this game over the others.

Regarding the future I have mixed feeling. The Devs don't seem interested in history. So naturally they look out of ideas. That said a couple of weeks ago, CA made a teases with a medieval reenactment event. A medieval III would be both a great news for the fans who prefer Historical settings but at the same time a confirmation that CA have run out of idea/interest in history and now just you the most pop culture cliche.

This 3K forum have about 350 threads,and 4000 posts...:no:,should we back to the West?

Activity in Wh part is similar...but i noticed overall activity over all TW forums here is somewhat lower in the last few months..

To many of us older players, who were barely teenagers when RTW was launched and it heralded the 3D era of Total War, the new direction can be construed in 2 ways - either you're a exclusively historical fan, or you like both fantasy and history. At least most of us. Only some are completely new TW players with Warhammer.

We will see down the line if Warhammer will be the Cayenne to the Porsche factory or it will be something different. Very possible WH will allow them to devote more resources to historicals.

For those not familiar, Porsche, one of the most respected sports car brands in the world, created the Cayenne, a not so sportscar SUV to help them cover the very high development costs of the sports cars. It worked brilliantly on a financial level, and the Porsche 911's are fabulous sports cars.

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Originally Posted by Huberto

The number of people playing a single game day after day on Steam and $ earned from said game are two different things. We know Rome 2 sold millions and 3K is the fastest selling game to date. I suppose CA could just go with the GW audience and try to drag everyone else along but that actually doesn't make sense because of how well the historical games sell. I'm on Reddit almost every day and the "Empire 2 when?" or "Med 3 when?" posts are VERY common. Back when I used to check there were almost always more folks playing historical than WH titles. Right now for example 20:00 US Eastern Time 41,000 are playing historical and 27,000 the Warhammers.

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Returning to old statement....New DLC dropped yesterday and WH2 got all time high peak. Even 3K is unable to break serious numbers with DLCs yet WH can. Just saying...And we will see what Wh3 will bring...

https://i.ibb.co/0DWBpD4/obrazek.png

It's the battles. They are so stale that there is nothing to talk about. If 3k had dropped in 2010 we'd be raving about it non-stop. But CA has long stopped improving battles in terms of positioning, tactics and manoeuvre and has instead worked on the spreadsheet simulator side of things. Exchanging spreadsheet data is boring.

Maybe a good chunk of the players are chinese, so they don't post in an english speaking forum

But realistically what kind of mod would work in this game?

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Originally Posted by Ngazi

But realistically what kind of mod would work in this game?

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There's quite a few. Most of the big ones are for characters or unit overhauls. There's some really nice ones that add character biographies and historical weapon models.

On the general overhaul side, there's our SFO mod, which is primarily KAM's balancing with some changes to the Han campaigns to remove some of the more problematic elements and make progression and empire development more serious. There's TROM, which is more playing up the Romance and elemental balance angle. Then there's UAD which is a strict historical overhaul that's mainly focused on recreating the historical scenario and mechanics, which ends up feeling very much like a Rise of Three Kingdoms throwback remade in TW:3K.

Using TWC to see whether if a game (like 3K) is popular or not is certainly wrong in 2020. Hell, I guess it's already wrong since 2015 already.

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Originally Posted by LestaT

Using TWC to see whether if a game (like 3K) is popular or not is certainly wrong in 2020. Hell, I guess it's already wrong since 2015 already.

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Reddit is not the answer either since the TW subreddit is 90% memes. And I love Reddit.

Game stats are the way to judge a game. And it looks like WH is the most popular.

If I were to wager a guess, it's because of the mods. There aren't any large overhaul mods for Three Kingdoms like EB or Stainless Steel. We saw that in Shogun 2, after all the large overhaul mods were made and the ones that are still being made are moved to Discord, the Subforum is basically dead. The only reason why I check the subforum is because of the tutorials for my submod of Total FoTS and whether or not I could do some large things when scripting. Interestingly enough, there still hasn't been a good guide to scripting on the Shogun 2 forum, but that's off-topic.

Additionally, Three Kingdoms seems to be a bingeable game instead of a Long-Play game. Like, in the beginning of every campaign, I just love how polished and how the mechanics in the game are mostly balanced. This goes a complete 180 when I get to King and I have to conquer the other 2 kings because I then complain about how they made a worse version of Realm Divide. In Shogun 2, at least you were able to easily defend your settlements if they were under attack via chokepoints and zone of control or just recruiting a few units. In Three Kingdoms, your econ gets screwed so quickly during king to the point that of annoyance and campaign quit. Also, in the past few months, they have done some stuff with the morale which makes battles a lot quicker.

I really dislike the battles to be quicker because my frontline disintegrates and the perfect hammer charge that I was setting up just doesn't have its anvil anymore

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Originally Posted by Basileos Leandros I

Reddit is not the answer either since the TW subreddit is 90% memes. And I love Reddit.

Game stats are the way to judge a game. And it looks like WH is the most popular.

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Not even talking about Reddit. I went there once in a while for other stuff, never TW games.

The official forum still have traffic for 3K. Same with FB groups. In any case, TWC is no longer the place to find information about never TW games. The train has left post Rome II.

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Originally Posted by Abdülmecid I

Therefore, if we take into consideration the appeal of Steam and Reddit

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I can never imagine that STEAM and Reddit would be alternatives for the TWC..... Maybe I am old-fashioned but that's impossible for me

WOW!
I've been away from TWC for several months and hadn't returned to my thread.
THANK YOU ALL for contributing so constructively to this important dialogue.
It reassures me that TWC remains a hub for thoughtful consideration of the TW titles.

OK, a bit late to the party but:

https://steamcharts.com/search/?q=total+war

In the end of 2021, 3KTW was the 3rd most popular game, about twice as many average users as the 4th (M2TW) and just a breath away from the 2nd (R2TW).

So I wouldn't call the game unpopular.

So in total, the TW series on Steam is played by about give or take 40.000 people a month. Is that a lot? Is that not a lot?

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Originally Posted by alhoon

OK, a bit late to the party but:

https://steamcharts.com/search/?q=total+war

In the end of 2021, 3KTW was the 3rd most popular game, about twice as many average users as the 4th (M2TW) and just a breath away from the 2nd (R2TW).

So I wouldn't call the game unpopular.

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Your comparison in NOT valid. Remember that while Rome II had to be activated via STEAM even if the owner has the CD version that is not apply for M2TW. If M2TW is 3rd in STEAM you must add the hundreds of thousands that bought the CD VERSION 15 years ago and still play with it .See that despite M2TW exists in STEAM most mods still refer for the CD version. So the numbers must be compared between Rome II, Attila and the next TW series but not vs M2TW that still dominates in TW HARDCORE FANS.

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Originally Posted by Basileos Leandros I

So in total, the TW series on Steam is played by about give or take 40.000 people a month. Is that a lot? Is that not a lot?

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It's played by approximately 40,000 people at any given time. Hard to figure out how many unique people that comes out to every month. There are still the few people playing Troy on EGS and few still using unverified physical or pirated copies, but those are likely in the realm of rounding errors.

Its pretty good for an entirely PC strategy game. It still puts us behind the combined Paradox lineup and maybe around Civilization. We can claim the largest PC strategy game launch I think though. We almost broke 200000 simultaneous players with 3K, and the closest one to that I think is the launch of Civ 6 (160,000).

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Originally Posted by kambiz

Newer games also less accessable to people that can't afford them !

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Gosh and look at the prices as well, I mean I can hardly provide myself with inflation and now these prices...

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Originally Posted by Live2sculpt

WOW!
I've been away from TWC for several months and hadn't returned to my thread.
THANK YOU ALL for contributing so constructively to this important dialogue.
It reassures me that TWC remains a hub for thoughtful consideration of the TW titles.

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That is my intention my friend, that TWC always stays the hub of all the things, happenings and related issues in regards to the TW games.
If we are to talk about these things, it should be on here!!!

3K isn't that bad IMO. Just a bit out of the usual more popular (I guess) European historical timeline.
It's release wasn't bad either. Actually it was far smoother than the usual big TW releases.

Because it's garbage. Just as all newer TW games. Long live the old times!!!!

Come on, 3K isn't that bad.
At least they tried something (quite) different ;)

My thoughts are because even though the game isn't bad, it doesn't nearly excel at things that make traditional total war fun. Shogun 2 was smaller in scope with less features but tactically it has battles that can make you feel like your strategy and tactical decisions have made a difference. Newer total wars continue to stray further from this point as evidenced by the now flagship total war title Warhammer. With those games as long as you bring the best unit and bring it in numbers you will win. in three kingdoms it tried to split the lines between warhammer type gameplay and 'records' i feel that was a mistake they should have chose a style for the game. Eventually they moved towards romance which might be the best for that series, however i feel like if they will go romance they need to change a few things and make the game more character based with events and creating a sub-faction system in the faction ala CK2 with more intrigue etc.

The General Discussion section for Three Kingdoms on TWC has 3,486 posts with 207 threads. The General Discussion section for Three Kingdoms on Total War forums, the original forum for Total War games, has 72.2k posts and 9.6k threads. I think it's just TWC losing its grip on Total War gamers.

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Originally Posted by izzi

Because it's garbage. Just as all newer TW games. Long live the old times!!!!

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Probably things started going downhill after the Creative Assembly started using that stupid Warscape engine and quality of the games...changed!