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[Kagus]

I played the demo to the latest Total War game, where they have three scenarios and one tutorial for you to entertain yourself with.

In all the time I spent playing it, I only ever managed to beat the tutorial.


I don't know why I lost so spectacularly on all the other scenarios...  My English longbowman got massacred when the French decided to move around the mud patch, my landsknecht formations were splattered in less time than I would care to recount, and my Spanish conquistadors got mobbed by Aztecs beyond number.

The closest I ever got to winning was one time I played the Spanish scenario (Cortes attacking a city that blocked his retreat).  My forces had long since been overwhelmed despite my hit-and-run cavalry tactics, except for about seven crossbowmen.  I stationed those crossbowmen waaaay up in a corner of the map, at the wooded end of a path that had the edge of the map on one side and the city wall on the other.  I was hoping to funnel the enemy troops to slow them down a little bit.

Then something funny happened...  The AI tried to commit suicide.

There was apparently something about that last stretch of ground that the Aztec warriors just would not venture into.  As the columns moved towards my position, they began marching forward a few steps before retreating back just as many.  All of this just within crossbow range.


So I managed to kill off a few of the blighters...  Melee troops just wouldn't come close, and the ranged troops repositioned before they fired a single shot.  Eventually, the time ran out and I lost by default.  If there had been infinite time, I actually would have killed all the Aztecs with just those crossbowmen.

[Cthulhu]

I beat the the Aztec mission and Agincourt.  I think I might've beaten the other one but I"m not sure.  The first time I beat Agincourt I dominated.  I can't beat it anymore.  Aztect mission I got extremely lucky.  I was in the same situation as you, but with Arquebusiers instead of Crossbowmen.  We fired our last volley into the crowd, and hit the king in the head.

[Kagus]

For a while I was rather crestfallen about my battle tactics...  And then I remembered that my battle tactics essentially fell under "don't fight a battle you're not prepared for", so all three missions took place in battles that I never would have started in the first place.

[Omath Erius]

As someone who actually owns the game, I can confidently say that the "scenarios" are the hardest part of the game.

The single battles are whatever you want them to be, the giant campaign thingy is actually pretty DF-esque now that I think abouit it:

The actual surviving "winning" part is easy, but grand projects, massive battles, and player generated stories are what keeps you busy.

My first ruler died heroicially during a crusade, on the way to Jerusalem (by boat, since I was England) his ship was sunk by the Turks. He valiantly fought against impossible odds outnumbered about 3:1 resulting in glorious defeat.

Ironicially Turkey was obliterated during that crusade by various other contributors, so the biggest threat to my water defended haven was the largest navy in the world: Denmark. Unfortunatly Denmark declared war on us shortly after.

We had already captured what most people now identify as Denmark, they were stuck in southern Scandanavia. With their ports blocked the only way to the rest of the world for the enemy was to cross a narrow strip of land into our territory guarded by a single fortress. Inside that fortress, the first son of the aformentioned king, now King of England himself was stationed. After a recent battle to capture the fortress in the first place, he was left with only his persdonal bodyguard some siege weaponry and some ragtag militia.

A full-scale invasion force arrived to retake their homeland, having almost no hope for survival, The Kings cavalry managed to stall the force long enough for the catapults to set the battering ram ablaze, after retreating, they shut the gate behind them and declared a victory. The resulting stall of them having to build a new ram gave time for reinforcements to arrive.


Good times...

EDIT: MASSIVE TANGENT

[umiman]

Kagus: Agincourt is particularly difficult. It takes some replaying to win and if you get it the first time, it's quite impressive. That's why it's one of history's more legendary battles. Basically, you just need to turtle and rely on your longbowmen while shifting your other units to cover them.

There's a very deep battle mechanic in Medieval. For example, if you position your units around 10 meters in front of your archers, your archers can fire straight forward, over their heads, instead of lobbing shots in a high arc. Also, if you are fighting against highly mobile or lightly armoured foes, you might want to switch to non-firey missiles for faster shots.

Also, it's quite imperative to discern how deep you want your ranks to be. If your spear line is too thin, the enemy can actually pierce it and punch through (The AI will sometimes do this) but if it's too think, they will just flank you.

I highly recommend the Total War series. I recommend it over Civilization. Simply because it maintains a lot of the aspects that made Civilization fun and then allows you to control your armies yourself (with the super deep, realisitc and engrossing battle mechanics) instead of relying on random results. In fact, you'll probably be spending more time on the world map instead of in battle. The Civilization-esque mechanics are quite superb. This is one of those games (kinda like DF) where whenever you lose a battle in the campaign (i.e: sandbox take over the world mode), you can only fault yourself. Not the stupidity where your aircraft carrier was sunk by an ironclad.

Hrm... there's a lot of things I love about it that I didn't mention here:

1. Each and every single one of your royal family members have their own stats, characteristics, and basically... is like an individual RPG character. They will grow and develop and you will be quite depressed when your awesome king of ultimate dreadness who singlehandedly conquered France dies of old age.

2. So many units. Insane. They're all basically the same but when it comes down to it, you can really tell the difference between those Polish nobles and your own Cuman Horse Archers.

3. Lengthy, lengthy descriptive flavour text for your viewing pleasure. EVERYWHERE.

4. Voice acting and speeches are brilliant. The over-the-top-ness doesn't reach the level of cheese like say... C&C, but it's damn good. I've played the game for over 400 hours and apparently I still haven't heard all the speeches the generals give before battle yet.

5. Huge battles. Massive. Want to recreate the defense of Helm's Deep? Go ahead.

6. Tactics play a huge part in gameplay. It's so important that if you're one of those who can't understand why it's silly to stand ON a bridge to defend it, you better not play this. If you're one of those who love to scheme and pretend to be generals, you'll love this. When your army of 300 defeats a 2000-strong force through clever use of strategy, terrain, cover, weather, and mobility, you will run around your house screaming in joy. (The game will mark all your incredible battles by putting a little sigil where it took place, detailing what happened)

Yeah, I really like the game. I'm really looking forward to Empire: Total War.

edit: It also reminds me of one time where my English forces were sieging a Scottish fortress. I had brought about a huge army consisting only of heavy knights, intent on just steamrolling them. I also had one group of militia spearmen accompanying them so they could man the battering ram to breach the gates.

It was all well and good until my spearmen reached the gates with the battering ram. What happened was the Scots charged out of the gates in that very instant, slaughtered my poor militia spearmen, then ran back inside. Now my army was stuck outside and the Scots were laughing their arses off.

[Kagus]

There's a slightly less well-known game called "Knights of Honor", that also takes place in medieval Europe. 

I was having lots of fun just playing the demo, just to see how crazy good ol' Yurp started looking after a while.

First off, Germany was huge, so everyone assumed they were the most powerful.  Technically speaking, they did indeed have the largest economic position at the beginning of the game.  However, since they were so big, everyone was afraid of them.  Every nearby nation would enter into an alliance with someone nearby and then start attacking Germany.  A few months in and the whole of Germany is reduced to one small province down near Bohemia.

By this time, the Teutonic order had erased most of Finland, the Vatican now controlled all of Italy (officially.  As in, it was all Vatican City) and the lower part of France and old-Germany.  England, having been shoved off the landmass formerly known as England by the Scots (led by me) occupied the other part of old-France.  New-France was in Africa, where very little actually happened.

Norway had pushed the Swedes off into the non-Teutonic part of Finland, which had caused the Finlanders to flee into the Slavic countries for refuge.  They were not well-received.


Man that was fun...  I learned that you certainly do not want to pick the biggest nation (look at what happened to Germany), but that you also do not want to pick the smallest (poor little Wales was such a pathetic little whipping boy that they, my long-time allies, were convinced into waging all-out war against me for the sum of 200 gold pieces).  The demo allows you to pick from two of the many nations, and both of those happen to start with two provinces.  Small enough to go unnoticed, large enough to not be crippled.


Yeah, that was fun.

[JustOnePixel]

Quite frankly,  I don't care whether I'm winning or losing in Medieval II, as long as I get to see thousands of detailed units hacking the crap out of each other and bleeding under a beautifully rendered sky.

More gore would be good, though.  but that's for Dawn of War II.

[Torak]

Rome's better.

[SeaBee]

Yeah, I really like the game. I'm really looking forward to Empire: Total War.

You and me both. About time we got some real naval combat ... and the time period is going to be pretty fun to play in.

Haha, what a tangent.

[Asheron]

Rome's better.

Agreed. The cries of men being slaugthered by spartan hoplites still haunt my dreams...
Hoplites of Sparta!
The cavalry is a bit overpowered, though.
You need a lot more tactics to win with cavalry in medieval II, and I can know it as veteran cavalry commander ( riding down people since Shogun ).
Medieval I never ceases to amaze me, though. It's a lot harder. You can create a large empire more easily, but then, it falls gloriously in dissaray.
I had this Italian colonial empire who had different provinces in east europe, constantinople and parts of egypt ( all rebel provinces ). Then, the golden horde invaded, and I sended my forces to Kiev to help the Russians defend.
I gloriously won, but turns later, the Russians and Byzantines turn on me. After decennias of bloody war, the situation stabilizes, and then, the holy roman empire and france knocks on my door and egypt attacks me.
I went on a rampage through mid-europe, completely slaugthering the hungarians, my 'noble' allies who betrayed me in favour for the holy roman empire and poland.
Good times...

[Jreengus]

Hmmm about that medieval europe game, forgive me if I'm wrong but I thought Germany wasnt united as a single country until a bit before the first world war? I had to do some coursework on WWI for history and Germany uniting was responsible for altering the balance of power between Germany and France which England had been preserving. So surely in medieval times Germany would have been a bunch of princedoms. (Unless it was a country which then dissolved)

[Kagus]

Think Holy Roman Empire.  It's not the Germany we know today, but it was certainly big.

[Cthulhu]

My history book said the Holy Roman Empire totally sucked.  It lies a lot, so I'd like to hear it from people who aren't biased.  Did they totally suck?  I just know if I say something about it before knowing for sure I"ll be wrong and get laughed atALPHABET.

[Torak]

It depends on what you mean by 'sucked'.

[Cthulhu]

I don't even remember why they sucked now.