Hehe, k. And just loving me won't do. (that will only get you a copy )

he he.

Well heres the report.

keep in mind ive played it on a handicapped system.

I loved it. Its weird because ive never known of these Roman "families" so i found it hard to grasp at the begginning, ive only ever known the Romans as, well, the Romans. But anyway i suppose its a thing ill learn if i get the game. I played a little tutorial fight which involved me supporting an ally by crossing a bridge. I only had 3 units, 1 of spearment - forget what their called, 1 of Roman archers and 1 of cavilry. But of course, being a TW veteran i annihalated.

What i found very impressive first off was the realism of the impact between two sides fighting and the animation of the soldiers fighting.

Ive never seen unit of Cavilry so quickly take out a unit of archers!

Next was the battle. Me- The Carthags Vs The Romans. I had 10 elephants Merc Cav, barbarian mercs, skirmishers, heavy cav and heavy inf. i was against a Roman force about a quarter larger than me, and of course, i annihalated.

The details of the units are good but the thing that shocked me the most was something about the elephants. I wanted to charge them first downhill so they could pulverise the advancing Romans- Which they eventuially did! - But as i issued the charge command, i didnt realise that my own unit of heavy infantry infront of the charging elephants would have any problems. Boy, was i wrong!

Overall, a good first impression of the game, but my review is mainly handicapped due to the spastic system i ran it on.

I excpect, with the managment side of the game aswell, makes one hell of a game.

Hehe, the tutorial fight is the same as in the full game, easy idd. The fights are very well worked out...I love them. This is a wet dream. I get to play a turn-based strategy game with managing, and to get to fight everything myself! (if I want to, of course. I'm not gonna waste my time chasing a 20-man band of enemy soldiers over the battlefield with an elite army of 700 soldiers..i let the computer handle that) Because you can manage everything yourself you can turn fights like you wouldn't believe it. Slaughtering armies of 500 with a 100-man force is doable, if you play it right. (and the circumstances are good) You wouldn't believe how important placing your troops is. yesterday I was a a mate's and his huge Roman army got ambushed by a smaller force or rebels, flanked from both sides. He got absolutely slaughtered...he managed to salvage a cohort of archers, but that's about it. And rebels are anything but heavily armed/trained.


About the fight with the elephants: they actually patched elephants' strength recently, lol. It was meant as a MP patch, but they added that anyway because it was so obviously necessary. The other SP patching will be done in the next one and believe me, some parts need patching. Most blatant example is rioting in your cities. There are a few things that can cause rioting: unrest (when you occupy city etc.), squalor (hygiene/overpopulation etc.), cultural difference, and distance from your capital.

Now the thing is, cities get so huge that no matter what you do they will start rioting because of sheer overpopulation. Which gives you two options: either you try to manipulate the population growth into a negative number but that costs you profits, OR, you let them riot and take over the city, recapture it on the rebels next turn and exterminate the populace. So the growth starts over from scratch again. So, i'd like them to change that. Other than that I'd like them to work out Protectorates a bit. As it is they just give you trade rights/military acces...but that's something I could have obtained manu militari too. So, what point would there be in forcing them into serving you if they're treated like "equals"? Because of that I've moved on to destroying factions, apart from my first experimental protectorate Numidia. (must be a 200-year peace by now)


I'm currently deciding my next move: crossing from Turkey to Greece and take on the Brutii, or make my way through the Kaukasus..cool thing is that rebels have taken over all territory between the mountains there, and even my armies are getting slaughtered there. Mountain territory: always hard to conquer.

I'm cracking up on the generals' speeches...depending on their 'reputation" they give different speeches. A guy who's a notorious drunk will say something like "what?! where are we...oh yeah, erh, attack. *hick*" I had a family member who had "The Mad" epitheton, and he'd say something like: "the enemy have advantage in number, but we have pretty purple hats!!". Needless to say, crazy generals usually have a bad effect on the troops' morale.


Anyhoo, some more pics:

lol @ lesbians.

Oh yes i know what silly custom battles are. Like having twelve 1337 Kensai take on 800 Samurai. (guess the game!)

played this game too a bit, not on my machine off course, but at a mate, and I must say it's pretty cool.
It reminds me a lot of Centurio, a much older game, but still fun.

Erh...Shogun total war? (no clue)


And hell yeah Arathorn, it rocks..I wonder why not everyone with 1337 machines here is playing it. Like BJ! (always picking on you eh mate )Maybe once Satis gets off his cra...erh, SWG-addiction, dunno.

BINGO.

lol...maybe. It certainly does appeal to my megalomaniac world-domination side. At the rate I'm going, I'll be sick of SWG in 6 months if there're no content changes. lol

I noticed that the elephants get scared and rout when i charge them first.

Hehe, that can happen depending on a few factors, influencing unit morale. With elephants fire arrows/projectiles or flaming pigs (no kidding!) will get them running. or when running solo towards a freaking huge army. (will get just about every unit panicking) Elephants have good morale tho, overall. So an elephant with some experience in battle will rarely run before getting seriously injured/cornered. Btw, you will have to kill off elephants that are panicking and running towards your own army...their drivers have a command to plunge a knife in their skulls, to be safe.

The morale factor is well worked out...with (mounted) animals it's like this:

horses< afraid of camels< both horses camels afraid of elephants. So a succesful charge with a camel-cohort on a bunch of horsemen can make them go nuts. Oh, and best way to deal with elephants charging towards your troops is fire...lots of it. Arrows, pigs, onagers, anything. Cos once they're tearing apart your frontline you'll have to spear the bastards. Which is a casualty-heavy job, hehe. talking about morale; I love this pic:




lol@ satis and content changes. I'm off, gonna continue my quest to girdle all around the meditteranean...should be a trade giant by then, smashing the opposition. Even tho i already actually won the title of imperator, heh.

lol. Pussy centurion.

Actually, they used to use a hammer and spike.

Hehe...they mention a chisel and a hammer in the game yeah. I do wonder if the drivers had much risk of ending under the elephants.

lol, that pic is hilarious.

Far as the chisel and spike, that's just freakish.

Its true. Its funny how you mention them as "drivers" Ox. I think "riders" is the word youre looking for.

Oh and i think an experienced rider would first plunge the chisel, then dive forward off the carcass. I think thats how it happened, because as you said the wider would probably end up underneath the damn thing.

Hehe, k riders it is...but maybe I have an ELEHANT CAR!!