Early Rome is ridiculous

[Ulfric Sombrage]

Just killed them with Epirus (main campaign), but they are a joke. I know real Rome had a lot of manpower, which helped them to deal with great generals as Pyrrhus and Hannibal, and come back in the "game" after they had heavy losses. But here it's just ridiculously OP compared to other factions. I feel like I have invaded USSR... You can take all their regions but one (and I specify this one is not Rome), and they still throw tons of units (100+ army...) instantly. No other faction do this. I know they are the beginner's faction, but this is really too much in my opinion.

[loki1006]

are they taking the emergency army for legacy decision? You should see this in the turn log.

if so, that is available to all factions, generates an emergency army and costs you legacy.

for Rome, I think it specifically models the ability to raise emergency legions under a Dictator.

[BroJo]

Originally posted by Ulfric Sombrage:

You can take all their regions but one (and I specify this one is not Rome), and they still throw tons of units (100+ army...) instantly. No other faction do this.

Actually, all factions can do this. There is an Emergency Levy decision that becomes available when a nation is massively outnumbered, and it allows one to trade legacy for troops. PocusFR said earlier,

Originally posted by PocusFR:

The emergency decision (Rome or others nations) are indeed a bit too much as they can lead to big power change, even from a backward nation without much resources. The idea was to provide a last measure safe guard (also for the player).

You'll be happy to know that there will be a condition on legacy in the incoming patch though! :-)

There has been discussion about tweaking it so that it isn't overwhelming.

[Ulfric Sombrage]

I know there is an emergency decision, but 5-6 times in 10-15 turns seems a bit huge no ?Combined with with the skill of legions, it makes Rome quasi impossible to defeat.

[欣怡 (Nathalie)]

I have not noticed this, was this the Pyrrhus scenario? Like others have said factions can use a decision which may or may not be tweaked as whislt some have had issue, others haven't so who knows (maybe I got lucky?). As for your comments Rome should certainly be tricky to beat, but they clearly arn't 'too OP' if you beat them as Epirus. Phalanx did not do well against legions, and ultimately Epirus lacked the manpower of Rome. If that happened then i agree its too much, but theres so many claims that contradict each other, or simply dont ring true to me after 50 hours in game that im jsut not sure. I really dont want the devs to start nerfing things so that the game becomes too easy. When it realeased lots of people complained it was too ahrd, but they actually turned out to jsut not understand the game. Again not saying you are one of them, just sceptical. Hopefully a Kind dev will reply soon.

[Ulfric Sombrage]

No it was the main campaign (I will edit my main post to specify this). And I don't want a massive nerf which makes of Rome an average faction, just one that make them a strong faction, but not a monster like it's the case now.

I beat them as Epirus, but it needed hum... maybe 20 or 25 victorious battles over them. It's really too much, Rome was not China lol.

[loki1006]

Originally posted by Ulfric Sombrage:

I know there is an emergency decision, but 5-6 times in 10-15 turns seems a bit huge no ?Combined with with the skill of legions, it makes Rome quasi impossible to defeat.

well at the moment that is a standard mechanic, the emergency levy pops up, lose 100 legacy get an army. Available to anyone.

Now I agree there is a potential issue when a state with a naturally powerful army uses this (compare to say a civ 1 tribe) and that it happens too easily. The second bit will be fixed in the next patch.

[pascal.difolco]

Originally posted by loki1006:

Originally posted by Ulfric Sombrage:

I know there is an emergency decision, but 5-6 times in 10-15 turns seems a bit huge no ?Combined with with the skill of legions, it makes Rome quasi impossible to defeat.

well at the moment that is a standard mechanic, the emergency levy pops up, lose 100 legacy get an army. Available to anyone.

Now I agree there is a potential issue when a state with a naturally powerful army uses this (compare to say a civ 1 tribe) and that it happens too easily. The second bit will be fixed in the next patch.

Yep maybe there should be a second condition with "current armies CP < x" with x around 150

[Slitherine_Iain]

Yesterday I managed to lose Rome on turn 12 while busy defeating the Samnites....

I thought the city would hold so waited too long to bring my army back and when I did Rome had already fallen and my relieving army got defeated. I've kind of given up and will start again and be more careful!

Guess I need more practice!

[Ulfric Sombrage]

If devs themselves usually play Rome, I have nothing more to add :b

[Slitherine_Iain]

I'm the dev director so while I do play Empires am I far from an expert as I have to manage all our releases (about one every 2 weeks), so my level of expertise is far from indicative of the difficulty! :)

It was actually the first time I have played Rome. I usually go for out of the way nations that don't get much testing like the Celtiberi and Caledonians as I know Rome gets a lot of eyes on it so no point in me duplicating that feedback.

[Ulfric Sombrage]

I was kidding you know

[zakblood]

while on the alpha and beta, i've played every nation more than a few times each, and so far won on nearly all of them, with some being much harder than others, but overall it's learning how the system works is overall key to winning and winning well, as soon as you understand if you wish for a certain bit of hardware, just take the area which produces it, then any nation can be Rome, or any nation can have almost any unit, as i play Rome with archers in stead of Javelin units etc etc, so seeing what you like, and knowing what plays best, then just take the area with it in so you can also make it, then your half way there

[Ulfric Sombrage]

What you say is beautiful. But in my game, Rome reborn (turn 120) in Venetia with a strong (150 army) a 2/2 leader and 6000 gold. The region because of bog, is impossible to take: my medium infantry is to weak to fight legion, my heavy infantry has a malus on this ground...

I tried to make a blocus and wait. But even if Rome loose 200 gold by turn, they still have 6000 gold since 20-30 turns.

This situation is purely ridiculous. I have 600+ army, 200 fleet, a 25 regions empire, and I can't beat this magic Romans, who are sort of bog's gods... They earn money from the sky I presume, and have now a 250 army, with just ONE fuc*** region. I wonder what is the mechanics I don't understand, but if you can enlighten me, you are welcome...

[CelestialSlayer]

Originally posted by Slitherine_Iain:

I'm the dev director so while I do play Empires am I far from an expert as I have to manage all our releases (about one every 2 weeks), so my level of expertise is far from indicative of the difficulty! :)

It was actually the first time I have played Rome. I usually go for out of the way nations that don't get much testing like the Celtiberi and Caledonians as I know Rome gets a lot of eyes on it so no point in me duplicating that feedback.

Hi Iain I think there might be a big with Rome. It fell really easily in my game. Like in the one turn it took my army to get there and defeat the army that was surging it, it got taken over. I lost my treasury and my capital moved. Like really easy for the invader. A bit to easy.

[pascal.difolco]

Originally posted by Ulfric Sombrage:

What you say is beautiful. But in my game, Rome reborn (turn 120) in Venetia with a strong (150 army) a 2/2 leader and 6000 gold. The region because of bog, is impossible to take: my medium infantry is to weak to fight legion, my heavy infantry has a malus on this ground...

I tried to make a blocus and wait. But even if Rome loose 200 gold by turn, they still have 6000 gold since 20-30 turns.

This situation is purely ridiculous. I have 600+ army, 200 fleet, a 25 regions empire, and I can't beat this magic Romans, who are sort of bog's gods... They earn money from the sky I presume, and have now a 250 army, with just ONE fuc*** region. I wonder what is the mechanics I don't understand, but if you can enlighten me, you are welcome...

The city should eventually fall to a siege... If you have 5x their troops you can relentlessly assault, weakening them each battle even if you "lose", at one point they'll die.