Age of charlemagne playing as charlemagne is not fun

[DJmass]

I am really hating playing as charlemagne. I ended up having to look online just to get past the first twenty turns. Now I managed to get a bit farther ahead but now all my generals have low loyaty and even with having built churches everywere I still have massively low public opinion. I always wanted to play a charlemagne compaign but now I hate it.

[Mile pro Libertate]

Originally posted by Haddon:

Originally posted by Rawfire:

Got no high horse to sit upon. Boost PO easily by building positive PO buildings.

Combat the mechanics with the tools the game gives you. It's really not that hard to understand, you just throw in the towl because you refuse to adjust your play style, mr high horse.

No, I mod things to be balanced. On VH/VH the mechanics of having no additional armies, armies not being able to make it to defend for at least 5 turns, and the negative PO throughout the entire empire from being sacked repeatedly, means you are gimped for the next 50 turns at least. Sure, you can build PO buildings in all of your settlements, but that does nothing for the force-wide morale debuff from being repeatedly sacked, and will still take dozens of turns to offset an imbalance. I can't abandon the settlement, I can't get there in time to defend it, and I can't recruit more armies because the game caps that. Those aren't problems with my strategy, those are limits to the game engine on turn 1, and things which are in no way true to history. Or most other TW, for that matter.

And Mile, my point isn't he should have the military that conquered much of Europe yet. But he shouldn't be limited to a couple small forces; the numbers in the armies isn't the problem, it is the number of possible armies, and the inability to raise another on the eastern front.

I understand the frustration with army limits.

I don't like it either: it's a hard stop that arguably takes alot away from the sandbox, and I preferred the older TW without this hard limit. If the player wants to have two 20 stacks, or ten stacks of 4 units apiece, that should be the player's choice, imo. I'm glad ToB is removing the army limits.

But getting back to AoC...at least the AI has caps too.

If the Charlemagne player was limited to 3 stacks and the Saxons were invading with like 5 and Aquitiane with 4, that would just be downright broken game design; but Saxons came into Frisia with only one stack, and another moving towards Aachen when I played, and the Frisian one got caught in a pincer between besieging my town and a relief stack I raised, being easily destroyed there. Meanwhile, the diplomacy helps tons: "war targeting" the Westphalia with Carloman, Obidrite and Brittany made the other Saxon stack turn back from Aachen, and they agreed to peace shortly afterward.

Beating back Angria and Eastphalia was mostly due to diplomacy as well: I used the "war targeting" again and had armies from Bavaria, Wilzi, Obodrite and Carloman all moving in, then vassaled Angria and had them fighting for me too, then added Duchy of Alemannia to my "coalition" to put the Bohemians, Nordalbingia and Danes in their place.


Lombards were dealt with similarly when war broke put with them. I took Pavia and turned it into a "fortress city" (no economic buildings of any kind), and fought one field battle after that, but the rest of it was all Lombard Seperatists, Italian Seperatists, Papal States and Provence doing the fighting, plus getting on good relations with Spoleto and Beneventum, so they weren't aggressive with their armies towards me at all.

I think the War Target feature is an extemely useful tool that doesn't get enough love from many people. I try to use it whenever I can - hell, at one point I even made deals with Austrasian Seperatists and had them alongside me lol - and it really makes up for the imperium limits/army caps.

Again, I don't like the fact that there are caps, and it is kind of forcing the player's hand to use other options, but at least the options are there.

The diplomacy layer of the game, for me anyway, is how you beat back the AI and its buffs/spam: dismantle the enemy coalitions; build up your own coalition; selectively "war target" the enemy towns and armies; free your own forces up so they can move to the most critical places.

[DJmass]

I have managed to deal with the military. My biggest problem is that because of war weariness and everything else, even with some provinces having two level 2 churches they still have negative public opinion and revolt every few turns. It drives me insane.

[Mile pro Libertate]

Originally posted by DJmass:

I have managed to deal with the military. My biggest problem is that because of war weariness and everything else, even with some provinces having two level 2 churches they still have negative public opinion and revolt every few turns. It drives me insane.

Lowering taxes helped me quite a bit.

Even Normal tax is like -10 public order.

PS: Income will take a huge hit with taxes on Minimal, but if you can get trade setup with as much of the world as possible, that makes up for it.

It is very possible to have anywhere from 4-6K income from trade alone, even early game. Make sure you ask for payment along with trade agreements and non-aggression pacts, that will generate thousands in payouts to help get through the early game.

[Smokedice]

Originally posted by Haddon:

Originally posted by Rawfire:

The game is balanced unmodded on normal difficulty. The point of VH is to unbalance the game in favor of the AI and throw as many unfair challenges in your way.

By modding, you are not playing a legit VH game. You've practically modded it back to "normal."

That is so absurd. The game is terribly balanced; vanilla TW have been since at least M2. And I love this "legit VH game", wtf does that mean? So like half of the TW community is playing "legit" Total War campaigns? It isn't a competition, it is a sandbox game...it is meant to be played how people like it. That is the whole point of modding.

It is a strategy game. You are supposed to think and plan your way through the game's challenges. Sure you can play "how you like it" by modding, but if you mod out the difficulties and imbalances that make it VH difficulty, you've essentially admitted your inability to play a legitimately VH campaign.

It is not impossible and it is not unbalanced. Look at LegendofTotalWar's Legendary WRE campaign where he declares war on everyone from turn 1. He "plays how he likes it" by using the tools the game gives him, not by downloading third-party cheats (yes I will call your mods wuss-out cheats)

[Haddon]

Originally posted by Rawfire:

Originally posted by Haddon:

That is so absurd. The game is terribly balanced; vanilla TW have been since at least M2. And I love this "legit VH game", wtf does that mean? So like half of the TW community is playing "legit" Total War campaigns? It isn't a competition, it is a sandbox game...it is meant to be played how people like it. That is the whole point of modding.

It is a strategy game. You are supposed to think and plan your way through the game's challenges. Sure you can play "how you like it" by modding, but if you mod out the difficulties and imbalances that make it VH difficulty, you've essentially admitted your inability to play a legitimately VH campaign.

It is not impossible and it is not unbalanced. Look at LegendofTotalWar's Legendary WRE campaign where he declares war on everyone from turn 1. He "plays how he likes it" by using the tools the game gives him, not by downloading third-party cheats (yes I will call your mods wuss-out cheats)

Jesus you elitist ♥♥♥♥, back off this "legitimate" BS. You have no idea what my mods are; I can just about guarantee 95% of TW players could not handle a VH/VH campaign with everything I have on, because I make sure to BALANCE. I don't mod out difficulties; I gave myself (and enemy forces) the ability to bring up an additional 2 armies, and allow them to march somewhat realistic distances (rather than taking 5 months to travel ~200 miles). I've been playing TW since Shogun, I have beaten legendary campaigns and make my game harder to make it worth playing, but the start of Charlemagne isn't a challenge, it just slows down the game for 30-50 turns. I can handle it; I can handle any campaign, but basically starting out with no way to counter a huge PO debuff and huge morale debuff just means everything slows way the ♥♥♥♥ down. Fix ONE of the 4 problems, and the game plays just fine.

Because CA has no ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ CLUE what "balance" means. You can beat an entire VH/VH Alan campaign with only their starting unit. I beat my last campaign of S2 using nothing but yari ashigaru and shock cavalry. A single chariot in R2 (before they fixed it) could take out 5+ units of elite forces and continue on their way almost unharmed. Something being completeable doesn't make it balanced. When even a normal mode campaign requires a lot of people to read guides for the first five turns, it is not balanced.

[Mile pro Libertate]

Originally posted by Haddon:

Originally posted by Rawfire:

It is a strategy game. You are supposed to think and plan your way through the game's challenges. Sure you can play "how you like it" by modding, but if you mod out the difficulties and imbalances that make it VH difficulty, you've essentially admitted your inability to play a legitimately VH campaign.

It is not impossible and it is not unbalanced. Look at LegendofTotalWar's Legendary WRE campaign where he declares war on everyone from turn 1. He "plays how he likes it" by using the tools the game gives him, not by downloading third-party cheats (yes I will call your mods wuss-out cheats)

Jesus you elitist ♥♥♥♥, back off this "legitimate" BS. You have no idea what my mods are; I can just about guarantee 95% of TW players could not handle a VH/VH campaign with everything I have on, because I make sure to BALANCE. I don't mod out difficulties; I gave myself (and enemy forces) the ability to bring up an additional 2 armies, and allow them to march somewhat realistic distances (rather than taking 5 months to travel ~200 miles). I've been playing TW since Shogun, I have beaten legendary campaigns and make my game harder to make it worth playing, but the start of Charlemagne isn't a challenge, it just slows down the game for 30-50 turns. I can handle it; I can handle any campaign, but basically starting out with no way to counter a huge PO debuff and huge morale debuff just means everything slows way the ♥♥♥♥ down. Fix ONE of the 4 problems, and the game plays just fine.

Because CA has no ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ CLUE what "balance" means. You can beat an entire VH/VH Alan campaign with only their starting unit. I beat my last campaign of S2 using nothing but yari ashigaru and shock cavalry. A single chariot in R2 (before they fixed it) could take out 5+ units of elite forces and continue on their way almost unharmed. Something being completeable doesn't make it balanced. When even a normal mode campaign requires a lot of people to read guides for the first five turns, it is not balanced.

I think you guys both make good points.

I would just take issue at the last part here: if people have to consult guides, even at lower difficulties, that wouldn't be evidence of imbalance.

It might indicate that the design is not as intuitive as it could be, but doesn't say anything about balance, because the corollary to it would be that an ideally balanced gameplay would see none of the players having to consult guides or seek advice from other players.

But nothing works like that in practice, which is why we see things like bell curves.

If you tweaked the game to the point that every single person could just beat the AI by simply each doing their own idea of what "should work" strategically (versus finding what works), you'd end up with a "game" that has no gameplay: people would just start the campaign, do whatever they felt like doing, keep clicking end turn, and at some point the victory screen would pop up.

[Haddon]

I would just take issue at the last part here: if people have to consult guides, even at lower difficulties, that wouldn't be evidence of imbalance.

Agreed...more than 5 turns into the game. If you need to consult a guide to understand mechanics, that is a problem with presentation in the game more likely than not. But if a large portion of people need help at the very beginning of the game, not due to a learning curve but due to being limited in your ability to respond (and at the mercy of Carloman actually helping), you've got an issue. At least, if that is a problem even on low difficulty settings.

I don't mod out challenge, I mod out annoyances and huge imbalances (and add in extra difficulty in other areas where I can), and a ton of other modders do this too; rework the game to be much more fun (we think, at least).

[Smokedice]

Originally posted by Haddon:

I would just take issue at the last part here: if people have to consult guides, even at lower difficulties, that wouldn't be evidence of imbalance.

I don't mod out challenge, I mod out annoyances and huge imbalances (and add in extra difficulty in other areas where I can), and a ton of other modders do this too; rework the game to be much more fun (we think, at least).

Keep telling yourself that. Why git gud when you can just mod your way to victory?

[walsh_cm]

Rawfire has this strange assumption that everyone that mods the game is cheating or making it easier. While some folks do that, it's their choice. CA allows the games to be modded so I don't know what the issue is with that.

The mods many of us use do not make the game easier, they fix some ridiculous mechanics/bugs.

For example... I modded out the attack and defense penalty from defending a damaged settlement. Those penalties can get as high as negative 18. Why did I do that? Because the ai is too stupid to know that it should sally it's army out and fight on the field when a city has been damaged. Does this mod help me or the ai?

I also modded out all ways to gain military experience outside of actual combat. Veterans can't train troops either. I find it stupid that you can hire automatically trained armies, or that an army just sitting gains more experience than one that goes to battle on occasion. Does this mod help me or the ai? I never saw multiple chevrons on ai armies. The ai rarely uses veterans or the other methods to hire already trained soldiers.

[Mile pro Libertate]

Originally posted by walsh_cm:

Rawfire has this strange assumption that everyone that mods the game is cheating or making it easier. While some folks do that, it's their choice. CA allows the games to be modded so I don't know what the issue is with that.

The mods many of us use do not make the game easier, they fix some ridiculous mechanics/bugs.

For example... I modded out the attack and defense penalty from defending a damaged settlement. Those penalties can get as high as negative 18. Why did I do that? Because the ai is too stupid to know that it should sally it's army out and fight on the field when a city has been damaged. Does this mod help me or the ai?

I also modded out all ways to gain military experience outside of actual combat. Veterans can't train troops either. I find it stupid that you can hire automatically trained armies, or that an army just sitting gains more experience than one that goes to battle on occasion. Does this mod help me or the ai? I never saw multiple chevrons on ai armies. The ai rarely uses veterans or the other methods to hire already trained soldiers.

I guess it is situational to a large amount.

Like with the town damage lowering combat stats: it would give you an extra advantage if the AI doesn't sally; on the other hand, if the AI is sieging you for multiple turns while you're waiting for a relief army, and they storm you before your relief arrives, to not have the maluses to stats would "imbalance" the game against the AI, because you already have a huge advantage in tactical ability, plus the defensive works of the town, and you'll curb stomp the AI assaulters when then should've been "rewarded" for catching you with your pants down, having bottled you up in the town with no relief nearby.

Same with recruiting at higher veterancy: you may rofl stomp an AI stack one turn because you are silver chevron and the AI is lvl 0 units; but a few turns later you find a high tier AI stack invading on an unprotected front, and all you have is your lvl 0 spawned garrison for a town.

Aside from this situational aspect, I think something else to consider is the "abstraction factor," as in trying to abstract real-world things that would weigh on the situation.

So going back to the maluses from town destruction: realistically, a garrison who has been enduring the conditions of being under siege for weeks or months, and with the town getting progressively destroyed during this time, should suffer in combat, because there is physical fatigue and morale issues; having to fight fires; water availability and quality going down as plumbing and aquifers and wells get polluted, destroyed or blocked access; pulling survivors out of rubble; tending to wounded all around; the townspeople growing discontented; if it gets bad enough some townspeople actually try to sneak out of the town to make a seperate peace with the enemy or betray secret ways to get inside the town; smoke fills the air and hampers breathing, and stings and clouds the eyes; the idea starts spreading through the ranks that, as the town gets further destroyed, the enemy is too powerful to contend with; dispatches/messengers have a harder time make it through burning and/or lost sections of the settlement; lot of energy expended, and confusion sown, by having to reposition men because of the crumbling layout; more energy expended laboring to throw up hasty repairs or new lines of defensive works; etc.

All of this is going to negatively affect morale, cohesion and stamina, which is reflected in the combat stats getting maluses.

[walsh_cm]

Those things are depicted when a settlement runs out of food by attrition. I did not mod out the morale penalty as I think that is legitimate, but massive negative values to combat ability I believe is inaccurate. I really disagree with most anything that affects actual combat ability. I think you can capture nearly all of those scenarios with a decrease in morale.

As far as experience, I never see a highly experienced AI army, and I have over 1000 hours in this game. With buildings, agents, generals, and offices I have the ability of pumping out units that have 5 or more bars of experience which is just silly. It is already too easy to recreate an army that has been completely destroyed, to also be able to recreate the armies experience is just bad design. You already get to keep the armies traditions, so basically you can completely replicate what you lost in a couple turns with just a different general. Having a highly trained army completely wiped out should have at least a few consequences don't you think?

[Smokedice]

Originally posted by walsh_cm:

Rawfire has this strange assumption that everyone that mods the game is cheating or making it easier. While some folks do that, it's their choice. CA allows the games to be modded so I don't know what the issue is with that.

The issue is that a lot of modders brag "Oh, I beat the game game on VH/Legendary, never play normal!" And then they are asked how they accomplished this they reply with "Well, first you gotta download this list of mods that remove so and so penalties, adds so and so features..." until it's no longer even the same difficulty. Might as well play on Easy instead of claiming you beat the game on higher difficulties because you modded it. No serious TW player will recognize anyone's VH campaign victory if it is modded.

[Haddon]

Originally posted by Rawfire:

Originally posted by walsh_cm:

Rawfire has this strange assumption that everyone that mods the game is cheating or making it easier. While some folks do that, it's their choice. CA allows the games to be modded so I don't know what the issue is with that.

The issue is that a lot of modders brag "Oh, I beat the game game on VH/Legendary, never play normal!" And then they are asked how they accomplished this they reply with "Well, first you gotta download this list of mods that remove so and so penalties, adds so and so features..." until it's no longer even the same difficulty. Might as well play on Easy instead of claiming you beat the game on higher difficulties because you modded it. No serious TW player will recognize anyone's VH campaign victory if it is modded.

What "serious TW player[s]" are you talking about? You are the only one here with a problem, it seems. Nobody is here bragging about how great they are, you came on here calling people losers for modding a game that is meant to be played any way the player likes. I have never heard of these "serious TW player[s]" you speak of; I hear you, and once in a long while a few others, calling people cheaters. You haven't added anything, you haven't helped OP, and you've brushed off everything counter to you with some elitist nonsense. Continue thinking you are awesome because you play a game differently from others, the rest of us will continue thinking you are a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥.

[Smokedice]

Originally posted by Haddon:

Originally posted by Rawfire:

The issue is that a lot of modders brag "Oh, I beat the game game on VH/Legendary, never play normal!" And then they are asked how they accomplished this they reply with "Well, first you gotta download this list of mods that remove so and so penalties, adds so and so features..." until it's no longer even the same difficulty. Might as well play on Easy instead of claiming you beat the game on higher difficulties because you modded it. No serious TW player will recognize anyone's VH campaign victory if it is modded.

you came on here calling people losers for modding a game that is meant to be played any way the player likes.

2 problems with your thinking there, 1 is you assume that the unmodded game does not already give you the tools to play as you like. It does, as a complete package.

2 is the game is not "meant" to be modded. Unless it's something specifically dependent on modding, like Garry's Mod, no game is ever "meant" to be modded. The game functions perfectly Unmodded. It CAN be modded, but to say it is MEANT to be in order to allow a player to play as he likes is elitist modder nonsense.

Originally posted by Haddon:

I have never heard of these "serious TW player[s]" you speak of

O RLY

Originally posted by Haddon:

I hear you, and once in a long while a few others, calling people cheaters.

so first you never heard of us, then you say you've seen a few. Make up your mind on which lie to stick with.

[-A7 Demon Seed-]

Originally posted by Rawfire:

Lots of losers here modding the challenges away, sad.

people can play as they like.....The only loser is the nerd that gets angry that people play the way they want.