Rome 2: Total war is coming!

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BallaTheFeared

Diamond Member
Nov 15, 2010
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Patch 2 Beta (Patch Notes)

http://wiki.totalwar.com/w/Total_War_ROME_II:_Patch_2

Warning: Your current Save Games will work with Patch 2, but Save Games created or overwritten in Patch 2 will be incompatible with previous versions of Total War: ROME II.


Technical and Performance Issues

Campaign performance optimisations.
Campaign AI round time improvements (greatest effect during early game).
A new "Limited" option has been added to the "Show AI Player Moves" settings in Single Player an Multiplayer Campaign modes, this enables the player to see all movement of enemy factions, all movement within the players regions, and all movement within sea that the player has ports in during the AI turns.
Improved AI recruitment decisions in Campaign modes. Further improvements planned for subsequent patches.
Pathfinding optimisation on the Campaign Map.
Fix for "Level of Detail" distances scaling incorrectly when the "Field of View" is changed which reduces the chance of the "Intelligent Zoom" [N] key, causing "zombie like” low quality textures on unit faces in battles.
A new warning message has been added to loading screen to inform the player when graphics memory is running low, and the game is downgrading the players graphics settings. This can be overriden, allowing the game to use system memory for graphics (VRAM) by ticking the "Unlimited video memory" option in the graphics menu.
Increased the frame rate and reduced frame stuttering in battles on certain GPUs.
Improved compatibility for graphics cards with multiple GPUs.
Added earlier Multiplayer Campaign resyncronisation detection, upon loading save games which allows resyncronisation in more cases.
More conservative out-of-the-box graphics settings and resolution for DirectX 10 and 11 on Mobile GPUs
Improved the processing speed of the default deployment placement, reducing battle loading times on some battle maps.
Fixed battle crash bug caused by the default deployment placement.
Crash fix for when the player placed the mouse over a garrison force of a region in Campaign mode.
Fix for crash loading save games that were created on the "settlement captured" screen in Campaign modes.
Fix for a crash when holding the [SHIFT] and [CTRL] keys down, and selecting a unit card, when no unit cards where previously selected in Campaign and Battle modes.
Fix for crash caused by forming a Confederation in Campaign modes.
Some desyncronisations have been fixed in multiplayer city / port assault battles.
Crash fix for when multiple AI reinforcements arrive in a single player siege battle in Campaign mode.
Fix for crash when selecting Custom Battle mode after fighting several different Multiplayer battles.
Fix for a crash in 4v4 custom or multiplayer battles caused by the battle AI.
Fix for crash when cancelling a game request for a password protected game whilst in a Multiplayer battle lobby.
Fix some crashes in multiplayer campaign mode, when one player quit the game, it would cause the other player to crash.
Fixed a Multiplayer crash which happened when a client joined a lobby and was being allocated to the wrong slot.
Fix for a very rare crash when launching a new campaign.
Fixed rare battlefield loading lockup.
Fix for a rare crash caused by animal handlers in battles.
Fix for crash that happens when AI unit triggers raise banner special ability when no human units are selected in battles.

Gameplay Improvements

Reduced infantry run speed, charge speed and acceleration in battles.
The low level casualty moral penalties have been significantly reduced in battles.
Improved balancing for Food and Squalor in Campaign Mode.
Campaign AI is more likely to make a stand when defending its final settlement, but may still seek out another home, if they fear losing the final battle.
Encampments battles are no longer incorrectly merged with Coastal battles, which lead to forts floating in the air when a friendly navy reinforced an army in the Fortification stance.
Improved ship movement speeds in battles.
Shock cavalry run speed and charge speed have been increased in battles.
Increased flanking morale penalties.
Added icons to indicate activity in the Technology and Faction screens during a campaign.
Fix for the boarding/ramming button which showed the incorrect state in certain circumstances in battles.
Fix for a bug that sometimes made it impossible to exchange units between a transported land force and another land force on the Campaign map.
Fix for armies on the sea getting stuck in patrol stance in Campaign modes.
Fixed splitting an embedded army from a navy which sometimes caused the player to get stuck in the Prologue Campaign.
Some missions in single player and multiplayer Campaign have been fixed and now execute correctly.
When a settlement is captured via a siege battle, with a friendly naval fleet blockading its port, the ownership of the port is now changed correctly to the friendly navy fleet on capture.
Fix for AI taking inappropriate sized siege equipment into battle when the user changed the settlement wall height, via the map selection settings, in Custom Battle mode.
Fix for defending armies under AI control grouping together at the edge of their deployment zone, during Ambush battles when the player choses to wait before attacking them.
Improved AI and scripting in the Raphia Historical Battle.
Fixed a bug preventing the player from progressing in The Invasion of Samnium prologue chapter, if they had spent all of their funds before being instructed to recruit a General (and therefore having no funds to do so).
The Attribute increases for an agent accompanying an army now activate its associated effects on the general of that army in Campaign modes.
Improved AI collision detection with Deployables in battle.
In Multiplayer Campaign mode, one player can no longer cancel recruitment during the other players turn.
The order of events leading up to the Battle of Bovianum in the prologue have been re-scripted. The player now gets multiple turns to construct siege equipment.
Fixed issues with not enough time being given for certain advisor lines to play in different languages in the prologue.
Fix for units floating in the air while climbing siege towers in battle, when the tower is placed on a slope.
Attacking siege ladders will no longer clip through the gate house in the siege on Bovianum battle during The Invasion of Samnium chapter in Prologue Campaign.
The victory screen in Multiplayer Campaign mode now shows the correct title for both players.
The Basilica of Vulcan religious building now applies the correct bonus to recruitment cost reduction in Campaign Mode.
Added level indicators to the Sanctuary of Austro & Sanctuary of Fraujaz shrines in Campaign mode and the Encyclopaedia.
Fix for settlement expansion trapping / blocking units movement on the campaign map in very rare cases.
Improved the terrain in a small Barbarian city battle map.
Minor bug fixes for Roman and Barbarian siege battle maps.
During battles, players are no longer able to un-pause the game while in the options menus.

Usability improvements

In Campaign mode, exempting a province from tax will no longer incorrectly adjust the food number in the province info panel left side of the screen.
Improved multiplayer lobby discovery, reducing the chance of finding *multiplayer lobbies with the wrong battle type.
Removed the red tint from the sky in battles.
Fix for "Rome Wasn't Built in a Day" achievement failing to unlock when its requirements were met in some situations.
The "Quaestor" achievement should now unlock correctly, when completing the Prologue campaign
Fixed the inability to select the previous faction, when an army is automatically loaded due to a battle type change during battle setup.
Improved the clarity of stats displayed for Slaves Economic Effect when placing the mouse over "Slaves" in the Province Details panel on the Campaign map.
Fix for rare cases of broken save games in Campaign mode.
Fix for Campaign mode bug, where a hostile agent and the players' ship became stuck in the same position, with neither one able to move.
Fix for very rare agent pathfinding issue, which caused the game progression to become impossible in Campaign modes.
Removed the ability to loading the wrong type of units into a battle from a saved army pre-set in Custom Battle mode.
In Multiplayer battle setup, unit restrictions related to "Battle type" are no longer desynchronised between the host and client, so only the correct units can be chosen.
Defending armies in an Ambush Battle can no longer load an army containing *Fixed Artillery and other Siege Equipment.
Fixed the tooltip displayed when placing the mouse over the garrison in enemy settlements, while the settlement is under siege.
The Public Order "Change per turn" stat is now displayed as the sum of all of its "Contributing Factors" on the Province Info panel in Campaign mode.
Right-clicking on the Aggressive, Balanced and Protective stance buttons when Autoresolving a battle in campaign mode will now take the player to the Encyclopedia, where these stances are explained in more detail.
More detailed descriptions added to the tooltips for the "Occupy, Loot and Raze" buttons after successfully capturing a settlement on the Campaign map.
Improved icons for Province Effects in Campaign mode.
Fixed an error with uploading stats when a multiplayer battle was ended prematurely.
The "Force March" movement effect on the campaign map (looks like a whirlwind) are now correctly removed from the screen when the AI move their army.
Correction to the Assault Hexeres unit card in the Parthia faction during battles, which had no colour mask and appeared black.
The buttons to change pages in the Leaderboards menu have been fixed, so more players can be seen on the Leaderboards.
The Provinces list in Campaign mode can now be scrolled with the mouse wheel.
Units in a recruitment queue, in a province with its capital under siege, now have an "infinity sign" icon to indicate that the "turns to recruit" is infinite while the siege is maintained in Campaign mode.
In the "Controls" menu under the "Settings" option in the main menu, when the player modifies the keyboard controls, and saves them, the new name for these controls is now replaces the "Classic Total War" name.
Added a tooltip to say "Left-click to remove unit from recruitment queue" for units that are queued for hire in Campaign mode.
Added a tooltip to make ruined buildings more obvious in Campaign mode.
Added tooltips to "Weather" and "Time of Day" settings in the Custom Battle menu.
Fixes and corrections for text in the encyclopaedia have been made.
Minor text and grammar corrections in Campaign Modes.
Fix for some German text not fitting into the available text space in the campaign mode user interface.
Improved text formatting in the Objectives panel in Campaign mode.
Added some localisation text fixes for French, Italian, German, Spanish, Czech, Russian, Polish and Turkish.
Fixed some missing text on the Diplomacy screen in Campaign modes.
Added white outline to Armoured Legionaries unit cards in battle.
 

thm1223

Senior member
Jun 24, 2011
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Some of these fixes really scream that this game was released in a beta state.
 

Dumac

Diamond Member
Dec 31, 2005
9,391
1
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Some of these fixes really scream that this game was released in a beta state.

I don't think that is really deniable at this point.

I wonder how many reviewers only played the prologue and a few turns of the actual campaign. A lot of these issues aren't apparent in the prologue, and I don't see how they could have missed it otherwise.
 

BallaTheFeared

Diamond Member
Nov 15, 2010
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I got a huge boost in performance from this patch.

Something like 62% more fps at VHQ and 25% more FPS at Ultimate.
 

BallaTheFeared

Diamond Member
Nov 15, 2010
8,115
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No, but it seems to be making better unit compositions and better units overall.

Also playing as the German faction on Legendary has been brutal, both because everyone and their mother goes to war with you for no apparent reason, and because my troops are similar but don't have the cheats enabled at this diff for the computer.

Oh and let's not forget the fact that I have no idea what I'm doing, all the units seem like trash to me.

Back to Sparta... Even if Phalanx is still broken, at least I can grasp the tactics for phalanx factions. I have no idea what to do with these Germanic units.

They seem to be good for dying and routing, but losing has its benefits... Hopefully I can get challenged in Greece the say way.


TBH though, I feel Roma has cheap units, but even with that said I have no idea how to use them... Maybe I should watch a video, all I know how to use is Phalanx, with siege and cavalry.


Edit: Nope.avi

Just lost a full army at TUR, took it but it was a costly battle. AI immediately countered with agents, then brought in a full army and wiped me out.

rome2_2013_09_13_20_17_48_541_zpsd163a2f4.png~original



This guy I haven't even fought yet, but he went to war with me soon after the game started.

He waited until I lost my 3rd Army trying to take the area below Casurgis, AI was waiting for me there with 1 1/2 Armies, was out numbered by about 1000, put up a good fight but couldn't win or even turn him, complete destruction of my Army there.

Then this guy comes in, takes Casurgis, moves an army to the other town in the providence, moves agents in on my Capital and starts to siege it.

rome2_2013_09_13_20_18_26_123_zpsc900c773.png~original


So basically in the span of 2-3 turns I lost two towns, 2 1/2 Armies, and three of my remaining four towns are under siege and I can't do anything except in one of them.... GG?

3 Turns until Chainmail for better infantry... Guess that won't happen now >.<

I think I need to go light cav to deal with their 4-5 ranged units, my melee units get destroyed by them it's not even funny.


But first I'm going to try Sparta again, see if it's any more interesting... But I think it's a CAI issue where they simply only aggressive against a select few factions.
 
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BallaTheFeared

Diamond Member
Nov 15, 2010
8,115
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Interesting...

rome2_2013_09_13_22_23_58_479_zps009ff8c9.png~original


Whatever they're doing it's going in the right direction, battle AI isn't better, but their unit comp is so the battles are by association.

At least so far, I don't want to get ahead of myself, but so far the changes they've made have improved the game greatly... Instead of declaring war on the next province for 150 turns, it seems every nation around me doesn't like me now including Egypt and their ally >.<

Also Knossos and Pregamon declared war on me as well.

So that's five nations, normally it would be just Mace, because I'd have already taken out Epirus and actually probably Macedon at the very least their capital...

Taking Athens caused quite a stir... No one wants to trade now either, so it's slaves, lots and lots of slaves, and possible revolts, and well I'm researching the entire public order chain...


Hopefully they can improve the AI, the rest is just fluff but if they can get the AI down so it stops charging through me when it have an overwhelming force to get a flag during a siege, and actually fix the siege AI and remove torch doors they'd have a great game on their hands. Everything else after that would just be icing on the polish :D
 
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Zanovar

Diamond Member
Jan 21, 2011
3,446
232
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does anyone actually play ou the boat battlles?as for the political stuff im lost:(.been up for days:S this game is addictive:Si need 4 hours.
 
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Regs

Lifer
Aug 9, 2002
16,665
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I auto resolve the boat battles for now. AI is still shit. They marched a whole stack at my army without attacking while besieged . They just tried to push through my units to get to the victory point without raising a sword. Shake my head....

But at least the turns are a lot quicker and it looks like the fixed the graphic problems for battle as the FPS I got a huge boost, and the units all don't look like mud! So that's a good start.
 
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blastingcap

Diamond Member
Sep 16, 2010
6,654
5
76
I didn't like Shogun 2 and the load times were excruciating and the lack of any decent multithreading was disturbing, so I was skeptical about this game pre-launch. I remember expressing my skepticism on a Video thread a couple of months ago, and just because it was a supposed to be a Never Settle AMD title some AMD fans jumped down my throat.

Oh well, at least there is Company of Heroes 2.
 

Zanovar

Diamond Member
Jan 21, 2011
3,446
232
106
I didn't like Shogun 2 and the load times were excruciating and the lack of any decent multithreading was disturbing, so I was skeptical about this game pre-launch. I remember expressing my skepticism on a Video thread a couple of months ago, and just because it was a supposed to be a Never Settle AMD title some AMD fans jumped down my throat.

Oh well, at least there is Company of Heroes 2.

The load times are fucking terrible:S,the further you advandce:S
 

Nintendesert

Diamond Member
Mar 28, 2010
7,761
5
0
I think I need to go light cav to deal with their 4-5 ranged units, my melee units get destroyed by them it's not even funny.




I've started playing Rome and I hate those damn slingers and ranged units pelting my beautiful legions. I've taken to releasing the hounds on them. I keep 2-3 war dog units and just send them at the archers and have my infantry advance behind them.

I will say that unlike other total wars that if you aren't really careful you can take a good bit of casualties in this one. I should get more equitaine units, but I like dogs.
 

Phoenix86

Lifer
May 21, 2003
14,644
10
81
What's the consensus, worth buying? Seems like a ton of bugs and maybe some design flaws makes it not worth it.
 

Nintendesert

Diamond Member
Mar 28, 2010
7,761
5
0
What's the consensus, worth buying? Seems like a ton of bugs and maybe some design flaws makes it not worth it.



I'm having fun with it. It's not that buggy to me. If you know what Total War is and the short comings the games usually have and are ok with that, then it's a good bit of fun.

It's definitely no SimCity if you're worried about that.
 

BallaTheFeared

Diamond Member
Nov 15, 2010
8,115
0
71
If you have to ask I'd wait until they iron out the game, people like myself have enjoyed it regardless because of the period in which the game takes place.


I'll probably go over 100 hours played today, I'm at 96 right now.


Steamrolling as Sparta again, trying really hard this time to avoid the civil war as I'm currently engaged in several wars on mutiple fronts and waring the two major factions in Gaul and Germania.

The playable faction from Germania, forget their name, they actually took out rome and because rome had one of my cities in Macedonia they went to war with me almost instantly.

Fought them back took over Roma, PS nice lands, then got into it with the Gauls as well now they both want peace but I really want to wrap it up before Civil war breaks out because all my military buildings are in Sparta/Athens so if I lose them it could be a long while before I regain a military output. Sparta is an auto loss, so I need to figure something out... Maybe make Roma my new base of operations...
 
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datalink7

Lifer
Jan 23, 2001
16,765
6
81
What's the consensus, worth buying? Seems like a ton of bugs and maybe some design flaws makes it not worth it.

I'd give it about a 6.5/10 right now. I love the genre and total war games in general, so it is till fun for me at the 6.5 level.

It sounds like the Monday patch is going to move it into the 7 range somewhere. A lot of things apparently are getting fixed.

Personally, unless you love Total War, I'd wait at least a month or two for it to get patched up some more.
 

Skott

Diamond Member
Oct 4, 2005
5,730
1
76
Yeah, I cant see paying the full price for a beta game. I'll hold off for a while. I'm watching to see how they plan to fix battles. That 'capture the flag' feature seems to really kill the idea of battle strategy and using terrain to your advantage. Naval battles need to be fixed as well. No reason to have to auto result a fight when the very feature of actually fighting it out on the water was one of the hyped features of the game.
 

Mr. Pedantic

Diamond Member
Feb 14, 2010
5,027
0
76
What's the consensus, worth buying? Seems like a ton of bugs and maybe some design flaws makes it not worth it.

No. Braving through the bugs isn't really worth it when at the end of each turn you have to wait 5 minutes for your turn again
 

Phoenix86

Lifer
May 21, 2003
14,644
10
81
OK sounds like I'll hold off a bit, BF4 beta is around the corner anyways. I really like the total war games but some of these bugs seem too much.
 

Regs

Lifer
Aug 9, 2002
16,665
21
81
No. Braving through the bugs isn't really worth it when at the end of each turn you have to wait 5 minutes for your turn again

The Beta 2.0 patch helps with this a lot and actually makes the game more enjoyable. The graphics are better and the performance smoother, but there is now some hitching which I hope gets resolved.

The siege battles and navel battles which include dis-barking onto land and enemy ships are the two biggest issues I have right now with patch 2.0. The Campaign AI is surprisingly tough at times, and the battles, with the help of a user mod, can now last upwards of 10-18 minutes.I imagine patch 3.0 will help settle a lot more issues with AI. So I would give it a month. But I have faith they can turn this into a solid game like it was suppose to.