I've never bothered with changing state religion or government type in any TW game. I just never found the necessity or advantage to doing it.

Could it be that the player has higher unrest penalties in hard campaign versus normal? Because despite every effort to control it, unrest was an issue in this game for me. I built cultural and church buildings everywhere, as well as used dragoons for garrisons and missionaries to convert.

Yes, you get more public order penalties when you play on any level above "normal". That's part of the reason why I don't bother playing on any level above "normal". It's just an arbitrary way to make the game harder.

Thanks, yeah I should have played on medium, it would have made for a better game I think. If I play another one when this one is done I think I will go M/M instead of H/H.

The hard battle AI is fine. I know they get bonuses, but it makes for closer battles. But the campaign AI I think I should have on medium. The sheer number of battles I've fought has been madness, at least 6 per turn, every turn. Two or three on the AI's turn and then another 3 or 4 in my turn, both against nations and against rebels. Admittedly this results in highly experienced generals, and I have 6 full stack armies with level 3 veterancy on all units. But I wouldn't mind a little slower pace to the warfare.

Wow. Yeah, that is insane! I've never played a campaign in any TW title with that much combat.

Yep, things are quieting down now, but that's only because we've eliminated most European opposition. France should be the next to fall, leaving only Russia, OPM (one province minor) Sweden, OPM Austria (my very petulant Protectorate. As Prussia I just had to add insult to injury and protectorate them, even though I don't see much value in doing so, more of a role-playing thing), TPM Venice and what's left of Russia. Everyone else has been absorbed in to the Greater Germany Co-Prosperity Sphere.

I guess expanding in to colonial lands might be worthwhile at this point. As my navy is now growing, it seems the time is right.

I played the vanilla Prussia game until about 1775 and decided to wrap it up. Downloaded and installed Darthmod 8.0.1. Early impressions are good, though I only played maybe 10 turns so far. Too early for a well rounded impression, but I like the increased range of ships, the fact that any ship can generate trade, and it seems as though agent traits were 'fixed'. Now I don't know that anything was wrong, but I found it very difficult to train up my agents in vanilla. It seemed very rare to get any traits or increase subterfuge skill, even with agents that had many successful missions. In Darthmod it seems much better.

Too early to know how different the campaign AI is. I chose France for this run. All was going well until England declared on us and now we are stretched thin, but these are the sorts of things that make the game fun and interesting. I do like that the enemy AI get much improved garrisons to prevent me from walking right over them.

As for battle AI, I really can't see much difference. I like the smoke, increased musket range, new battle sounds and larger and more varied units, but I wonder about the author's claim of vastly improved BAI.

The thing that I really don't understand is naval auto-resolve. I'll give an example. I have a navy that is comprised of 6 veteran fifth rates, 2 sixth-rates and a couple brigs and sloops. Embarked is a very fine admiral with half a dozen positive traits as well as a couple ancillaries. The enemy is a single sixth-rate with no admiral. To avoid spending 10 minutes actually playing the battle to sink a single ship, I chose auto-resolve. We sink the ship but lose like 6 ships in the process. How does that single ship sink half my navy of superior ships?

The same thing happens with auto resolving naval battles in Napoleon TW.


I have no evidence but my impression is that there is an extra penalty for auto resolving naval battles in both Empire and Napoleon. I think the developers did this to encourage people to play more 3D naval battles.

Yes, I agree. Typical CA gamey BS.

Well that's disappointing. I had a quick look about for a mod to 'fix' it, but turned up nothing. In the Prussia game it really didn't matter because I had no navy to speak of until the second half of the 18th century. But as France, at war with England, a navy is essential, but I'm not keen on fighting countless 3D naval battles quite frankly. Maybe if I knew what I was doing I'd be a bit err, keener.

What really sucked is the coop campaign mod that was made for Empire because it didn't allow you to fight 3D battles. You could only autoresolve which meant that you needed to avoid naval battles unless you had an overwhelming superiority.


In TW: Empire I found a navy to be absolutely essential if you played as Spain, Netherlands, Britain or France. All of the other factions I ignored having a navy except for trade ships.

What's the single hardest campaign you've ever played in any TW title?


Hands down the toughest challenge for me was playing as the Western Roman Empire in TW: Attila.

Yep no doubt. My navy is more or less gone at this point. I'm in about 1710 in this Darthmod France game. I chose 2 turns per year FWIW.

I started off the game by attacking Savoy. They fell easily enough. Due to alliances I found myself at war with Genoa, so took Genoa from them. And then we took Wurtenburg because I wanted to expand the borders slightly and get their school. These wars resulted in war due to alliances with virtually every western European nation. But I didn't want to expand on the continent any more at this point, so went turtle and concentrated on the colonies.

But soon England DoW'd me and that's not good. Immediately they were all over my navy. They sunk both of the trade fleets I had just sent to Ivory Coast and my Home Fleet that was raiding, wish I had kept them in port! And then they landed a full stack in French Guyana, which has a gold mine that I had just upgraded. Yeah, enjoy the ducats you English kniggits!

And then they invaded my sleepy French Canadian provinces, one turn after I had declared on Iroqouis. As France I got a mission to take Michigan, Algonquin and a Cherokee province. Upon completion, my protectorate Louisiana would become part of France, so seemed worth a punt. But of course now we are stretched too thin, as my colonial army was in it's infancy and not strong enough to fight on both fronts. But we set about correcting that and went all Medieval on England's American territory.

In a series of close fought battles we managed to push England back as far as Virginia while also making gains against the Iroquois. Speaking of which, the natives can put up a hell of a fight. They really did a number on me in a battle that I entered with confidence and favorable terrain. We won, but at too high a cost. I think that army had an elite general who survived the battle and was later assassinated.

And then England accepted peace, good thing too as they were blockading my ports and we were closing in on bankruptcy. Relieved, I aggressively moved the majority of my colonial army toward Michigan with a view to sweeping through and then down to the Cherokee nation to complete the mission and integrate Louisiana, then Iroquois outflanked me and is now living in my former cities Philadelphia and Algonquin. Nice move you sneaky bastages!

And then Mughals took my colony in India. Oh well, less to worry about.

I'm really enjoying this run, thanks Barkhorn for suggesting the mod. These games are quite fun when everything is so finely balanced on the edge. When you know you don't have enough troops, enough money and you're praying that the enemy doesn't land another stack.

For me I'd say it was a Teutonic Order H/H Stainless Steel game in M2. They have the coolest units and headgear, but very hard to get going against the pagan menace, and then the Mongols arrived. Nightmares!

Apparently it seems that most TW fans want a Medieval 3 for the next release by Creative Assembly. I concur!


I have zero interest in this whole Warhammer thing.

Medieval 3 sounds fun. I really enjoyed 2. There aren't many time periods that CA have not already touched on that I would have any interest in, honestly. The only subject I would really like to see, that they haven't already done, is the American Civil War. It would probably have to be more like Napoleon because of the narrow focus, but if done right I think it could be really fun!

Based on how great "Fall of the Samurai" turned out, CA could most definitely make a really good TW: ACW but like you said, the main issue would be limited scope. You'd only have two playable factions.

Solution - have two campaigns, the historical Union vs Confederacy and a second fictional campaign where it's every state for itself! Maybe include a few Napoleon TW style mini-campaigns that focus on a single theatre.

Yeah, In Napoleon, I only really ever played the historical campaigns. I can't really speak to the grand campaign for that title. I got a lot of enjoyment out of the smaller scenarios, though. I really liked the way I had to alter my playing style to accomplish the objectives in a limited time and with limited forces.

They could probably do something similar with the ACW and get a good result. It would be interesting to see how the real time battles were done, since the real life armies were so much larger than your average total war army. I wonder if it would even be feasible to have correctly sized armies? As far as general characters go, there are tons of interesting and famous generals who could be represented.

If they broke the war down into detailed campaigns the relatively short time period covered would be less of an issue. I think, though, that for the strategic map portion to remain relevant it would need a serious re-working. Perhaps a focus on army supply and logistics and the resources that certain towns offered as a strategic consideration, and less on the general economy like in other TW titles.

I would love to see it, and think it could be done, but I don't think it will be.

I would certainly like another Medieval game. And the Civil War too, so I support both of those ideas. There is a Civil War mod for Empire but I haven't tried it. But I don't think an American Civil War TW game will be made. The limited scope will be a turn off for a large section of potential buyers I would image. I don't know how much interest there might be outside of the US. It could be made more interesting and challenging by introducing things like lines of supply and the narrower focus could be offset by new features and game mechanics. New terrain features like sunken roads, creek beds and so forth could bring a new tactical dimension. The TW formula works, but I would like to see a bit of a re-imagining of the mechanics.

As for Medieval, that would be welcome.