Rome: Total War

[General Ludd]

I've been palying this again lately, and I'm sure there's alot of other people still playing it too. So, why not have a general discussion thread?

To start things off, has anyone played any mods for the game? I'm using Total Realism right now - I don't notice much of a difference on the battlefield, and some of the new units don't seem to be skinned properly (if you zoom far enough their skin changes).

The LOTR: Fourth Age mod looks promising too.








Anyways, I also had a question. How the **** do you kill elephants? I've usually played as the Julii or Gauls so I haven't really run into them before, but now that I'm up against Carthage, I'm starting to encounter them. Where I've run into the biggest problem is in trying to siege a town that has elephants in the garrison. They can't be scared off because they just stand in the town center. I had three full groups of velites and a bunch of Pricipes and Hastati unload all of their javelins and not kill a single elephant! When that failed, I sent my Triarii up to engage them in melee, and unsurprisingly the elephants made short work of them. After breaking down the walls, and fighting my way through spearmen and cavalry my entire army of more then 1000 men was annihilated by two dozen elephants. Pretty ridiculous.

[Kassiopeia]

Aye, in the regular game the elephants are pretty damn overpowering. Which is why I like playing Carthage. Burning pigs, though, are supposed to scare them. Aim the pigs in their general direction and have the men accompanying them set them alight, with any luck they'll run right at the elephants and promptly make them go ballistic.

[Jamski]

I shall be getting this game as soon as I get my new box to play it on the w00tly settings it deserves. Then I will have something worthwhile to contribute.

-Jam

[Illuminatus]

All hail Rome: Total War !

Playing my third game as Egypt and I am still not bored. I plan on letting Rome expand this time.

To scare elephants - you can use anything flaming - archers and onagers, although archers are easier to get. Your goal is to scare the elephants so they stomp their own army while panicking. Don't attempt to kill elephants, scare them. There are also some mercenary units that have a bonus against elephants - use them as hmm, "elephant fodder". Anyway, I recommend developing a bit more, although I would advise you to get many triarii - after Marius reforms you can't build them anymore.

[General Ludd]

But my problem is that in a siege, you can't scare elephants. They just sit there waiting for you in the town center and if you manage to scare them briefly, they just rally again a second later.

[Spaced Cowboy]

Have you tried Ballistas, or some of the other, high end missle weapons?

[Illuminatus]

Originally posted by General Ludd
They just sit there waiting for you in the town center and if you manage to scare them briefly, they just rally again a second later.

Hammer them with every missile unit you have, and if you have enough units try to rush them from all four sides when you are out of ammo - you should be able to hurt them this way I hope. Interesting enough, whenever I would seige Chartage cities, elephants would be used at frontline by AI, not centered at square (are those elephants equipped with archers? that might explain it - I noticed sometimes AI stashes missle units at city square). Since they are the only unit remaining I doubt you can do anything else except kill everything but elephants and pummel them into submission with missiles. Velites are pretty weak missle units - use archers and flaming arrows plus perhaps balistas as SC suggests (I never used balistas, so I can't comment their usefulness).

[General Ludd]

I used velites because "skirmishers" are supposed to be the counter to elpehants. I wasn't at the point where I had archers or siege weapons yet... although it seems ridiculus to resort to using catapults and ballistas to kill elephants.

Interesting that you usually encounter them on the front lines, though. These wheren't the elephants with archers on them, just regular elphants. Maybe it's because I sort of bypassed the core of their army - I left three infantry groups of theirs up on the walls while I sapped a hole and marched in from the side (and sent a group hastati up the walls on a siege tower to keep the occupied) When I entered the city, all I faced up front was a group or two of iberian spear men, a cavalry group, and the general's group while the elephants just sat in the town square waiting for me. *grumble*

[Stuie]

I've been playing this ever since it came out. Current recommendations:

Rome Total Realism v4.1
Then add Unified Rome mod.
Then mod Rome back to the Senate.

Fun.

There are a bunch of other changes I've made to my personal version. Maybe I'll get around to posting them sometime...

[Spaced Cowboy]

Well I beeline for archers in my biggest town. It is the first thing that I build after I hit the 6000 pop (after the gov's house). Then I start cranking out archers like mad. Flame arrows rule!

I just sit back and let my archers pound the enemy until they get tired of that and charge me. Then the Hastati and cav hold/finish then off.

Haven't used the ballistas, but have built a few. They move real slow, so they'll slow down my army. Keep a couple around in my big cities just for show.

[Spaced Cowboy]

Okay, so how old has your leader gotten before he died. Right now my 1st leader is 67 (never had one get that old before).

[germanos]

I just bought the game, and it's awesome!

City management is a bit difficult though.


My first (and only) Faction Leader died at the ripe age of 62 and took 5 retinue-caracters with him

[Spaced Cowboy]

Don't worry you'll get tons of those guys, especially after you build the academy, and other associated buildings.

[Aramis]

Once a faction leader reaches his late 50s I start splitting up his retinue whenever the chance permits. Have a couple of retainers(?right word?) that should be about a hundred years old now.

[The diplomat]

Originally posted by germanos
City management is a bit difficult though.

I will let the AI auto-manage cities. That way you can focus almost entirely on "bonkin' some heads" as the civ2 advisor would say.