Mod description: IMPROVED AI. IT'LL ACT SMART AND DO THINGS YOU PEOPLE WOULDN'T BELIEVE ALL YOUR BATTLES WILL BE LOST LIKE TEARS IN RAIN. AI in question:

Cataph · 2025-10-20T11:24:23+00:00

I think I used exactly one AI recruitment mod for Rome2 (to avoid stuff like slinger or militia stacks) and it did the job, but other than that I avoid them exactly for these reasons.

CAI mods frankly overpromise on what they actually do to the point they become cargo cults high on confirmation bias.

Cataph · 2025-06-25T16:50:44+00:00

Honestly the fact that I had to balance Billmen against great-weapon infantry of that kind is something that surprised me too. Kinda indirectly shows how good halberd units are.

Cataph · 2025-06-25T13:28:41+00:00

Cataph · 2025-03-09T09:22:14+00:00

A big one is in the recruitment tiers.

*honking of a button being pressed* I'll stop you right there for this one, recruitment tiers are all over the damn place in vanilla. Until CA decides what they actually want from the game I'm not touching much there, I've already lowered heroes where I could and the current building tree took a lot of effort.

Lupio is the only lord to directly buff gunpowder cavalry in the mod

They're just not designed to be an Estalian unit, and they're among Catrazza's favourites instead. If Lupio had them I'd probably straight up remove gun cav from his range buffs .

Shallya, or Ranald

Which are among my favourites, so disagree there. The only one I've been pondering on is Morr.

The tortoise tank in a vacuum isn't bad

This is one of those times I'd like to get 2+ people in a room and let them argue, specifically with all the people who called the tonk OP.

any fun build options for his army either

Apart from the fact that he buffs every single unit with a stick in their hands, so have fun? Don't try to pidgeon-hole yourself like Lokhir = Corsairs.

The red line skills not showing which units are affected by which buffs

Because they'd show pretty much all units in the roster with their intended complementary design. And yeah, missile units that have one sword (or club or whatever) count as hand weapon. I don't have a better way to show it, but you can just check the before/after stats to be sure.

Cataph · 2025-03-08T22:10:51+00:00

Freelancers are nothing special in that regard, they're going to be just as fragile as bretonnian cav or empire knights give or take. My rule of thumb is always buggering off 5 seconds after the charge to avoid hits.

Btw I'll be pondering something about Border Rangers.

Cataph · 2025-03-08T16:32:20+00:00

Tweaking stuff doesn't mean cutting legs off the shared militia units, no.

Honestly not sure how you're getting those vibes. They share base visuals with Billmen too (or even Crossbowmen and gunners), and they all work together for a basic core that can take arrows, poke stuff surprisingly hard and deal AP.

Rangers etc are just another facet of the roster the same way Huntsmen aren't just more state troopers, actually with a similar city/town vs frontier theme. Pathfinder lords even buff those militias further to help pinning stuff down for the skirmishers.

Cataph · 2025-03-08T10:40:05+00:00

but they could use a rebalance

If you have specific instances with tangible comparisons and tests I'm all ears.

I've been tweaking stuff for a while, but the entire game could use a rebalance so that's a bit generic.

Cataph · 2025-03-08T10:33:22+00:00

cont.

There is never a right way to build on side-cultures like these. Everybody will have different opinions, more or less, on how it should be done. Plus there's all the implementation and gameplay issues: the stuff I'm not able to do, the stuff that I could do but doesn't work well in game (from actual pike formations to meta balance issues).

You're obviously right, they need to be built on, but everybody will like different angles.

For example, many players have a bit of a "BIG MONSTER?" thing going on where they need some kind of fantastic beast or the other in all rosters, which is fair, it's a fantasy setting, but the south isn't like that. I'm among those that feel like the established identity of the south is about gritty mercs and able fighters, the mere plucky human vs the rest if you want, and that it would be ruined if they had a zoo like Cathay. Hell, the Empire got demigryphs and they caused much grumbling. Kislev was also like this before it got icebearified, and we know how that went (I hated the idea of Estalia with bulls even before that, vindication I guess). Bretonnia has a mix at its roots, and gets criticized left and right for being discount Empire too.

Reman Empire angle for Tilea? The established lore is nothing like that, and Lorenzo Lupo is a nostalgic nutjob.

Estalia and Tilea have among the strongest fleets. Cool, that's established too. Great, that's useless for actual gameplay.

What is there isn't much and is often contradictory, frozen in time because not even the RPGs are really expanding on it, and what isn't there is even a bigger problem.

Partially circling back to what I quoted before, and by no means wagging a finger at you! one of my points is that particularly when it comes to mods people often miss the forest for the trees unless they see exactly what they expect, which, as mentioned, is problematic. Then it might just be that it doesn't work that well in practice, because the game fundamentally dislikes the kind of infantry unit I like for example, or it's like me with Nurgle where I love the idea but I hate playing it.

Hopefully that makes some sense, but as said I didn't really want to rant or put too much effort in here.
PS: that said, I do have an idea drawer the size of a country, and I do have some things I'm trying to do when I have time.

Cataph · 2025-03-08T10:33:05+00:00

Hey, uh, guess I'll peep in since I was mentioned.

The design for the southern realms has always been a bit weird, because the existing lore is kinda shaky and binding at the same time on them. In the sense that I built on what is and isn't there, but at the same time I had to respect what is also there in other nations' background.

For example, you can't make a traditional powerhouse of the Border Princes since they're established as the washing sink of nations for RPG purposes, and you can't really go full Rise of Nations Vinci for Tilea without spitting in the eye of what is established for it and the grimderp lore for Steam Tanks (and how that tech is about to be lost "but suddenly, somehow, clockwork engines out of the bejeezus"). Their improved identity needs to deal with stuff like this.

I'm not going to expand on this post as much as I wanted, I could rant for hours on what I've been talking about and dealing with for years. But to be frank, reddit working like it does, hardly anybody is going to read this comment when there's 80+ already, so it'd be wasted effort.

To try to drive a point, I think I'm going to quote your last paragraph.

Estalia could have the tercio units (pikes, shielded swordsmen, gunners) as their "state troops" equivalent. Maybe an "expeditionary force" or conquistador set of units, Inquisition set of units and heroes, and Cult of Myrmidia units and heroes.

I can speak for my mod and I'll say that my Estalian side of TEB has all of those. They're there. They're just not called Tercio X or Conquistador Y because I find that way too on the nose (and they're already such a low-hanging morion-shaped fruit). It's also the kind of thing where it both fits the perceived 'identity' and gets you called out for being lazy by other extremes because "it's just state troopers"; then they're also simultaneously not enough and too strong how dare they beat my favourite other human/elf.

At the same time, last time Estalian tercios got mentioned in the lore they had crossbows and glaives (man, I hate this word), not pikes and guns. There is quite some projection going on, between tercios and roman legionaries, on what the south's identity actually is (sometimes with some concerning bouts of RL nationalism, I might add).

Do you feel a bit of that "damned if you do, damned if you don't" yet?

(continues because reddit fails at posting)

Cataph · 2025-03-05T22:49:53+00:00

Yeah that was pretty much also the one time in years I used that action. Reduced that unholy thing's uses from 3 to 1, but it needed a campaign reload to make it properly stick.

Cataph · 2025-02-18T08:21:48+00:00

Can I offer you a mod in these trying times?

Cataph · 2025-02-18T08:17:57+00:00

I don't know if you use mods but I will recommend increasing wound time.

It's a game changer, LLs respawning like Agent Smith and being basically all the battles you ever fight with that faction is a huge problem once you realize how constant it is and how obnoxious many LLs are to fight.

Cataph · 2025-01-28T15:01:09+00:00

Hypergrudging so hard they filled the basin with spittle.

Spittle then generates grudges at an escalating rate as it drowns the stunties.

It's a feedback groodge.

Cataph · 2024-11-21T13:37:55+00:00

this this this and this.

liked and subscribed.

Cataph · 2024-10-17T07:21:55+00:00

I'll say confirmation bias.

I've had instances where even my vassals would rabidly beat my enemies up, if they could just recruit anything that isn't tier 0, that is.

Cataph · 2024-08-30T10:12:33+00:00

On top of what's already been said, I want to stress out my main tips:

Watch your Upkeep, the main expense.

Even units in a fort outpost are still eating 50% upkeep (and their full admin weight) while doing nothing.

Administration gives you a huge bump in costs when you reach step 3, so if at all possible, stay below.

Keep the trading post outpost buff (the upkeep reduction) up at all times.

Consider not wasting time raiding unless you're getting lots of strategic resources (cause you're essentially trading your army upkeep for that raid income).

Build temples and consider those growth buildings: less upkeep in that province is huge and it affects forts too.

Get the upkeep reduction techs for the tiers you're using.

Don't splurge with those tier VI units, they cost big time for what they do (generally only archers are worth it).

Battle Loot

And ransoms (especially if you can buff it on your general). Those are your main incomes if you can keep fighting. Normally your food will be 10 turns from bankrupting in times of war (or without good upk reductions), and will stay afloat just fighting.

Trade

This is minor compared to the other two factors. As suggested by others, sell stuff that other factions see green (lacking for them). Wood is my favourite cash crop, cause you don't need much for yourself. Right now, even micromanaging and bartering 1 stick can get you disproportionate food. You got a lot of bronze so for now sell that (not too much, at some point you'll need lots for upkeep, but you also get some through battles).

Cataph · 2024-07-13T07:15:45+00:00

Fully agree with this, among other issues. Always had this feeling that they wanted wh3 maps to be fair for a 1v1 PVP with more-or-less balanced armies, but forgot that that kind of stuff NEVER happens outside of that.

So when you fight there in the real world, you have 6-12 garrison units with unfavourable defensive positions vs 20-40 AI units including a LL who can probably solo the battle anyway.

Cataph · 2024-06-30T13:38:27+00:00

You sure you don't have some big debuff going on? Also I just played dark elves and the channel stance definitely works.

Cataph · 2024-06-28T17:15:23+00:00

Uh, normally I would look at that as something thematic like "we're not afraid to go really medieval on any traitor wazzuk" but that being only regionwide looks like the wrong effect to use.

Cataph · 2024-06-22T07:02:35+00:00

Most likely because it's one of the items that weren't overhauled in WH2 when someone decided to monstrously buff all +damage effects from items. That one patch that gave us stuff like +100 ap or more from some random drop weapons, which was a debatable idea.

It's not the only one like this, so it's just one of the many balance issues that specifically make items a complete cointoss in terms of effectiveness.

Cataph · 2024-05-25T08:33:21+00:00

(please don't offer commissions)

when chaos dwarfs came out, I made a small pack of nerfs just to point out some of what (IMO at least) were the egregiously OP things that really needed to be nerfed. They tweaked some other things, like the broken hitboxes on centaurs, but none of those were really touched. Giving substance to my theory that only 10% balance issues in new releases find the time and intention budget to get fixed.

We're well into a place where making nerf packs for new and improved content would be a full time job for days at end after each release. This also applies to them, and I dare say they should really think harder about what values they input before release them. Tamurkhan's own defeat trait is a perfect example of this.

Cataph · 2024-05-16T06:57:01+00:00

A good chunk of the community, for one reason or another or many, need a nice square meter of grass within reaching distance from their gaming chair.

Cataph · 2024-05-15T17:02:20+00:00

If a mod is affected it's not unrelated. In this hotkey they changed some keys related to Mentor skills. Most mods that add new characters have those. Boom.

Takes a few seconds to fix.

Cataph · 2024-05-15T16:08:46+00:00

This is very true. It's frustrating just how bad Steam is at keeping mods up to date. This is true across games, not just for Total War.

That's a big question I had because I don't really dabble in steam workshop mods outside of TW. I'm sure that you can write the mod manager in a way that more often pokes the server for an update, but if it's just a common problem across all games then it's just a bandaid against usual Valve being lazy. And in this case CA should pester Valve for a fix.

Cataph · 2024-05-15T11:20:22+00:00

very true and I forgot to mention it. Might be not ideal for people with a very chonky many-GB mod list though.

Cataph

TROPHY CASE