Grand Strategy Imperator: Rome - the new grand strategy from Paradox

[The Brazilian Slaughter]

I hope they adequately represent some of Rome's issues, like their problems with the Socii

 

[Fedora Master]

I hope they adequately represent some of Rome's issues, like their problems with the Socii

"A tribe of socii is demanding citizenship!"
[]Give them full citizenship (+5 Unrest, 1000 manpower)
[]Refuse them (-1 Stability)
[]What about the women though (ROME YES)

 

[Ovg]

Did they say anything about exporting a game to Crusader Kings 2 or 3? It would be fun.

Also, I can't wait for the first black jewish emperor.

 

[thesheeep]

Also, I can't wait for the first black jewish emperor empress.

 

[Life of the Party]

Hello everyone, and welcome to the fourth development diary for Imperator!

This time we’ll take a look at the different types of units an army can have in the game.

Archers
These units can assault, prefer to fight from the second row, and can be built by anyone. They are good versus infantry, but weaker versus cavalry. They are cheap and fast to build.

Camels
These units prefer to fight on flanks, and require the camel trade-goods to be built. They are quick to build, and move quickly. Strong versus lightly armored types.

Cavalry
These units prefer to fight on flanks, and require the horse trade-goods to be built. They are more expensive to build, and move quickly. Countered by heavy infantry and warelephants, but very good against everything else.

Chariots
These units can be built if you have the celtic or mauryan traditions. They are rather cheap to build. They are very good against light infantry, but weaker against other units.

Heavy Infantry
These units can assault, and require the iron trade-goods to be built. They are not cheap, but are really good against cavalry, light infantry and chariots.

Horse Archers
These units prefer to fight from the second row, and require the steppe horse trade-goods to be built. They cost similarly to cavalry, and are deadly to slower moving units.

Light Cavalry
These units prefer to fight on flanks, and require the horse trade-goods to be built. They are not very expensive to build, and move very quickly. Weak against most units, but strong against archers and light infantry.

Light Infantry
These units can assault, and can be built by everyone. They are are cheap and quick to build, but weak against every other type of unit.

Warelephants
This unit requires the elephant trade-goods be built. They are very expensive to build, but are very good against units that can not quickly run away.




One interesting thing for modders is that you can add and make as many unit-types as you’d like, and they are all written like this.

Code:
archers = {
army = yes
assault = yes
is_second_rank = yes


enable = yes

maneuver = 1
movement_speed = 2
build_cost = 2
build_time = 45


light_infantry = 2.0
heavy_infantry = 1.25
cavalry = 0.75
warelephant = 1.0
horse_archers = 1.0
archers = 1.0
}

Next week we’ll talk about pops for a bit!

 

[mondblut]

Also, I can't wait for the first black jewish emperor empress.

Are you assuming xir gender?????

 

[mondblut]

These units can assault, prefer to fight from the second row
These units prefer to fight on flanks

So it's going to have the same horrible combat as Vic and EU4 then. I bet they will also take months and half the continent's population to resolve, too. You could raise a legion in Iberia, ship it to the battlefield, watch it evaporate, raise another in its stead from the points it has just freed, and ship it still into the same battle, yay.

 

[thesheeep]

These units can assault, prefer to fight from the second row
These units prefer to fight on flanks

So it's going to have the same horrible combat as Vic and EU4 then. I bet they will also take months and half the continent's population to resolve, too. You could raise a legion in Iberia, ship it to the battlefield, watch it evaporate, raise another in its stead from the points it has just freed, and ship it still into the same battle, yay.

How else would you do it, though?
If you resolve the battles "instantly" it can only be based on an extremely simplistic model or require too much CPU - not really satisfying and very flawed (just look at Total War auto resolving ).
If you slow down time and give battles their own "phases", it would grind the flow of the game to a halt every few seconds if a battle happens somewhere.
If battles become kind of a semi-permanent long-term thing (like HoI 4), it becomes extremely abstract and not satisfying, either (at least it wasn't to me).

I know the numbers and times are weird, but to me, EUIV still has the most satisfying combat out of all similar games.

 

[mondblut]

How else would you do it, though?

CK2 has fairly quick combat resolution, it only lasted for a couple of weeks at best. And it actually fielded diverse armies, not "infantry in front, cavalry on the flanks, uh, how about some artillery in the back?" for everyfuckingbody.

I know the numbers and times are weird, but to me, EUIV still has the most satisfying combat out of all similar games.

As Burgundy-Netherlands, I had a battle against Ottomans in the steppes of Ukraine. It lasted for 2 years, involved over a million people on either side, and pretty much every regiment existing in Eurasia from every nation, some of them several times over as they were destroyed and raised again. I didn't know trench warfare was invented back in 17th century. They must have created entire industries around shipping people there. Like, early railroads or permanent ferries at regular intervals.

 

[thesheeep]

How else would you do it, though?

CK2 has fairly quick combat resolution, it only lasted for a couple of weeks at best. And it actually fielded diverse armies, not "infantry in front, cavalry on the flanks, uh, how about some artillery in the back?" for everyfuckingbody.

I wasn't even aware CK2 was any different than EUIV in that regard.
To be honest, I never played it much - having to micro all those family members just got incredibly annoying and I stopped after unifying all of Scandinavia under one Finnish flag
What exactly does it do differently? Because for me, most EUIV battles resolved as quickly as they do in CK2...

I know the numbers and times are weird, but to me, EUIV still has the most satisfying combat out of all similar games.

As Burgundy-Netherlands, I had a battle against Ottomans in the steppes of Ukraine. It lasted for 2 years, involved over a million people on either side, and pretty much every regiment existing in Eurasia from every nation, some of them several times over as they were destroyed and raised again. I didn't know trench warfare was invented back in 17th century. They must have created entire industries around shipping people there. Like, early railroads or permanent ferries at regular intervals.

That is a bit of an extreme case, though
In my hundreds of hours of playing EUIV, there hasn't been a single instance of something like that.
However, what I like about the battles in EUIV is that you can easily see the success of investing in things like morale, discipline, composition and tech - each is important, but none so much that it invalidates the rest (except for extreme tech differences, maybe).

 

[mondblut]

I wasn't even aware CK2 was any different than EUIV in that regard.
To be honest, I never played it much - having to micro all those family members just got incredibly annoying and I stopped after unifying all of Scandinavia under one Finnish flag
What exactly does it do differently? Because for me, most EUIV battles resolved as quickly as they do in CK2...

Well, for one, you can't control your troop composition. It consists of a bunch of levy gangs each fielding a little bit of everything, depending on their culture and the development level of their holdings. Even the retinue units are combined arms with like "400 archers, 100 swordsmen" or "300 knights, 200 horse archers". Then, a lot of damage is processed very quickly. Depending on general tactics that were rolled, the very first tick of combat could eat up like a third of both armies. Consequently, there is no constant influx of reinforcements from all over the world trickling into the battle and keeping it going; you'd be lucky if armies deployed in neighboring provinces could reach it in time. Armies tend to be much smaller too; other than with event-triggered hordes, a 10k troop is considered a very sizable force.

EU, by contrast, is about slowly and methodically grinding the forces down, while they are reinforced at a faster rate than they are killed. Trench warfare at its worst.

 

[Fedora Master]

If all it takes is access to trade goods, does that mean I can create Germanic Horse Archers?

 

[lophiaspis]

Only way this could be great is if they gave Doomdark free reign as with CK2. Since that is not the case, I predict it will be ruined by Johan's shitty autism.

A Rome simulator will inevitably be just a mediocre map painter unless you have a character system of equal complexity as CK2. It's not enough to have a half-assed character system: the game must be built around the character system. You must have a fully detailed simulation of Rome's internal politics to make a real difference from every other Rome game. And when you invade Gaul, the Gaulish tribes must not be generic provinces with generic attributes but each must be run by a chieftain with relationships and personality traits that Caesar would exploit. That's the only way to elevate this game to excellence but so far it seems they are missing it. Probably as mentioned because of Johan's autistic hatred of complex character systems.

Keep in mind this is a studio that made CK2 and Stellaris back to back. One of the top 10 strategy games of all time, and one of the worst strategy games ever. It's clear there is a lot of internal struggle between great and shitty designers there. Everything depends on which designer wins. This time it seems like Doomdark, their only great designer, and the designer that a game like Rome needs, lost. To me that means this game is already doomed to mediocrity.

 

[vonAchdorf]

A Rome simulator will inevitably be just a mediocre map painter unless you have a character system of equal complexity as CK2. It's not enough to have a half-assed character system: the game must be built around the character system. You must have a fully detailed simulation of Rome's internal politics to make a real difference from every other Rome game.

:hopefullyoptimistic: Unfortunately they said this won't be the case. I don't expect a much more complex system than in EU:Rome.

 

[lophiaspis]

:hopefullyoptimistic: Unfortunately they said this won't be the case. I don't expect a much more complex system than in EU:Rome.

And here's the problem with Paradox. A visionary developer would immediately see how they struck gold with the character system in CK2, and think about how they can isolate that and develop it in new titles, perhaps creating a true classic. Instead, the mediocrity known as Johan "Josh Sawyer of Strategy" Andersson wants nothing more than pointless rehash after pointless rehash of his decades old autistic bean counting simulators. It's a similar issue with Nintendo, where Miyamoto has an irrational hatred of their massively popular 2D games and just wants to make 3D Mario after 3D Mario with shitty 3D platforming gameplay that very few people buy.

 

[vonAchdorf]

I agree with you on the superiority of their character driven games, but I think there are other people, who prefer a nation centric game (with light RPG elements character elements). If a synthesis is possible (which has yet to be seen), Republican Rome would be a candidate.

 

[Life of the Party]

It's not a matter of preference. I have no problem with playing a dynasty in Crusader Kings because the medieval period was mainly about struggles between various noble families all based on the idea of feudalism. Classical antiquity however was mainly about struggles between various forms of government all based on the idea of citizenship.

Which is why you shouldn't worry about the character system as much as about the way their POP system currently works or there being only three forms of government or Rome having only one consul.

If Rome and Athens have the same form of government and the Roman one is not much different from a monarchy, then we have a real problem. A problem that will unfortunately probably be solved by a flood of DLCs.

 

[thesheeep]

A Rome simulator will inevitably be just a mediocre map painter unless you have a character system of equal complexity as CK2. It's not enough to have a half-assed character system: the game must be built around the character system. You must have a fully detailed simulation of Rome's internal politics to make a real difference from every other Rome game. And when you invade Gaul, the Gaulish tribes must not be generic provinces with generic attributes but each must be run by a chieftain with relationships and personality traits that Caesar would exploit. That's the only way to elevate this game to excellence but so far it seems they are missing it. Probably as mentioned because of Johan's autistic hatred of complex character systems.

Keep in mind this is a studio that made CK2 and Stellaris back to back. One of the top 10 strategy games of all time, and one of the worst strategy games ever. It's clear there is a lot of internal struggle between great and shitty designers there. Everything depends on which designer wins. This time it seems like Doomdark, their only great designer, and the designer that a game like Rome needs, lost. To me that means this game is already doomed to mediocrity.

Eh, I hope it will NOT feature a complex character system, or at least not one that requires you to intervene much.
To me, it was as I said the most annoying part about CK2.
If I play a grand strategy game, that is what I want to do, grand strategy. Not playing babysitter for a bunch of people like The Sims.
Who to marry, what stats to use for generals/rulers/governors, who to execute - that's the complexity of the personal drama side I'm willing to deal with. That last thing I want is to micro-manage some dude's personal vendetta against bloodline X.

 

[vonAchdorf]

Like I said, there are two player types - grand strategists and CK2 LARPers players I prefer the character driven gameplay by far, EU bores me latest after the 1st colony is founded. But I understand that other players see that differently and I'm not sure if both play styles can be combined into a game which serves both audiences well. Rome will lean towards the nation state players, even if it has slightly deeper character focus than EU.

 

[thesheeep]

I don't think they can be combined well.
If there is character driven gameplay, it will always be in the way of making the decisions or actions you want to make, annoying the strategists.
If it was so unimportant that you can mostly ignore it, the players wanting more character gameplay won't be satisfied.

From everything I read so far, this game seems to be of the second category. Good for me, then.

 

[fantadomat]

I don't think they can be combined well.
If there is character driven gameplay, it will always be in the way of making the decisions or actions you want to make, annoying the strategists.
If it was so unimportant that you can mostly ignore it, the players wanting more character gameplay won't be satisfied.

From everything I read so far, this game seems to be of the second category. Good for me, then.

Hmmm you can kind of do it,but not to full extent. You can personalise generals and rulers,but not to the CK extend. The worst thing for me in CK is the endless event spam,you can't play for more than 30 seconds without some stupid event pop up. It is real shame because there is a good game under all this shit.

 

[Trash]

EU: Rome was a game that just fell shy of being a classic. Hope they keep in those aspects that really worked. Having to manage your internal politics very carefully, the need to be wary of your succesfull generals becoming too succesfull and making sure your governers don't rebel. Can modern Pdox deliver? I kinda doubt it. Still, a new Rome is better than no new Rome.

 

[Life of the Party]

Hi and welcome to the fifth development diary for Imperator! This time we delve into the population mechanics.

The population in the game is divided into population units, or “pop” for short, just like Vicky or Rome1.

Each individual pop has its own religion, culture and happiness . So yes, there are minorities in Imperator!

While there are ways to increase happiness of pops, including ideas, inventions and access to trade-goods, they tend to be less happy if they are not of the same culture-group, or if they belong to a different religion. Happiness impacts two thing on the pop, first of all, a pops happiness directly affects how productive they are. Secondly, low happiness increases unrest in a city.

There are four different types of pops in the game.

• Citizens - They provide research and commerce income. These represent the patricians in Rome, and nobility in monarchies
  
• Freemen - They provide manpower. The plebs of Rome is included in this group.
  
• Tribesmen - These provide a tiny amount of manpower and tax income. These are the barbarians or uncivilized parts of your areas.
  
• Slaves - These provide tax income

So how do you get a more pops in a city?

First of all, there is always a single pop either in growth or decline, depending on the population growth of the city. When this pop is fully grown or totally dead, either a current pop is picked for death, or a new random pop is created that will slowly grow.

Terrain, Civilization value, amount of pops in the city and access to trade-goods impact the growth in a city.

Secondly, you can also gain pops through warfare. As you sack cities you will take some of their pops back to your main capital, and your provincial capitals as slaves.

One other aspect of conquest is that when a city formally becomes yours, citizens becomes freemen, and freemen becomes slaves.


If you need more citizens or freemen of your pops, you can always promote pops to a higher class of society, where promoting a slave or tribesmen to freemen currently have a base price of 10 religious power, and promoting a freemen to citizen costs 10 oratory power.

If you permanently want to increase a pops happiness, you can always spend some religious power to convert them to the state religion.

We’ll talk a fair bit more about pops in the development diary about colonisation and internal movement later on.

Of course, any modder can define how many pop-types they want and what they are used for freely. Here is an example of the freemen poptype.


Code:
freemen = {
local_manpower = 0.05
can_promote_to = citizen
demotes_to = slaves
}


Another cool modding aspect is that everything that costs power, manpower or money use the same “price”-mechanic internally, so you can base everything on money if you so desire. Here is a few scripts from the price database.


Code:
freemen_promotion = {
religious = 10
}

assault = {
manpower = 2
military = 20
}

send_gift = {
scaled_gold = 0.2
}


Next week, we’ll be back looking at the economy system.

 

[Life of the Party]

Another DD and another gameplay mechanic that is entirely balanced and designed around using your magic mana points. And that is really upseting. How can it be that everything player would do in I:R has to involve using mana resources? It's wrong direction, I don't want I:R to be EU4 in ancient times.

I don't think you'll love our games from now on.

There's also this:

https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/foru...a-imperator-is-the-sequel-to-eu-rome.1107428/

 

[The Brazilian Slaughter]

First of all, there is always a single pop either in growth or decline, depending on the population growth of the city. When this pop is fully grown or totally dead, either a current pop is picked for death, or a new random pop is created that will slowly grow.

This seems retarded, can't they just do proper pop growth?