Rome Total War: Overview - The Battle Map, Multiplayer, and Historical Battles
The Battle Map
Tactical battles showcase the Real-Time-Strategy half of Rome Total War. They are initiated in the Campaign Game when either when the player attacks or is attacked by another faction and the player elects to fight on the Battle Map rather than allow the computer to automatically resolve the battle. They can also be played through a Custom Battle, Quick Battle, or in Multiplayer. In fact these latter modes of play consist entirely of tactical-level battles on the Battle Map.
As noted previously, battles fought on the Battle Map are done in real time. However, the player may pause at any time and and issue orders to their units, check their status, and verify where they may be moving to. This makes the game very forgiving for those not accustomed to RTS gameplay.
The Battle Map is rendered in beautifully detailed graphics, featuring naturally rolling hills, tall grass, trees, brush, rock formations, and even human-structures such as roads, farms and temples. If played out as part of a Campaign, the terrain on the Battle Map reflects that of the area on the Strategic Map where the battle was initiatied. For example: if the battle is fought at a river-crossing on the Strategic Map, there will be a river in the center of the Battle Map. This adds an element of strategic thinking to the game, in that the player can choose to attack in areas where their forces will most benefit from it on the Battle Map. In Custom and Multiplayer battles the player may choose the terrain in which the battle will be fought.
Units are rendered down to each individual soldier, and their sizes are scalable to allow users to field larger or smaller numbers of soldiers, which makes the game very friendly to players with older computers.
The player may command up to a maximum of 20 units in a battle. It is possible to have more of your units (and of allied factions) join in the battle. However, these troops will be under the control of the computer. The player may disable this feature so no computer control allies enter the game.
Factors such as weather and terrain do make a difference in Rome Total War, as they directly affect the ability of units to fight. Some units will gain bonuses in certain terrain, and other penalties. High ground will increase the range of missile weapons. Rain or fog will decrease their range.
In addition to this, many units suffer penalties when attacking certain units, or receive bonuses when fighting others. For example, spear-armed infantry units receive a bonus against cavalry, however sword-armed infantry units receive a bonus against spear-armed infantry. This reflects the rock-paper-scissors nature of ancient arms systems. The skillful use of these factors will often determine victory or defeat.
A key factor in every battle is that of morale, which is influenced by many different things. Among them are how tired a unit is, whether a friendly or enemy general is near, whether there are enemies on their flanks or behind them, how many losses it has taken, and whether other friendly units are fleeing the battle.
Battles are rarely won or lost due to simply killing every soldier of the enemy army. Rather they are won by routing the enemy from the field (however, it is often possible to hunt down the fleeing enemy soldiers and kill them all before they can escape).
Multiplayer
Rome Total War features multiplayer play as well as singleplayer gameplay. This comes in the form of LAN battles as well as Internet play that is hosted for no charge by GameSpy. The entire online interface is built into the game, so no extra applications are needed to immediately jump online and start playing. It is a credit to the game that even though I write this several years after its release, there is still a thriving multiplayer community on the Internet. As previously stated, all battles are fought on the same Battle Map used in the singleplayer game.
Multiplayer does have different options to determine the resolution of battles however. Most common is the Last Man Standing game type, in which the only player who remains on the map wins. Another option is the Scored Resolution, where the winner is determined by a score calculated by the computer based on the type and number of enemies each player killed. Typically this option is only used in free-for-alls or battles where three or more teams are competing against one another.
Up to 8 players can participate in a single game, and anywhere from 2-8 teams are possible. In the absence of human players, the computer can be given control of any number of factions as well. So for example it is possible for a team of humans to play a team of computer-controlled factions.
Each player has a single faction to choose units from. A player may choose any faction to play, and the same faction may be represented multiple times in a single team. However, a faction used on one team cannot be selected by the opposing team.
The units comprising each army are chosen by the players prior to play. Each player is given an equal amount of points (called denarii after the monetary unit used in the single player game), with which to select them. This denarii amount is chosen by the player who hosts the game. As well as simply purchasing units, these denarii can also be used to upgrade units with better weapons, armor, and experience.
The Hosting player also chooses what map the battle will take place on, and can also set conditions such as the game type, weather, time of day, and whether there will be a time limit. The Host also determines the difficulty level that the AI will play at if a computer-controlled faction is in the battle.
Historical Battles
The player also has the option of playing several historical battles. These can either be played by a single-player as a Custom Battle is, or in Multiplayer. The single-player battles are:- Asculum
- Carrhae
- Cynocephalae
- Gergovia
- Raphia
- Telamon
- Teutoborg Forest
- The Siege of Sparta
- Lake Trasimene
- The Trebia
- Asculum
- Gergovia
- Bibracte
- Carrhae
- Raphia
- The Siege of Sparta
- Lake Trasimene
- The Trebia