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I only start getting crashes at really, really late game - 1878, for example, and theres only a few massive Empires left.

1.4 has given the micro-states some real teeth now - the Italian states for example seem hells bent on recreating the Roman Empire at the moment, and they seriosly fethed up my sea trade for a few years before they finally accepted a ceasefire.

Tech trading also seems to be much more prevalent now, especially when someone wants access to your lands so they can go smack some upstart on the other side of your territory that you dont happen to be interested in.

The game is actually starting to sound like it is getting better. That is a very good sign. It is a shame that my computer cannot run it though. Damn, just when they start to make the AI semi decent too.

Naval battles are the real shiny bit in 1.4, IMO.

There's a lot less wackiness and random sinking, and I've yet to have my line crash into itself (as they frequently would in earlier versions), even when performing tight turns amidst fields of flotsam. Almost every single magazine hit has been positive or at least unobjectionable, which is also a big improvement.

The only complaint I can think of thus far is that chain shot might be too good now, especially in the hands of someone skilled with small squadrons of frigates. Since the AI does not fit that criterion, it's difficult to tell. All I know is that frigates are downright dangerous now (as they should be) and can properly handle galleons and 4th rates with some skilled maneuvering.

It's a pity there is no way to transition to Constitutional Monarchy from Absolute without going through a double revolution (AM -> Republic -> CM). While I can agree that a revolution is needed to go from any monarchy to republic, it seems reasonable to allow an AM to deliberately change to a CM (perhaps if discontent is on the brink of forcing a revolution, you can say "okay okay, i'll give up some power, don't behead me!!" instead.)

As India I'm purplexed to notice that my trade partners don't declare war on me.

Well now I'm running in to some shit like the fact that as the Ottomans (though this also happened with the Poles) I can't see my minister for India. When I select India in the policy window I retain a view of Europe and I get a portrait of my minister but switching to the Ministers view he isn't there to be viewed or replaced.

Another thing that I just thought of. If the AI is being slowly improved, It may result in NTW being a better game (if not a bit of a cash cow) as a result and that at least is a good thing. Frankly though, they should not leave games broken and buggy. Though many devs cannot balance for shit (*cough Relic cough*), it says something about you if your willing to leave a game in a broken, twisted sorry state.

Brother-Captain Gaius wrote:Naval battles are the real shiny bit in 1.4, IMO.

There's a lot less wackiness and random sinking, and I've yet to have my line crash into itself (as they frequently would in earlier versions), even when performing tight turns amidst fields of flotsam. Almost every single magazine hit has been positive or at least unobjectionable, which is also a big improvement.

The only complaint I can think of thus far is that chain shot might be too good now, especially in the hands of someone skilled with small squadrons of frigates. Since the AI does not fit that criterion, it's difficult to tell. All I know is that frigates are downright dangerous now (as they should be) and can properly handle galleons and 4th rates with some skilled maneuvering.

Alas, chain shot now outranges round shot and is now absurdly capable of taking down masts from *long range*. It's all well and good that frigates are dangerous now (it was ridiculous that fleets of frigates would fall to a few galleons in 1.3) but now *third-rates* can be forced into surrendering by fleets of *sloops* because they got demasted.

Is there any way to get all those special units in the "Elite Forces" version without buying the whole game from Steam?

Another patch has been released on October 5, simultaneous with the new Warpaths DLC. Various bug fixes, crash fixes, performance enhancements, and balancing, is the short version. Steam has the full summary as always.

Yea and now my program manages to CTD every time before the opening cinema in spite of two reinstalls... ffffff

does it make indian and ottoman trade vessels not suck?

If you're referring to the India faction trade vessels, no, they still suck.

If you're referring to indiamen, no, they still suck.

Indiamen (and other merchants) should suck, though, when trying to fight an actual navy.

Then again, so should most pirates.

Not really. Yeah, merchantmen should generally lose to a 5th rate or two, in an academic sense (i.e., not taking into account particular tactics, maneuvering, etc). Indiamen in particular were known for being relatively well-armed however - correct me if I'm wrong, but that even included some double-deckers (not counting any lighter guns on the upper works), whereas frigates of the era were almost always single-deckers (ridiculous in-game 5th rate model notwithstanding).

In game, the indiamen are more poorly-armed than a friggin' sloop.

How it should be balanced, IMO, is to either have multiple types of indiamen available (i.e., "light" indiamen with firepower comparable to a 6th rate, and "heavy" indiamen more in line with a 4th rate or super-frigate) or compromise with a generic indiaman of roughly 5th rate firepower. The downside then becoming a serious lack of maneuverability (as poor as a lineship - they're constructed similarly after all) and an absolute bare-bones skeleton crew - perhaps limiting the ship to only loading and firing a single broadside at a time, rather than the concurrent operation of both broadsides that the game currently allows, in addition to just having a very low number of crew.

Since it's currently 24.99 in celebration of Warpath's release, should I pick up ETW? I rather liked the demo, but the complaints about bugs and balance issues made me decide to hold off on buying it.

Executor32 wrote:Since it's currently 24.99 in celebration of Warpath's release, should I pick up ETW? I rather liked the demo, but the complaints about bugs and balance issues made me decide to hold off on buying it.

I'd call it a bargain, given the age of the game. It should be quite playable, at this stage. Of course you're talking to someone who owns it and still hasn't played it.

Executor32 wrote:Since it's currently 24.99 in celebration of Warpath's release, should I pick up ETW? I rather liked the demo, but the complaints about bugs and balance issues made me decide to hold off on buying it.

I'd honestly say go for it. Unlikely that it will drop to 19.99 anytime in the near future and MOST of the egregious memory leaks and CTDs have been dealt with ( I haven't had a CTD since 1.4 came out and only one since 1.3). Meanwhile the enemy now knows how to invade amphibiously (freakin Martha Confederacy started picking off my Caribbean islands last game) and will negotiate in a smarter and more realistic sense (they keep the trade agreements even if they hate you because its good money for them too).

Anyway that would be my recommendation.

Brother-Captain Gaius wrote:Not really. Yeah, merchantmen should generally lose to a 5th rate or two, in an academic sense (i.e., not taking into account particular tactics, maneuvering, etc). Indiamen in particular were known for being relatively well-armed however - correct me if I'm wrong, but that even included some double-deckers (not counting any lighter guns on the upper works), whereas frigates of the era were almost always single-deckers (ridiculous in-game 5th rate model notwithstanding).

Armament isn't all, though: indiamen were heavily armed, yes, but they had only tiny crews of civilian sailors. Military ships had much larger crews, allowing them to work the sails and guns at the same time, and they were typically trained much better (and had more officers), meaning both more accurate gunfire and much smoother maneuvers in combat.

Brother-Captain Gaius wrote:In game, the indiamen are more poorly-armed than a friggin' sloop.

Well, ETW doesn't take into account the above influences, so I guess they had to make due

I know. Hence why I suggested severe maneuvering and firing penalties for indiamen, emphasizing that they are not warships and should not be treated as such.

Currently, however, they are completely incapable of defending themselves which is pretty silly, especially since fluyts and galleons are so powerful. Both of those actually give a frigate pause when engaging, and an indiaman should too.

The problem here is that CA mistook an Indiaman for a generic tradeship. Hence those of us who know a bit about history are annoyed, while everybody else who thinks "big lumbering easy prey trader" does not care.

Thanas wrote:The problem here is that CA mistook an Indiaman for a generic tradeship. Hence those of us who know a bit about history are annoyed, while everybody else who thinks "big lumbering easy prey trader" does not care.

They honestly ended up using it as the generic tradeship which they could fix the whole issue by renaming the unit "Merchantman" and giving you the ability to build a heavy Indiamen (probably about where they have the Fluyt at in the game, itself another oddity given its relative firepower) for the major European powers.

^But doing so would make the english even more hilariously game-breaking than they already are.
And if you let others build heavy indiamen, you add another historical inaccuracies.

I mean, I am pretty annoyed about many of the mistakes in the game, but I can recognize one when it is necessary for the game.

I picked up my campaign again and have played for about another 20 turns now. The 1.5 patch seems to have made text slightly less readable and introduced some other interesting bugs along with its fixes.

Like if you leave ships at anchor in a battle with the enemy miles out of sight they'll randomly have people die and guns be destroyed. Apparently grape shot is now utterly worthless against all targets: I fired 3 2nd rates full broadsides of grape shot from 0 range into a brig and didn't kill a single guy, and I've tried small ships vs big ships and all other permutations but no combination ever produces more than 2 casualties.

AI seems stupider in battles now, although a bit smarter in the campaign.

Game's been updated again. Single fix listed, artillery shot fixes or some such.

Now that I've finally finished FO3, I can give it a whirl.