Rand Denner
Recruit
In no particular order:
• You can't seem to order a unit of my troops to focus attacks on a specific unit of enemy troops. This is a constant frustration leading to unnecessary losses.
I just had an entire unit of cataphracts with a huge line of completely unprotected enemy archers in front of them, charge straight through them and a further 150 meters to pointlessly attack enemy spear infantry and get bogged down, losing units while enemy archers shot at my troops unmolested. The cavalry were 100m on the other side of the archers (250m away from the infantry) when I gave them the order to charge.
If I could have, I would have forced them to attack the enemy archers of course, but each time I reoriented my cavalry, they were all determined to ignore them and race back and kill themselves on the infantry spears.
I've also seen my archers consistently ignore exposed enemy archers on a hill above (shooting back at them no less) while mine waste arrows shooting into shields on an enemy infantry shield-walled troop below.
There needs to be a way to order a troop to focus on an enemy troop.
• Enemy spears apparently have a magical ability to stop a horse at full charge dead in its tracks from any minor hit. Especially the horse I am riding. Either the horse should slow, stumble, or even trip and fall, but (unless it is moving slowly enough) it should not magically stop dead from a full gallop and waste 5 or 6 seconds rearing up while I can do nothing but take a savage beating from the surrounding troops.
• Even the smallest trees (some saplings about a meter high at most) will also stop a horse dead in its tracks. This should almost never happen. The small trees should just be trampled, possibly doing minor damage to the mount (depending on armor).
Even the larger trees are a massive problem as horses have no self-preservation. Horses should automatically navigate slightly to avoid trees, like they do (most of the time) in reality.
• Assigning troops to siege equipment manually is not intuitive. I click on the setup screen, but there is no indication that troops are assigned. Once the battle starts they will move to man the siege equipment (if I clicked right) but they should visibly attach themselves in the battle setup screen and their icon should change to one that shows they are manned.
• You should also be able to assign archers to defensive mantlets in the same way as assigning siege crews.
• You can't order siege equipment to do anything in battle. I once wanted to use my catapults to break down a gate, but they would just shoot at whatever they felt like because you can't seem to give them orders.
• I'm on a horse. Why is my inventory still limited to four items? Could there not be at least two "horse inventory" slots?
• If a bow or crossbow is equipped it should have an automatic slot located beside it for one group of ammunition, freeing up slots for actual weapons or shields. Otherwise a bow or crossbow takes up twice as much space as a shield and each piece alone is worthless without the other. Also there is no indication to the players that an equipped item is useless. If a player equips the wrong, or no ammunition, the game should let them know. Or if they have ammunition, but no launcher.
In reality, I could easily have three or four weapons, a shield, and a quiver belted onto me at the same time
These are just the complaints that are top of my mind now. Please feel free to add any of yours in the comments to this. And if I have anything wrong, please let me know.
• You can't seem to order a unit of my troops to focus attacks on a specific unit of enemy troops. This is a constant frustration leading to unnecessary losses.
I just had an entire unit of cataphracts with a huge line of completely unprotected enemy archers in front of them, charge straight through them and a further 150 meters to pointlessly attack enemy spear infantry and get bogged down, losing units while enemy archers shot at my troops unmolested. The cavalry were 100m on the other side of the archers (250m away from the infantry) when I gave them the order to charge.
If I could have, I would have forced them to attack the enemy archers of course, but each time I reoriented my cavalry, they were all determined to ignore them and race back and kill themselves on the infantry spears.
I've also seen my archers consistently ignore exposed enemy archers on a hill above (shooting back at them no less) while mine waste arrows shooting into shields on an enemy infantry shield-walled troop below.
There needs to be a way to order a troop to focus on an enemy troop.
• Enemy spears apparently have a magical ability to stop a horse at full charge dead in its tracks from any minor hit. Especially the horse I am riding. Either the horse should slow, stumble, or even trip and fall, but (unless it is moving slowly enough) it should not magically stop dead from a full gallop and waste 5 or 6 seconds rearing up while I can do nothing but take a savage beating from the surrounding troops.
• Even the smallest trees (some saplings about a meter high at most) will also stop a horse dead in its tracks. This should almost never happen. The small trees should just be trampled, possibly doing minor damage to the mount (depending on armor).
Even the larger trees are a massive problem as horses have no self-preservation. Horses should automatically navigate slightly to avoid trees, like they do (most of the time) in reality.
• Assigning troops to siege equipment manually is not intuitive. I click on the setup screen, but there is no indication that troops are assigned. Once the battle starts they will move to man the siege equipment (if I clicked right) but they should visibly attach themselves in the battle setup screen and their icon should change to one that shows they are manned.
• You should also be able to assign archers to defensive mantlets in the same way as assigning siege crews.
• You can't order siege equipment to do anything in battle. I once wanted to use my catapults to break down a gate, but they would just shoot at whatever they felt like because you can't seem to give them orders.
• I'm on a horse. Why is my inventory still limited to four items? Could there not be at least two "horse inventory" slots?
• If a bow or crossbow is equipped it should have an automatic slot located beside it for one group of ammunition, freeing up slots for actual weapons or shields. Otherwise a bow or crossbow takes up twice as much space as a shield and each piece alone is worthless without the other. Also there is no indication to the players that an equipped item is useless. If a player equips the wrong, or no ammunition, the game should let them know. Or if they have ammunition, but no launcher.
In reality, I could easily have three or four weapons, a shield, and a quiver belted onto me at the same time
These are just the complaints that are top of my mind now. Please feel free to add any of yours in the comments to this. And if I have anything wrong, please let me know.
