What are you playing? (Redux)

[vinraith]

Just slaughtered 9,000 Aedui in modern day Provence in Europa Barbarorum Alexander as the Romans with a Polybian army.  Massive slaughter, managed to envelope two Celtic armies but was so fucking outnumbered on the last one that I ended up hiding a portion of my army in the forest until they came up, mostly so they could regain some stamina.  Fucking epic. 

Does running EB under Alexander improve things markedly? Enough so to bother picking up Alexander just for that?

[Queequeg]

Just slaughtered 9,000 Aedui in modern day Provence in Europa Barbarorum Alexander as the Romans with a Polybian army.  Massive slaughter, managed to envelope two Celtic armies but was so fucking outnumbered on the last one that I ended up hiding a portion of my army in the forest until they came up, mostly so they could regain some stamina.  Fucking epic. 

Does running EB under Alexander improve things markedly? Enough so to bother picking up Alexander just for that?

That depends, as there are two ways of doing it.

1) With only graphic improvements, which in all honesty makes the game as good looking as MTW2 in almost all respects. 
2) As part of the Alexander mod. The Alexander mod adds quite a bit, (they retrain armies so no ghost units, the AI in general is improved, the eleutheroi are strengthened immensely, slower expansion, slower building times and different effects, only some cities can become huge, some of the Hellenistic units are remodeled).

On the other hand, you can't do Shield Wall or swim like in EB:BI, so IDK.  It was a nice change of pace from vanilla EB for me, I have to say, and the added challenge and graphic improvements are nice.

[DisturbedPervert]

I've been playing the new Suikoden on the DS for the past few days.  About 12 hours in.  I didn't like it at first, but it started to pick up after the first few hours and is getting pretty good.  Some of the 'normal' Suikoden stuff is missing.  No strategic battles, and no Runes.  The lack of tactical battles isn't a big deal, those were never that interesting other as an atmosphere device.  But the magic system, which is somewhere between the rune system and a standard MP system, isn't quite as good. 

Overall it's good though, and it definitely feels like a Suikoden, which I was worried about.

[vinraith]

Just slaughtered 9,000 Aedui in modern day Provence in Europa Barbarorum Alexander as the Romans with a Polybian army.  Massive slaughter, managed to envelope two Celtic armies but was so fucking outnumbered on the last one that I ended up hiding a portion of my army in the forest until they came up, mostly so they could regain some stamina.  Fucking epic. 

Does running EB under Alexander improve things markedly? Enough so to bother picking up Alexander just for that?

That depends, as there are two ways of doing it.

1) With only graphic improvements, which in all honesty makes the game as good looking as MTW2 in almost all respects. 
2) As part of the Alexander mod. The Alexander mod adds quite a bit, (they retrain armies so no ghost units, the AI in general is improved, the eleutheroi are strengthened immensely, slower expansion, slower building times and different effects, only some cities can become huge, some of the Hellenistic units are remodeled).

On the other hand, you can't do Shield Wall or swim like in EB:BI, so IDK.  It was a nice change of pace from vanilla EB for me, I have to say, and the added challenge and graphic improvements are nice.

That sounds like it might be worth $10. Do you know anything about running EB on the Steam version of the game? I have Rome on disc AND Steam (was free with my Empire preorder that I'm not playing...) but from a laptoping standpoint Steam's better than disc check. I don't know how a clunky mod game (ie a game with no mods folder where you're usually making a copy of the game to mod it) works in this circumstance, though. I ask because I figure I should buy the "right" version of Alexander, either the one on Steam or the one from... wherever else you get Alexander.

[Queequeg]

Just slaughtered 9,000 Aedui in modern day Provence in Europa Barbarorum Alexander as the Romans with a Polybian army.  Massive slaughter, managed to envelope two Celtic armies but was so fucking outnumbered on the last one that I ended up hiding a portion of my army in the forest until they came up, mostly so they could regain some stamina.  Fucking epic. 

Does running EB under Alexander improve things markedly? Enough so to bother picking up Alexander just for that?

That depends, as there are two ways of doing it.

1) With only graphic improvements, which in all honesty makes the game as good looking as MTW2 in almost all respects. 
2) As part of the Alexander mod. The Alexander mod adds quite a bit, (they retrain armies so no ghost units, the AI in general is improved, the eleutheroi are strengthened immensely, slower expansion, slower building times and different effects, only some cities can become huge, some of the Hellenistic units are remodeled).

On the other hand, you can't do Shield Wall or swim like in EB:BI, so IDK.  It was a nice change of pace from vanilla EB for me, I have to say, and the added challenge and graphic improvements are nice.

That sounds like it might be worth $10. Do you know anything about running EB on the Steam version of the game? I have Rome on disc AND Steam (was free with my Empire preorder that I'm not playing...) but from a laptoping standpoint Steam's better than disc check. I don't know how a clunky mod game (ie a game with no mods folder where you're usually making a copy of the game to mod it) works in this circumstance, though. I ask because I figure I should buy the "right" version of Alexander, either the one on Steam or the one from... wherever else you get Alexander.

I'm running it on Steam and it plays great; actually a lot faster, and at higher resolutions and a lot of other improvements in graphics.  There should be some help over on the EB Alexander topic in the EB Sub-Mod forum if you have any trouble. 

[vinraith]

I'm running it on Steam and it plays great; actually a lot faster, and at higher resolutions and a lot of other improvements in graphics.  There should be some help over on the EB Alexander topic in the EB Sub-Mod forum if you have any trouble. 

Sounds good. Thanks for the advice MP/Q.

[Queequeg]

I'm running it on Steam and it plays great; actually a lot faster, and at higher resolutions and a lot of other improvements in graphics.  There should be some help over on the EB Alexander topic in the EB Sub-Mod forum if you have any trouble. 

Sounds good. Thanks for the advice MP/Q.

Just a word of warning though; idk if there is a way to get the right unit roster for MP with Alexander, as for EB they have to have two .exe files to play MP.  There probably is a way, but with the added hassle of steam I haven't checked it out yet.

Be prepared for quite a bit more difficulty if you play as an eastern faction and a total free ride if you play as a western faction.  The economy seems a little iffy, and with the mod's attempts to make the AI more conservative and stronger the Selelucids are able  to fuck almost anything up the ass unless you aren't capable.  I had my first string of defeats as the Parthians up against those Silver-Shield motherfuckers. 

[vinraith]

I'm running it on Steam and it plays great; actually a lot faster, and at higher resolutions and a lot of other improvements in graphics.  There should be some help over on the EB Alexander topic in the EB Sub-Mod forum if you have any trouble. 

Sounds good. Thanks for the advice MP/Q.

Just a word of warning though; idk if there is a way to get the right unit roster for MP with Alexander, as for EB they have to have two .exe files to play MP.  There probably is a way, but with the added hassle of steam I haven't checked it out yet.

Be prepared for quite a bit more difficulty if you play as an eastern faction and a total free ride if you play as a western faction.  The economy seems a little iffy, and with the mod's attempts to make the AI more conservative and stronger the Selelucids are able  to fuck almost anything up the ass unless you aren't capable.  I had my first string of defeats as the Parthians up against those Silver-Shield motherfuckers. 

Hmm, noted. Is it possible to install things such that you can use BI for skirmish/MP and Alexander for the campaign, I wonder. Blech, this is going to be complicated. Still, sounds interesting enough that I'll probably give it a try when I can find $10 to throw at Alexander.

At the moment, Steam's hitting me with a ridiculously good Ubisoft bargain every day and trying to eat all my April game cash before I even reach April. Bastards.

[Syt]

Still mostly playing HPS' MC'85 Germany games. Still on the small scenarios. I think I'm starting to get the hang of pushing a WP offensive action within the short time limits.

[Ed Anger]

AGEOD's Napoleon's Campaigns 1809 scenario as the Austrians.

[Berkut]

LOTRO. I just love the story of the game, and the setting. They really did a masterful job of creating the Tolkien world without making it a farce.

[vinraith]

On PC, I've been playing through Assassin's Creed, which has significantly exceeded my (admittedly low) expectations. I'm also still playing Rise of Nations multiplayer and Team Fortress 2 on the side.

Oh, and I finally dusted off my DS and went back to Etrian Odyssey. I'd stopped in the middle of stratum 4, so getting back in the groove is proving to be a bit challenging. Still, no one makes games like this any more (true Western dungeon crawlers, albeit with some Japanese art that's readily ignored). This'll hold me nicely til Dark Spire in a couple of weeks.

[Grey Fox]

NHL 09
HAWX
Curling DS
Burnout Paradise
LOTRO

And at some point, I really need to finish CoH:OF

[derspiess]

Sorta getting back into PC gaming, I broke down & bought Fallout 3.  Plus I found 007 Quantum of Solace on clearance at Target for $15-- it's a nice little mindless shooter

[Norgy]

Apart from some FM2009, I haven't played much recently.
I played some EUIII a few weeks back and enjoyed it.