A feature I want to see return is the captain retinue but not be restricted to certain factions/cultures and they do not have the upgrades provided by Yuan Shao's captain's armoury.

A feature I want to see gone is the restrictions on cross-culture requirement for Yellow Turban generals as without having a free general to carry out the attract talent assignment you could be low on generals and being able to recruit a captured general would be better then spending the upkeep on a captain early on.

What I want to stay: population, spies, court mechanics

What I want to go: ugly unit cards

Retain: Diplomacy, Army System, AI (generally good). 

Revamp: Court, Spy mechanic, AI (most of the time it refuse to siege the mountain pass), assignment, Character mechanic.

Remove: Black Ink UI, Wu Xing Elements (potentially destroyed the game esp when it comes to duels. Eg, Guan Yu losing to sentinels), peach blossom tech tree. 

Note: Revamp is in between retain the current state with minor/major changes. Remove means, replace the whole element with something different. For instance, Court mechanic is great but requires more additional mechanic like Liu Hong's politics. Remove on the other hand, means completely replace it with a new element (for example, the tech tree should have something like a Confucian/secular theme, very similar to Yellow Turban's tech tree vibe). Dont get me wrong though, although the peach blossom tree looks nice. After playing the game for 4K hours, it just feels out of place. 

Maybe revamp the way the units and Commanders worked, i didn't like the fact u HAD to take certain Character types in order to play with armies, for example armies always had to have a strategist for formations and archers etc  

Most features of the game I want to keep. Rework maybe, but keep. It's mostly tweaks here and here :

Campaign map : 

- Diplomacy : remove the gold per 10 stacking, make sure to disentangle the treacheries (right now it still happen if Vassal v Vassal conflict happens)

- Spy Mechanics : it can become completely overpowered with all the "adjustments" that were made to it (the tech tree tweaks are I believe the thing that pushed it into OP territory). What Spy Mechanics really need tho are clearer indicators about why you can / can't do a certain action. Because right now it feels arbitrary and it's not the greatest (I had to explain the gam!e to a friend and he was like "okay I have enough of both type of points, why can't I do this action")

- Court Management : Overall it was pretty lackluster in 3K but it doesn't bother me, useless "depth" àla R2/Attila would be nice, but it's frankly not neccessary. On the other hand what needs to be worked on is probably the characters, one key balancing change I'd like to see is making the base satisfaction of characters 45 instead of 25 but higher court ranks removing satisfaction instead of giving some (right now it gives +10/+15). This would make satisfaction management a bit more interesting in the lategame at least.

- Tech Tree : Remove unlocks on such a tree : make it bonuses only, that way the AI doesn't struggle as much as it does now. Overall the 1 tech every 5 turns is an excellent system that I want to see in more games, too often would you have the player stacking research rate and snowball out of control. No more. And that's good. Sitll it's without a doubt that the AI uses the tech tree not as well as a player (since it lacks adaptability frankly).

- Faction Unique Mechanics : As I've said before Cao Cao and Yuan Shao mechanics should be the standard moving on. On the other hand, I also do think that they were left completely unbalanced and overtuned (not unlike Sun Ce & Lu Bu mechanics) which leaves kind of a bad taste in my mouth. Yes, balancing is less important in a SP game (which TW is) than in a MP game, but still, if you just run with powercreep and unbalance everything even a SP game will feel bad (just look at the folks removing Cao Cao schemes because they can't deal with it, early Cao Cao war is a pretty big russian roulette from my experience...)

- Commandery management is overall imho absolutely fine and basically a keeper. Not quite sure about limiting the assignement number but I guess it was to avoid AI character bloating. Only thing I'd like to see added are regional units and perhaps some sort of Province level management. (Province level management that could somehow be tied with Imperial Favour as well). Tho I'd say that we're already getting bonuses from a lot of sources, I'm not sure I want to stat-stack provincial bonuses on top of everything else. Some people want to see the numbers go wee, that's not my case.

- Redeployment should take a bit longer. Nuff said.

There are also more things I could talk with about general balancing, tweaking the AI so it's more aggressive overall, changing the ways income works because right now it ain't it, perhaps removing March Stance. It's not really about the actual map system

Battles :

- Class system : Obviously need to be kept and whereas some folks want it gone, I want CA to actually go fully for it. Right now the Wu Xing meant to work in a multiple ways RPS system just doesn't work. Melee Cav can't really commit to melee long enough to beat melee infantry, Spear Guards (so green unit with shields) can enter the best anti-missile formation of the game. Strategist characters can't duel (which creates an imbalance in the system) but basically through Wisdom of the River will win other folks duels most of the time. Not to talk about how unbalanced character equipment is in Romance, it doesn't really feel good.
Sure, some Three Kingdoms fan will be ultra triggered if Guan Yu loses a duel to a Strategist (on top of losing to Sentinels), I'm more bothered by Guan Yu struggling vs other Champions or some Vanguards (like Lu Bu). As Guan Yu should be a very strong duelist, but not a litteral god. Exceptions can be made (like a character like Guan Yu or Zheng Jiang typically tapping into more duelist power) but again, it should be exceptions (and a strong sentinel such as Zhao Yun should still beat out Guan Yu in a protracted duel)
There are further tweaks that could be done, such as the ability to retreat from a duel without retreating from a battle (right now it's only possible if you interrupt the duel, which ain't cool)

Then again, it's mostly balancing at this point. :)

- Retinues : Don't change a thing for the most part, maybe make it so the AI tries to build up armies that are coherent (no double class characters in armies and army composition can be improved, ofc that goes through multiple systems so it's not an "easy" fix as some people think it is



If there is one feature I definitely don't want to see in 3K2 it's the YTR vs the World thing. Don't get me wrong, they should be HARDER to recruit for other folks, but not straight up impossible.

keep:
* diplomacy was great

* brigade style retinue system (subdivision of an army in retinues led by their heroes)

* * double-click on general selected entire subdivision, which came in handy; i just wished there were more grouping options/controls 

* infantry formations (though most of them were irrelevant)

* ui / art style was fine for my taste but generally too much colours (colour settings for environment were neat)

* i liked the supply element on the campaign map

undecided:

* split scope between romance and records version (records mode and its features felt very compromised)

revision: 

* hard lock unit types via wu xing elements (whats the value behind that? it does not create interesting dillemata olny restrict playing freedom in a negative way)

* hard r/p/s unit type matching totally ruined three kings skirmish for me (cavalry and skirmish dominance)

* i didnt like the spy mechanic personally but on the other hand probably made for great platform for story telling / immersion / role-playing i suppose

/*slightly off-topic

akin to pharao campaign settings id like an option for 40-unit armies as standard army size (with either trickle in reinforcement like in older tw games or improved ui and control elements such that 80-unit armies are comfortably manageable -> hint: three kings retinue organization would be a start)

united84#8186 wrote:

Retain: Diplomacy, Army System, AI (generally good). 

Revamp: Court, Spy mechanic, AI (most of the time it refuse to siege the mountain pass), assignment, Character mechanic.

Remove: Black Ink UI, Wu Xing Elements (potentially destroyed the game esp when it comes to duels. Eg, Guan Yu losing to sentinels), peach blossom tech tree. 

Note: Revamp is in between retain the current state with minor/major changes. Remove means, replace the whole element with something different. For instance, Court mechanic is great but requires more additional mechanic like Liu Hong's politics. Remove on the other hand, means completely replace it with a new element (for example, the tech tree should have something like a Confucian/secular theme, very similar to Yellow Turban's tech tree vibe). Dont get me wrong though, although the peach blossom tree looks nice. After playing the game for 4K hours, it just feels out of place. 

I'm inclined to agree with you and Rewan on these points. A more robust quest generation mechanic would be a helpful with these changes. In particular, I'd like the missions given to adapt more to the world state of the campaign. My idea on this is that it promotes some of the what if scenarios that either happened or were likely to happen in the 3 kingdom epic( it'd still be optional as per our standard sandbox games but adds flavor text and could vary the number and type of rewards). 

What is the point of 3K2 in the first place though?

If you want features to remain then why not play 3K1?

Jam#4399 wrote:

What is the point of 3K2 in the first place though?

If you want features to remain then why not play 3K1?

I could ask the same thing for people who want Medieval 3, Shogun 3 or Empire 2 ect.

Same game in new gen engine with better AI, better graphics, some UI improvement and better spy system.

I absolutely loved the whole aspect of generals being larger than life in that RPG fashion. I know it ruined the tactics of large army maneuvers when 1-3 guys can wipe out hundreds, but it was a lot of fun for me. I'd love to see that continued into other settings within the franchise.

Also loved the retinues and how they impacted recruitment. I absolute love the smaller scale stuff of 12~ units vs another 12, as opposed to 20+ vs 20+ and you tend to get late-game in almost any Total War.

Garrisons being dependent on the buildings within your settlement as well as the governor you've assigned, a definite keep for me. Absolutely loved it.

One thing I disliked (somewhat) was the different classes of generals, as sentinels seemed too overpowered and I didn't like having to use a strategist for easy access to formations. I'd rather have each general be a blank slate as they were in, for example, Shogun 2. From that point you could mix and match between skills that improved their personal strength, buffs/formations for units under them, diplomacy with other factions or other things more fitting to your faction leader... etc.

Spies... I never ever used these in 3K, just couldn't be bothered frankly. I do like the agents in the older titles somewhat, but I felt like they were spammed out too much. Perhaps a return to hiring agents but a stricter limit on how many you can have... or perhaps certain factions having a buff to the unit cap on these. As an example, an extra ninja agent or two for the sneakier factions.

Appointing governors, that we could then vassalise. This was a mechanic I would love to see in all current and future Total War games. It gets so dull and boring painting the map. Want to see more Crusader Kings/Stellaris level ideas, not more dull and moronic Warhammer garbage.

Population, Food, Resources, Taxation, Government budgets and laws we can enact, titles and promotions we can award.. It would be cool if we could grant characters gold and acres of land as a reward too.

It would be nice if we could have a return from TW ROme/Attila where we can choose to build Weapon/Armour crafting areas for our troops to receive superior quality gear.

If we got the ability from Empire Total War, to choose whether we want to build a City or a Military Fortress, that would be really cool too.

The game has been sadly cancelled, so the discussion is kinda pointless.

True, never rely on rumours, although some are better than others it’s not confirmed until CA officially confirm it.

I want CA to spend a bit more than absolute minimal effort in Records mode. Romance is ok to play a few times but it feels distinctly closer to Warhammer than a historical game with magical abilities and OP characters. 

On the other hand, half the character skills on Records more are useless as well gear bonuses and several map regions that produce weapons/horses/armor become nearly useless on Records mode. 

Having some options with characters in Records such as what type of bodyguard, or that gear + titles can change what tier cavalrybodyguard  a general comes with would be huge. 

Then the only other main ask I'd like to see if Goryeo and some of the steppes. 3K battles are pretty good with mods and some house rules such as no more than 1 red cavalry, no trebuchets, and no more than 1 retinues per army of elites except for the Faction Leader's army. 

Continuing the improvements with diplomacy would be the next absolute bonus to look forward to, espcially if dynastic marriages actually meant something more. Marriage in 3K currently works and certain characters can actually add a huge bonus to a realm in stability but making long lasting alliances/vassal relationships cemented by a marriage and having some consequences to divorcing a high status foreign bride would be ideal because it often feels like marriage is more about gaming character collection than anything else in the current 3K.