Greetings!
First up, we'd like to start by thanking you all for sharing your thoughts, feedback and kind words with us in the wake of the Total War: PHARAOH DYNASTIES release back in July. It has thoroughly warmed our hearts to see so many of you enjoying the game and hearing your many stories of epic victory (and in some cases crushing defeat, but hey who's counting?).
On Thursday 12th September we'll be launching Patch 2.0.2, bringing with it a hefty number of fixes, tweaks and balances to further improve your gameplay experience.
Without further ado, here’s the highlights for Patch 2.0.2.
HIGHLIGHTS
- Made improvements that reduce end turn times by approximately 10% on average.
- Lethality now affects generals as intended by design.
- Balance pass on Lethality, focusing primarily on ranged units.
- Rebalanced campaign AI, with a focus on easy and normal difficulties.
PERFORMANCE
Made improvements that reduce end turn times by approximately 10% on average.
Fixed a rare crash that occurred during active ambitions.
The campaign tutorial no longer soft locks if a Legitimacy war starts before the relevant objective is issued.
MAIN SCREEN/GRAPHICS
Fixed an issue where, on wide screen resolutions, the background in the main menu would be cut off instead of filling the entire screen.
CAMPAIGN
GENERAL/ GAMEPLAY
- ‘Inspect the Stockpiles’ now only considers positive resources in rare cases where the settlement also incurs expenses.
- Sacking settlements now correctly applies a public order penalty.
- Fixed a bug where the first level of Presence under Competencies incorrectly granted +13 Armor to Shielded Infantry Units.
- Fixed an issue where Sherden and Peleset received a significant unit debuff when invasion armies began to appear.
- Armies in the Horde Encampment stance can no longer attack without the player first manually exiting the stance.
FACTIONS/FACTION LEADERS
- Taking an occupation decision with the Sea Ravager title now allows the resulting AP replenishment to be used for changing stances.
- Fixed a bug where the default skin starting generals were gaining experience and leveling up while using the Avatar of the Gods skin versions.
- Fixed a bug that wrongfully allowed default skin starting generals to be used for forced inheritance while playing with the Avatar of the Gods skin versions.
- Fixed an issue where Sea Peoples’ factions lost the ability to conquer outpost slots without owning the region after their faction leader died.
MINOR FACTIONS
- Granted the Warriors' Refuge outpost building to the minor Thracian faction to align with the intended design.
- Fixed an issue where the Thracian minor faction received fewer effects from the Governance competence.
- Fixed an issue where minor Canaanite factions were unable to construct monuments.
- Updated incorrect minor faction names in the Faction Selection screen.
CAMPAIGN AI
DEV NOTE: We would like to extend our warmest thanks to everyone who shared their feedback and participated in the Dynasties Campaign AI Report MEGATHREAD.
- As a result of all the feedback you kindly provided, we identified several key actionable areas, including:
- Campaign AI diplomatic aggressiveness, especially when there is significant distance between factions
- Difficulty level balance issues, primarily concerning Easy and Normal
- Ramesses’ campaign being significantly harder than expected
- An overemphasis on Native units by the Campaign AI
- A general reluctance from the Campaign AI to re-colonize ruins
The areas mentioned above include a mix of bugs and design choices that are not being received as intended. An example of a bug: some, but not all, Aegean Campaign AI personalities did not have their war declarations configured to take distance into account properly for evaluation. This resulted in Aegean factions being equally likely to declare war on factions of the same relative strength, regardless of distance.
An example of design intent: Campaign AI factions can be configured to spend their 'downtime' between war, conquest, and pillaging on various activities, one of which is re-colonizing ruins. To allow the Pillars of Civilization mechanic to have a greater impact, the Campaign AI has been focusing on interacting with outposts for the first 70 turns of any campaign, with a gradually increasing priority for re-colonizing ruins.
The goal of our changes has been to preserve the current experience while fixing bugs and providing alternatives where possible. Hard, Veteran, and Legendary difficulties remain largely unchanged, with the only difference being the Campaign AI's diplomatic aggressiveness. If you enjoyed the behavior of the Dynasties release, please use the 'AI Diplomatic Aggressiveness' Campaign Customization and set it to the highest level.
Below are the detailed changes and adjustments:
- To address player feedback regarding the campaign AI being too aggressive against the player, especially when playing as Ramesses, we have implemented the following changes:
Rebalanced the priorities of human-targeting task generation for Easy and Normal difficulty levels.
Increased the early game grace period before Campaign AI factions begin focusing on expansion from 10 to 12 turns on Normal difficulty and from 14 to 18 turns on Easy difficulty.
Decreased the Campaign AI recruitment slots by 1 on Easy difficulty.
- To address player feedback regarding the campaign AI primarily recruiting low-tier native units instead of stronger units from their respective factions, we have implemented the following changes:
Increased the building values for structures that provide recruitment of faction units.
Aegean factions now have unit qualities applied to all units.
Updated faction unit qualities to be higher compared to native units of the same tier.
- To address player feedback regarding the campaign AI not occupying the numerous ruins in Southern Egypt (including changes related to occupation decisions and colonization), we have made the following adjustments:
Increased the likelihood that settled factions will loot, sack, or occupy settlements, slightly decreasing the chance of choosing to raze.
Rebalanced task generation targeting abandoned (ruined) settlements, giving higher priority to re-colonising.
Reduced the priority of interacting with outposts for all campaign AI personalities.
- Rebalanced long-distance penalties for war declarations to ensure consistency across all campaign AI personality types.
DIPLOMACY/ADMINISTRATION/ECONOMY
- Fixed a bug where expired barters could be exploited to extort resources from the AI that it no longer possessed.
- Fixed a bug where Administration points for units inside forts were not subtracted after the fort was demolished.
- Adjusted the Administration cost of Sherden units for Ramesses to ensure it is appropriate.
- Obedience armies now have their Administration value calculated correctly upon creation.
- The AI should now accurately evaluate legitimacy support requests from the player.
- Damaged buildings now give the same amount of Administrative Burden points as non-damaged buildings.
DYNASTY
- Fixed an issue where the 'Lost His Scion' deed would appear when replacing or wounding the scion.
- Changed the age at which characters appear visually mature in the family tree screen from 11 years old to 14 years old.
- Removed the God Devoted general status from a character when they change factions.
- Fixed an issue where certain characters could acquire more than six traits throughout the game.
- Fixed an issue where the 'Devotee of ...' epithet would display the name of a character instead of the God to whom the army had prayed.
COURT
- Fixed an issue where Court discount values would sometimes change after a Legitimacy war.
- Fixed a bug where an active dilemma prevented the player from interacting with the Court.
- Fixed a bug where factions outside the Court were incorrectly receiving discounts intended for court members.
- Fixed a bug where visiting sacred settlements as a High Judge displayed an incorrect tooltip for 'Adjudicate Grievances' and 'Exchange Units'; the latter now correctly allows the player to garrison their army in the settlement.
- Fixed an issue where the Court discount sliders accepted invalid numbers, preventing the discounts from changing.
- All intrigues have a cooldown of at least one turn.
- Fixed a discrepancy between the displayed and awarded bonuses for the High Priest court position.
- The cooldown for the Visit Settlement agent action is now visible.
POWER OF THE CROWN/LEGITIMACY
- Now correctly displays 0 legitimacy for factions with no sacred regions in the Power of the Crown UI; legitimacy is disabled for these factions.
- Fixed a bug where the player's faction would be displayed in both 'King of Kings' and 'Other Factions' if it did not have the highest legitimacy.
- Fixed several cases where the Court Presence power did not function correctly and failed to increase the court limit.
- Battle legitimacy will now decay correctly for all royal traditions.
- Fixed an issue where the Forced Annexation royal power remained in the Diplomacy screen after the player lost Legitimacy.
- Fixed a bug where the remaining duration of the Legitimacy War was not displayed on the Power of the Crown button.
ANCIENT LEGACY
Sargon
- Updated the highest-tier effect for the Strategist Archetype in Ancient Legacy: Sargon to apply to a single province where a new general is hired and to provide experience per turn.
- Now, when the player has the ambition to destroy the current ruler's faction and becomes king by inheriting it via the dynasty feature, the ambition is automatically cancelled.
- Grand ambitions are now removed from the Ancient Legacy: Sargon panel after being forfeited, without requiring the panel to be closed and reopened.
- Fixed an issue where counters for Grand Ambitions from Sargon's Ancient Legacy that require the player to build a certain number of buildings would reset if the player loaded a save while having an active ambition and some required buildings already constructed.
- Fixed an issue where the panel would close when clicking on an ambition slot that is on cooldown.
- Fixed the 'Towers Unto Skies' grand ambition to require management buildings, as its description states, instead of military ones; active ambitions will remain unchanged, but taking the ambition anew should function properly.
- Fixed the objective of the 'Blood, Terror, Аnd Legend' mission not displaying correctly when first shown.
- Fixed an issue where the title 'The Great' did not grant Victory Points.
- Fixed an issue where the Tier 3 Main Archetype did not grant the title 'The Great.' Removed the stipulation that Grand Ambitions cannot be forfeited.
Hammurabi
- Fixed various issues that occurred when editing a law text field.
- Laws affecting the recruitment rank of Javelin units will now correctly apply to all Javelin units.
- Fixed a display issue for some effects where values were not calculated correctly in a unit's tooltip; for example, multiple values increasing Ranged Lethality (such as 10% + 2%) would incorrectly display as 11% instead of the proper total.
Thutmose
- Fixed a bug where laying siege to the target settlement of the Thutmose legacy would disrupt administration numbers and trigger diplomatic contact with all factions.
- Fixed an issue where death dilemmas were incorrectly triggered when breaking or continuing a siege on Thutmose's targeted settlement.
Atreus
- Fixed a bug related to the rewards for completing all Dominance objectives in the Ancient Legacy Atreus mechanic.
- Fixed an issue where the 'Kill this General' objective in Atreus would not complete.
ROYAL DECREES
- Replaced the effects of the Royal Decree 'Itinerant Gods' due to an exploit for free gold.
- Fixed an issue where the 'Crescent Rivers, Ever-flowing' royal decree did not take effect.
PILLARS OF CIVILISATION
- Fixed instances where the current Civilisation level effect bundle was not removed after a level change.
SETTLEMENTS/BUILDINGS/OUTPOSTS
- Fixed incorrect buildings in the Tax Administration chain in Dur-Kurigalzu; added the Monument of Greatness to Babylon and Nippur.
- Enabled the Translators’ Quarters to be built in Dur-Kurigalzu to align with the intended design.
- Added a stone deposit to the province of Wilusa; no more endless supply of stone for Troy.
- Fixed an issue where low Influence caused Tausret's Bronzework Pipeline to provide more armour on recruitment.
- Added a missing Art School building to the settlement of Melid.
- Fixed an issue where the Bronzeworkers' District was unavailable in certain Mesopotamian settlements.
- Fixed an issue where the units provided by the Native Barracks building chain for the Fenkhu Region had incorrect tier distribution – the level 5 Native Barracks provided tier 4 units instead of tier 5 units.
- Fixed the native recruitment building in Purushanda; it now correctly grants Highlands units.
- Fixed an issue where the Thrace faction couldn't recruit the Mad Mares of Thrace unit from factional recruitment buildings.
- Fixed an issue where Babylon, Hanigalbat, and Shutrukid could not construct Grand Temple buildings in the Aegean part of the map.
- Removed unnecessary effect bundles for Amazon Treasures from several regions in the Aegean.
- Fixed an issue where the Peleset could not construct garrison buildings in the new realms.
- Fixed an issue where the Woodworker Brigades building could not be constructed in Sparta.
- Added a faction-specific Sherden building, available along the Mesopotamian rivers and in several previously missed regions of the Aegean.
- Fixed the Mustering Hall building chain in the Wilusa province to be upgradeable.
- Fixed an issue where the Assyrian faction building, Defender's Fortress, did not have assigned units as a garrison.
- Assigned the correct units for recruitment from the native Muster Field building chain in the Mat Tamti realm.
- Fixed an issue where Horde factions incorrectly had two separate categories of Management buildings in their settlements.
- Fixed an issue where Nomad outposts providing resources were not properly updating province information.
- Fixed an issue where granting autonomy to an outpost did not increase the amount of resources produced.
- Added clarification to Native Recruitment Buildings with identical names, indicating whether they can be constructed in Minor or Major Settlements.
- Removed the duplicate Guard Tower building from Nineveh. Enabled Sea Peoples factions to construct Forts in Mesopotamia and the Aegean.
- Removed the Smuggler's Market from Unet Sneferu.
- Fixed a bug where the main resource of the Mu Ua settlement was incorrectly displayed as stone on the battle map, while the campaign map correctly indicated it as food.
AMBITIONS
- Fixed an issue where the Rumblings of Discontent ambition did not complete even when all conditions were met.
ANCILLARIES
- Ancillaries equipped by civilians will no longer be available for selection in character details and Ancient Legacies: Hatshepsut, Khufu, and Perseus to align with the intended design.
- Increased the Legitimacy gain of Amenmesse's Golden Mask ancillary from 3 to 6 to align with the command tooltip and intended design.
- Fixed an issue where the faction leader had available crown ancillaries obtained from a former faction leader who was a pretender or ruler, but the tooltip in Character Details incorrectly stated that crowns couldn't be used.
VICTORY OBJECTIVES
- Fixed the 'God-Favoured' victory objective to properly reward victory points at 800 Favour.
CAMPAIGN UI/UX
- Implemented a number of UI enhancements to address various visual, text (incl. localisation), spacing, texture and icon inconsistencies, as well as bugs, clipping issues and missing elements in tooltips and interfaces.
- Implemented various UX improvements to enhance user experience and interface usability.
- Updated the description of the 'United We Stand' event message, when shown to the joining faction, to better reflect their perspective.
- Fixed an issue where the 'Forced Annexation' button would sometimes be visible in the Diplomacy menu when royal power was not available.
- Fixed an issue where predisposed traits markers were missing in the Character Details panel when cycling through characters.
- Added missing effect bundle icons for the following: 'Situation: Laying Siege,' 'Leader's Privilege,' 'Scion's Privilege,' and 'Relative.'
- Fixed an issue with the chariot ancillary being difficult to select.
- Assigned the correct texts for one type of Faction Leader Death dilemma.
- Fixed Alpanu's epithet to refer to her instead of Ra.
CAMPAIGN ENVIRONMENT/ANIMATIONS
- Added missing catchment override configurations for encampment battles in the Aegean and Mesopotamian regions of the campaign map.
- Fixed the incorrect night skybox texture in the post-battle matched combat scene.
- Fixed a bug with the cape and weapons in certain post-battle animations.
- Resolved issues with incorrect battle maps loading when attacking forts.
CAMPAIGN CUSTOMISATION
- Added a new Campaign Customisation option for AI Diplomatic Aggressiveness, allowing you to choose how aggressive the AI's war declarations are.
- Fixed an issue where female non-general characters would gain ancillaries from the 'Fully-equipped Generals' Campaign Customisation option.
- Fixed the notification for gods, which would not hide when starting with the 'All Gods Discovered' Campaign Customisation option.
- In new saves, it is removed after seeing all the gods, while in old saves, it is hidden after a few turns.
- Fixed an issue with the starting camera for minor factions when the Random Faction Starting Positions customization option is enabled.
- Forced Annexation is now accessible to the Mesopotamian Royal Court when playing as a Mesopotamian faction with the 'Enable All Royal Powers' option enabled.
- Resolved an issue where only the primary army was relocated during randomization when Random Faction Starting Positions was enabled.
BATTLE
GAMEPLAY
- Fixed an issue where units could lose orders even when there were no visibility obstructions between them and the enemy unit.
- Fixed an issue where the maximum missile block chance displayed more than 100% when enough bonuses from different sources were applied.
UNITS GENERAL/ABILITIES/ATTRIBUTES/STANCES
- Fixed an issue where certain ranged units would gain campaign bonuses from effects intended for melee units.
- Fixed a bug where the Underdog ability, available to some elite units, could also buff certain enemy units.
- Fixed an issue where the wrong unit was present in specific armies at the start of a new campaign.
- Fixed an issue where Akkadian Chargers were incorrectly assigned the 'Shoot While Moving' attribute.
- Changed the attribute provided by the Claw of Bastet title to align with the intended design.
- Fixed an issue where new abilities were not affected by cooldown-reducing effects.
- Fixed an issue where ancillaries that provide effects to the general were not applied to bodyguards mounted on chariots.
- Fixed an issue where some medium-weight units had incorrectly been assigned the 'Hide in Scrub and Forest' attribute instead of the 'Hide in Forest' attribute.
- Units will now remain more compact when attacking an enemy in an advance or retreat stance.
- Fixed a bug where missile units in the new rosters were missing fire arrows. Updated the bow models for certain composite bow infantry units.
- Fixed an issue where Guerilla Stalkers were missing the 'Hide in Scrub and Forest' attribute.
- The Spread Stance now functions correctly.
- Fixed an issue where the campaign cost and upkeep of Island Skirmishers and Veteran Island Skirmishers were swapped.
- Changed the name of tier 4 Trojan Swordsmen to Veteran Trojan Swordsmen.
- Fixed an issue where Young Spears were incorrectly categorized as Spear and Shield Infantry. Cimmerian Scouts are now correctly equipped with spears.
- Fixed an issue where Akkadian Chargers were incorrectly given the 'Shoot While Moving' attribute.
- Entities in Phalanx formation now advance properly without clumping or staying in one place when the stance is used while the unit is moving.
- Fixed an issue with the Heedless Charger battle ability where the ranged requirement was not working.
BATTLE AI
- Improved AI response to cavalry harassment.
LETHALITY
- Fixed an issue where units with the Lethal Blow piercing ability couldn't inflict lethal blows on enemies.
- Lethality now affects generals as intended by design.
Balance Pass:
- Ranged units feeling too strong because of their Lethality:
Increased the projectile spread of bow units to 5-9, depending on unit tier.
Increased the projectile spread of sling units to 6-10, depending on unit tier.
Increased the direct shot projectile spread for both bows and slings, as well as for javelins, to 3-6, depending on unit tier.
Reduced the lethality of direct shots of bows and slings by one-third (twice as much as the arching shot lethality).
- Two-handed (2H) weapons currently feel somewhat weak:
Increased the melee attack of all 2H weapon units by 2.
Increased the speed of units with 2H weapons by 2.
Increased the charge speed of units with 2H weapons by 4.
- Reduced the Lethality of all tier 1 and tier 2 units by 1-2%.
- Increased the Lethality of all tier 5 and tier 6 units by 1-2%.
VICTORY POINTS
- Fixed a bug where units within the radius of an Armoury Victory point gained the 'Repairing Armour' ability, allowing them to repair armor faster than it was damaged, leading to armor values exceeding 1000.
BATTLE ENVIRONMENT/ BATTLE MAPS
- Addressed various visual and gameplay issues on battle maps by adjusting reinforcement zones, adding playable areas on some maps, and scaling down areas to create space for reinforcement deployment.
- Adjusted the battle areas for the following battles, among others: River Locus (Siege), Wide Open (Ambush), Murder in the Mudflats (Land), and Kur Comes to Babylon (Land/Sally Out).
- Fixed a bug that allowed gate capture points to be captured from outside the fort by moving the capture locations 2 meters inside.
- Addressed several visual issues, including missing and misaligned assets.
- Fixed an issue where the gates of Babylon were open at the start of the land/sally out battles.
- Fixed a bug where the battle for the Uas region loaded a land battle instead of a minor settlement battle.
- Added coastal backgrounds to certain maps.
- Fixed a bug where spawned reinforcement entities could sometimes get stuck in the trees.
BATTLE ANIMATIONS
- Fixed an issue with the model for Shielded Spear Warriors.
- Fixed an issue with the model for Island Club Warriors.
- Fixed a visual issue with the armor of Assyrian generals on chariots.
- Fixed a bug where units knocked down by sword and shield enemies were missing the animation when getting back up.
- Fixed a bug where entities were not facing the ladder while climbing.
BATTLE UI/UX
- Fixed an issue where certain messages in campaign battles (not custom battles), such as 'Your general has fallen!' and 'Your warriors are wavering!', were not appearing in both text and audio.
- Changed the colors of the Aeolia (Achilles) faction banners to match the faction flag.
- Toggling the visibility of the Army panel during battles with large armies will no longer cause it to move away from its intended position.
TUTORIAL/ONBOARDING
- Fixed missing defender general images in tutorial battles.
- The Encyclopaedia pages for the Target Towers and Mounted Veterans' Centre buildings now display the correct titles.
- Fixed an issue where the court did not display properly if a position was selected beforehand during the scripted tour.
MISCELLANEOUS
AUDIO
- Fixed several diplomacy VO lines when interacting with Rhesus.
- Camelry units now have the correct VO.
- Fixed missing or incorrect sounds for certain unit armours.
CINEMATICS
- Merneptah's death movie now plays upon the character's death instead of the death of their faction.
- Agamemnon is no longer using the incorrect weapon in his front-end movie.
ACHIEVEMENTS
- Fixed a bug where the 'Lovers in Arms' achievement was awarded only to the player who triggered the campaign victory.
- Fixed an issue where Cult centers added in the Dynasty edition did not count towards Irsu's achievement for razing five Cult centers.
BLOOD PACK
- Entities no longer continue to fight after being beheaded.
MULTIPLAYER
- Fixed an issue where the Quick Battle auto-ready timer would not stop and reset if the player deselected the Start button and no other players were ready.
FOR MODDERS
- Added documentation to the Assembly Kit for mod authors:
scripting_lua_guidelines.docx: A guide for scripting in Lua.
pooled_resource_guide.docx: Documentation on pooled resources.
Also includes example commands.
- Added 12 custom civilizations levels for modders to use.
New custom civilization options: custom_1, ... custom_12.
These can be used to extend the Pillars of Civilization mechanic or to change the visuals of the game.
Campaign: Add a new set in Weather\campaign\sets.xml. The .environment files should be put in the same or existing subdirectory.
Battle: Define environment variations for civilization level in warscape_asset_variation_db\environment_map.xml
- The multiple resource deposits are now displayed properly in the province info panel.
- Added cm:province_set_pooled_resource function and depletable_resource_remaining_amount_no_faction method to the province script interface.
- Resource deposit tooltips now properly display the status of multiple deposits instead of always showing ‘dwindling’ and the correct resource name instead of defaulting to ‘stone.’
- Added new methods to the script game interface related to the family tree:
reassign_character_to_faction
make_adopted_child
appoint_character_as_faction_heir (with paying the normal cost or not)
marry_characters (all of arranged, diplomatic, political)
divorce_character
- Fixed an issue where the maximum missile block chance displayed more than 100% when enough bonuses from different sources were applied. - > new rule in _kv_rules table: max_missile_block_chance
Once again, thank you all for your feedback and bug reports since the launch of DYNASTIES. If you run into any new issues after updating to 2.0.2, please report them over in our dedicated bug reporting area.
Remember you can join the conversation with other Total War fans over in our official Discord server, or in the CA Community forums. We can't wait to hear more about your conquests!
See you on the battlefield!
—The Total War Team
⚠ IMPORTANT
If you experience any issues after downloading the update, please take a moment to Verify the integrity of the game files first to ensure there were no issues when downloading. A step-by-step guide can be found in this article. If the issues persist, please visit our support site for additional troubleshooting steps and assistance.
🧱 MOD WARNING
Please note that user-generated mods may have compatibility issues with new game updates. If you are encountering performance or stability issues following a release, is recommended that you disable any mods you're running. If you continue to experience issues, please visit our support site for additional troubleshooting steps and assistance.
