Balanced Total war?

[Nutmeg]

What's the closest the Total war series (including mods) has come to being balanced?

I've only played Shogun, Mongol invasion, Rome, Barbarian invasion and the 'Broken crescent' mod for Medieval 2.

When considering balance between factions, Shogun is trivially balanced. However, iirc, it is not very balanced when considering different army compositions. I also remember Geishas breaking the game.

Your thoughts, gentlemen?

 

[Disgruntled]

Its hard to say without being more specific on what kind of balance you want. Ive played most of the games bar Napoleon and some expansion packs. Shogun 2 and its expansions is the obvious choice since everyone has mostly the same troop compositions.

Any of the European Total Wars cant be more balanced because some factions have much stronger starts and troops than others.

 

[golgo21]

Play Europa barbarorum 1 and 2 for Rome and medieval 2.

 

[Jokzore]

Sometimes I think these games aren't supposed to be balanced but are rather supposed to reflect actual historical circumstances, but that would be giving CA and Sega far too much credit.
The closest one that comes to anything even resembling balance is Medieval 2.

edit: I've enjoyed TW:Warhammer, but thats more because of the setting than the game itself. Considering the absolute trash thats published under the Warhammer name any game that so much as runs could be considered decent. As far as balancing goes, for good or for worse , everything is op.

 

[Raghar]

Warhammer is balanced. I remember how elichtv was saying "It's fucking dragon, they balanced it for multiplayer and now it's weak like a shit."

 

[Maggot]

Shogun 1 is pretty balanced. Everyone gets access to the same troops and while Kensais mow down ashigaru like it's nothing, they die pretty easily to arrows if I remember correctly. Also everyone has the same income so building an optimized army is half the fun. I would say Shogun 2 as well but then they added overpowered DLC units and the avatar conquest mode where you get locked out of certain troops until you grind for them. I can't really speak for the gunpowder games but I remember Napoleon being really popular online and it seemed pretty balanced.

 

[Rahdulan]

The closest one that comes to anything even resembling balance is Medieval 2.

When you want ruin someone's day it's either longbowmen or cavalry, which is appropriate enough.

Didn't they actually nerf longbowmen in a patch because they were so OP? Cavalry cycling has pretty much always been a Total War staple that just got more and more pronounced as pathfinding got better dynamic.

 

[Raghar]

Balanced games are boring. Each faction feels similar, and you will miss the happiness of using totally OP unit and slaughter everything.

 

[Konjad]

I just had an idea for a perfect strategy game!

A game that is balanced! But not just balanced when you begin the game, but Bethesda-balanced!

The more powerful you would get so would others.

Did you just conquer a province of some faction? Now 2 more provinces spawned and belong to that faction! Did you develop some technology? So did everyone in the entire world!

If Skyrim sells in millions, I'm pretty sure such strategy game would sell just as well!

I think I'm gonna make a kickstarter, gather the money needed for the development and abandon it.

 

[Emily]

The only total wars that were "hard" were Shogun 2 and Medieval 1.
The rest you could win in any way you liked so balance was kinda trivial.

 

[Sranchammer]

WRE in Attila is challenging