New Total War game: Warhammer

[BlackAdderBG]

People are already starting to buy games they can't pirate.

Any data to back that up?

 

[flyingjohn]

I wonder how much does denuvo cut into the profits of the games?
Considering they constantly update their protection it ain't cheap.
And if it takes a percentage cut that piles up already with steam and other taking a percentage cut as well,and it is impossible to actually gather whatever or not the pirated version equaled increased sales.
Are publishers really willing to cut into their profits so they pat themselves on the back for beating piracy?

 

[Blaine]

Are publishers really willing to cut into their profits so they pat themselves on the back for beating piracy?

They're willing to do whatever it takes, because piracy is the universal scapegoat for poor sales, and so they must treat it as such so that everyone is able to believe it.

 

[Raghar]

This game would be buggy mess. They just cancelled current version and pushed new one. A new large version instead of a day one patch on decryption is bad sign.

 

[Seethe]

That's just adorable. Piracy of anything will never end, EVER. It's only a matter of time.

Even Denuvo said that it's not uncrackable, but only protects the game long enough for it to no longer matter. Of course it's going to be cracked eventually, but Denuvo is a team consisting of ex-scene crackers. Every time someone cracks Denuvo, they change the DRM and we go back to square one.

Right now scene groups are stumped. They haven't been able to crack games released in December 2015. If it's going to take this long for every Denuvo game, piracy is going to take a massive knock. People are already starting to buy games they can't pirate.

I doubt it. People who pirate games are the ones who cannot afford them in the first place or never cared too much about them, so it makes no difference. The mentality of a pirate isn't "I cannot pirate this so I will buy it". The mentality is "I cannot pirate this, so I guess I'll play something else til it gets pirated". At least that used to be mine.

I didn't even know about the existence of Denuvo or that those games were not cracked yet, I actually learned about it today from this thread. Not because I bought them, but because they are so shit that I couldn't be arsed to even try to pirate them and play them for free. And because of the abysmal state of triple A games, the "I cannot pirate this, so I guess I'll play something else" mentality is even more reinforced.

 

[Zewp]

I doubt it. People who pirate games are the ones who cannot afford them in the first place or never cared too much about them, so it makes no difference. The mentality of a pirate isn't "I cannot pirate this so I will buy it". The mentality is "I cannot pirate this, so I guess I'll play something else".

Not really. Maybe in some cases, but not all. I've bought this game because I can't pirate it. As have a number of my friends with Rise of the Tomb Raider, Just Cause 3 and other Denuvo games. I'm waiting for both of those to hit sales and then I'm buying them too. I'm probably going to end up buying Deus Ex Mankind Divided too. I'll wait to see what the consensus is on the new Mirror's Edge before I make a decision on that, because EA. All of these are games I would have pirated, but now instead am buying or going to buy because of Denuvo.

People don't pirate exclusively just because they can't afford stuff. You only need to hang around Steam and Reddit to see how many people are saying they bought Denuvo games because they got tired of waiting for cracks. Out of my group of friends I'm the least well-off (poor university student) and I still have enough disposable income to buy at least a few games a month. I also used to be the one who spent the most money on games, despite them being richer than me.

Like it or not, Denuvo's going to improve sales. It might not convert the majority of pirates and I'd be surprised if the figure is even as high as 5%, but it is making people buy stuff.

 

[Blaine]

Total War AI grandmaster strategic plan:

• Ichijo sitting pretty on a nice, big hill; all they have to do is wait
• order their cavalry on direct frontal charge into my spearmen; rout almost immediately
• order archers down off the hill, toward my reforming army, alone and away from their main force; burst into treats almost immediately
• remainder of army charges down off the hill entirely to meet me on flat plains

All they had to do was sit on their huge hill and force me to run up it. I haven't even played this game in like three years. Granted, I'm playing on normal, which IIRC gives the player slight bonuses, so I'll restart on hard. Regardless, I should have lost double the troops I did.

Gotta get re-addicted to this game so I can forget about Total Warhammer for at least a month or three, great success so far.

Spoiler

 

[you know what time it is]

Googled 'denuvo games', yeah... i'll live.

 

[DramaticPopcorn]

People are already starting to buy games they can't pirate.

Any data to back that up?

I bought Lords of the Fallen

 

[Blaine]

Shogun 2 Chronicles:

• some daimyo being an ass about trade agreements, get mad, want to kill
• check military strength: weak
• check economy: destitute
• Sounds good, let's declare war.
• assemble after winter, arrive, lay siege
• castle town packed full of advanced samurai units, severely outgunning me
• leave, sue for peace, pay big tribute
• behead an advisor, hire a ninja

And that's enough Shogun 2 for today. My head's full of fuck.

 

[Lone Wolf]

From memory, that sounds like a scripted garrison. Which doesn't get taken into account during strength assessment.

 

[Seethe]

 

[DramaticPopcorn]

jesus

 

[Lone Wolf]

Well, to be fair, that doesn't seem to be standard.

Just watched some YTube gameplay (with the guy in observer mode, watching AIs go at it) with Dwarves vs Chaos. You can bet your ass Chaos walked over and laid a beating on the Dwarves.

It was probably a unit in the big formation not falling into line properly. Happened in Fall of the Samurai, too, wherein the AI would sit still under fire until all of its units were lined up and ready to go.

 

[Vibalist]

Fuck off. Same shit all over again.

 

[Lone Wolf]

I have a strong vested interest in that not being the case, seeing as I preordered.

Dun-dun-duuuuun.

 

[Trash]

Haha, the BAI did shit like that occasionally since the first Rome. Amazing they still haven't stomped that one yet.

 

[varangos]

call of warthammer beginning of the end times is out by the way
http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?665359-COW-Beginning-of-The-End-Times-V1-0-RELEASED

 

[Lone Wolf]

Sounds legit.

For me and my allies even as early as turn 7-8 full stacks of Chaos Undivided troops were spawning within our borders and sieging towns, when no one but Ostland even had a standing army. Further south for Wissenland, half and full stacks of Skaven were spawning, and for the far-westerners full stacks of Vampire Counts were spawning.

In all seriousness, scripted tides of doom aren't my cup of tea, but these guys (and the sub-modders) deserve huge credit for what they were able to squeeze out of the Medieval 2 engine.

 

[Trash]

Call of Warhammer is a notoriously fiddly mod. Not to mention extremely railroaded. It's nice that people have worked so hard on making a less railroaded submod but at its heart it remains a mess. A grandiose mess but still a mess. The LOTR mod is unfortunately still the only real worthwhile fantasy mod for Medieval 2.

 

[varangos]

this sub mod seems much more stable than call of warhammer 1.51,but it seems quite rushed,stuff like unit cards are missing and the new music is beyond lame.
i quite enjoyed COW 1.51,AI in total war games is notoriously retarded,without scripted stuff there is no challenge at all.

For me and my allies even as early as turn 7-8 full stacks of Chaos Undivided troops

well in 1.51 when the scripted invasion begins,45(forty five) fulls stack materialize in around kislev and rekt everything.
so it looks like an improvement if you dont like scripted stuff.

 

[Blaine]

Yeah, I've been trashing the BAI in Shogun 2 on Hard with 4x Katana Samurai, 2x Naginata and 2x Yari Samurai, 4x Bow Samurai, 4x Katana Cavalry and a strategy-oriented daimyo. Haven't lost a unit yet, because the BAI makes stupid decisions like charging their yari at my cavalry who've just broken from cover. My cavalry then wheels around to sodomize their archers and crash into the flanks of their main force; meanwhile, their yari are trailing uselessly behind, and then I can casually send in katana samurai to meet them and deliver them from their suffering.

These are enemy groups with typically 2-3 generals as well as a fair portion of samurai in addition to their ashigaru and garrison troops. They're still outmatched by an appreciable margin (I'd say about 4 to 3 in many cases), but surely they can manage to kill at least one unit.

 

[Seethe]

Isn't Shogun 2 the game where if you kill 10 soldiers, the morale of the entire unit collapses an retreats? Did they even fix that yet?

 

[Blaine]

Isn't Shogun 2 the game where if you kill 10 soldiers, the morale of the entire unit collapses an retreats? Did they even fix that yet?

If it ever did that before, it certainly doesn't now. Bottom-of-the-barrel ashigaru cavalry and archers are the easiest to rout, though, especially when hit with their hard counters, because their base morale is low in the first place and light cavalry are few in number, while the archers are of course very weak in close combat.

In the larger battles, most enemy units hold on until near the bitter end, although if enough units in a given vicinity are "Decisively Losing" and one routs, it can easily cause a chain reaction. The chain reactions are a combination of troops being demoralized by the sight of their side losing, and also the fact that more of your troops are then free to flank those who are holding out.

I'm not sure what it's like to be routed because I'm not a retard and I follow the basics of The Art of War when playing Total War, though I'd reckon I'm somewhat above average at best at large-scale tactics and and somewhat below average at strategy (Codex average, that is).

I'm going to get destroyed on the campaign side eventually due to not paying enough attention to some important details and making hasty decisions, but in the meantime I'm gonna have fun.

 

[Hoodoo]

What's most aberrant is the streamer's satisfaction. 'This is great for me' and he keeps on playing. That's the Total War audience right there. Why program an advanced AI if a dumb AI makes the average player feel smart and satisfied?