Would you like to see Medieval 3 get the trilogy treatment?

Druidsbrook

Hey all,
How would you feel about a new Medieval total war presented as a trilogy in a similar manner to the Warhammer series? TW: Warhammer is the most supported and largest Total War title yet and this is because its been broken up into three games worth of content.

What would a Medieval 3 look like in this format? Heres my thoughts

Game 1
This would be the similar focus of Medieval 2 with a mostly European map and factions the main events could be around invasions from the middle east and Africa

Game 2
This map would flesh out the muslim world and feature a seperate campaign focused there with most of the factions trying to form their own Caliphates, other Christian factions would appear here like Byzantium, Iberian Kingdoms, Ethiopia who would have their own objectives. (the map would probably go from Iberia, parts of the mediterranian and Africa into central asia) End game events could involve defending from crusades or mongols.

Of course like Warhammer a campaign stitching the new area on to the original game 1 map would appear and should result in having the best map of 'old world' we've seen yet surpassing Medieval 2 and Rome 2's attempts.

Game 3
This game is basically about expanding the world out as far east as its possible. Mongols would be fully fleshed out as a playable faction with unique empire building mechanics. The seperate campaign would be focused on Mongolian campaigns so central asia into eastern europe and south into India and east into China. And of course a final update to the Total map creating effectively a Total War: Eurasia.

I'm honestly not sure if it would be possible it would certainly end up bigger than Warhammer maybe it would need to be broken into four games? And there are certainly downsides to this approach.

Would you like to see a Medieval 3 or another historical title as a trilogy? Would you break up the games differently? Let me know what you think!

Maxim1lian

Hello. I wrote earlier about a similar scheme, initially, though in the form of large additions, but then I thought that it would be quite possible to make a trilogy. However, my concept was different from yours. It was based on exactly 2 centuries for each game of the classic Medieval.
It looked like this:
Part 1 - 10-11 centuries (900-1100 years + -)
Part 2 - 12-13 centuries (1100-1300 years + -)
Part 3 - 14-15 centuries (1300-1500 + -)

Such a concept will allow us to focus more accurately and historically to convey military science and its evolution (from chain mail to plate armor), events of that time, historical characters, as well as display in more detail more correctly the states of that period - kingdoms, empires, duchies, etc. Because some states did not exist in the 10-11th century, but some states appeared later, for example, in the 13th century.
The map should be large immediately upon release. The map should include Europe, North Africa and Western Asia. Other regions are not needed, other regions need to be done for other games in the series - within the framework of the historical series, or the saga of the series. The map should also be more detailed, similar to the Crusader Kings. There should be many provinces in which there should be many settlements. Something like this - 1 big city, 2-3 medium-small towns and 2-3 castles. So that there were many such provinces in France, not 2-3 provinces.
I also believe that the main goal of the game should be to unite historical lands and hold them. For the seizure of historical lands of other states, fines should be imposed on these lands, since the people there have their own national identity. Like the war between France and England - the Hundred Years War. Well, or as an example, playing for France, if we begin to seize the lands of the Holy Roman Empire, then the opponent will have to gather an alliance, which may include the Holy Roman Empire, England, Castile and Leon, etc. That is, a war will begin on several fronts, which the player may not pull. There will also be war weariness, because of which our lands and vassals will have to rebel against the player. Thus, the player will have to think over their decisions and play carefully, otherwise you can lose everything.
These are my thoughts. But this approach to Medieval 3 will allow you to maintain it for 5-6 years for sure. The popularity of this period is the highest. The main thing is that CA would take the project seriously, and think it over well. I really don't know if they even read this section of the forum, because there are often many interesting ideas, not only mine)

Commisar

Yeah I could see it being phased in to three like that, however not sure how the game would handle the addition of the "grand campaign" with it having the historical timeline such as still having technology to unlock before you've taken half the world by the third game.

It does have the advantage of more central nations don't get a safe border in game as there can be a lot of threats from the East/West depending on where you are but at the same time there is then the resource cost of many nations you never really interact with.

Oh also, might need to see big changes to the trade system in such a game, maybe trade range would need to be developed? I thinking rather strange if we can get a constant trade with China before the 1200s.

davedave1124

It seems like I'm being short changed here. In M2 I got all of these periods without paying for a full game x 3.

Commisar

davedave1124 said:

It seems like I'm being short changed here. In M2 I got all of these periods without paying for a full game x 3.

Yeah why I like the idea of the increased map size. We didn't see India and have only had it covered in Empire and Medieval would be a better period to represent it with.

davedave1124

Commisar said:

davedave1124 said:

It seems like I'm being short changed here. In M2 I got all of these periods without paying for a full game x 3.

Yeah why I like the idea of the increased map size. We didn't see India and have only had it covered in Empire and Medieval would be a better period to represent it with.

Major extensions of the map would be better than time periods -yes.. Europe, America’s and then the East.

jamreal18

What is the point?

Warhammer was only divided because the each races use different skeletons.Medieval only has humans, what is the point of dividing it?

It's like you are asking for fewer factions compared to what CA is already offering. Rome 2 has 8 factions on release, China has 11 factions on release. How many do you expect in Medieval if you want to divide it into 3 games?

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Mongols shall have their own game which is separate from Medieval. Remember China should be part of their game and you want to mix China with Europe?

If they do that, so Rome 2 should had been divided into 3 sub games as well?

Do people really want to wait 3-4 years before they can play the complete game?

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@Maxim1lian
Maybe Chapter Packs might work.
Improving High and Late periods but making different games for those period is too much.

Will you like it if CA only make Roman Republic and sell the Imperial Rome as separate game?

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Let CA make expansions like:

*Hundred Years War,
*Holy Land Crusades,
*Northern Crusades,
*Reconquista

Actually those events should be incorporated 8nto main game itself but if they want enhance those events into their own, let them be.

Don't ask CA to disect Medieval period itself into multiple games.

Maxim1lian

jamreal18 said:

@Maxim1lian
Maybe Chapter Packs might work.
Improving High and Late periods but making different games for those period is too much.

Will you like it if CA only make Roman Republic and sell the Imperial Rome as separate game?

+++++++++++++++++++++++
Let CA make expansions like:

*Hundred Years War,
*Holy Land Crusades,
*Northern Crusades,
*Reconquista

Actually those events should be incorporated 8nto main game itself but if they want enhance those events into their own, let them be.

Don't ask CA to disect Medieval period itself into multiple games.

I think chapter expansion packs are more likely than dividing the game into a trilogy. If only for the reason that the game will be called "3", if you make a trilogy, it will cause confusion. Why do I propose packs of chapters, because I am sure that everything cannot be crammed into one game campaign, and if you do this, you will get a not entirely detailed and accurate game. Medieval 2 had everything at once, but it was not very detailed, something was not there at all. Сhapter expansion packs for different centuries will allow us to work more deeply in each century - however, there will be a lot of work for developers. Only the models of soldiers, warriors and knights for units will have to be done a lot, since they will differ greatly from each other in different centuries, and that's not all, there are also many cultures that will also visually differ from each other. Also, the current concept of CA campaigns covers about a century, since now the games have a system of seasons of the year, because of which 1 game year now lasts 4 turns, that is, there will not be such a system as in Medieval 2. And that's good, with the seasons the game looks more realistic

Maxim1lian

For those who write about a large map for the whole world. It must be understood that the coverage of the whole world, deprives the provinces - cities, settlements, castles in Europe, North Africa and Western Asia. It also hinders the concentration of developers on the cultures of those regions, and most importantly their diversity, because they still have to deal with some kind of India or Africa. Why is this necessary, in a game where the concentration is mainly on Europe and the surrounding regions? We also get clone units, because the developers will have to make tribes of some kind of Africa, and the roster of India. Do you really want it? Although I can certainly understand your love and craving for painting the world map with your faction, because there are probably no other goals in the game for you.
India, America - these are other games, other parts of the series. The discovery and conquest of America generally needs to be done within the framework of the Saga, in the base game about the "old world" it is not needed.

Commisar

OK so to avoid a wall of quotes:
@jamreal18
The point I take form it would be the largest TW to date with the biggest range of factions and cultures.

They should only split Rome 2 in to multiple games if they'd branched out and done to India and China.

And would people rather wait 8+ years with no historical TWs to get one on this scale?

It wouldn't stop CA doing DLCs.

@Maxim1lian
Problem there is then you are more looking at making M4 and 5 when Ca has to change the map and many of the mechanics to represent the changes in factions and technology over the time period.

The idea for splitting it to cover more area has been taken from WH 1+2, as far as I can tell the Mortal Empires campaign map doesn't reduce the coverage of the areas, it just increases the map and adds more details. By splitting the games up you'd have the same detail for each region as a TW focusing on that area would have anyway.

It wouldn't impact their focus anymore than moving to different time periods would. Be less clone units then we'd get just in Europe as you would have more new cultures and technologies along with the different climates causing historical changes in military style.

Yeah the conquering the map would be over the top, I doubt it would be possible within the campaigns time limits. And yeah that is the entire goal of TW as set by the games victory conditions, not a fan of it always being like personally.

I don't expect them to do either with the historical games.

Maxim1lian

Commisar said:

@Maxim1lian
Problem there is then you are more looking at making M4 and 5 when Ca has to change the map and many of the mechanics to represent the changes in factions and technology over the time period.

The idea for splitting it to cover more area has been taken from WH 1+2, as far as I can tell the Mortal Empires campaign map doesn't reduce the coverage of the areas, it just increases the map and adds more details. By splitting the games up you'd have the same detail for each region as a TW focusing on that area would have anyway.

It wouldn't impact their focus anymore than moving to different time periods would. Be less clone units then we'd get just in Europe as you would have more new cultures and technologies along with the different climates causing historical changes in military style.

Yeah the conquering the map would be over the top, I doubt it would be possible within the campaigns time limits. And yeah that is the entire goal of TW as set by the games victory conditions, not a fan of it always being like personally.

I don't expect them to do either with the historical games.

No, initially the author of the topic wrote about the trilogy. I just stressed that the concept is not bad. However, in my last post, I wrote that this approach can cause confusion in the series numerology. So I suggested calling it expansion chapter packs.
I also propose to make a huge map right away on release, without further extensions. This map should include ONLY the territories of Europe, North Africa and Western Asia. Other regions and territories must be consecrated in other historical games in the series or saga series. The expansion chapter packs should only focus on historical characters, historical events, historical states of the century, to which the expansion chapter pack is dedicated, as well as the visual and artistic part, this includes medieval armies, knights, weapons and armor, architecture, etc. etc.
And conquering the map is not my favorite thing from a historical point of view, I believe that it is historically correct to create states within its historical boundaries. And for this you need to make many provinces, and cities, settlements and castles in them, so that the game would be long and interesting. For the seizure of historical lands of another Thrace, gameplay mechanics must be applied, in the form of fines for the captured lands, as well as the political unification of several factions against the player in order to put the player in place. This is all Medieval, this is not a game about Antiquity, where playing as Rome I can understand the seizure of all the lands, or the Three Kingdoms, where playing as Cao Cao you re-unite the empire. Medieval is all the same what is different, this is feudalism in the first place, and the conventional French would not want to live under the rule of the British, because then the national identity of the peoples was formed

Whiskeyjack_5691

I certainly like the idea, but I think a campaign map scratching from the Atlantic Ocean to the South China Sea is simply too big to be feasible. Maybe it could be done with expansion packs and areas like India and China being self-contained campaigns, but that wouldn't be the same thing.

Maxim1lian

Whiskeyjack_5691 said:

I certainly like the idea, but I think a campaign map scratching from the Atlantic Ocean to the South China Sea is simply too big to be feasible. Maybe it could be done with expansion packs and areas like India and China being self-contained campaigns, but that wouldn't be the same thing.

I am writing about this. Medieval 3 should concentrate on the classic region with Europe and some adjacent regions, such as North Africa and Western Asia (which includes the Middle East, Asia Minor and some other areas). And to make this map as large as possible on release, so that there would be many cities, settlements and castles.
As for Asia as a whole, I think it is necessary to make a game for Medieval Asia separately, where there will be about the same concept for centuries and chapters 10-11,12-13,14-15 centuries, India, China, Japan, Mongolia. I believe that developers need to focus on something in particular in order to get a more detailed, elaborate and varied game in small details. And if you do everything at once, then this will not work, since you will have to pay attention to the whole world. Because of this, regions and provinces will become smaller, cities and settlements will become smaller, the variety and detail of game models of soldiers, warriors and knights, and their weapons and armor will also be smaller.

jamreal18

Anyways for Medieval Era, do you think Carolingian Empire and Vikings Expansion will be part of it?

These period should be part of Medieval Era..

"This era is often considered, to begin with, the "fall of Rome" and end sometime in the 11th century. It encompasses the reigns of ​Charlemagne, Alfred the Great, and the Danish Kings of England; it saw frequent Viking activity, the Iconoclastic Controversy, and the birth and rapid expansion of Islam in Northern Africa and Spain. Over these centuries, Christianity spread throughout much of Europe, and the Papacy evolved into a powerful political entity."

https://www.thoughtco.com/defining-the-middle-ages-part-6-1788883#:~:text=Generally, the medieval era is,lacks hard and fast parameters.

Kinda Agree with Maximilian.
If CA includes Mongol in M3, the game might get shrinked cutting some areas, castles and cities.

Mongols should be a NPF only but a threat instead.

Maxim1lian

jamreal18 said:

Anyways for Medieval Era, do you think Carolingian Empire and Vikings Expansion will be part of it?

These period should be part of Medieval Era..

"This era is often considered, to begin with, the "fall of Rome" and end sometime in the 11th century. It encompasses the reigns of ​Charlemagne, Alfred the Great, and the Danish Kings of England; it saw frequent Viking activity, the Iconoclastic Controversy, and the birth and rapid expansion of Islam in Northern Africa and Spain. Over these centuries, Christianity spread throughout much of Europe, and the Papacy evolved into a powerful political entity."

https://www.thoughtco.com/defining-the-middle-ages-part-6-1788883#:~:text=Generally, the medieval era is,lacks hard and fast parameters.

Kinda Agree with Maximilian.
If CA includes Mongol in M3, the game might get shrinked cutting some areas, castles and cities.

Mongols should be a NPF only but a threat instead.

I think not, as these periods were touched upon in Attila and Thrones of Britannia. The most that can be from the Early Medieval is the 10th century. Although, of course, even the 10th century is unlikely, I prescribe it in the packs of chapters along with the 11th century, in order to equally divide 3 packs of chapters of 200 years. It's just that if you exclude the 1st century from the package of chapters, then you will probably get only such an option, 150 years each.
11-12 centuries - 1050-1200 years
13-14 centuries - 1200-1350
14-15 centuries - 1350-1500
Also not a bad option for chapter packs

Commisar

Maxim1lian said:

No, initially the author of the topic wrote about the trilogy. I just stressed that the concept is not bad. However, in my last post, I wrote that this approach can cause confusion in the series numerology. So I suggested calling it expansion chapter packs.
I also propose to make a huge map right away on release, without further extensions. This map should include ONLY the territories of Europe, North Africa and Western Asia. Other regions and territories must be consecrated in other historical games in the series or saga series. The expansion chapter packs should only focus on historical characters, historical events, historical states of the century, to which the expansion chapter pack is dedicated, as well as the visual and artistic part, this includes medieval armies, knights, weapons and armor, architecture, etc. etc.
And conquering the map is not my favorite thing from a historical point of view, I believe that it is historically correct to create states within its historical boundaries. And for this you need to make many provinces, and cities, settlements and castles in them, so that the game would be long and interesting. For the seizure of historical lands of another Thrace, gameplay mechanics must be applied, in the form of fines for the captured lands, as well as the political unification of several factions against the player in order to put the player in place. This is all Medieval, this is not a game about Antiquity, where playing as Rome I can understand the seizure of all the lands, or the Three Kingdoms, where playing as Cao Cao you re-unite the empire. Medieval is all the same what is different, this is feudalism in the first place, and the conventional French would not want to live under the rule of the British, because then the national identity of the peoples was formed

But you want the to do the region correctly, with the towns, cities, states/princes/etc in the correct location. As the borders of provinces and regions shifted historically and locations rose, fell and moved means a lot of changes. If you want that type of accuracy that does mean a lot of fundamental changes to the map which is a lot of work and then having all the new tech and units is even more. It is effectively making a new game each time.

We have the 3K chapter packs, where you are just looking at the same map, same units, same tech but ownership of the regions being changed along with the lords and a handful of unique elements being added.

...for a large part of this time frame large amounts of geographical France was owned by the English crown, the Angevin Empire. Was pretty much the main thing for the English and French for a lot of the medieval period. Both nations ended up claiming the throne of the other, taking land and expanding in other areas should be allowed as historically it was tried (Spain did it quite well) but yeah there should be more attempts to balance power. Hopefully the improved diplomacy from 3K would be useful for that.

jamreal18 said:

Anyways for Medieval Era, do you think Carolingian Empire and Vikings Expansion will be part of it?

If CA includes Mongol in M3, the game might get shrinked cutting some areas, castles and cities.

Mongols should be a NPF only but a threat instead.

There was a Vikings expansion for Medieval 2, depending on when they set the games start date it could fit being basic part of the grand campaign or be an early DLC campaign.

Yeah would expect them to have the Mongols work like they did in the past games, large horde army that appears and is a late game threat for the nations in the region. I think I prefer this to the more recent changes where the map just gangs up on you or you have a civil war.

Maxim1lian

jamreal18 said:

Kinda Agree with Maximilian.
If CA includes Mongol in M3, the game might get shrinked cutting some areas, castles and cities.

Mongols should be a NPF only but a threat instead.

I believe that the invasion and conquest of the Mongols should take place in the second chapter of the expansion pack. In Medieval 3, she as a faction should appear in the 13-14 century. When it settles on the territory of Europe, in the steppes near the modern city of Astrakhan in Russia (at that time, Saray-Batu was the capital of the Golden Horde), you can make it a playable faction, and let you play for it from about 1224 (it was in this year that them at that time the capital). The Golden Horde has been completely independent since 1266, retaining only formal dependence on the Mongol Empire. By the middle of the 15th century, the Golden Horde split into several independent khanates. That, as it were, would allow several Mongol factions to do in chapter 3 of the expansion pack, and the prerequisites for the events of its collapse.
Something has brought me into history, although we are discussing a little different here)

ShiroAmakusa75

davedave1124 said:

It seems like I'm being short changed here. In M2 I got all of these periods without paying for a full game x 3.

You could also theoretically play R2 and get to the dates where Imperator Augustus and Empire Divided took place. I think however this more about unique start conditions. The first Medieval Total War actually had this feature where you could pick low, high and late middle ages which would swap the factions and their holdings around on the map to better resemble the corresponding historical situations. Similar to how the chapters in 3K work.

davedave1124

Ephraim_Dalton said:

davedave1124 said:

It seems like I'm being short changed here. In M2 I got all of these periods without paying for a full game x 3.

You could also theoretically play R2 and get to the dates where Imperator Augustus and Empire Divided took place. I think however this more about unique start conditions. The first Medieval Total War actually had this feature where you could pick low, high and late middle ages which would swap the factions and their holdings around on the map to better resemble the corresponding historical situations. Similar to how the chapters in 3K work.

And this is something I'd be happy with, different start times. Although I always started on the earliest so I could enjoy the complete game.

personally I think the only thing that could justify splitting it up into 3 games is to show totally unique cultures, mechanics, units etc.

Druidsbrook

Sorry to reply so late, it's been interesting reading all thoughts here.

I can understand the resistance to break up the game but in theory it should lead to the components of each game being far more detailed and immersive than anything from the the previous titles. Game 1 could deliver fully fleshed out European cultures with more unique mechanics and audio and visual details. Game 2 would see the middle east get a similar treatment with new mechanics for the cultures there and more detailed provinces so places like Egypt are not 1-2 settlements.

Time periods is another legitimate idea as Medieval 2 covered a huge time span and it would be fun to mess about with different start dates and see the different eras fully realised with changes to economy, politics and warfare. Personally I felt Medieval 2 tried to cover too much I'd rather see a smaller time frame but with a greater variety of cultures and a larger world.

It is possible trying to make a game that covers Europe to China would be too much but this is why breaking it up into three games was the idea and certainly a game focused on specific Asian cultures would be great but a game where lots of different medieval cultures can clash does hold a certain appeal (See Age of Empires 2).

jamreal18

Mortal Empires still can't make the whole Lustria accessible even though its already made up of two games. The Old World was shrank in combined map, right?

Guys, if CA would split 1 era into multiple games, how much time would you have to wait to play the complete game? If that happens, I want to see lots of unique battlemaps and siege maps.

How many playable factions do you want to see per game?

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For the Mongols, I want to see them being made in their own game.

Suggestion for playable factions:

Factions:

• Borjigin clan
  
• Merkit clan
  
• Kara-Khitai Khanate
  
• Xia Empire
  
• Song Empire
  
• Jin Empire
  
• Goryeo Kingdom
  
• Khwarazmian Empire*
  
• Kamakura Shogunate
  
• Delhi Sultanate
  
• Kievan Rus
  
• Volga Bulgaria*
  
• Abbasid Caliphate
  
• Byzantine Empire
  
• Sultanate of Rum
  
• Kingdom of Georgia
  
• Kingdom of Hungary
  
• Kingdom of Poland
  

Regards to Matt Jeans