Empire Realism - The Most Underrated Mod for Empire Total War? 

Looks pretty good, but is it realistic for every Line in the Lineinfantry to shoot at the same time, even though the Line (of the same unit) in front of them is standing in the way (and should therefore be shot by their own comrades)? Maybe I saw that wrong in the Video, but that does not seem very realistic to me^^ Besides that, it looks good.

@@maximilianhaas2052 Empire TW game is very limiting to be able to use real historical firing drills.. for example Fire by Rank, that was heavily used in base game, was not really in use in 18.century at all.. Early in 18.century, every nation used different approach to deliver volley fire. French used deeper 5-rank formation, with rotating ranks delivering fire one by one, English preferred 3-ranks and delivering volleys by pelotons/divisions. (while ETW does have platoon fire drill, it is not actually how it was used, as within battalion there were only 4 divisions which alternated their fire, while ETW drill uses small groups of men firing, which decreases unit firepower instead of increasing it).. Swedes for example preferred single volley and had men in 4-ranks, but only 2-3 ranks actually had muskets, remaining men had pikes! but that is not possible to simulate in ETW because unit can only have one type of weapons... so Instead, every Line Infantry unit uses same volley fire drill, where first two ranks are firing.(occasionally third rank might fire, if it has line of sight). They always fire at will. This is mostly to make sure gameplay wise, neither player or AI is hampered by nonfunctioning firing drill and can effectively fight - firing drills in ETW have also some additional problems, like for example they wont commence, if there is single soldier stuck out of position somewhere.. entire unit will wait, till that single men gets into his place, while being shot at by enemy... with firing drill in ER, this never happens, because each soldier can fire as he sees fit and his weapon is loaded...

@@JaM-R2TR4 Hey and thanks for the historical info input! Don't get me wrong, I wasn't complaining about the mod (it might have sounded like that). I just thought the solution to this problem which was implemented in the base game (fire by rank, where one volley is shot, then the first rank kneels down to reload and the second rank shoots etc.) was somehow an already (and maybe more) realistic approach (it does not have to be historical to be realistic). But yes, it was probably not historically correct. Anyway: Thanks for the detailed explanation! Edit: On the other Hand: I don't know how difficult it would be to reload a musket while kneeling down (I can imagine it would be way more difficult than doing so while standing). So yes, it would probably be less historically accurate AND be less realistic^^

​@@maximilianhaas2052 btw Fire by Rank in reality was not very effective for musket equipped infantry... because muskets could be loaded a lot faster while standing.. so with soldiers kneeling after firing, it would take them too long to load the weapons again... even later, when 2-rank volley fire was practically a standard, first rank was supposed to kneel, yet it was not used that much as kneeling was not very popular with officers.. Drill books portrayed it, but it was quickly discovered that in combat, soldiers that knelt down, were hard to order to stand up again... which hampered the unit mobility.. During Napoleonic era kneeling of first rank was even prohibited for that particular reason..

@@JaM-R2TR4 Yeah that's what I thought with hindsight (see my edit). But thanks for the clarification :)

Not a big issue, especially for France as that 1 province is super rich.

yeah really hate the fact that France and Spain have two provinces (one huge one and one token one). Need a bigger map in the sequel

@@GudeaTW Agreed the lack of provinces is the only main issue with empire and napoleon. Hopefully, in the future the maps will be a great as the Warhammer series.

@@wolfofthewilds I wouldn't say lack of provinces is the *only* main issue, as far as Empire goes. Empire really lacks some key features that a game of its complexity seems to be lacking. Better diplomacy and diplomatic features is one glaring oversight that it really needed. Being able to formally liberate conquered provinces would be nice to have, the only way to do that now is to conquer a province and let it rebel to its original owners (but the new AI doesn't recognize you as its liberator and in many cases betrays you). Protectorate status is also pretty useless rn as the only time the AI seems to take it is when you've completely grounded them into the dirt but at that point it's probably better to just conquer them. It would have been nice to establish coalitions against mutual enemies. Empire really needed another some more love from CA before they moved on. I hope they remaster it one day or give it to Feral Interactive once they're done with the Medieval 2 mobile port (and eventual Remaster as they did with Rome).

Is there a mod where you can play as America And natives in grand campaign?

Definitely agree - I prefer the deep mechanics to the spectacle (though the spectacle is nice too!)

What does the ER stand for? Ty would like to try some empire mods

​@@souffffffffffslr it means Empire Realism

getting Feral to fix Empire would be something very cool indeed...

Anything official will be Woke af, they WILL push it into everything they do nowadays. Treasure the old and go with mods.

@@Br1cht big fan of ostriches, eh?

Nice! ER is a really nice mod indeed... still have to try NTW3

@@GudeaTW I really like the multiplayer aspect of NTW3

Hey can I help you with modding? I like this idea

@@ScaniaVikings I'm taking a break from major modding as I just got a new job but I can send you what I have and you can play around with it

@@thesiberianproductions3748 Whats your discord?

It is an underrated game I think

Yup, this feature is huge! Empire Realism does it the best

ntw3 for napoleon also dose this and despite being multiplayer focus the campaign is great.. just finished a campaign, grabbed empire in the steam sale and am looking for a similar empire mod.. this looks like it.. hope it unlocks some nations though

It's a fantastic battle experience for sure!

Hmmm I'd say that Empire Realism has pretty good AI, but Imperial Destroyer's is quite good

Yes I will make more content about this mod!

It they can remaster it to the level of Rome remastered patch 2.0.4 I would support that

Diplomacy needs fixing. Prussia having inflicted no defeats on me (playing as Britain), ad me having them under blockade for 7 years, they keep asking for Ireland in a peace settlement. I am also at war with France having them under Blockade (all ports) and wrecking their economy with cavalry, slowly chipping away and winning the war in America, and they just aren't budging.

Yup will be talking about Napoleon Realism as well! Rome 2 Realism also looks quite cool

Shogun2 Realism was made by my friend DaVinci, later it was took over by somebody else. I was not working on it at all.. My mods are Empire Realism (ER), Napoleon Empire Realism (NER) and Rome 2 Total Realism (R2TR4)

Shogun 2 Realism was an awesome mod indeed! But yes JaM didn't make that one.

Ahhh, my mistake. Thanks for clearing it up.

you're welcome :)

Yup really love that portrait pack! Not a bad game but any means for sure, just needed more time in the oven

@@GudeaTW Problem is, as I started playing I went bankrupt in the first turn as Poland ...!!!!

Well, I gave it a try. Started as Sweden and turn 1 I was 3,3K in the red... No thanks, but good job on the mod highlight!

@@7Rendar I played as Sweden and made it all the way to 1840s where I basically control the entire Baltic while having an alliance with Britain and their allies. At the start, you have to disband most of your eastern troops while setting taxation to high so you get more money. Focus on Norway, immediately kick them off of Northern Europe; they can have all the fish in Iceland. This is done in probably ~10 turns. Then with the new land, use the money to get new troops to fight Russia. It's only the first 10 turns that makes or break the campaign in this mod.

xD yup..

I'm using durango's historical portraits mod, if I understand your post correctly

@@GudeaTW yes, that was my question. That’s strange I have that mod installed too but my menu background on startup looks like vanilla, not like yours. 🤔

@@w.d.r1444 Durango also has a menu mod, a UI mod and a load screen mod. All work fine with ER or on there own

that's how it is

Hmm I can't say I do

Can't do pows since I think that's more of an engine thing.. supply mayybe, might be in Terra Incognita... agree about generals, wish the traits system was more in depth

yup!

Empire Realism is barebones so that it is compatible with essentially any graphics mod - probably including that one

@@GudeaTW nope, tested it and since they both change the strapos they are not compatible. shame because Realism has the battles down, but Absolutum has the visuals and audio down.

@@SpainBlood001 personally rather use ER with sound mods and Napoleon effects

I agree!

Perhaps ask JaM about this in the realism discord in the link in the description?

@@GudeaTW cool, ty

@@GudeaTW The discord-link doesn't do anything... it opens Discord's main page, but there's no invite to the server

Try this discord.gg/hT5mbmVU

@@GudeaTW there we go, thanks mate

sure

A lot of the major mods really improve the battle AI, including Empire Realism, TROM, and Imperial Destroyer

@@GudeaTW I tried imperial destroyer and did not liked it, it remove more than added though i would love to have the new regions, i will try this empire realism, it seems really an improvement.

I think empire Realism is a more complete mod than imperial destroyer

Hmm destroyer is a pretty cool mod, give it a shot

@@GudeaTW is destroyer battle/campaign AI better than darthmods?

I would say yes

I agree, it makes it less important to strategize about the regions you conquer.

Empire 2 with everything fixed and a huge map would be epic

@@GudeaTW guess i will have to stick to the eras total conquest mod for medieval 2. it just needs a deployment zone mod to make field battles full sized like sieges so i can use the whole map instead of get cucked when good terrain is inbetween tiles and outside the redline

still have to check out that mod..

@@GudeaTW its good, the scale is weird on the campaigns with america though and armies on cmap move too far by default but i like it enough that i did a meme hotseat with myself to effectively have good cai for 5 factions.

it is good. but its just laggy and end times take too long. Also i think they should have added more units to some other factions, but mods fix that issue.

In terms of gameplay yes

I'd prefer a sequel...

Fire by Rank is not realistic either. it was used in 16th and 17th century, but ETW starts in 18.century.. and by that time more advanced firing drills were used.. Look at it this way - to be able to control entire regiment, to fire only with single rank, would require having officers placed between divisions for each rank separately (so practically 3x more officers).. plus, it would be pretty impossible to fully control it.. that's why units rather delivered fire in smaller groups (divisions) which were easier to control. And historically, all these drills eventually evolved into voluntary volley fire drill, where first two ranks delivered fire, with third one being seen as reserve. French specifically considered this drill most effective, as it allowed each soldier to fire with its own tempo (unit did not wait till every single soldier reloads its weapon, misfires were common ), plus, once firing started, officers were pretty much unable to control the unit anyway due to all the smoke, chaos and noise of muskets fired.. All this is simulated indirectly through cohesion system, which applies with every volley fired.. longer unit is firing, more disordered it gets and easier it is to break such unit with a charge.... so technically, you want to drag enemy line infantry into long range firefight, and when units start to get disordered, just charge them with fresh units or cavalry... (charging with disordered units would not work as they are as easily to rout as enemy, plus, there is a "will check" implemented for the charge, so only units with stable cohesion and morale will actually charge, disordered units might break right there trying to charge... and of course, cohesion level impacts the power of the charge bonus..) From technical perspective, i would definitely use some different fire drill, if those were actually working properly, and they would not put AI into a disadvantageous position all the time.. player usually knows something is off, and can fix own unit positioning so it would fire properly.. but AI tends to get stuck, and those fire drills would just make those units not fire a volley and be just sitting ducks... so it was a choice between a "spectacle" or gameplay.. and i had to chose gameplay..

The "everyone fires at the same time" is best for the AI. The AI can handle it much better than any other firing drill. My favorite DarthMod submod that focuses on harder AI also makes that change.

@@JaM-R2TR4 hey it’s the mod creator! Appreciate the response, it’s more-so the way that everyone in the rear ranks also fires their weapons even though they’re behind the guys in front. I personally like when that detail is taken care of. Like in imperial splendor, the effects are flashy and fun but most units all fire their rifles at the same time. Imperial destroyer has fire by rank, but the muzzle flashes are miniature atom bombs for each rifle, which loses me as well. I know I’m being nit picky, but that’s my preference. Other than that though the other realism aspects are cool. Well done.

@@RM-cv4tl i'm afraid that is not possible, because volley fire allows all men to fire.. so if unit is in 3 ranks, they will fire from 3 ranks... if they are in 6 ranks, 6 will fire.. only change is, that ER limits the line of sight of each soldier entity, so rear ranks "cannot see" through ranks in front of them... so practically, first two ranks fire almost always, and third rank might fire sometimes... but if you position the unit on a slope, they will have line of sight anyway... some time ago, i tried to change the setup a bit, only allow first rank to fire (the default fire mode), but make that each musket fires 2 projectiles, effectively simulate 2-rank fire... but it had its own problems.. some players rather have more muskets firing, some pointed out they can "cheat" the AI and extend own line so thin, that they will gain firepower advantage... so i returned to current firing drill as its least problematic of all available...

I think JaM explains his reasoning pretty well here!

ah should check that out!

Just delete the er pack files

Yes?

@@GudeaTW as in not Istambul. I'm joking btw

Ah.. well yeah ;)