*Warning* DO NOT purchase Rome II: Total War without reading...

Folks, I would not normally post this as an additional thread when there is already a dedicated threat for Total War. However I wanted to ensure I warn as much as my fellow NBR members about the utter piece of fraud taking place with Rome II: Total War.

This game is a COMPLETE & UTTER disappointment making even Empire: Total War look good. I have listed my feedback below, and I strongly recommend nobody considers purchasing this game without at least visit the games official forums : Total War: ROME II. There are enough well constructed posts there that summarize the reason why you will not enjoy this game.


About Me

I have been a HUGE Total War fan since Rome 1, playing and enjoying every release in the series including Empire: Total War & Napolean Total War which clearly were not the strongest titles.

I play Shogun 2 regularly up to this day more than I play any other game in my library.....

So in other words I am a huge fan of the Total War series, and my opinion should be considered to represent a Total War Fan versus a Casual gamer trying out the series for the first time.

My Review

I am not going to write a long review, I will jump right to the point and say this game is a HUGE dissapointment to the point where I don't even enjoy playing it PERIOD. It is has never happened where I have got a new Total War game, and actually stopped playing because I do not enjoy the game. To understand the difference both Empire & Napolean Total War were quite disappointing for me, but were still good enough games that I enjoyed playing them. Rome 2 Total War is so bad after forcing myself to play for 4 hours yesterday, I simply do not have any desire to turn on the game again.

Specifics

Graphics - The graphics are just terrible considering this is a next-gen title. What is extremely frustrating is the game looks NO WHERE near as good as the gameplay videos released for Rome 2 over the past year "Here is a link to a thread exposing the issue http://forums.totalwar.com/showthread.php/81022-What-happened-to-this?". Coupled with the poor graphics the game also has HUGE performance issues, where the strategic map slows down considerably at random times. Also there are several weird graphic errors, such as images not rendering right away. No where near what you would expect from a game you just paid $60 for.

User Interface - HORRIBLE, HORRIBLE, User Interface. I mean I don't think they could of made a worse UI if they tried. It is clear this game was designed with consoles in mind, as they have stripped out the previous UI we have come to love in the Total War series. Replacing it with this simplified UI which does not provide all the information you need "which it used to", but also takes up literally half your screen during battles.

Some of the changes to how you build and upgrade your buildings are just awful and although simple in design quite confusing to use.

I have no idea why they decided to redo the great user interface from previous Total War games, aside from obviously getting ready for a console port.

Actual Battles - It feels like they have taken all of the strategy out of winning battles, now its whomever has the "best" army wins. For example they have added "control points" which can now be captured by the attacking player as part of any battle. Why this is such an AWFUL change is it forces the defending army to position itself in the middle of the map, otherwise it will leave these "control points" undefended. All the means you had previously of defeating a stronger army with strategy by "position on a hill, or trees, etc" is now gone.

Animations - I can understand why they didn't opt to put in as much gore as we may be used to playing Shogun 2 with the Darthmod + gore mod. However these animations are just atrocious. Literally your armies run at each other and form a huge blob despite the formation you have them in, and than slowly units start just falling over. I would compare this to watching a cheap action movie, where your watching a fight scene and it ruins the movie as its painfully obvious the main action hero is just punching the air next the bad guys head followed by the bad guy falling over and moaning with bad acting...

AI - In this games case the AI isn't just poorly designed, but its actually outright broken! The enemy AI will rarely EVER attack you, and during battles will stop moving and do nothing for no particular reason. Also the enemy AI is completely unable to siege any city. Usually ends up just piling all its units by your gate .... only to sit there and slowly get eroded away by archer fire. I just can't state enough how bad the AI is in this game.


You mean you have nothing good to say about this game ???

I really don't sorry folks.... Some of the changes introduced such as the ability for any unit to magically build a "transport ship" which will rival any of your expensive navy units, are just so bad it's trying to fail. I am sure Rome 2: Total War does some things better than it's predecessor, but the current overall package is just so it's extremely difficult if not impossible to take notice of what the game does right.

There are definitely worse games than Rome 2 : Total War, the fact that Rome 2 is a bad game is not why I made this post. The fact that they have hyped this game and made claims that are simply just not true as pushed me to make this thread. Claims such as "Improved AI, Massive Land & Navy Battles, better multiplayer, etc." are just absolutely false, coupled with gameplay videos that look AMAZING when the actual gameplay looks god awful makes me feel like I have been de-frauded after spending $60 on this game.

It happened to you... please don't let it happy to yourself or anybody you care about !! Friends don't let friends buy Total War Rome 2 !!!

Saddest thing is all they had to do was release Rome: Total War 1 refreshed with upgraded graphics and it would of been a HUGE hit!

The only reason they didn't do that, is they wanted to release a new total war game which was ready to port to the xbox/playstation. Please don't reward this behavior by giving Total War your business. Believe me they are already profitable on this game with the records they broke for pre-orders and all, let's not reward them any further!!


Folks, I don't think I will get a single reply to this thread of anyone disagreeing with how bad this game is.... yes THAT's how bad Rome 2 Total War is... even on the NBR not a single flame shall take place lol.

 

I was reading today that the developer plans on doing weekly updates? I'm glad I did not buy it on Steam and I was tempted.

 

Yes they are, so in essence I am part of not soo exclusive team of beta testers who paid a $60 fee for the privelege lol.

Some people are hopeful a mix of these patches & mods will correct the problems everyone hates. I am not so optimistic as it will be 6 months before this game is as polished as it should be.... and even then die-hard fans like myself will likely not enjoy the game as much as previous Total War 2 release.

Patches are not going to resolve the problem that it is clear they are trying to make total war appeal more to casual / console gamers.

 

Least I got it for $47 and $13 in store credit.

 

Thanks for the review. It's a $20 game to me. I paid $30 for Shogun 2 and regret it because I've only played 6 hrs of the learning campaign and never finished that. I should have bought it when it was 8+ months old at $12.

Control points are stupid. But that's a COH 1 feature.

 

I am not seeing any plans of console version to be developed. What maybe the reason that they turned all of those assets down? (That the 2012 demo ran on a triple sli + i7 990x computer probably? When I first saw the Cartage video I knew that our computers just cannot pull that off, given the already HORRIBLE performance at Empire..)

 

Damn, i feel like strategy gaming has died...

 

Just a dang shame. Total War was one of the last bastions of good, complex historical strat gaming. The game has obviously been dumbed down for the masses in an attempt to drive up sales. Thing is, there is really no market for a dumbed-down strategy games: casual or "action" gamers aren't interested and strategy enthusiasts require complexity and detail.

 

Another dumbed down feature in many games is No Save Game feature at any time... Stupid checkpoint save game systems.

Lots of mixed reviews on amazon... Amazon.com: Customer Reviews: Total War: Rome II [Download]

 

i wouldnt say its all bad. i like how there are more options for agents. the stances during campaign movements. the province getting divided into smaller regions and gives bonuses when you own the whole province.

it does need more optimization. and my generals and agents needs to stop dying after 20 or so turns. it gets really annoying.

 

After watching 2 youtube videos it didn't seem all that bad.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RbZKQ30Lj3Y

But I'll still get it when it's a $20 game, it'll probably be way patched by then.

 

I really don't care for the new UI, after using it I like it, I wish that you clicked instead of hovered the mouse

The BAI is the same as usual, the CAI has improved

I like the new way of recruiting armies, it really makes it easier

I really like the new way of the political intrigues, its extremely interesting and can be upgraded and I hope it will

in therms of graphics I can't enjoy full blown sparkles sparkles and from the pics I see (from players) its about the same as shogun if not better

regarding animations, cqc with close ranged weapons tends to form blobs

 

agree. as for the campaign gameplay and ui, many players are playing it like the older titles, without reading the manual or playing a few games for familiarity. they expect to go in there and do the things that worked for them before and win. its a new game with many new features. many of the complaints on this aspect are actually l2p issues.

as for the bai, yes its always been bad so nothing new here. as for the speed of battles, vanilla shogun 2 on launch also lasted 2-3 minutes so they were as short, if not shorter than rome 2's. also, if you played with the better troops in custom battles, you will see that they will last longer, owing to the better (defensive) sklls. also it was mentioned in a few dev interviews that they wanted rome 2 to be a more mass based, violent game as opposed to shogun 2's more elegant, one on one engagements- so in this aspect i think they accomplished what they set out to do.

as for gfx, i have to admit the first video releases from last year(carthage) looks better than the game right now. it seems like it had a graphics injector that was removed from the final release, maybe for performance issues. if you however looked at the last two major video gameplay footages before release, teutoborg forest and egypt, they look exactly like the released game gfx.

as for bugs and stability, any tw vet knows that shogun 2 and napoleon were the only two games that were relatively stable and bug free on release. everything else, including the beloved rome 1, took many patches to 'fix'. the issue here is nostalgia and hype. people like comparing this game to the classics, forgetting that it took a while for rome1 and shogun1 to be the classics that they eventually became. as for hype, all big companies do that- if you got on the hype train with your unchecked expectations, well thats your own fault.

tldr- the game is worth buying at 45usd as long as you know where its coming from and as long as you keep your expectations in check. and anyways, it can only get better.

 

oh and regarding control points - anyone who has played tw games for a while will know exactly why they put this in.

in the previous titles, the bai would refuse to attack a player in a well fortified position such as a hill or slope because it deemed these scenario as unwinnable if attacked. thus it would form its own position and wait for the player to attack it instead. a lot of people saw this as an ai flaw, i however thought this was an ai actually 'thinking' out winning scenarios for itself. however the end result was a boring wait and see game that many complained about.

control points were introduced to force both forces to engage. its true that players will now have less use of terrain features for attack and defense since the location of engagement is dictated by the capture point. but this is clearly a choice of between to evils - would you have a 30 minute no engagement battle or capture points? ca chose the latter and imho its the lesser of the two evils.

 

Here's a youtube video on the flaws of Rome 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_QK-lcW8a8

I have only 7 hours on Shogun 2 with all of it's expansions too so I can be happy playing that while Rome 2 gets 1 year old and patched up. Maybe I should buy Rome 2 at $12 like Shougn 2 did in 8 months or so after release.

 

ah the angry joe review, the only thing worth in there is the problem with the BAI, which funny enough are the same problems that affect rome 1, its a curse! Though I do agree that multi could have more players that would make it very very interesting

its actually stupid that in his shogun 2 review he asked exactly what he received capture points.

in the end I have no problems with the capture points, in terms of features this game is quite fine, I want AI, balance and performance fixes.

 

as fun as joes review is, a big part of it is about gfx issues that, to be fair, many people do not suffer from. i for one have never experienced any of those issues and many in twc or steam forums do not report such.

karam, your review is much better put together without the hype and nerd rage. its not a perfect game but its not as bad as many put it out to be. and its the 2nd most played game in steam.

 

yeah the constant nerd rage against rome 2 is simple

1) gfx, or shiny bling bling - sure it matters to some, not to me

2) Family tree removed - sure it never ever ever mattered to anyone and it doesn't fit rome political system

3) AI - passive CAI and stupid BAI, stupid BAI is common, for CAI read the review

4) UI - people hated the change, I feel its like looking at the win 8 launch or when Lion came

5) Diplomacy is broken - it isn't the only thing broken is your brain

6) Performance issues - yes they exist, no they are not affecting everybody


thats it, thats actually pretty much it

oh there are those people that complain about steam too.

its incredible how few complaints can make TWC rome 2 forum an impossible place to discuss something, and given that for me the only relevant part in there that is a big concern is the AI, the rest can be fixed and I hope that they don't put back the family tree

BTW today they started to complain the lack of videos, they want intro faction videos

another thing that I missed on my comment earlier about angry joe review is that there still speeches at the start of the battle, you just don't move your general when the battle starts that he will give you the speech, they are usually amusing, very funny most of them

 

to add about gfx bling, many have been complaining about how drab rome 2 looks. imho, its historically accurate as many times they were fighting in desserts or plains; and their gear was not shiny bronze or cured leather like what you have in shogun 2. in shogun 2, you were fighting in settings that look more like royal orchards, with all the cherry blossoms adn flowers on screen.

 

you forgot that the armour also had lacquer so they are really shiny.

Im in the can't care less camp, the units now after the hot fix on low actually look better than on shogun2 for me on medium high

To add nerd rage list

7) armies that can turn into transport ships, people complained that we didn't have naval invasions, now they complain that we do have naval invasions, and its 3 more points if its not a major faction that does it

8) Civil war brings too many stacks, but that only happens because you are causing a bug in the system with radious mod, Im glad I got the bug, its a challenge

Basically people are moving to complain from its too easy to there are somethings that are challenging me and I don't want those, they are game breaking, because the game should be harder

lack of logic is indeed present, I don't know how their brains work

 

regarding the naval transports, 1turn is one year so its equally conceivable for an army to construct such ships in that time frame. also, those transport ships being as powerful as some dedicated naval units may be historically accurate as both ships were constructed via basically the same shipbuilding techniques.

in shogun2 the people cried how difficult and unfair the campaign was after realm divide. the same people are now complaining that its too easy .

 

Yeah the balance of the ships is a concern because despite being built similarly to warships, you get those for free. They really need to be weaker, not ton just more.

I never had any problems with realm divide, it took me by surprise the first time, but it was easy for me, since I do grow a decent economy, so while the hit on money was a good one, my front lines were stable, my economy was decent and I had good armies


Im glad the discussion was over the forums and not at a bar, a modder that I like his work, just lost my respect

modder go and asks hey is it worth to mod this game?

are you kidding me? grow a pair, play the game, decide for yourself

and then we got prometheus with his delusional behaviour, being delusional. according to him he logged more than 100h on the game and he hates the freaking guts of it, even before it was released he hated it

so the point of this post is, some mods are being done already and some guys are working on larger projects, we just need the tools to get more job done.

 

1) i didnt buy a thousand dollar laptop just so i can play games in crap graphics. if i wanted to do that, i would have bought a console. harharhar.

2) i didnt really care about the family tree in shogun 2, so i didnt really miss it. what i did miss is assigning generals to my staff for some bonuses, but the province edicts and general traits makes up for it.

3) CAI is aggressive against other CAI controlled faction. towards the player, not so much. BAI sucks.

4) i have mixed opinions on the UI. you get a nice explanation on most things just by hovering over it. the portrait of the units are way too big, both in Campaign and in Battle. i find myself grouping my armies and just minimize everything except for the map.

5) the CAI is the one coming to me for treaties. compared to shogun 2, the CAI is engaging more treaties with me.

6) its not affecting everybody, its affecting more than the 2% that CA mentioned.

i do miss the short video when an agent is performing a job. the general speeches in shogun 2 gets old, i found myself skipping it and just get to the battle.

 

yeah I miss those videos too, they were hilarious, they removed them from FotS and I don't remember people complaining much, I guess they should have.

as I said before, my main problem is the AI, performance bugs are easier to fix and can be done with a dedicated team to it, which is actually more beneficial for them and for us. but the AI needs a revamp, it needs to get to manage those economies and the behaviour inducing is only helping the smaller factions, not the larger ones

 

1. how can rome 2's graphics ever be considered crap?
3. try the new beta patch heard it makes cai much more agressive. soon enough we will be seeing the same guys qq'ing bout how op civil war is.
6. how would you know if its affecting more than 2% unless you have the usage stats that ca/sega possess?

i agree though that they should bring back agent cut scenes. battle speeches were nice to have, added a certain cinematic flair to the game. it was skippable for those who didnt want it anyways.

 

the speeches are still there, start a battle don't move the general and move the camera closer to him, you will hear a speech being done right there

 

yup i know they are still there but i liked those in game cut scenes of the speeches before the battle - thats what i was referring to.

 

ahhh those, the cinematic view that we have now doesn't offer the same thing

 

Literally.. First Age of empires died and now Total War is a total disappointment. Not many games like these exist
I loved these two series but oh well..

 

humm? there was nothing strategic about AOE, nor starcraft, nor several other series, mostly you performed a script

want strategy? play masters of orion, SoaSE and some others

 

btw here is the diplomacy problem that many people are complaining about.

The 50/50 Balance of Power bug..

i kinda agree.

 

annoying yes, but not game breaking. also seems like something thats easy to fix.
the total war series has always had diplomacy quirks ( but that is indeed a bug). well the cai, originally started out as a 'wrapper'- a reason for fighting the battles. imho, it has come a long way from then but it will never be as polished as civ.

 

the diplomacy works, that is a very poor excuse for a complaint thread and explanation

its visibly clear that the OP didn't show the hate status, and from what I can see the hate is extremely high

at first they are at war, then he tries a trade agreement? it doesn't work.

tell me one example in real life that this happens? it takes time for one to accept the other outside very extraneous circumstances. and the hate is still there.

what is actually broken is the power balance meter, that is very much clear and easy to fix

 

good catch karam.
so balance of power only shows your civs relative strength vis a vis other civs. it is not an indication of how successful a diplomatic transaction will be. and the 50/50 bug is mere cosmetic in nature.
i dont know cause ive been playing custom battles most of the time and havent really delved into the campaign intricacies.

 

my point is the balance of power bug. the AI thinks that it's forces is just as good as mine. even though all the AI has is a small region under siege by me, and a small fleet somewhere out in the sea. i think in cases like that, making negotiations in my favor in exchange for their safety is highly acceptable.

i did it to macedon, and they never surrendered. maybe macedon is just meant to be stubborn, or it could be a bug. its not game breaking, but i think it should be addressed.

btw new beta patch fix the zombie looking army. and while playing the game, i noticed that game is using core0 thread 0 at a constant 99% usage while the rest of the cpu gets around 50%

 

I never have been having problems with people surrendering...

for example, in my last campaign as macedon (I had to restart because of the patch 2 beta), I basically annihilated the bastarnae that had 3 out of 4 settlements in the pontus caspia, 1 out of 3 of the dacia province and 1 out of ? from sarmatia, I only left them with sarmatia. sued for peace, got it


so that is a medium large empire, got it to sue for peace, I didn't even had to pay anything, from the AI its characteristics are warlike/reliable, this last bit influence a lot of how the AI behaves to your propositions, thats also the largest empire I fought in this campaign so it has to serve. In previous campaigns I also didn't suffer from it, Im not expecting to see the AI that is losing badly to surrender to me, there is always one madman that needs 2 atomic bombs to surrender or another that needs a war in 3 fronts towards the capital to put a bullet in his head, or to have small people push very large siege units in the last bastion of their culture and be amazed when all else fails and knee to a salad

things happen this way in real life, not everyone is reasonable, so expect that, not everyone is also unreasonable

for smaller factions it has been on the depends side, some sue for peace, some I sue for it, some accept some don't


one thing that has been annoying me is the price of the trade agreements, I think I have more than 4 million in cash now, and they are trying to charge me 10% of it for trade agreements, I refuse immediately, some turns latter the fee is considerably less or doesn't exist, I sign the treaty. It does simulate real world behaviour, however the initial prices are way too high, one of the last that I saw the AI wanted 300k for a treaty, that is never going to be ever regained from it

they need to rework the sanitation buildings. the bonuses are too low, they basically gives you bonus to pop growth, and thats it, they don't really make the streets cleaner, the people healthier. at level 2 the best bonus is -3 for squalor, at lvl 2 I get +5 happiness and monetary bonus for the entertainment building.

 

never had the zombie bug either. my soldiers are looking normal, even before the beta patch.

but glad it solves that gfx issue for the few that had them.

 

I have to agree with both sides on this one. It's a very good game and is nowhere near as bad as what the OP suggests, but it is clearly not fully baked.

There are major and minor bugs, like the fact that I have battles crashing the game every single time in a similar spot, especially frustrating when I'm about to win a long and tiresome siege and watch that annoying crash message. Then there are minor inconsistencies, like the fact that an assassination had failed against my general, yet he still somehow died and I have to replace him every single time, or the fact that I had an army sitting in the city as a land unit, I got attacked by another land army, but now I have to defend the city when my units are in ships around it? Why? To add a challenge or something?

Then there are WAY too many minor factions to deal with, to a point that on my relatively fast laptop I have to wait 1 whole minute between turns, watching the factions take their turns one by one up to a point that it becomes ridiculous - another one and another one, then another one, 20 have passed, and another one, 30 have passed, OK, enough already!! They really didn't have to go for historical accuracy that far, it completely ruins the whole flow of the game.

I got it as a $44 deal, but I would still advise waiting for the game to be fully patched. I just now started using a battle mod that manages to improve the battles and prolong them a bit, making the battles not turn into what the fans call 'mosh pit' of units hitting each other over the head, but it's still not quite there yet.

The diplomacy works, though. It's actually very good. I made a fully diplomatic game a few days ago, and it actually got boring, since I managed to stay allied to most of the map up to a point that opposing factions were afraid to attack me. The fact that the game reminds you to level up your units and research before ending your turn is just what the doctor ordered.

Then there are the random events that can really tip the game completely, like the fact that I had a huge plague a few games ago that swept through the whole continent, killing off units and halting everyone in their tracks, earthquakes that can in bad or good times (getting an enemy city crippled before I even get there sure is convenient), the minor faction events where I can choose my action a la Paradox games, and the whole thing is really nicely made.

But yeah...missing a few months in the oven, that's for sure. The crashing battles alone anger me to a point that I'm now actually not playing the game at all and wait for patches.

SHAMEFUL DISPRAY, indeed

 

i got the game for 44usd too and imho its a good deal.

as mentioned many times in this thread and the other rome 2 threads, many of the percieved bugs are l2p issues and intentional features. i think we can add to that list amirfoox's too many faction and plague issues - intentional features and both historically accurate.

it has performance and stability issues, yes but it is still the 2nd most played game in steam. clearly a vast majority can still play the game and are having fun.

oh and try the beta 2 patch, it solves a few graphical issues and helps with the campaign turn length iirc.

 

Oh, I wasn't complaining about the plague, that was an example of something done right, but the factions - why bother streamlining the settlements and then leave something like that in? Why do I care about some tiny country that I'm about to squash in an instant only because someone scribbled it in some ancient text?

OK, add a few for flavor, sure, but when it detracts so much from the gameplay (IMO), cutting this list by half, at the very least, wouldn't hurt.

And yes, I can still play the game, but these inconveniences are really getting on my nerves to a point that I decided to wait, that's all. And saying: 'you have a problem, millions of others don't, so there!' is kinda like saying: ''oh, you poor baby, you got robbed/lost your house/got a divorce? there are millions of people dying in Africa right now!' What do I care that others enjoy the game if I don't or can't? That's hardly a winning argument (not that I'm arguing, mind you).

 

im not arguing myself. just stating facts. and i think it is important. it is a counterpoint to the flawed argument that if it wasnt fun you, it wont be fun for everybody else. not that that was your main argument, but i just wanted to put it out there just the same. that statement was addressed more to people contemplating on getting the game.

 

as I said in my review I like the game, its as usual not a perfect game, but with the patch 2 beta it actually got a lot better.

I don't have stability issues, I had 2 CTDs, but those were caused by the usual save game corruption

I actually prefer to have those 108 factions there, its annoying to wait, the end turns have gotten faster on the new patch and it really adds flavour, its much better than the usual mass of rebels that were before warscape.

regarding your battle, are you sure you saw the icon of your general? I saw that happen to me before, curious I went to check it out, and voila it was there as a navy, there are other instances that happened as well, several times during sieges when I didn't see the path blocked, so my general sailed and attacked the settlement.

I can't tell you how much the army becomes a fleet of transports made the game more dynamic and interesting, its for me the single best dynamic feature, followed suit by the province system tied with the political system

 

I'm quite sure that was the case with the army turning all of a sudden to a fleet of transports, I have the savegame (although I don't have the beta patch, so I'm not sure it would be compatible). I like this feature a lot, myself, but like I said - it all comes down to the fact that the game could spend a few more months in the oven, that's all.

trvelbug, yes, you are indeed arguing. And that is not a flawed argument, that was an opinion, the same thing you have (!= stating 'facts'), which I can learn to accept and I hope you can as well.

Anyway, what patches won't do, mods most surely will, so like I keep saying: a very good game, that still needs more time.

 

im playing more after the beta 2 patch. i can only play it on low settings with extreme textures. i also noticed that when any units is set on forced marched, my fps drops by half.

btw, i am slowly losing influence of my faction. what is gerontes and how do i get it back?

 

indeed i can. ultimately we are just sharing our opinions and observations in a constructive way. far better than the qq'ing and fanboyism of drama queens in other forums.

i do hope you get to sort out your issues (at least the performance related ones) so as to enjoy the game better.

 

I just tried the beta patch (I didn't know how to download it at first) and they improved things significantly, the turns just fly by. Before the turns took almost a minute at times, now they seem to take 5-10 seconds at most, the minor factions flip really fast now.

The performance improved as well, and they also added more information like the turns to finish research (or whether you research at all) and more diplomacy information that shows factions that share your blood and I bet there are other improvements as well, good job to them!

 

nice to know it sorted out some major issues for you.
iirc, rome 1, arguably the most loved iteration of the series, was in much worse shape at launch. i remember the fps drops when firing fire arrows, the longish campaign turns, ahistorical units, broken campaign ai, etc. so really im not worried about rome 2 . in fact, it could end up being the best of them all.

one thing that kinda bothers me though is that rome 2 barbarians look a bit too organized formation wise. i remember in rome 1 they didnt line up in orderly ranks and were more of a rabble force. rome 2's implementation could be more historical though, i dont know, but having barbarians form ranks just doesnt sit well with my contemporary view of them.

 

I wouldn't buy Company of Heroes 2 either. The 4800MQ / 780M combination can barely handle it.

 

you mean gravitas?

if its that, its simple, the best way is to have a general that is from your family then use him to conquer things.

aside that, you are info for some rough times, you need to kill the generals or statesman, bribe and shame the rival families

the best way that I found is to have generals for each family in the game.

however the balance depends on which faction you are playing, for romans a balance is good it avoids civil war, or not then you have civil war and the balance won't matter much afterwards (I always have very late civil wars, so I don't know if it can happen again be warned). For monarchies I found that to have a power around 60% is a good thing, I don't get so much hate from the rival families and I can avoid assassination attempts. even if the general survives he might be injured and injured is an instant substitution for him, so you lose what could be your best general

 

ive had coh2 on pre order and have been playing it on and off since launch at the second to the highest settings.