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Beat the campaign as Ogre Kingdoms.

Wasn’t too keen on playing Ogres at first. Was worried they’d play like bigger Orcs. Turns out they might be my favorite faction so far. The use of camps is a pretty inspired mechanic, almost like an immobile Black Ark in a way. I conquered as much of the Mountains of Mourn as possible and strung out camps along the way so that as an army ventured out, it would recruit on the move from one camp circle to the next. Eventually when I had a bulletproof economy, I tore down most camps and rebuilt them near enterances to the mountains and crossroads and used them as defensive elements before expanding again.

Now that I have a grasp of the core mechanics of the campaign, it doesn’t bother me as much. The orientation of the map bothers me the most now, I think.

Probably just going to conquer Cathay as Greasus now.

Voss wrote:

Andy Hall wrote:"We're never gonna say never because there should always be the opportunity to bring these new races in or new nations, but you know I've seen the road map and these nations aren't on there now. There's no plans to do them in the immediate or even long-term future. We've still go so much to do with Cathay. Honestly the stuff I've seen it'll curl your toes in the best possible way. [...] People are kinda desperately hanging on for one of these other nations. [...] Don't lose any sleep, it's not happening anytime soon. Probably never, I'm afraid.

https://www.reddit.com/r/totalwar/comments/sojlzi/andy_hall_on_khuresh_ind_and_nippon/

From an interview vid here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nOhfmyZ2UOA

~1:20:20


So, on principle, never say never, but yeah, no. Never.
Not even on the long term road map is pretty definitive for a finite term project like a computer game.

Well that’s a bummer.

So, CA put up a Patch 1.02 and 'ongoing investigations' timeline (which is more an intention than a timeline but nevermind) and spend a lot of time waffling about... well, tripe.
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1142710/eventcomments/3185738755278039758/

I don't know of any other company that handles bugs the way CA does, as if bug fixing will make the game explode and start from scratch and all other work is impossible while it happens. But this oversharing really doesn't help (especially with the 'we can't possibly see Denuvo as causing problems. Why would anyone think that?' section).

---
Anyway, maybe the 10th of March or the 17th, if you're affected by one of the very small list of issues they're currently working on (which you probably are not).

Another fix (including gameplay balance and bugs) next month.

And then maybe after that we'll see a real timeline of oncoming content.

Well they aren't wrong - changing a tiny bit of code really can cause a ripple effect. The problem is most people have no clue about coding games on even a most basic level. Personally I think the "Oversharing" is not done enough and I always hold up Factorio's blog as a fantastic example of both providing weekly marketing releases of info and also providing a level of decent and understandable education on the coding behind the game. On how what can seem like a really simple idea to suggest can actually be a complex series of problems - some of which might be inherent in how they coded some parts of the game much earlier and now present problems to changing some newer things - - unless they go back and change big parts of the earlier code which hits other features too.


It's why suddenly oversharing coding info in one moment doesn't work because the fanbase has no underlaying concepts to draw upon so it just sounds like its making excuses. Best thing CA could do is actually talk about the code and how things work

Obviously there are ripple effects. But that's not how they're presenting the information (nor how they've framed it in the past. Where for TW2, they claimed they couldn't work on DLC while they were still working on bug fixes, which is insane). They're literally showing the code as a pile of sticks where if they hit another stick, the whole pile collapses and has to be reassembled. That's a terrible metaphor for coding- ripple effect bugs aren't that pervasive in general, and when they are, you simply revert the changes.

If they're going to talk about it this way, they're better off shutting the hell up.

Voss wrote:
So, CA put up a Patch 1.02 and 'ongoing investigations' timeline (which is more an intention than a timeline but nevermind) and spend a lot of time waffling about... well, tripe.
https://steamcommunity.com/app/1142710/eventcomments/3185738755278039758/

I don't know of any other company that handles bugs the way CA does, as if bug fixing will make the game explode and start from scratch and all other work is impossible while it happens. But this oversharing really doesn't help (especially with the 'we can't possibly see Denuvo as causing problems. Why would anyone think that?' section).

---
Anyway, maybe the 10th of March or the 17th, if you're affected by one of the very small list of issues they're currently working on (which you probably are not).

Another fix (including gameplay balance and bugs) next month.

And then maybe after that we'll see a real timeline of oncoming content.

I kind of appreciate CA keep players in the loop. It's nothing new, they've always done blog style posts, I think it's better than them staying quiet.

Of course it's expected there'd be some marketing talk in there.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Voss wrote:
Obviously there are ripple effects. But that's not how they're presenting the information (nor how they've framed it in the past. Where for TW2, they claimed they couldn't work on DLC while they were still working on bug fixes, which is insane). They're literally showing the code as a pile of sticks where if they hit another stick, the whole pile collapses and has to be reassembled. That's a terrible metaphor for coding- ripple effect bugs aren't that pervasive in general, and when they are, you simply revert the changes.

If they're going to talk about it this way, they're better off shutting the hell up.

I feel like you're taking this too personally, lol.

A game is a complicated program, stuff needs to be QA tested and even in the little crappy programs I write sometimes fixes have unforeseen consequences that I don't immediately realise.

Maybe they used a crap metaphor, but whatever, I get the point they're trying to get across. At least it's not Cyperpunk 2077.

I feel like you're taking this too personally, lol.

Not at all. I feel like they're trying to be too personable, rather than getting stuff done.
Inviting the crowd into your process is exhausting, and all people really want is a reliable timeline for the content they care about. Not meandering excuses for why it isn't happening and handwaving problems like Denuvo

As for 'marketing talk,' I'm not sure where you got that- it has nothing to do with what I said.

Not sure if I mentioned it before, but the Kislev technology tree, aside from the Ice Maiden training, is mostly hot garbage. Might be the most random scattershot tech tree in all the TW games I've played in recent memory.

Also, "unlocking" Tzar Boris is pretty lame. Fight a battle to free him and then either give him a major settlement or he leaves?

Voss wrote:

I feel like you're taking this too personally, lol.

Not at all. I feel like they're trying to be too personable, rather than getting stuff done.

I'd be surprised if the community engagement person is the same person on the ground making the changes, so making a blog post like this isn't really slowing them down from "getting stuff done".

Inviting the crowd into your process is exhausting

Exhausting for who? If you don't care, don't read it. CA have always (or at least as long as I've been playing TW games) done "developer diaries" and blog style posts.

I rarely hear whinging about developers communicating too much, usually it's whinging about developers not communicating enough

and all people really want is a reliable timeline for the content they care about.

They've said the 10th to 17th for a 1.0.2 patch, and early April for the next gameplay patch, that's probably about as reliable of a timeline you're going to get.

As for 'marketing talk,' I'm not sure where you got that- it has nothing to do with what I said.

I was talking about the "handwaving Denuvo" stuff, perhaps "marketing talk" was the wrong terminology to use.

But yeah, I don't really see the massive problem with this post from CA, maybe it's too many words but it takes all of 10 seconds to flick through the headings and find the bolded text that has their projected dates.

There's plenty of things you can be unhappy about with TWW3, this just seems like the weirdest thing to get your panties in a twist over.


The biggest issue IMO is just that most people seem to find the campaign boring, and the most interesting bit of news they could release is a timeline for mortal empires, as it seems that's what most people are wanting.

Denuvo is a massive issue, due to the toll it takes on performance alone, nvm that it is completely overpriced AND destructive as an anti piracy meassure to the point that it punishes paying customers whilest pirating players have better performance.

Not Online!!! wrote:
Denuvo is a massive issue, due to the toll it takes on performance alone, nvm that it is completely overpriced AND destructive as an anti piracy meassure to the point that it punishes paying customers whilest pirating players have better performance.

Personally my performance has been a bit weird, when the game first released I had reasonably good performance (similar to what I had in TWW2) but then when I started my Cathay playthrough my performance tanked. At first I thought it might have been because Cathay itself was more graphically intensive, but I went back to a previous campaign and performance was bad there too, so I think it might have been the first patch which came out roughly the same time. When patch 2 came out (and I also updated my graphics drivers at the same time) the performance went back to what it was on release.

Dunno if Denuvo could be to blame for that.

A younger me probably wouldn't have bought the game knowing it had a crappy DRM program on it, but the current much older version of me didn't even realise it had DRM until after I'd preordered it.

On a separate note, LegendofTotalWar said he's going to stop livestreaming TWW3 content until they make the game better, either through patches or releasing mortal empires, and has given a short essay on it. His main gripe seemed to be what I mentioned a couple of posts ago, many people find the main campaign sucks and it seems Legend is on the same page.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
Denuvo is a massive issue, due to the toll it takes on performance alone, nvm that it is completely overpriced AND destructive as an anti piracy meassure to the point that it punishes paying customers whilest pirating players have better performance.

Personally my performance has been a bit weird, when the game first released I had reasonably good performance (similar to what I had in TWW2) but then when I started my Cathay playthrough my performance tanked. At first I thought it might have been because Cathay itself was more graphically intensive, but I went back to a previous campaign and performance was bad there too, so I think it might have been the first patch which came out roughly the same time. When patch 2 came out (and I also updated my graphics drivers at the same time) the performance went back to what it was on release.

Dunno if Denuvo could be to blame for that.

A younger me probably wouldn't have bought the game knowing it had a crappy DRM program on it, but the current much older version of me didn't even realise it had DRM until after I'd preordered it.

On a separate note, LegendofTotalWar said he's going to stop livestreaming TWW3 content until they make the game better, either through patches or releasing mortal empires, and has given a short essay on it. His main gripe seemed to be what I mentioned a couple of posts ago, many people find the main campaign sucks and it seems Legend is on the same page.

Oh the performance is anyways all over the place, my old gtx 980 nvidia and old 7core intel processor did run the game (at low graphics) better than my 2 cousins far more modern setup with better processors and graphics cards (1080 ti), atleast ingame.

Further, CA clamps actively down in the forums to the point that even PC gamer wrote about denuvo and CA's behaviour, treating any comment that demands the removal of it as spam, does highlight that it is an issue.
https://www.pcgamer.com/the-impact-of-denuvo-on-total-war-warhammer-3-is-still-being-investigated/
in the past there have been games that have suffered tremendously from denuvo and its system in performance and load time, and in general (according to ca) some frames have been lost.
Now what "some frames" means , in the context of CA stating such a thing, one can only deduce, however, considering rome 2 trailers and statements and what happened at release of rome 2..... (no i don't like CA and what they did to total war.

As an aside, it has been benchmarked on multiple differing games that Denuvo does seemingly increase loading times ASWELL as frames.


f.e.

Not Online!!! wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
Denuvo is a massive issue, due to the toll it takes on performance alone, nvm that it is completely overpriced AND destructive as an anti piracy meassure to the point that it punishes paying customers whilest pirating players have better performance.

Personally my performance has been a bit weird, when the game first released I had reasonably good performance (similar to what I had in TWW2) but then when I started my Cathay playthrough my performance tanked. At first I thought it might have been because Cathay itself was more graphically intensive, but I went back to a previous campaign and performance was bad there too, so I think it might have been the first patch which came out roughly the same time. When patch 2 came out (and I also updated my graphics drivers at the same time) the performance went back to what it was on release.

Dunno if Denuvo could be to blame for that.

A younger me probably wouldn't have bought the game knowing it had a crappy DRM program on it, but the current much older version of me didn't even realise it had DRM until after I'd preordered it.

On a separate note, LegendofTotalWar said he's going to stop livestreaming TWW3 content until they make the game better, either through patches or releasing mortal empires, and has given a short essay on it. His main gripe seemed to be what I mentioned a couple of posts ago, many people find the main campaign sucks and it seems Legend is on the same page.

Oh the performance is anyways all over the place, my old gtx 980 nvidia and old 7core intel processor did run the game (at low graphics) better than my 2 cousins far more modern setup with better processors and graphics cards (1080 ti), atleast ingame.

Further, CA clamps actively down in the forums to the point that even PC gamer wrote about denuvo and CA's behaviour, treating any comment that demands the removal of it as spam, does highlight that it is an issue.
https://www.pcgamer.com/the-impact-of-denuvo-on-total-war-warhammer-3-is-still-being-investigated/
in the past there have been games that have suffered tremendously from denuvo and its system in performance and load time, and in general (according to ca) some frames have been lost.
Now what "some frames" means , in the context of CA stating such a thing, one can only deduce, however, considering rome 2 trailers and statements and what happened at release of rome 2..... (no i don't like CA and what they did to total war.

As an aside, it has been benchmarked on multiple differing games that Denuvo does seemingly increase loading times ASWELL as frames.


f.e.

Is there any way of getting TWW3 without Denuvo on it?

My understanding was TWW2 had it also, so wouldn't we expect a similar performance hit as we always had?

Even in TWW2 I always felt the load times were a bit long given that I've got the game installed on a reasonably high end SSD and everything else loads like lightning (other games I often can't read the load screen text because it's loaded before I have time to read it).

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Is there any way of getting TWW3 without Denuvo on it?

By pirating the game.

Yes, the irony is so thick you can almost walk on it.

Apparently Denuvo has been on all three Warhammers

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Is there any way of getting TWW3 without Denuvo on it?

By pirating the game.

Yes, the irony is so thick you can almost walk on it.

Gog can have also keys without.
But yes, if Performance and loadtime annoy you you are better off to "Pirate" instead of being a paying customer.
Nvm that denuvo chronically get's cracked earlier than promised, but piracy bad and Big problem... (Ironic, piracy is Bad but childgambling, bs DLC, licensces instead of ownership are all good and acceptable behaviours according to the gaming industry.)

Not Online!!! wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Is there any way of getting TWW3 without Denuvo on it?

By pirating the game.

Yes, the irony is so thick you can almost walk on it.

Gog can have also keys without.
But yes, if Performance and loadtime annoy you you are better off to "Pirate" instead of being a paying customer.
Nvm that denuvo chronically get's cracked earlier than promised, but piracy bad and Big problem... (Ironic, piracy is Bad but childgambling, bs DLC, licensces instead of ownership are all good and acceptable behaviours according to the gaming industry.)

TWW3 isn't on GOG though?

Has TWW3 been cracked yet? Has anyone actually tried a cracked version to see how it compares?

Or even TWW2?

I haven't really been in the piracy game since I was a kid (prior to Steam, and prior to having enough money to actually buy games). Back in the day piracy would sometimes give you a better version of the game, but often it'd have its own problems or it wouldn't properly integrate patches and upgrades or would introduce new performance or stability issues.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
Is there any way of getting TWW3 without Denuvo on it?

By pirating the game.

Yes, the irony is so thick you can almost walk on it.

Gog can have also keys without.
But yes, if Performance and loadtime annoy you you are better off to "Pirate" instead of being a paying customer.
Nvm that denuvo chronically get's cracked earlier than promised, but piracy bad and Big problem... (Ironic, piracy is Bad but childgambling, bs DLC, licensces instead of ownership are all good and acceptable behaviours according to the gaming industry.)

TWW3 isn't on GOG though?

Has TWW3 been cracked yet? Has anyone actually tried a cracked version to see how it compares?

Or even TWW2?

I haven't really been in the piracy game since I was a kid (prior to Steam, and prior to having enough money to actually buy games). Back in the day piracy would sometimes give you a better version of the game, but often it'd have its own problems or it wouldn't properly integrate patches and upgrades or would introduce new performance or stability issues.

TWW2 has been cracked one day after release, despite denuvo, it was at the time the laughing stock and lead to backlash but CA is nothing if not hostile torwards its community at multiple points and still refuses after the initial Denuvo encryption to not remove it later on, as many other games do.
TWW3 after a cursory glance has not been cracked yet, seemingly.

Also found some people testing the performance, and saying that yes especially loadtimes seem to significantly get lower for tww2.

Not Online!!! wrote:
TWW2 has been cracked one day after release, despite denuvo, it was at the time the laughing stock and lead to backlash but CA is nothing if not hostile torwards its community at multiple points and still refuses after the initial Denuvo encryption to not remove it later on, as many other games do.
TWW3 after a cursory glance has not been cracked yet, seemingly.

Also found some people testing the performance, and saying that yes especially loadtimes seem to significantly get lower for tww2.

I seem to recall a while back someone saying although TWW2 had been cracked, it was complicated. I don't remember the specifics but it might have been certain DLC or patches not working. And it seems from googling that cracked versions don't remove denuvo, they just confuse it, so it still operates in the background. But yeah, I guess the reason I mention it is because I think there's an idea that the pirates get a better version of the game, and while that's sometimes true it's often not.

I do wonder how much CA have control over it. The publisher is SEGA and often it's the publisher that decides what DRM a game is going to have and whether it'll get removed or not. I know in other cases developers have said they didn't want to put DRM on a game but were contractually obliged by the publisher to do it.

It seems all recent versions of TW games (including all 3 Warhammer titles) have been using Denuvo, so one would think if TWW3 has performance issues caused by the DRM the earlier games might have similar issues.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

Not Online!!! wrote:
TWW2 has been cracked one day after release, despite denuvo, it was at the time the laughing stock and lead to backlash but CA is nothing if not hostile torwards its community at multiple points and still refuses after the initial Denuvo encryption to not remove it later on, as many other games do.
TWW3 after a cursory glance has not been cracked yet, seemingly.

Also found some people testing the performance, and saying that yes especially loadtimes seem to significantly get lower for tww2.

I seem to recall a while back someone saying although TWW2 had been cracked, it was complicated. I don't remember the specifics but it might have been certain DLC or patches not working. And it seems from googling that cracked versions don't remove denuvo, they just confuse it, so it still operates in the background. But yeah, I guess the reason I mention it is because I think there's an idea that the pirates get a better version of the game, and while that's sometimes true it's often not.

I do wonder how much CA have control over it. The publisher is SEGA and often it's the publisher that decides what DRM a game is going to have and whether it'll get removed or not. I know in other cases developers have said they didn't want to put DRM on a game but were contractually obliged by the publisher to do it.

It seems all recent versions of TW games (including all 3 Warhammer titles) have been using Denuvo, so one would think if TWW3 has performance issues caused by the DRM the earlier games might have similar issues.

I guess the loading issues of TWW2 are a good enough proof.
Maybee well due to the fact that they did not optimize it well enough and denuvos new version doing a worse number on TWW3?
Then again i had issues at the start of TWW2 until some patches in.

Whilst Legend loses his gak at the state of the game (and rightly so):



... CA have a small update, the key part of which is this:

CA wrote:Following Patch 1.0.2, we’ll talk a bit more about Update 1.1: the first major gameplay update for Total War: WARHAMMER III. This is aiming to include several bug fixes, balance tweaks, gameplay changes, and mechanical improvements to a variety of areas in the game.

Here are just a few of the areas that will see improvements in 1.1:

The Chaos Realms, negative traits, realm rewards, and rift management
Numerous balance tweaks to the Factions
Bug fixes (including the Supply Line bug)
…and much more!

Many of these changes are based on feedback from the community—with many more of your comments, critiques, and ideas being worked into our future updates. Following 1.1, we'll provide a longer-term look at what's coming in the future. It’s clear that *MANY* players are waiting to hear more about the Blood Pack, Immortal Empires, and other new content coming to the game, and we’re excited to share more about those projects once we’ve established a strong baseline for WARHAMMER III

I think I'll just ignore the game until this 1.1 hits, which I suspect is what a lot of people are doing, given the ever-dwindling player numbers.

Truthfully, I doubt 1.1 will be enough. That 'longer term look' at the future just feels bad. When IE arrives and the first DLC is on the horizon, then I'll care. As is, it can go on the shelf with the other unfinished games of 2020-2022.

Irony being that they warned CA about their Chaos realms campaign mechanics.

And i reckon if they'd get rid of denuvo that we would also see a lot of performance issues going away or being lessend sizeable.

I have to say that Leadbeltchers are very very strong, as they should be, but it does kinda feel almost unfair.

 Grey Templar wrote:
I have to say that Leadbeltchers are very very strong, as they should be, but it does kinda feel almost unfair.

I still haven't even played an Ogre campaign. I never even finished my Skarbrand campaign and only just started Tzeentch and Cathay campaigns.

Definitely waiting on mortal empires.

Though I do hope CA do some more campaigns for the warhammer series. I quite liked the Vortex campaign in TWW2, similar campaigns that span the races from all 3 games would be cool and definitely something I'd be willing to buy DLC to try.

I also hope they improve the responsiveness of units. I find myself clicking heaps to get units out of combat otherwise they just stay there and keep fighting which is not something I noticed in TWW2.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:


I also hope they improve the responsiveness of units. I find myself clicking heaps to get units out of combat otherwise they just stay there and keep fighting which is not something I noticed in TWW2.

I think some of that are the changes to unit mass. It seems a lot harder to push through other models.

The other aspect is, I suspect, that individual models disengage, but enemies re-engage them and that 'deletes' the pathfinding waypoint for the move order (or recalculates it. But if a model is hemmed in by too many enemies on all sides, it will recalculate, and recalculate and recalculate and... hopeful hit some limit CA set up on pathing). If that happens to enough of the unit, the order just gets 'lost.'
Pathfinding can be super complex for a computer (as multiple node locations along the path are very helpful, but an obvious tax on computing power). It might be worth testing on different unit sizes. If more orders get lost on ultra rather than medium unit sizes, it probably is a pathfinding issue.

Voss wrote:

AllSeeingSkink wrote:


I also hope they improve the responsiveness of units. I find myself clicking heaps to get units out of combat otherwise they just stay there and keep fighting which is not something I noticed in TWW2.

I think some of that are the changes to unit mass. It seems a lot harder to push through other models.

The other aspect is, I suspect, that individual models disengage, but enemies re-engage them and that 'deletes' the pathfinding waypoint for the move order (or recalculates it. But if a model is hemmed in by too many enemies on all sides, it will recalculate, and recalculate and recalculate and... hopeful hit some limit CA set up on pathing). If that happens to enough of the unit, the order just gets 'lost.'
Pathfinding can be super complex for a computer (as multiple node locations along the path are very helpful, but an obvious tax on computing power). It might be worth testing on different unit sizes. If more orders get lost on ultra rather than medium unit sizes, it probably is a pathfinding issue.

Maybe that's it. It seemed like firstly the unit is very slow to response, then secondly 1 or 2 models from a unit get "stuck" and then the whole unit just re-engages instead of running away. A similar thing used to happen in TWW2 with units like Pegasus Knights, but in TWW2 it was only a handful of units where it would happen frequently, in TWW3 it seems like more often than not I have to issue a fall back order many many times before they actually do it.

I do have to say I am annoyed with how fraking narrow the lanes are in settlement battles. Total War has always had pathing issues in settlements, yet they keep making the pathways in the settlements narrower and narrower. Not to mention the ratnest maze means that flanking the settlement from multiple directions usually means your units have to wind their way across a bunch of stupid bridges and stuff to loop back and hit the defenders in the rear. Just give us some simpler settlement designs like we had in Rome 1.

 Grey Templar wrote:
I do have to say I am annoyed with how fraking narrow the lanes are in settlement battles. Total War has always had pathing issues in settlements, yet they keep making the pathways in the settlements narrower and narrower. Not to mention the ratnest maze means that flanking the settlement from multiple directions usually means your units have to wind their way across a bunch of stupid bridges and stuff to loop back and hit the defenders in the rear. Just give us some simpler settlement designs like we had in Rome 1.

I do think the settlements in TWW3 were not designed by someone who actually tried to play a game on them.

They're like those game tables that someone made because it looked cool rather than because it's good for gaming. It was kind of entertaining the first couple of games but it quickly grew tiring.

It's an annoying combination of being too big for the number of units you're likely to have, but also absurdly narrow choke points.

The whole game feels a bit like they didn't listen to their playtesters, or had playtesters with very narrow tastes.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 Grey Templar wrote:
I do have to say I am annoyed with how fraking narrow the lanes are in settlement battles. Total War has always had pathing issues in settlements, yet they keep making the pathways in the settlements narrower and narrower. Not to mention the ratnest maze means that flanking the settlement from multiple directions usually means your units have to wind their way across a bunch of stupid bridges and stuff to loop back and hit the defenders in the rear. Just give us some simpler settlement designs like we had in Rome 1.

I do think the settlements in TWW3 were not designed by someone who actually tried to play a game on them.

They're like those game tables that someone made because it looked cool rather than because it's good for gaming. It was kind of entertaining the first couple of games but it quickly grew tiring.

It's an annoying combination of being too big for the number of units you're likely to have, but also absurdly narrow choke points.

The whole game feels a bit like they didn't listen to their playtesters, or had playtesters with very narrow tastes.

the best part about settlement battles mistakes they made, was the capture zones. which range from nonsensical, to outright worthless. Ironically also crippling walling up minor cities.