Pleasantly Surprised

[33Vyper]

I was bored tonite.....did not feel like WITP...so I noticed that these two titles had a demo...tried it

Wow...its not so bad...in fact it is quite addicting. Good graphics...not so bad music...and an AI that has its moments.

All in all a good investment !

[IainMcNeil]

Glad you like it! Now go and tell your friends

[33Vyper]

your welcome......if your interested I would like to see a more complicated economic system....but them I am a bit of an egg head

[DandricSturm]

I probably would not have bought this one except for the demo.

[ravinhood]

Can't wait for Legion II, hurry up Iain. One thing I would have liked to have seen in Spartan was attacking a faction penalty to the other members of that faction. So, that more of the faction members/group might goto war with the player than just the one attacked, especially if they are allies.

Something I found all too easy was to setup a ring of alliance or be likeable with all in a particular faction except the one I was going to attack, thus they sat back and I could "backstab" each one individually without worry about being attacked by more than one group. If you could add a "backstabbing" penalty that would apply to the whole faction group this would totally stop that little loophole in the game system.

Something I find in most all games with diplomacy and allies, is allies hardly ever help each other out, hardly ever seen any support when they can clearly see there is an enemy army marching toward their ally. If you could put some support into this feature it would be very welcome.

All n all though Spartan is still one of my favorite wargames. I was able to mod it so there was a severe penalty for attacking any faction or being attacked by them to the point that war was immenent upon first contact. Made things a lot more hairy.

[IainMcNeil]

We have plans to trasnform the next game radically so are always interested to hear feedback

[jvgfanatic]

Chalk me up for another fan of this game Going to have to look at other slitherine games as soon as I can afford em.

[donkuchi19]

Just purchased both Troy and Spartan. That brings my Matrix total up to 8 and waiting for 2 more.

[Big B]

Hello Iain,

I bought Spartan over the Holiday (couple of weeks ago) I am still learning it - but I like it. I plan to get GoT soon as well - since I understand they go together.

You claim you wanted input for future releases - so here goes.

1) The best thing about Spartan is the fact that the campaign can be MULTIPLAYER (even if it is only 2 players) so in future - DON"T ignore that!

2) The second best thing about Spartan is (to me) that it is NOT Total War - as your advertising makes abundantly clear - and is more than just endless battles (very boring).

3) I love the Historical period it's based on - another plus for me.

Keep up the good work, and I am looking forward to see what your cooking up next!

EDIT:
You may have already accounted for this- I am not that far into the game at all and have yet to learn about the difficulties of moving large armies over great distances, however -
In future releases some sort of supply difficulties to represent just how tough it was to keep massive invasion armies fed enroute to where they are going (like Xerxes army that invaded Greece) would be something to keep in mind. Something like supply convoys over land and at sea, etc.

[IainMcNeil]

We wanted to avoid the micro management of supply chains, so instead we charge you double pay whenever your troops are stationed outside a friendly city to simulate being on campaign. This is ok at the start, but advanced regular army units have high pay requirements and large armies of them can cost a fortune

[Big B]

ORIGINAL: Iain McNeil

We wanted to avoid the micro management of supply chains, so instead we charge you double pay whenever your troops are stationed outside a friendly city to simulate being on campaign. This is ok at the start, but advanced regular army units have high pay requirements and large armies of them can cost a fortune

Hmm, well, that works I guess.

The reason I suggested simulating supply problems and supply chains was to simulate different strategys for defeating a large invader - like attacking his supply lines to force them to leave, and also to simulate the problems of armies over a certain size marching together so the option would be to have them take different routes on campaign - and again giving a defender opportunity to possibly take them on one at a time (play Napoleon).

Just my thoughts...

[Hanal]

ORIGINAL: Iain McNeil

We have plans to trasnform the next game radically so are always interested to hear feedback

I hope the next game is not transformed into an RTS....

[CamelCity]

I got GoT last spring, and played the Thermopolae scenario a couple of times without really learning the game first (I'm a huge "Gates of Fire" fan, so I wanted to jump right in-- that's why I bought GoT). Needless to say, I got crushed, and then I got busy with other things, and didn't play GoT after that. Got a new computer in January, and on a whim put GoT on it. Spent an evening really going through the tutorials (which are excellent, by the way), and I must say I've been pleasantly surprised as well.

I've since added Spartan so that I can play the full complement of scenarios.

Regarding the supply chain & troops in the field: I think charging double for troops in the field is a good solution (rather than constructing a supply chain to have to micro manage). Overall, I think the integration of the economics system and the martial system is very elegant and well thought out. You can't have a huge conquering force out in the field without the economy to back it up. I like how the economics can become an integral part of the military strategy-- for example, if you are the Spartans, you need to capitalize on copper. If you are fighting the Spartans, you had better deny them copper so they can't afford those deadly heavy infantry units.

You CAN attack an enemy's supply chain, in an indirect way. If you can find a "soft" city in the enemies empire that is also resource-rich, attack and conquer it! The loss of income from the resources, as well as the loss of taxation income, will hurt the silver supply, and can thus cripple those expensive armies out in the field.

[Copper]

I love the multiplayer campaign, dont take that out, please!

Next game has to keep it.

[sapper_astro]

I didn't even know that Gates of Troy was affiliated with Matrix. I have played this game for quite some time now and had plenty of fun.

The good: AI, Diplomacy, Economy, era.

The bad: Battles. Im not expecting total war, but i think unless you go all out, turn based battles would have been fine.

Can't find Spartan anywhere and Gates of Troy is game enough for me. Just wanted you to know that your on the right track and the game is indeed a good pastime.

[IainMcNeil]

If you want a bit more from the battles you should check out Legion Arena. Its go not economic campaign, but adds control of battles & an RPG layer to army management.

www.slitherine.com/LegionArena