Check out my new guide!

http://steamproxy.net/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=361156842




I'm Diplomatt (previously known as memccann) and I started playing Rome II multiplayer in January 2014 and I worked my way up to compete in some the top tournaments agaisnt the world's best players. This is my guide to help aspiring players to improve and hopefully reach the top one day. Feel free to leave any suggestions and I hope you enjoy :)

So you go into a battle and what do you see? A massive list of factions that can be rather daunting at first. I'm going to take you through each type of faction, their strengths and weaknesses and who they good against

Rome
So I'm assuming most of you will be familiar with Rome as a faction and they're very strong so they are a good faction to start with. They may be over used but its for a reason. Their main strength is infantry with lots and lots of cost effective swordsmen.

Typical build

This is not set in stone at all but this is a very general idea of what to use

• Generals Bodygaurd/Legatus
  
• 3 Syrian Archers (not always nessessary)
  
• 4-6 Cheap Cav
  
• Lots of infantry, a mixture of elite and mid tier and maybe even cheap infantry as well

Who are they good against?
Rome are pretty decent agaisnt any faction in the game but are especially good against spear heavy factions

Who are they bad against?
They aren't 'bad' agaisnt anyone but they can be beaten by a lusitani player who knows what hes doing and their focus on infantry can be used agaisnt them if the opponent uses skirmishers, elephants or chariots well.

Carthage
The old arch-enemy of Rome and also a pretty decent faction in multiplayer. Their strengths are elite skirmishers, a variety of hoplites and a good selection of cav.

Typical build

• Generals Bodygaurd or Noble Cav
  
• 3 Cretan Archers
  
• 4-6 Hoplites
  
• 2-6 Swords
  
• Mixture of mid tier and elite cav
  
• Skirmisher Cav (maybe)

Who are they good against?
They are quite effective against hellenic or eastern factions

Who are they bad against?
They can be weak agaisnt sword heavy builds but this can be dealt with by skirmishers and elite units like campanian cav

Barbarians
Iceni, Arverni, Suebi, Lusitani, Arevaci, Boii, Nervii, Galatia, Odrysian Kingdom, Getae
I have grouped all barbarians together because firstly it would take ages to do them individually and secondly they all have a similar play style in general. Their strengths are infantry which will form the core of the army and they also have decent spears.

Typical build

• 0-3 Skirmishers
  
• 1-4 Elite Swords
  
• 2-8 Mid tier swords
  
• 4 Mid tier cav

Who are they good against?
Barbarians are fine against other barbarians and they do well agaisnt Greek factions

Who are they bad against?
They are weak against eastern factions and factions with special units (ele/chariot). They are slightly weaker than Rome but they can definitely win.

Nomads
Roxalani, Royal Scythia, Massagatae
These guys only have cav so you know what to expect straight away. However their horse archers can be good and heavy cav can be lethal in the hands of a good player. These factions will require good micro to be effective. A lot of melee units have the draco ability which gives them a big advantage while its active.

Typical build

• 1-5 elite cav
  
• 4-6 mid tier cav
  
• 4-10 horse archers

Who are they good against?
Sword based armies

Who are they bad against?
Spear based armies especially greek factions

Parthia & Armenia
The great empires of the east have brilliant cataphracts and good skirmishers. These should be the focus of your army rather than units like swordsmen

Typical build

• 3-5 Eastern Cataphracts
  
• 5-6 Foot or Light Archers
  
• 2-4 Hoplites
  
• 1-2 Eastern Spears
  
• 3 Horse Archers

Who are they good against?
They are quite effective against hellenic factions, carthage and barbarians

Who are they bad against?
Greek factions

Hellenic Factions - Successor Kingdoms
Macedon, Pontus, Selucids, Baktria, Egypt, Epirus
These factions have top cav, excellent skirmishers and a variety of possible play styles. You could go with a pike core and let your skirmishers do the killing or go for a sword based army. A lot of them also have access to special units and elite spears.

Typical build

• 1-3 Elite cav
  
• 2-4 mid tier cav
  
• 4-6 mid tier swords
  
• 0-6 pikes
  
• 0-2 elite swords
  
• 2-5 skirmishers
  
• 1 ele/chariot

Who are they good against?
They are pretty good against any faction due to their varied unit rosters

Who are they bad against?
They're not perticularly bad agaisnt anyone

Hellenic Factions - Greeks
Sparta, Athens, Syracuse and Ardeai (not greek but same play style)
Unfortunatly the rosters of some of these factions are rather limited meaning you are going to be pretty predictable. However Syracuse has some good cav, Athens have good skirmishers and they all have some great elite hoplites that will hold out for ages.

Typical build

• 4-10 hoplites
  
• 0-6 swords
  
• 3-5 skrimishers
  
• 4-6 cav
  
• 1-3 elite hoplites

Who are they good against?
Parthia and Nomads, ok agaisnt Carthage and Sucessor Kingdoms

Who are they bad against?
Sword heavy factions like barbarians and Rome

Tactics to use in game

Flanking

Flanking is when you attack an enemy in the rear or flank with a unit while you hold it from the front with another. Cav is good at this because its very mobile and has a powerful charge. If you have a numbers advantage it is better to flank with one unit and engage the other head on than to just engage both units from the front.

Rush

Rush tactics are where you take an infantry and cav heavy army with little skirmishers and go straight in for a fast engagement. The advantage of being agressive is that you get to pick your engagements and your opponent is more likely to make mistakes if hes under pressure

Skirmishing
A common tactic of skirmishing is to 'focus fire' where you order all your units to fire a 1 enemy unit so then it dies quicker. It is important to protect your skirmisher from enemy cav so it can be useful to keep a couple of cheap spear units nearby. 'Kiting' is a type of tactic where you have a lot of skirmishers and retreat from them enemy so you can get as many volleys off as possible before you commit to a melee engagement. This requires good micro as it maybe become difficult if your opponent has cav chasing you.

Special Units
So some people may say chariots and elephants are OP but they're only good if you know how to use them. Chariots are used the best to kill your opponents sword infantry. Don't engage them against pikes or heavy cavalry. You need to keep issuing them with move orders to make sure they don't get bogged down. Keep them moving through your opponents infantry and you can rack up 300+ kills in no time. Elephants might be a bit weaker in this patch due to the fact that skirmishers were buffed and a lot of infantry units have javelins. You need to be vary careful about missiles and pikes and again they work well against infantry when you spam move orders.

Getting the right engagement

Its important to get the right units against the right enemy units. Heres a general guide of who you should engage with what units

Swords: Good against spears and other swords.
Spears: Good against cav
Cav: Good against skirmishers and swords to a certain extent
Skirmishers: Good against other skirmishers, elephants, swords and cav
Dogs: Good against horse archers and light units
Chariots: Good against infantry
Elephants: Good agaisnt melee infantry

In general the total war community is pretty good but heres a basic list which a lot of it can apply to any game

Do's

• Say gl hf before the game (good luck have fun)
  
• Say gg at the end (good game)
  
• Be friendly in chat
  
• Make an active effort to engage is some way

Dont's

• Noob box or pike box
  
• Spam (lots of the same unit)
  
• Hill camp
  
• Run away for ages
  
• Rage quit

Heres how you become an MLG pro in 3 easy steps:

Step 1. Practice, Practice, Practice!

Sounds obvious I know but its really important. The more you play the better understanding you get of factions, builds and maps. Also your micro management skills will improve meaning you can make faster decisions in the heat of battle.

Step 2. Find some friends

Playing random online battles is fine but sometimes you meet spammers, droppers or people with a much different skill level to you. Learning multiplayer works best when you have people to play with of a similar or slightly higher skill level because you can constantly get good games and you can share tips and tricks with each other.

Step 3. Watch YouTube videos

Watching YouTubers is great because you can see how they play and steal their tactics and armies and again gain further understanding of how to play. Here is a list of the best Rome II Multiplayer YouTubers in my opinion who you can definately learn from:

Atilla The Great
Heir Of Carthage
Milk and Cookies tw
Reptilicus
The Armenian King
The Prussian Prince
THFE Productions
TOR
Wolf Of Remus tw

So you think you're pretty decent? Time to take your next steps

Getting involved in tournaments
So first of all you need to know how to find them. Heres are some websites and steam groups which may be useful. They might not all be active all the time but they're good places to look at.

Total War Online - Forum[totalwaronline.bbfr.net]
Total War Online - Steam Group
BETA Flash Tournaments - Steam Group
TWR Tournaments - Steam Group
Grand Master Championship - Steam Group
French Center Total War - Forum[frenchcentertw.forumactif.org]
Russian League Total War - Forum[rusleague.org]

Joining a clan

I'm not going to try and pursuade you to join any perticular clan but I will list the benifits. It gives you a good group of people to play with regualrly and you are sure to meet some good friends. Like I said in part 3 of the guide you are sure to learn a lot from playing with good players. Before joining a clan you will most likely have to play with them to show how good you are. You don't nessessarily have to be the best in the world they might be looking for people with potential but it differs depending in who you're trying to join. Joining a clan isn't nessessary but I think its highly recomendable for someone loooking to get into competitive multiplayer.

If you get involved with multiplayer you are sure to meet plenty of people in clans. The best way in my opinion to join one is find people already in them who you play with and ask them or you can just apply to one. Some clans will have ranks and leaders, some will have no politics. Some will be mostly people from one country some will be international. There are lots out there and there will be one thats right for you.

So I hope you learnt a lot and a ready to go and kick some ass on Rome II. Please share and leave feedback on what you like and didn't like so I can change it and help as many people as possible.

See you later