Total War Saga: Thrones of Britannia - The Vikings Strike Back

[@gya3519]

Anglo Saxons taking issues with the Danes settling in Britain is one of the biggest cases of the Spiderman pointing at Spiderman meme in history. Also Northwic is Norwich, not Norfolk.

[@quimble2177]

Jon...mate...just click the unit and you get the option to give them better weapons, it’s the same for when you get a better, higher tier unit...you aren’t familiar with the newer Total Wars are you Jon?

[@ilo3456]

Wait for real? Since which Total War does this work?

[@quimble2177]

CPU Purple Heart/Neptune when you click or shift click units in the campaign map you get a few options. Disband Upgrade weaponry Upgrade unit, this takes it to the next tier of unit, so for example in Rome 2, hastati become Legionaries after a certain tech, Merge units which takes men from the units you selected and maximises the amount of men you can re-add to that unit/units Been in since Rome 2

[@Healermain15]

That wasn't in any of the games I played, and I played most of them. Probably something that started in Rome 2 (which I didn't play much), and got skipped for Warhammer.

[@lou1958]

I cringed when he didn't recognize the little gold chevrons indicating an upgrade is available. It's Attila after all.

[@quimble2177]

lou1958 I mean apparently he’s said he’d played Rome 2 and Attila but since he doesn’t know that the person that told me that was either lying or misheard something or he hasn’t played them, I mean some who comment prior to this one said they played a little bit of Rome 2 and skipped to Warhammer (which in my opinion is even more simplified than Rome 2, I mean you can’t even raise or lower taxes for fuck sake, though some of the UI is nice) which...so Jon went from...medieval 2 to Warhammer?

[@burntbybrighteyes]

We demand Lunden be renamed to Milton Keynes!

[@Healermain15]

Alternatively: Our New Haus.

[@DZ-1987]

"Ournewhaus" Fuck throats, am i right?

[@charlieheadlam8771]

No, it must be slough

[@laurence2799]

Only 20 minutes in, but one of the first things to jump out at me on the battle map was how well units interact with one another when moving. My troops getting all bunched up when they ran into each other was a huge pain in my last Rome II campaign (wasn't too keen on warhammer). Nice to see small QoL improvements being implemented!

[@eldestoyster426]

I can't believe you're not more exultant about having Cambridge as your vassal, Jon. Surely that's the secret dream of anyone whose sympathies lie with Oxford. :P

[@gennik7966]

Brace for the chat Roleplayers.

[@HaixThePro]

Gruß Gott!

[@ChevyChase301]

Plus 1 Intelligence long ago I was Admiral Jon and Lentulus Brutus... perhaps I will return.

[@tiberiusbrutus942]

Nah.....nah.

[@guthrum3456]

Tiberius Brutus ah Tiberius it is good to be back

[@manueltellez9460]

ALSO HYPE

[@DiceSully]

Thing will come from the Thingvellir in Iceland. Tribes and villages would meet in the Thingvellir valley discuss trades, deals and any disagreements or grievance. It's actually where the word "thing" comes from. You'd bring your issue to the Thing, then eventually that became, you'd bring a Thing. So it is very heavily involved with law. it has such historical significance in Iceland, that when Iceland became independent from Denmark in 1944 the treaty was signed in front of thousands in the Thingvellir. I would say to anyone who has the chance to visit Iceland, go, and visit the Thingvellir. It's created by the splitting of tectonic plates and it's possibly the most stunning place I've ever visited.

[@Begruded_Norse]

Sorry, but I'm pretty sure you are off there. Seeing as Thing - Ting is quite Norwegian/Danish. Even our local courts is called Tinghus. Remember that 'everything' Icelandic stems from it's western Scandinavian heritage.

[@jarradscarborough7915]

almost makes me wanna travel to the opposite side of the world to go see it...

[@DiceSully]

I've had a Google and I believe you're right. Damn the No Such Thing as a Fish podcast, I trusted it haha. Ah well, the point that it is the old norse word for assembly and it's link to law still stands. One other thing still stands. Thingvellir is a stunning place :)

[@catriona_drummond]

Things are even older that that and not resticted to Nothern Germanic tribes. They were an old Germanic custom that Tacitus reported about in his book "Germania" about 100 a.D.

[@matthiashrafnkelsson2180]

James O'Sullivan yes Þingvellir is beautiful

[@KrMaHo]

jon, the yellow arrows on a unit card means that upgrades are available...

[@jonsitron11]

Jon, your infantry (more specifically the axemen) rely on the charge bonus, they shouldn't just stand and take the enemy's charge.

[@verdantsquire950]

Jon click on the guys with the glowy arrow and then you can upgrade them

[@selder_7]

was nice to give Total War a little break but I'm glad to have it back now, some of my favourite series on youtube

[@CommissarMitch]

"Nothing really happened between Rome and the Rennesance. The dark ages are called that for a reason" - Jon in his Rome Total War let's play about 1 year ago. Irony is bliss.

[@Narmatonia]

Commenting here from Gipeswic, happy that my homelands are going to be kicking arse. Also Rendlaesham is now a small village called Rendlesham, it was a lot more important back then.

[@Skutchletugg]

17:53 "...You don't necessarily want cavalry to be the anvil anymore." The cav were never the anvil. The anvil stays still. The hammer moves fast. The cav are the hammer.

[@dwiss2556]

Oh man - that history intro was just a wonderful piece of work! Hats of dear Sir!

[@movingparts6270]

So was this before or after Lord of the Rings?

[@kaynethwithmoor7963]

Lol dude, this isnt even the same age Lotr happens

[@arifmior6978]

Technically lotr is set before the ice age, look it up

[@Kirakon78420]

Hi Great playtrough ! You can actually retrain the units you started with by leaving your mouse on one of the units that have the yellow arrows, three options appear and one of them is to upgrade their weapons ! Cheers

[@ZefVolk]

More than 10 minutes? What is this black magic!

[@ManyATrueNerd]

Yep, all the restrictions are gone - we can now play the game in full :D

[@jarradscarborough7915]

All the restrictions except the perception! :P

[@polishenglish8356]

A beginning of a new great series!

[@DaveP1991]

Rendlaesham is basically the nearest village to the Sutton Hoo burial sites. Probably a royal seat for the East Anglian viking kings.

[@HaixThePro]

Oh this will be great.

[@manueltellez9460]

HYPE

[@GoErikTheRed]

Jon. It is very easy to upgrade guys after you train them. Do you see the units with the big gold chevrons? Click on the unit card. A few options will pop up. One of them is disband. One of them is upgrade. Click on that.

[@Dixnnn]

I came back to comment how much I loved the fact that you could hear the genuine excitement in Jon's voice at the start.

[@Czarhay]

@ManyATrueNerd I recently went to Iceland and picked up a book on Icelandic sagas. Dublin and a few British Kings are mentioned in Egil's Saga. The settling of Iceland was around the year 900 very close to this time. Interestingly Dublin is a major Viking trading hub during the reign of Norse King Harald Fair-Hair. I would recommend having a read of a few sagas for context.

[@gramursowanfaborden5820]

petition for naming one of your armies the "chunky, chunky lads" and filling it with heavy infantry.

[@peterpan23]

Jon, I said Mount and blade.....but this is okay....

[@DZ-1987]

I've had a good long thought. It would only be pain. No enjoyment, just pain.

[@davidarnold9324]

Awesome! I have been checking for your video all day.

[@bengwa7]

Counter charge your main line, don't shoot into the shielded flank. Charge axe infantry into the rear, you are over reliant on archers, use them to disable enemy skirmishes so you have ranged superiority. Also love you.

[@DannyMakesVideosIGuess]

I'll be honest, it just looks more simplified and streamlined, not much customization just: build, fight, talk and repeat. Always disliked the building slots, nor the province system although i do like food being a main resource. What i don't know about is the difficulty system, i know i asked this a while ago, but that was for a different build: does an increased difficulty just mean 'haha AI get ridiculous bonuses from nowhere for no reason other than artificial difficulty' or is there improvement in that area? Just got to the rebel battle part of the video, seems like the AI is as bad as early games XD they just stood there defensively when they could have gotten to the high ground and defended against you properly. Seems like an okay game but i doubt i'll get it (i might actually, it's only £26.99 on steam, 10% off offer and i kind of wanna try it out). With all that said, i'm glad you seem to enjoy it, Jon. EDIT: I hope it doesn't lend itself to auto-resolve as well...

[@SimonL98B]

Agreed, seems like an waterd down version of Attila wih some reskins attached to it...

[@ManyATrueNerd]

I don't know EXACTLY what higher AI does, but it looks like they can field more armies a lot more easily, so (assuming they even obey a system of food and cash in the first place), they probably get bonus gold and food.

[@tommyknockers5492]

The 'tardiness' of the AI at higher difficulty settings has totally ruined the Total War series for me. That and Sega (presumably).

[@DannyMakesVideosIGuess]

I thought so, artificial difficulty is commonplace now, no matter it's not a big deal

[@Alex-0597]

+Danny The only way I've ever seen to make the harder AI "better" without giving it mechanical advantages is to neuter the easier AI. XCOM: EU dues that by forcing the alien's combat AI to do substandard moves on every difficulty below Classic. That's why you'll occasionally see alien units just run out into overwatch fire to secure better cover rather than try and remove the overwatch first.

[@d.ag.b1135]

This just makes me wish there was a Crusader Kings game that looked this good visually. Someday...

[@RobBCactive]

I found Ilyrium mercenaries often made good flankers in original RTW, actually hidden velites too or a square block of hastati or Barb spears could Hammer, so long as cavalry cover to counter enemy cav was present. Units then exert strategic battle threats, requiring counter deployments whilst not actually engaging. Much more subtle than rigid lines with cav running about, that is generally used. Needs a feel for arrival times to point of effective attack, rather than unit attack/defense stats

[@DannyMakesVideosIGuess]

Kingdoms, not empires Jon.

[@ze_rubenator]

The difference between a kingdom and an empire is just that when a king's ego is inflated to a certain point he starts calling himself an emperor because it sounds cooler. Doesn't really matter what you call them.

[@Savalanoghlu]

No, there are significant and distinctive differences between kingdoms and empires.

[@ze_rubenator]

Not really. A common definition is that an empire has to have overseas territories, colonies or otherwise occupy parts of a foreign culture. However, that completely falls apart when you consider the Japanese emperor or many of the Chinese emperors of the past. The terms "kingdom" and "empire" come from different geographical locations, different languages and different times (ancient Roman and Germanic respectively), but essentially they both mean "hereditary monarchy," although even that isn't always the case.

[@miserychickadee]

Japan called itself an empire because China called itself an Empire, so that can more or less be ignored. China called itself an empire because they used to have many different people with many different cultures, built from many conquered kingdoms, who have since homogenized.

[@UltimaPowers]

So begins the MATN TW tradition of naming things wrongly, despite being corrected in every video.

[@Kaiimei]

Rendlaesham in modern England is Rendlesham. It's a pretty small village, with only about 3100 people as of today living there. Honestly, it's not a surprise you didn't know what it was.

[@Ket246811]

"Sir. You're changing our name to the Warriors Who Slay?" "Yes." "Yassss Queen! I mean *cough* good choice commander..."

[@ChevyChase301]

Pls do Barbarian Invasion

[@ripley2075]

pls

[@Alexthe360Great]

Caleb Ryan- Yes, this would be amazing. There is one general in particular that has something like -12 morale. I want to see Jon conquer the world with that guy.

[@seawind930]

Have him get a mod to play as the Romano-British.

[@Alexthe360Great]

Do you know if there is a mod for M2TW Kingdoms Britannia to play as the Baron's Alliance? If there is, I've never found it.

[@fortitude120]

pls don't ignore this Jon :/

[@TheRagan7]

Yay East Anglia. Wooo. Home land represent!

[@ManyATrueNerd]

Fear the might of Norfolk

[@dan-el6015]

And Suffolk Jon! :)

[@dan-el6015]

We're here too...

[@DaveP1991]

D F Naaa, its all about Norfolk... ;)

[@JL-uq6dq]

Im just disapointed that wallingford has been ignored. Alfreds largest burgh and it doesnt get a mention.

[@Knightcommander69]

I totally missed this series! Can't wait to power watch it.

[@Matt-cz6ti]

Fun fact: After the battle of Eddington Guthrum actually became a Christian and adopted the name Aethelstan. Alfred was his godfather, and the two were then allies (or, more accurately, East Anglia paid tribute to Wessex in exchange for being left alone) until Guthrum died in 890, twelve years after Thrones's start date

[@yancieb]

Man I love the graphics and art style in this game, especially the unit cards.

[@oneofmanyjames-es1643]

I'm going to guess that the agreement that let you have this required that little history lesson. Guthram's great but he's not exactly Alcebiades.

[@ManyATrueNerd]

No actually - I just wanted to give a tiny bit of context :)

[@oneofmanyjames-es1643]

That's fantastic, though the 'hey why don't we own the stuff rather than steal it' isn't actually the main reason why the Vikings settled. It was mainly about aristocratic rivals not having enough land back in Norway, and the pressures of population growth, so going off to conquer the soft and squishy Englishmen made sense. As you've noted, Kent has lots of lovely farms.

[@ManyATrueNerd]

I freely admit that my version of events was very simplified for brevity

[@gafasd]

I can see Jon as king of Britannia. Their queen is old and feeble. Should not be too hard to annex.

[@DZ-1987]

Fool! there can only be one King! And its... You were referring to the modern queen. Alright, nevermind.

[@thenautilius]

AN HOUR? AN HOUR OF NEW TOTAL WAR?! You spoil us Jon!

[@deadserenity95]

Here King should definitely give other benefits, would be a lot more tactical and interesting if your choice also dictated between a better army or better farming not just plan +5/-5 for each group

[@dominicomucci3014]

Might be able to-a get some high ground-a here! And get an advantage-a. Our archers-a are now in range! Skirmish mode-a!

[@Smi7h1sH3r3]

"The Sleighing Killers"? too much? also, OMG, yes!!!!! hope this one comes back! oh, also, not sure if it's so, but in Rome 2, upgrading units was done by clicking unit card and a little "button" would pop up above them, rather than retraining them in the training menu. not sure if that helps!

[@rateeightx]

Fun Fact: Colchester (Or Camulodunum, As The Roman's Called It) Was The Largest City In Roman Britannia!

[@AnotherGuyProductions]

Just as i started my Viking campaign in ck2... how interesting

[@rad666a]

Rendlaesham is modern Rendlesham, famous because it's where the "Rendlesham Incident" happened at an RAF base in 1980.

[@DaveP1991]

Karl Olson Much more famous for being the site of Sutton Hoo

[@Dudelolwat]

Lunden would make a good trade city, who would have thought? Maybe you could make a bridge across that river that runs through it.

[@SparrowFae]

Fitting that this came out while I'm vacationing in the UK. That means I can't play it right now, but this video will suffice.

[@OOUGH]

It's not out until May 3rd.

[@SparrowFae]

I'm here til the 5th ;p

[@Tom-tk4ir]

The one problem with these game is I don’t like the campaign map

[@tactictoe]

I'm at the point where you're talking about Norfolk and i'm now thinking of Alan Partridge. Aha!

[@joepriest9511]

you got so lucky with there general falling.

[@ManyATrueNerd]

I did, but maybe not QUITE as lucky as you think - I haven't seen the exact calculation, but generals don't have quite the ridiculous amount of HP they have in other Total War - just like their bodyguards, they can be squishy.

[@MagraveOfGA]

hmm... I kindof hope that there's a late-game horde event where the Normans invade

[@shacklock01]

There is, as well as a proper Norwegian and Danish invasion. Or all three can happen in one campaign if you do the legendary victory

[@huttj509]

30 mins in... I wonder if the governor thing is random, or if they did that on purpose. I can see it being a deliberate design decision. Put some things in part of the strategic layer that are "wrong" so when the player starts looking there they might easily notice that, and clue into WHY they might want to pay attention to governors, rather than seeing everyone appropriate and thus ignoring it. I put "wrong" in quotes because, while significant over the course of the game, it's not gamebreaking if you don't spot it. It's not like a game where you forgot to equip your weapon before going into battle and thus have no chance.

[@TtThunder43]

It’s so cool that I watched this and happen to watch The Last Kingdom too

[@cinos9940]

Another viking raid lets grab our axes

[@jansenart0]

The birds aren't there on the battlefield for ambiance: they actually can show where an enemy is, out of LoS.

[@joec3626]

Many A True Viking

[@jackiechuuan7645]

OMG you already have it?! Wasnt it deleyed? [havent seen the video yet] first by the way

[@ManyATrueNerd]

Yep, I have it early - and even better, ours will be the only channel on KZbin with the Viking East Engle campaign on it for a while :D

[@Fattybryce]

Pretty sure you just click on the unit and a menu with the option to upgrade it will pop up like in Rome 2. There was the same little yellow arrow on all the units that could be upgraded.

[@Otterwatche]

Jon should be a history teacher.

[@hitomisalazar4073]

Between, the Rome: Total War campaign, and Medieval 2 campaign, does Jon ever NOT go heavy into Archers? He keeps playing factions he says are really good and meant to use Heavy Infantry (Rome, Danmark, hell the 3 Kingdoms factions he played) but ends up in a love affair with archers as his primary focus.

[@thevoxdeus]

In a hammer and anvil, the cavalry are the hammer, not the anvil.

[@FishingForScience]

Woo East Anglia and Norwich is your start point! Finally the home city gets recognised 😂

[@shacklock01]

fairly sure you can recruit anywhere in your territory without settlement or fortified stance. Fortified is only needed to recruit in neutral and (hostile?) territory.

[@mikek2971]

Hey Jon, have you watched "the last kingdom" vaguely about this time period?

[@chompysaid204]

Gwined is awesome. Improved followers are great.

[@christomasjames6620]

Hi John have you read any of the Bernard Cornwell book based on this time period are really great the first few books were the base for The Last Kingdom TV series that now on netflics

[@jonasvalfridsson]

Art style is great, but I wish some day they make the viking voice acting sound less generic east european and more like The Swedish chef in Muppet show

[@Next0gen0]

Archer's become hammer's? No walls on sub regions? Free Visibility? This is no longer the total war we knew. The New World Has Come!

[@ManyATrueNerd]

The vision thing can be a bit odd - free visibility into your neighbours is great, but if your neighbours is a really narrow sub-province, you might have zero information about a major city that's very close to you, but technically 2-regions away...

[@Next0gen0]

Us: Heeeey guy's. Glad to see were getting along. BTW, anything interesting happening in that city over there? Them: Naaaaaaaaaaah...

[@pocketrocket129]

You shouldn't put your long axes in the main battle line. They should be on the flanks trying to get them round the sides to get the charge off

[@ChrisStroud1]

What do you think about the pedestrianisation of Northwic city centre?

[@PoisonInc]

A good game to play is guess what the ancient town names eventually became. Heh... Nottingham used to be called Snotingaham.

[@turtlezeus1610]

Yessssssss! More total war but more specifically a new total war.

[@gasmaskgaming9343]

A new series on my birthday yay

[@aleksandarvukojev9898]

Many, did you consider playing rome 2 total war, i just love your total war gameplays

[@TheAvesMYSTR]

Norwich Massiff represent!

[@yeahididgetarat6135]

why does Jon saying wharf so satisfying

[@nikolasweischner3560]

The nerfing of cav in this game is... strange. To say the least.

[@zagreus5726]

Wont deny...The game looks fantastic .Visually very nice :)

[@darthkingedededbobo6117]

as a scandinavian i approve of this

[@Artebudz]

These battles seem to be over extremely quickly..

[@horstmuller3373]

The Last Kingdom taught me about this.

[@Anthony-mt7qr]

Norfolk looks fairly unremarkable... no change there then...

[@XProjectHunterX]

hot damn you got an early copy, more total war is always good

[@danielhuber5713]

Still not Cursader Kings, but I feel like we're slowly getting there.

[@KegManplays]

Rendlesham these days is still called Rendlesham. And its pronounced Ren-dul-shum. Earmutha is great Yarmouth. Colneceaster is Colchester. Gippeswyk is Ipswich.

[@lazerwing3022]

i want jon as my history teacher

[@lazerwing3022]

wait london was originally called lunden? as in the field or the grove in danish?

[@radu0011]

do different marching stances not exist in this game anymore or does MATN just not know about it?

[@harryhawtin8197]

Love total war, and love the channel. 1+1=2

[@PunnyPanther]

The guy in the opening cut scene sounds Scottish. Its like a successful Braveheart if they were not Vikings

[@ManyATrueNerd]

Its still better than Rome: Total War, where Romans were oddly American...

[@PunnyPanther]

Many A True Nerd Rome: Total War was not Historically accurate full stop. But we can forgive it because it's the best game

[@demitriusrawluk5747]

Calum Baillie Scottish people probably do sound quite a bit like the old Germanic People. Many words in Scots are still pronounced like the anglo-saxons would’ve (brown cow = broon coo)

[@Nicegoesbad]

Is Uthred somewhere? Is he in the Game?

[@kingcynic5669]

Thank God (and MATN) for a new historic Total War. I admit that I have been cheating on you Jon by watching The Wanderer's Frost playthrough and Horath Drak's Stellaris. I will always be faithful for Total War Britannia though. Even when you don't know what you're doing, you always SOUND like you know what you're doing. No one does hilarious and historically informative commentary as well. Any chance of twice a week?

[@bluedragonepic8193]

Yes finally

[@neondeacon]

jeez the amount of friendly fire?

[@Naxych]

The campain map looks very brown..

[@JfergusonKG]

Is it just me or does this feel a bit oversimplified? I've always been a fan of the old total war games, and this feels almost like a free-to-play version of those in terms of so many features and mechanics seem to be stripped out.

[@shacklock01]

Compared to Med2/Rome 1/Empires, yes. But compared to later Total Wars this one actually has a fairbit of under the hood mechanical depth. Fair few Grand-Strat(ish) mechanics in the campaign map.

[@irishprice]

All I can say is... Viking infantry battle and not one unit locked shields to make a long shield wall.....? :O? (Also use infantry skills like you use cavalry skills..?)

[@exp3l3r22]

Eyyy Colchester! that's where i'm from ;)