Napoleon: Total War Darthmod update has "enhanced Battle AI that awaits to crush you"

The latest update to the Mythos Edition of the marvellous Darthmod project for Napoleon: Total War has landed according to ModDB , which makes this a good excuse to highlight Darthmod for any Total War players who haven't considered modding the game at all just yet.

The infamously challenging has gradually added more and more units to Napoleon, and has tuned the AI to be more aggressive and tougher to beat. Installing it will add 191 new land units, 14 new naval units and extra visual effects that make Napoleon's battlefields smokier, bloodier and more explosive. The mod also increases unit sizes and includes a campaign that supports 40 unit armies. The AI has been overhauled to use its generals more carefully, and combat has been rebalanced to make melee more decisive.

Those changes have been around for a month or so, but Darth Vader and co. have been busy tweaking the mod to make it better. Today's tweaks sharpen up the AI even more. Check out the full summary of the many, many changes Darthmod Napoleon makes on its TWCenter page . And check out the latest changelog, for version 2.5+++ below.

Version 2.5+++ "Mythos Edition" (17/7/2012)

  • Fix of broadside damage being too weak.

  • Improved melee and animation mechanics for even more cinematic and realistic engagements. The AI is affected very positively and now should behave better and be more responsive.

  • Adjusted the Formation AI and now the BAI should be more effective overall:

  • The AI now forms proper double lines, more suitable for the 40 Unit battles engagements.

  • The AI now can defend more efficiently and artillery fires at the advancing human army without hesitations.

  • The AI should attack not too stretched out and more coordinated.

  • Managing properly the formation offsets now the BAI can attack more efficiently by exploiting the weakness of the human player, that is the ability to control many fronts at the same time and musket/charge at will. In short, the AI moves much more decisively in the battlefield and should provoke much more casualties to the human player.

  • CAI should now be much more mobile and eager to defend borders/settlements/cities and also to invade.

  • Rank fire has less fire delay.

  • Melee penetration enhanced to the maximum cinematic level.

Tom Senior

Part of the UK team, Tom was with PC Gamer at the very beginning of the website's launch—first as a news writer, and then as online editor until his departure in 2020. His specialties are strategy games, action RPGs, hack ‘n slash games, digital card games… basically anything that he can fit on a hard drive. His final boss form is Deckard Cain.