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Rome Total War: Barbarian Invasion – Retrospective

A year after its release Rome Total War received its first expansion: Barbarian Invasion. Rome Total War is a grand expansion of the series bringing it into 3D and introducing new mechanics, Barbarian Invasion is more about thematic and strategic changes to the Total War formula.

Most strategy games feature you starting small and rising up to become a great power. This setup commits players to a steady sense of progression and expansion giving them a connection to the empire they built, Barbarian Invasion inverts this trope.

For the two fractured halves of the Roman Empire, you’ll simply be tasked to survive the waves of barbarian migrations, and hold together your massive crumbling empire. As for the other factions, you’ll have to fight your way into the heart of the ailing Roman Empire and carve your way through to the richest regions to give your people a new homeland.

Instead of the diversity of faction cultures which you have in Rome Total War, hew you’re limited to the: Romans themselves, Germanic Barbarians, Steppe nomads, and the Sassanid Persians. 

The biggest difference from Vanilla RTW though is between the factions is the close of the technological gap between the Romans and their barbarian neighbors. Mostly gone are the naked warbands of the Gauls and Germans, replaced with hardened warriors who can go toe-to-toe with the Romans. Now that they have their troops on par with the Romans and the Romans are trying to cover far more territory at the start than they were in Vanilla, there’s a more even playing field. 

On top of it all, you’ll now have to deal with the struggle between Christianity, Zoroastrianism, and Paganism. With the Roman Empire being split between the rising Christians and the older pagan tradition.

All of these factors coalesce in the amazing campaign of Barbarian Invasion. Few Total War worlds are so well-realized and so focused. 

Campaign Overview

The campaign isn’t just smaller in terms of there being fewer factions, there are also literally fewer provinces in the game 72 compared to the original’s 103. There are fewer factions, less troop variety, fewer provinces, fewer armies at your disposal. It’s a time of decay, the old ways are failing, that empire you built-in Rome Total War that was so glorious? Yeah, that’s this monstrosity now. 

Rome has grown too big to even maintain a singular authority. Throughout the empire, corruption and religious struggles run rampant. Rebellions are all too common, your borders are overextended and the Barbarians who’ve you’ve kept divided for ages are now ready to come and take your land.

Manpower is now at a premium, after the Crisis of the Third Century, plagues, and previous invasions the Empire is a shell of its former self.

As for the Germanic tribes, well they’re about to have a bad time themselves, as Attila the Hun is on the move. In the East, the Eastern Roman Empire and the Persians are locked in a struggle they’ve been in for nearly 200 years.

Each faction is poised on the brink of collapse. It’s not the hopeful future of the main campaign where you sought to build an empire that will last the ages: Barbarian Invasions is about just surviving. 

Roman Campaign

There are now two Roman factions: The Western and Eastern Empires. The Western is in far worse shape than its cousin in the East, as it was historically. 

The Western Empire was never as populous or as Urbanized as the East. It also has far more vulnerable borders to defend. On top of this, the empire is swimming in corruption and the religious schism between Christian and Pagan is far worse than in the East.

You’re dealing with both pressing managerial and military problems. On the military front, you’ll have to manage four fronts to fight on: Britannia, Germany, Illyria, and Africa. In the north, you’ll be fighting off the Celts and the Saxons with the limited resources of Brittania. If you lose Britannia to any other faction a new emergent faction the Romano-British. 

The Romano-British represent the remnant peoples left in Britain in the wake of the Roman retreat from the island. Their faction roster combines the best of the Roman and Celtic armies with the excellent Comitatenses and the Celtic Gael Knights. They’re not playable in the base game but are in custom battles. 

For the Western Empire, you have two options to deal with Britannia: abandon it or rush the Celts, driving them from the island, then defending it from the Saxons. In Africa, you’ll want to just hold Carthage. The Barbarian Berbers will launch assault after assault onto your settlements there and you’ll likely not have the resources to hold them off. 

Looking at Illyria, you’ll want to either abandon the area entirely and defend Italy or garrison the territory as a buffer. Note that if you do decide to keep the area you’re liable to be attacked by your “allies” in the Eastern Empire. This is an effect of Rome Total War’s not-so-excellent diplomacy system.

Germany will be your main area of focus. This is where the Germans will be being pushed across the borders as hordes, fleeing from the oncoming Huns.

Internally, you’ll have to deal with a ton of rebels. For each Roman faction, their rebels will form your own faction which will produce armies and try and conquer your territory. This is unlike the bog-standard rebels you’re usually dealing with. 

I’ve spent a lot of time on the strategic options of the Western Roman Empire because I think there are some of the deepest in the Total War series up to this point. Focusing on preserving something already too large and rotten to its core is the sort of compelling setup which makes Warhammer 40K so popular.

The main strategic choices are either: abandonment or defense. Will you try and hold all your territory or pull back to more defensible positions? The answer has its degrees. I’ve pulled all the way back to Spain or Italy but generally, it’s a good idea to just abandon Illyria and Brittania. 

This is what Total War does well, and it’s these sorts of interesting strategic decisions that are so lacking in too many other Total War campaigns. 

The Eastern Empire’s situation is far simpler. You have the Danube and the Mesopotamian fronts. The Danube is a difficult early concern as that’s where the Hordes will be coming through in the beginning of the game before moving west. 

Your main adversary lies further East: the Sassanids. The Romans and Sassasinds have been locked in a 200-year on-and-off conflict by this point and the Sassanids are no pushovers. Compared to the Romans, they have some devastating heavy cavalry and their infantry has improved from the Parthians in RTW.

I find the Eastern Roman Empire less interesting than the Western since they start in a much better position. Their cities are more prosperous, borders more secure, and more Christianized. So once they are able to defeat the Sassanids they’ll be in a good spot for the rest of the game.

That doesn’t mean their campaign is worse, it’s still more difficult than any campaign in Vanilla RTW and provides a great sense of challenge without the sheer masochism that is the Western Roman Campaign.

Barbarian Campaign

The selling point of Barbarian Invasion is obviously that you’ll get to be the barbarians doing some of the invading. The major change from Barbarian factions in Vanilla Rome Total War is that if they are defeated they will be able to transform into a horde, instead of being wiped off the map.

They can also transform into a horde by choice if they have only one settlement remaining.  When that happens the faction will spawn several stacks of units and begin to search for a new homeland. 

This means as the Romans it’s often a better idea to keep certain barbarians weak but not destroy them, as doing so will give them several full stacks on your doorstep. 

Among the Germans

The German tribes are some of the most interesting in the game, each one features their own unique units, though in practice this often just equates to medium spearmen. I think this relative uniformity between the Germans is good. It makes them feel like a people, though each has their unique flavor, Saxon Keelmen look nothing like the Frankish Sword Heerbann even if their function remains mostly the same. 

As the Germans, you’ll be sandwiched between the Western Roman Empire and the advancing Steppe tribes. Tribes like the Vandals and Huns, not to mention those that they, in turn, push out like the Goths and Sarmatians. 

This means you’ll either have to pack up and try and fight your way into the Roman Empire or try and battle the Huns, often you’ll end up doing both. There is this beautiful strategic line you must walk as the Germans between not pushing into the Western Empire too early and bearing the brunt of their still formidable armies or waiting too long and not getting their rich cities for your own. 

The next major group of Barbarians are the Goths, you can play as the main group of Goths but there is also another emergent group: The Ostrogoths. The Goths start in the Carpathian mountains but will quickly want to move as they are directly in the path of the Hun’s and not likely to do well against them. The Goths generally move west, as they did historically, to avoid the main thrust of the steppe tribes. 

The final major Barbarian group are the nomadic Steppe Tribes namely the Vandals and the Huns. These tribes start as hordes and are the catalysts for most of the actions in the game. They’ll move west looking for lands to conquer and a new homeland to settle in, and in doing so push out everyone in their way. This creates a cascading wave effect as the people pushed out by these tribes will push against others and eventually crash upon the borders of the Roman Empire.

Playing these tribes is a balance between looting cities and maintaining your armies enough so that when you do want to settle down, you can. Your horde units don’t require upkeep but can’t replenish themselves so you’ll want to keep them relatively safe. When you seize new cities you’ll have the options to either settle or sack them. With sacking providing massive amounts of gold but incurring huge deaths among the population. 

Once you settle as a horde you’ll lose most of your horde troops and be forced to rebuild your armies in your new homeland. This is why it’s smart to settle in the heart of the Roman Empire, where there is already enough infrastructure to support producing higher-tier units. 

Emergent Factions

New to Rome Total War are emergent factions, which I touched on previously. These factions don’t exist at the beginning of the game and are not playable without modding. Instead, they will appear on the map once certain conditions are met. These range from the Romano-British to the late-game horde: the Slavs. 

There are also the emergent rebel factions for the Roman empires. I should note that generals in the empire now have loyalty ratings which represent the General’s probability of rebelling. If the general does join the Rebel faction they’ll take their army with them.  

Religion 

Speaking a little more about religion, there are only three religions in the game paganism, Christianity, and Zoroastrianism. Religion is detailed both at the settlement level and on the Character sheet. This creates a dynamic where you can have a Christian governor managing over a pagan population, which will enrage them. It further deepens the level of empire management you’ll be doing and you can influence the direction of your empire by tearing down temples of the opposing faiths and building your own. 

This is most critical for the western Roman Empire whose lands are fairly evenly split between Christian and pagan. An important choice in that campaign will be which religion you choose. It also adds another layer of problem-solving onto the Western campaign as you’ll have to manage that on top of everything else you’ll be doing and tearing down religious buildings will only further the unrest throughout the empire. 

Choosing between the religions will also influence what buildings you can build. For example, Christian cities cannot build Coliseums and hold games, as the blood sports are repugnant to Christians.

Battles & Units 

The biggest change in terms of the battle system is the inclusion of night battles. This can be triggered when a general has the Night Fighter trait. This disallows enemy reinforcements, and your own(unless the reinforcing general also has the Night Fighter trait). 

These battles expand the strategic options you have at your disposal and just look great. Units hold torches and fire arrows light up the night sky, for 2005 graphics this is really something. 

The types of units you’ll be using have also changed. Gone are the Sarissa pikemen and crack legionaries of the ancient world. There is a greater focus on heavy cavalry in the game, anticipating the rise of knights in the medieval era. 

Comittienses have replaced the standard legionarrie, and while they still dominate the battlefield they’ll act as your elite heavy infantry, not your mainline troops, as they are often too expensive to maintain. 

General units can now be recruited in cities like regular troops. I cannot express enough how much this can break the game. With the greater focus on heavy cavalry, and the general unit’s ability to regenerate troops this makes an army of generals unstoppable doom stacks capable of wiping out anything. I’ve played games where having just one of these can conquer nearly the entire Roman Empire as the Franks, it’s ludicrous. Generals used to be a rare commodity, something to be protected and nurtured since there was such a limited pool, now they are the strongest unit and you can have as many as you want.

Barbarian Invasion also adds two new historical battles. The Battle of Chalons or The Battle of the Catalaunian Fields between Attila and the Roman general Aetius, and the Battle of Badon Hill which is non-historical and features King Arthur as the Romano-British. Both of these battles are alright, and I don’t feel like either really makes use of the setting. It’s also sad to see other historical battles like Adrianople were ignored in return for a mythical one. 

Conclusion

In my piece on the original Rome Total War I argued that the strength of that game was in its campaign, specifically the detailed mechanics in the Roman campaign, and in the diversity of its factions which gave the game a “clash of civilizations” feel. 

Barbarian Invasion mostly does away with the huge amount of faction variety and unique campaign mechanics for a more universal experience. Each faction has its own goals, either to preserve or destroy the Roman Empire, and around that crux, and the catalyst arrival of the Huns, the campaign succeeds. 

In many ways it’s a much better campaign than the original, more factions are interesting to play, the introduction of religions adds new levels of management. It maintains what was great about the original, and builds off of that while taking its own direction. In short, it’s an amazing expansion to the base game.

Barbarian Invasion is about decay. About fewer armies, factions, and provinces but that’s only part of the story. For many of these factions, this is their time to rise up, to begin to build their own story and emerge onto the world stage. It’s a time when the ancient world is dying and a new medieval world is being born. It focuses on just maintaining what you have serves as the perfect bookend to Rome Total War’s empire-building bonanza. 

Barbarian Invasion painted a darker world but was a worthy successor to Rome Total War, next we’ll be looking at the less worthy second expansion to RTW: Alexander.

This article is part of a series on the Total War Series you can find the other articles in the series here:

• Shogun Total War
• Medieval Total War
• Rome Total War