I've been having problems getting either of these games to run smoothly. They both work fine when I initially launch the game, but as soon as I start actually playing a campaign or scenario map, virtually all the in-game animations (flags, unit movement, attacks, etc.) become stutter-y and discontinuous. In addition, when I go back to the main menu, the animation effects which had been running smoothly in the menu now also stutter.

I've tried adjusting the setup parameters - Direct3D, resolutions, and so on - with no luck. It doesn't seem to matter whether I run the game in "compatibility mode" or not, either.

Does anyone know of a fix for this problem? This is really frustrating.

You didn't mention your system details, but assuming you run at least Windows Vista:

I tested them both briefly on Windows 10 with DDrawCompat and they seemed to be working fine. The performance improvement was more noticeable in SM, but I didn't see any performance problems with or without it in AoW2. It's worth a try in both cases anyway.

I did notice a lot of screen tearing in AoW2 when scrolling though. It can be fixed by forcing V-sync on in driver settings.

Ultimately found a solution. A recent windows update apparently interfered with the game somehow, and I was able to fix the problem by using system restore to go back a couple days.

Do you know the Windows update number? I haven't fired up AoW:SM in a few months, but I'd hate to have to encounter the same problem...

The update in question seems to have been KB3035583 if I'm reading the update manager correctly. I'm not knowledgeable enough about computers to really speculate on what it might have been doing or whether this problem would be particular to my machine.

Isn't that the “Get Windows 10” app?
Don't tell me that it also ruins games -_-'