yep, those games are like the total war version of panzer corps.

Sorry for that half baked comparison... we just hit the clock of 12 and me and the person i live with had to exchange new year greetings ;-p

First of all i meant Panzer General of course, and while there are not many options for displaying medieval combat with units types and all i do feel that total war has covered this in a way since 1996 or so to be iconic enough to be used in such a manner

So yea, The Kings Crusade and Mark of Chaos and the tactical play-out in King Arthur are to me total war styled tactical play-outs, btw i have been trying to pus CA for years now into a direction that they will add a DLC that will cover a similar mission based style into one of their games !

Sorry for this half ass piece of writing ;-)

Getting rid of 2020 now

In my opinion (and that of many other fans), it's mostly about modding/custom content. It comes with a powerful editor to create your own adventures with, and there are countless free and actually good quality adventures made by other players that you can download and play (or play online with others). It also offers lots of gameplay hours just for the official content though, with three lengthy campaigns and several DLC adventures. Personally I think a lot of the custom content made by players is better than the official stuff, but the latter has its moments, too.

Gameplay-wise it's different from e.g. Baldur's Gate in that you don't control a full party, just your starting hero. You can have companions and give them orders, but they are still controlled by the AI. I think that's the main criticism by RPG veterans; the real time with pause combat isn't quite as tactical and exciting as in other RPGs, but its still D&D and gets better at higher levels. Wyvern Crown of Cormyr introduced a new knight class and has jousting tournaments, for example, in which you can decide whether to fight honorable or not.