You should be able to get through the standard install procedure just fine, with the latest version of wine. But dont run the game as soon as its installed. You need to configure wine properly first.

1: Install TA
You can run the setup.exe from the cd, if you have problems you may need to check your cd drive path in WineCfg->Drives. You can also create images and mount them manualy with programs like Gmount-iso, Acetone ISO or cdemu (not tried cdemu myself). It would be a good idea to take all the relevant .hpi files off the disk now too.

2: Install CC, BT & 3.1c Patch.
Installing these should not be a problem either, just make sure you do it in the right order, CC 1st, then BT and lastly apply the 3.1c Patch.

3: Optional - No CD & Unit Limit
I rename TotalA.exe to TotalA.exe.ORIGNIAL and then use the 5KNo-CdPatch.exe instead. I rename the patch to TotalA.exe, set my unit limit in tota5k.ini (The 5k Patches ini file, same as the normal TotalA.ini)

Now I have a fresh install of TA ready to be modded, I make a big zip file of my TotalA directory and save it as TA_FreshInstall.zip. If I mess up an install I can just delete the TotalA directory and unpack a new one from the zip file.

1: Copy TA
Make a copy of your C:\CAVEDOG\TOTALA (/home/you/.wine/drive_c/CAVEDOG/TOTALA) folder and paste it strait back into the cavedog folder. This should make a "TOTALA(copy)" folder. Rename this to Escalation (C:\CAVEDOG\Escalation).

2: Install Escalation
Following the normal ESC install but put all the required files into your Escalation directory instead. After you have setup WineCfg you will use the TotalA.exe in your Escalation directory to run the mod.

1: Configure Wine for TA Open up winecfg and goto the Applications tab. In the application settings list you should see an option for "Default Settings" click that one to make it active, then click the Graphics tab. Make sure that "Emulate a virtual dektop" is ticked and the desktop size is at least 1024 x 768.

Go back to the applications tab and click "Add application". This will bring up a file chooser window where you can chose your TotalA.exe file. (C:\CAVEDOG\Escalation\TotalA.exe), this will add it to the applications list. Select the totala.exe on the application list to make it active. At the bottom select Windows Version and make it Win98 or Win95. I personally find 98 more stable.

Now go back to the graphics tab and look over the Windows Settings part. You want to have the first box (Allow DirectX etc ...) ticked and the last one (Emulate Desktop). Turn the other 2 off. Set the desktop size to match what you set it to before. If its not already the same.

Onto the Audio tab there not a lot to do here, I usually just turn the sound off to save on possible crashes but apparently using the ALSA setting with hardware acceleration set to "Emulation" works best.

2: Configure Wine for ESC
After youve installed the ESC files, you will need to add an overide for dplayx in wine, otherwise you will experience bugs with ESC. With TotalA.exe selected in your winecfg go to the Libraries tab, type "dplayx.dll" in the "New override for library" and then click "Add", this should show up in the override list. It should have (native,builtin) after the name, if its the other way around then click edit and chose that way round.

Now you are ready for Skirmish play, I suggest adding the Mostly Harmless AI until an ESC specific one comes out.

3: Configure Wine for Multi-Player (Untested)
Ive not tried this bit so its probably better you read the links pages at the bottom for this.

Your going to have to download winetricks. A simple .sh script that does cool stuff to wine automaticly for you. Once you have downloaded the script, run it and you should see a list of things it can do. What you need is the DirectPlay part. Choose that option and winetricks will start downloading and installing various drivers from microsoft. This should enable you for online play the same as if you were on windows.

The only problem I can forsee is that part of the DirectPlay download is dplayx.dll, im assuming it will still work though as the new dplayx will be in the windows/system anyway.