New SS 6.4 HS: preparations thread (2 turns per week)

[Myth]

Since I will be turning the save with all factions bar 3 to Human and give it to the players, why should I keep the raw result I've gotten now from them? I'd rather we discuss whetehr it's viable or not. At turn 51 it seems fairly balanced, apart from a few key points:

Egypt has a ton of armies and has surrounded the KOJ.
Venice is a non-factor
Sicilly and Portugal have not expanded and have limited armies as a result.
The HRE is on the back foot and is being pressed from a very well blobbing France, from an aggressive English invasion and the Italians have reclaimed anything south of the Alps.

Apart from that, all the other factions have settled in nicely. I'm not sure how the ERE managed to take that fat stack in rebel Constantinople AND push into Asia Minor, but they have and they are well balanced with a strong Hungary and Turks as neighbors.

Out of the problematic factions, which ones should I reinforce? Also, I propose the starting gold is 100,000 minus 5000 gold for each settlement owned. So a small faction can start with large armies and plenty of gold to throw around (to make more troops, to fort up and to buy off enemy forts etc.)

Also, what is the purpose of these settings:

allow_validation_failures = 0
validate_data = 1

Oh and just to let you know, we're usually playing with Gracul AI which has been able to surprise us a number of times with its aggressiveness. Longer assimilation is also a great addition, I've been considering it for Clash of Gods.

[sonnet]

Apart from that, all the other factions have settled in nicely. I'm not sure how the ERE managed to take that fat stack in rebel Constantinople AND push into Asia Minor, but they have and they are well balanced with a strong Hungary and Turks as neighbors.

I gave ERE (modified the desscr.strat) about 2 stacks of supertrained (9 exp ,3 arm upgrade,1 weap upgr) swordsmen and few scholarii.
If they still have them you should disband them now as they served its purpose of making ERE develop.

Out of the problematic factions, which ones should I reinforce? Also, I propose the starting gold is 100,000 minus 5000 gold for each settlement owned. So a small faction can start with large armies and plenty of gold to throw around (to make more troops, to fort up and to buy off enemy forts etc.)

Just reinforce Venice (which if I understood correctly is going down, reinforce particularly against Hungary rather than Genoa, so that Genoa remain a good option).
Reinforce HRE so that France do not get too powerful, Portugal is not an issue as long as Castille is really in good shape.
To reduce Egypt armies best option is (if you can ) to call a crusade on them. This should be quite effective. You might using Jihad against France to get the same effect.

Also, what is the purpose of these settings:

allow_validation_failures = 0
validate_data = 1

Those settings are against cheating.
Basically without those settings I can before loading my turn modify some files of the mod (for instance I could change the stats of my units) load the game play the save(like playing and winning battles), save it then reload with the vanilla files and no one will know I cheated.
We found out about it about 2 years ago as it happened in one HS in an italian forum that a guy used to cheat that way.

Oh and just to let you know, we're usually playing with Gracul AI which has been able to surprise us a number of times with its aggressiveness. Longer assimilation is also a great addition, I've been considering it for Clash of Gods.

Tbh I have no idea about either Gracul or Savage. For some reason players have always used savage and I just kept that.

[Tonno]

This sounds good to me, KoJ shouldn't be in such problems, one stack of KoJ knights with a solid general that has the golden-horse thingy should be able to bring a lot of pain on Egypt. Plus if Byz pushed into Asia Minor it should prevent any Egypt-Turks ganks.
To hell with HRE. :D

We can allow a power or two in the game, it won't change a lot, only others would consider to brig them down faster.

[Myth]

Venice is down to 3 cities. Actually Sicilly has expanded in Greece, so they are fine.

Aragorn seems to be doing great as well, pushing into French and Moorish lands. The HRE will be given a lot of armies and cash, because the TO has also taken a settlement off them, and Poland and Hungary are very secure and well established.

The KOJ will be given stacks, but there is an active crusade vs. the Egyptians already. I would rather everyone have strong armies to allow for a more intense early game war, than cutting them back to allow the big nations to just outproduce the smaller ones.

That anti-cheating method is a great addition and I'm definitely enforcing it on future .org games.

I will handle this tomorrow as it's 1 AM here already. Is anyone up for a Broken Crescent game?

[sonnet]

I've been trying to find a player for teh Mongols/Kwarezm block in those days. Since I've been unable, we're going to cut the conquerable area as we did in the past with similar HS:


If Turks or Russian factions owns settlements beyond the border, they have to give it to a AI faction.

[Tonno]

Wait, this map is the map we gona play at?

[sonnet]

Wait, this map is the map we gona play at?

No, that's the map of Beyond the dark. I posted just to illustrate the map's border of the conquerable area.

[Tonno]

[Myth]

@sonnet I re-read your PM and it turns out Lithuania was a requirement. They got owned by Poland and the TO. There is only one rebel stack of theirs. Should I re-run the save? Perhaps add a few more guys to them?

[Tonno]

Uhu Poland... Gif sajv now!!! It's good, trust me!

[sonnet]

@sonnet I re-read your PM and it turns out Lithuania was a requirement. They got owned by Poland and the TO. There is only one rebel stack of theirs. Should I re-run the save? Perhaps add a few more guys to them?

As long as TO is in excellent conditions it's not a major problem.
What is needed is that at least one faction in each block is in playable state. Ideally all factions should stay alive, but that's ideally.

The final list of the blocks (with the associated players ) is this one:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showt...post2053598407

[yuonyuon]

We still waiting for the map. but the player list is not complete .

[sonnet]

We still waiting for the map. but the player list is not complete .

What do you mean is not complete?

[yuonyuon]

England player is not active , also in TWC is missing in all his curent HS.

new people or those you don t have full trust , they are first to crack , and once the HS is started there will be a problem , ofter all i think other players are verry rilaible with the exeption of EBs but we will see about that .

[Vipman]

Was probably going to take TO anyway :P

@Myth guide for console commands here http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...f-Guide-Admins
BTW you can just enter create_unit "unit" 5 , without 0's.

PS So on this forum if someone puts @username in a post does he get a notification? Is it by default or where do I enable it/ see it? Test: @Vipman. So only appears in Profile>Mentions tab, no notification? Meh..

[ebs]

youn I playing in 9 HS do u know that?and its normal sometime to be late or miss any of this HS.. also last months I work too much I have 2 jobs.. and most of the time im playing in time.. so stop write my name ....... .....

[sonnet]

England player is not active , also in TWC is missing in all his curent HS.

new people or those you don t have full trust , they are first to crack , and once the HS is started there will be a problem , ofter all i think other players are verry rilaible with the exeption of EBs but we will see about that .

I think I read a message of Vipman saying that Legourou (England's player) will be back in a few days and that he warned about his absence, but his warning just went unnoticed.

About reliability in general, as I warned, players knows exactly which day and time their turn fall.
So if they know they can't make it (which in my dictionary means the player will be not and they can't be physically at home at the time of the turn, as otherwise I stated that even few minutes should be sufficient to play your turn. If you want to spend more time on it and going against such guideline it's truly fine -it's your time-, but it should not be an excuse to post your save late. This is supposed to be a light-thinking and funny HS ), they should ask someone to sub them (preferably the player who comes after or before their turn).

If they don't (which will be the player's fault) they'll be either skipped or lightly subbed (which means few moves without having much thinking) if any of the admins or the player who comes after them is available to it.

[Myth]

I am all for subbing as an admin. I am loathe to skip a turn. Though I myself HAVE lost entire hotseats due to bad plays by a sub. If someone can't play their turn, some instructions on what to do via PM will do wonders.

OK I think I go this unit creation thing down. Invicta, have ou decided upon starting gold? I'd hate to go in and change gold as well after the fact of balancing armies out.

When you do an @ in front of a user name, the user gets a notification up top but NOT an e-mail. If you know he checks his e-mails for notifications, best stick to a PM. The @ things was added upon my request, since it works so well on enworld and it really does make life easier for hotseat games.

So look, we will have the following type of factions:

Big ones with lots of settlements and relatively fortified positions and enough armies to defend their land but if they go expanding they risk being eaten alive by an aggressive backstabber (ie. France)

Medium sized ones which are in a good geographical position. Balanced number of teritories and armies (ie. Leon-Castille)

Small ones that have a few settlements but huge armies and are basically wildcards and forced to either go aggressive or disband armies (ie. Crusader States / Teutonic Order)

To ensure the fortified position thing I think I will grab some FMs and create forts at specific choke points for factions that are very exposed, like the HRE, ERE and Turks.

[Tonno]

Do we really need so much balanceing, isn't the point of skip-a-few to get "random" things, yet not overpowered things (in case of SS).

(Talking about adding gold)

[sonnet]

I am all for subbing as an admin. I am loathe to skip a turn. Though I myself HAVE lost entire hotseats due to bad plays by a sub. If someone can't play their turn, some instructions on what to do via PM will do wonders.

OK I think I go this unit creation thing down. Invicta, have ou decided upon starting gold? I'd hate to go in and change gold as well after the fact of balancing armies out.

Players will get the situation as it is.
Gold doesn't need to be modified. As we played already those skip-a-few we're prepared to this already.

Big ones with lots of settlements and relatively fortified positions and enough armies to defend their land but if they go expanding they risk being eaten alive by an aggressive backstabber (ie. France)

Medium sized ones which are in a good geographical position. Balanced number of teritories and armies (ie. Leon-Castille)

Small ones that have a few settlements but huge armies and are basically wildcards and forced to either go aggressive or disband armies (ie. Crusader States / Teutonic Order)

Sounds good. If you can post the save with all passwords blank, players can have a look and see if everything is alright before starting as also choose their faction
(as most of the player can choose between 2 factions)

To ensure the fortified position thing I think I will grab some FMs and create forts at specific choke points for factions that are very exposed, like the HRE, ERE and Turks.

Only one fort per region is allowed to each faction. So I'd suggest to not do anything in that regard. Players have 2 turns of forced peace (they can't attack other human players in the first 2 turns). So each player have 2 turns to balance their asset and situation.

PS: about subbing, this whole (particular ) HS is based on a schedule to make sure that we could play 2 turns per week.
Players know exactly when their turns fall, so it's up to them to appoint a subber (possibly the player who comes before or after their turn, and give them the password) or being skipped.
Subbing is possible only if there's an admin on-line in that moment of the day.
You might be new to such system, but I used it twice already in twcenter and it worked quite well.
Otherwise the HS would be delayed.

Also like Tonno said, you don't need to add armies to perfectly balance all the factions. Adding armies was to be done for certain factions only if needed on turn 50 (and no more than one stack unless the situation was desperate) in case they were dying out.

[Jiub]

For one, i just really want to start this already :))

[yuonyuon]

For one, i just really want to start this already :))

We all waiting but nothing.!!:(((

[Tonno]

Well I prefer a clean start, so there are still rules to discuss.
But yes, I am HOT FOR THIS STUFF!

[sonnet]

Well I prefer a clean start, so there are still rules to discuss.
But yes, I am HOT FOR THIS STUFF!

The issue about a clean start is that players will need many turns before being able to engage conflicts.
Many turns means months.
The skip a few is a shortcut and factions will be ready from the start to sustain conflicts.
This also improves the gameplay: if for instance HRE at the start of a vanilla HS goes to kill Genoa in the first few turns,
other players with few units and busy race to capture the rebel settlements before the others won't bring any help.

[Myth]

I got down to Hungary in my rebalancing effort. It takes more time than expected, because the unit names aren't all readily apparent in the file Invicta mentioned. For example, I couldn't find Dismounted Kings Men.

There can't be perfect balance but you can't roll with a Norway and Denmark who each have 2-3 provinces and rag-tag forces. I gave them about 1.5 stacks of elites. 2 for Scotland which was down to a few FMs versus a dominant England, which also received a few units because it's main stack is on a crusade and is in the middle of europe. So on and so forth. It should be available tonight, patience. I might also give it to Invicta first so he can disband some of the units I've added (which doesn't require an admin PW) as I might have overdone it in some cases.

[sonnet]

I got down to Hungary in my rebalancing effort. It takes more time than expected, because the unit names aren't all readily apparent in the file Invicta mentioned. For example, I couldn't find Dismounted Kings Men.

There can't be perfect balance but you can't roll with a Norway and Denmark who each have 2-3 provinces and rag-tag forces. I gave them about 1.5 stacks of elites. 2 for Scotland which was down to a few FMs versus a dominant England, which also received a few units because it's main stack is on a crusade and is in the middle of europe. So on and so forth. It should be available tonight, patience. I might also give it to Invicta first so he can disband some of the units I've added (which doesn't require an admin PW) as I might have overdone it in some cases.

@Myth : for dismounted Kings men, I believe you're looking for the "Gotland Footmen" (as they're called in the EDU file)

I cannot disband units: being a player I might be or might be seen as biased.

[Myth]

But you haven't chosen a factin yet. No matter I'll just go over all the factions one more time to make sure I haven't overdone it.

[sonnet]

But you haven't chosen a factin yet. No matter I'll just go over all the factions one more time to make sure I haven't overdone it.

My faction is the "Turks".
Any chance to get the save today?

[Myth]

OK boys, HAVE AT IT

it was a pleasure setting this up for you, and I see some great potential for this game. Sure, there might be a massacre or three within the first 10 turns, but I think a cunning choice of allies and mutual factions will get you far. Some factions start with 75k gold and poor armies. Some have huge armies but are poor. Some are spread out, some are very secure. I'll be keeping track on the game closely.

FYI the golden chevroned infantry in Jersualem was actually fielded by the AI.

[Tonno]

That's what I thougt so... My game won't load this save, anyone has any tips before I re-install it all?