Rebel guidance.

[ReluctantSamurai]

About elite revolts, I've never seen like these one

Best solution is to not let a city get to a revolt stage in the first place. Several suggestions....

A city with population of 2k-6k rarely, if ever, needs to be exterminated upon capture. There is plenty enough time to put your own buildings/temples in place to reduce culture penalties. A city between 6k-12k is about the same...best to occupy when captured. A city between 12k-24k is where things start to get dicey. If the governors palace has already reached maximum, best to exterminate and jack the taxes to very high to slow down growth. Choose the best Law&Order temple you have (if it's better than the native one), and put in place a governor with the highest number of influence laurettes. Doesn't matter his management skills...it's influence that keeps unrest in check. Use peasants or some other local unit (Town Watch, etc) as garrison as this helps with unrest. When the population starts to get large again, begin to reduce taxes until it gets to the lowest level.

More often than not, the population will reach a point where it stops growing. This is your target...what I call ZPG (Zero Population Growth). If this happens at 75% loyalty or higher, you will never get a revolt in that city ever again. That little orange guy on the city campaign tag is your best friend In R1 I can get to ZPG in virtually every city I own with almost every playable faction...and without the need for a city manager. Revolts are a pain in the a$$ unless you like the "Butcher" moniker for your faction leader.

ZPG is not an exact science, and it can be puzzling to accomplish at first, as Vincent has discovered. But to me it removes one of the more frustrating aspects of the game (revolts), so you can concentrate on having fun instead of threatening to toss your computer out the window

[Vincent Butler]

Well, I think that campaign is stuck with the large units. Anyway, you seem to have done well so far with Autoresolve. What kind of processor are you running? I used to run RTW and BI on a standard Macbook running Snow Leopard. 2.1 Gigahertz processor, 1 GB RAM (I think). That works for medium sized units. Now just an idea, I don't know if it is a factor. I wonder if the amount of the previous owner's buildings affects the quality of the revolting troops? Rome seems to get a boost while fighting. Sorry, didn't see the Cav. An idea to deal with the troops, and it works better with RTW phalanx than BI Spear Wall, get them to come down a narrow corridor such as a bridge. Schiltrom units work very well for this, though Franks can't form Schiltrom. Great strategy against hordes, I know, they funnel right onto your spears (or whatever you are carrying, works best with spearmen at a bridge or gap in the walls.) And don't try it with your levy spearmen, not against those good armies. Use your heerbann. Sometimes you just have to let the good armies hold sway till you get a better army to deal with them, especially after they have split up.

[Matteo]

Best solution is to not let a city get to a revolt stage in the first place. Several suggestions....

A city with population of 2k-6k rarely, if ever, needs to be exterminated upon capture. There is plenty enough time to put your own buildings/temples in place to reduce culture penalties. A city between 6k-12k is about the same...best to occupy when captured. A city between 12k-24k is where things start to get dicey. If the governors palace has already reached maximum, best to exterminate and jack the taxes to very high to slow down growth. Choose the best Law&Order temple you have (if it's better than the native one), and put in place a governor with the highest number of influence laurettes. Doesn't matter his management skills...it's influence that keeps unrest in check. Use peasants or some other local unit (Town Watch, etc) as garrison as this helps with unrest. When the population starts to get large again, begin to reduce taxes until it gets to the lowest level.

More often than not, the population will reach a point where it stops growing. This is your target...what I call ZPG (Zero Population Growth). If this happens at 75% loyalty or higher, you will never get a revolt in that city ever again. That little orange guy on the city campaign tag is your best friend In R1 I can get to ZPG in virtually every city I own with almost every playable faction...and without the need for a city manager. Revolts are a pain in the a$$ unless you like the "Butcher" moniker for your faction leader.

I've already reached ZPG with some cities, but when you have cities with all types of buildings built, a good garrison and lowest taxes, and unrest doesn't calm, what do you do?

I wonder if the amount of the previous owner's buildings affects the quality of the revolting troops? Rome seems to get a boost while fighting. Sorry, didn't see the Cav. An idea to deal with the troops, and it works better with RTW phalanx than BI Spear Wall, get them to come down a narrow corridor such as a bridge. Schiltrom units work very well for this, though Franks can't form Schiltrom. Great strategy against hordes, I know, they funnel right onto your spears (or whatever you are carrying, works best with spearmen at a bridge or gap in the walls.) And don't try it with your levy spearmen, not against those good armies. Use your heerbann. Sometimes you just have to let the good armies hold sway till you get a better army to deal with them, especially after they have split up.

I don't know if the previous buildings affect the quality of revolts, maybe they do... for istance, if there is a forge, some rebels units may get better weapons. But why this doesn't happen in all my cities? Every single city is upgraded to the maximum, but why in Londinium or Samarobriva or Tara I can win rebels (even they outnumber me) with 5 peasants units and 5 archers?

[ReluctantSamurai]

I've already reached ZPG with some cities, but when you have cities with all types of buildings built, a good garrison and lowest taxes, and unrest doesn't calm, what do you do?

In R1 some settlements have a permanent, built-in, unrest. Jerusalem, Tarsus, Patavium, and Londinium are a few examples. It's hard coded and nothing you can do about it except deal with it. You can be suffering subterfuge attacks from spies, especially in a newly conquered settlement. First thing I always do when capturing a new settlement is hire several spies. If possible, I send a family member with high security traits (like the faction leader/heir) to be the governor for several turns. And of course, a good assassin to eliminate any enemy spies that are detected. Suffering from subterfuge attacks happens far more often than you think. I'd estimate that 50% of all newly captured settlements, have at least one spy embedded. I've captured enemy capitals where I had to eliminate 3 or 4 spies before things calmed down....

Make sure your governor, if you have one, doesn't have traits that add to unrest or decrease law&order. A governor that adds 3 (30%) to unrest needs to leave town immediately! Don't overlook having local militia like peasants or town watch type units as part of your garrison. They have a calming influence (don't remember the exact numbers) on unrest.

I don't know if the previous buildings affect the quality of revolts, maybe they do

They most definitely do. The more developed the barracks are, and the more upgrades available from blacksmith's, foundry's, temples, etc, the more likely revolting troops will be of higher quality with better weapons/armor.

But why this doesn't happen in all my cities?

Composition of revolting armies is randomly selected. If you redo a turn, as an experiment, just before an impending revolt, you'll see differing army composition and quality. Local merc pools and the number and type of army barracks also affects the composition, but the biggest variable is chance

[Vincent Butler]

Best solution is to not let a city get to a revolt stage in the first place. Several suggestions....

A city with population of 2k-6k rarely, if ever, needs to be exterminated upon capture. There is plenty enough time to put your own buildings/temples in place to reduce culture penalties. A city between 6k-12k is about the same...best to occupy when captured. A city between 12k-24k is where things start to get dicey. If the governors palace has already reached maximum, best to exterminate and jack the taxes to very high to slow down growth. Choose the best Law&Order temple you have (if it's better than the native one), and put in place a governor with the highest number of influence laurettes. Doesn't matter his management skills...it's influence that keeps unrest in check. Use peasants or some other local unit (Town Watch, etc) as garrison as this helps with unrest. When the population starts to get large again, begin to reduce taxes until it gets to the lowest level.

More often than not, the population will reach a point where it stops growing. This is your target...what I call ZPG (Zero Population Growth). If this happens at 75% loyalty or higher, you will never get a revolt in that city ever again. That little orange guy on the city campaign tag is your best friend In R1 I can get to ZPG in virtually every city I own with almost every playable faction...and without the need for a city manager. Revolts are a pain in the a$$ unless you like the "Butcher" moniker for your faction leader.

ZPG is not an exact science, and it can be puzzling to accomplish at first, as Vincent has discovered. But to me it removes one of the more frustrating aspects of the game (revolts), so you can concentrate on having fun instead of threatening to toss your computer out the window

I only exterminate large/huge cities, as a rule. On smaller ones I try enslaving, if public order is red or blue. Now I garrison large anyway, typically a full army, which for me is ten to fifteen units, depending on region and faction. I like to be able to hold off an attack or defeat a revolting army. Also, I pull armies out of my towns to create a steady supply of armies, so I like to have enough to do that. Greece and Rome are the main places I do that. Greece usually does not have full armies unless I am expecting attack. But for me, money making is more important than public order, I can handle the public order for the most part, it is only a few cities that regularly riot, and I can deal with that. Another tip, if you have a plague in a town near an angry town, train a unit, can even be an agent, in the plague town and move him into the unhappy town. The plague will help reduce population and hence increase public order. Not exactly ethical, though.

[Matteo]

WRE is at the bottom of the barrell, as you can see from the screen...



... now it's emerging a big deal: incomes. I'm going more and more down, every city, except for those in UK, is down economically. I saw the details and the problem comes from upkeep armies: I had about 300000 dinars, look at the screen, I lost about 200000 within 15 turns. I have Hunters (archers), Nobles and Francisca Heerbann as garrison, also Paladins in some cities, because I'm always worried about the moment they'll revolt. You have seen what kind of revolts WRE gets, so I couldn't win if I leave only peasants and archers, I think you all agree with me about this.



So, there are some cities which have reached ZPG, do you suggest me to put archers and peasants there to pay off costs? Mainly because in England my four settlements have all peasants and archers, and they never go down indeed.



P.S.: Shouldn't Carthago be one of the richest city of the game? At least in RTW it was so... why I get just 549 from it?

[Vincent Butler]

Quality of buildings may have some effect on revolts, but not all. A revolt can spawn units with gold and silver attributes, when the faction cannot make them that good, like Julii with gold shield, in a town that can only improve to bronze. Oh, when you besiege, Matteo, do they sally forth or do you just launch your attack? If you can, and I don't know how you play, let your siege reduce their numbers, like besiege them without attacking. If they don't sally forth or get help from another army, you can reduce them to up to a quarter of their original strength, depending on the size of their walls. For example, against epic stone walls, you can reduce an 80 man unit to in the twenties by letting your siege go the entire 11 turns or whatever it is, different walls have different lengths as you know. I am assuming you know all this, though, and are not a beginner. And don't use Francisca Heerbann as garrison, maybe one or two, use your Axe and Sword as your main garrison troops, they will defeat most attacks, especially on walls where the enemy is not able to front you fully, I like to have two units per enemy siege tower (moving them up once the siege tower has reached the walls) and one unit per ladder.

[ReluctantSamurai]

Shouldn't Carthago be one of the richest city of the game? At least in RTW it was so... why I get just 549 from it?

The number you see on the campaign map does not represent the true income of a city. It's a reflection of how your total costs are divided up between all of your cities. To see the true income of a city you have to open the city information screen, then go to the income/trade screen (third button down on the right side page). There you will see all the individual trade routes both land and sea, where they go, and how much they are making. All of that is totaled up and that is the true income of a city. That Carthage is still in the positive despite all the overall deductions,is an indicator that it's making quite a lot of money (most large cities usually show a negative number).

I lost about 200000 within 15 turns.

You probably have too much army upkeep compared to your income. A good rule of thumb is that army upkeep + wages (family members, agents) should not exceed 1/2 of your total income. If the treasury gets into the millions of denarii, one can obviously afford much more than 50%. Conversely, a treasury well below 100k should carry much less than 50%.

Quality of buildings may have some effect on revolts, but not all.

I should have been more clear in stating that barracks and bonus buildings increase the chances for a higher quality revolt. It still comes down to probability in the end.

[Matteo]

Quality of buildings may have some effect on revolts, but not all. A revolt can spawn units with gold and silver attributes, when the faction cannot make them that good, like Julii with gold shield, in a town that can only improve to bronze. Oh, when you besiege, Matteo, do they sally forth or do you just launch your attack? If you can, and I don't know how you play, let your siege reduce their numbers, like besiege them without attacking. If they don't sally forth or get help from another army, you can reduce them to up to a quarter of their original strength, depending on the size of their walls. For example, against epic stone walls, you can reduce an 80 man unit to in the twenties by letting your siege go the entire 11 turns or whatever it is, different walls have different lengths as you know. I am assuming you know all this, though, and are not a beginner. And don't use Francisca Heerbann as garrison, maybe one or two, use your Axe and Sword as your main garrison troops, they will defeat most attacks, especially on walls where the enemy is not able to front you fully, I like to have two units per enemy siege tower (moving them up once the siege tower has reached the walls) and one unit per ladder.

But I have all my cities improved, all buildings and whatever... I just don't get why some city revolt in WRE and some, instead, in grey rebels which are definitely easier to defeat.

Vincent, I already know about the siege, I'm not exactly a newbie, you got it. Sometimes they attack me first, otherwise I always try to keep the siege for 4-5 turns, bribing the incoming armies. The problem is that, as you can see from the date in the screens, I'm in a late stage of the game, so each city I have or capture has the best walls by now.

I don't keep Francisca Heerbann as garrison to mantain public order, I know peasants can handle that too. I keep Francisca for when the city will revolt, I can't win using Francisca and other gold troops, how could I with peasants?

The number you see on the campaign map does not represent the true income of a city. It's a reflection of how your total costs are divided up between all of your cities. To see the true income of a city you have to open the city information screen, then go to the income/trade screen (third button down on the right side page). There you will see all the individual trade routes both land and sea, where they go, and how much they are making. All of that is totaled up and that is the true income of a city. That Carthage is still in the positive despite all the overall deductions,is an indicator that it's making quite a lot of money (most large cities usually show a negative number).

Why?

I should have been more clear in stating that barracks and bonus buildings increase the chances for a higher quality revolt. It still comes down to probability in the end.

I was thinking, guys... what if, once taken out troops and set highest taxes, I destroy barracks? The next turn rebels shouldn't have units like Comitatenses First Cohort or Plumbatari, right?

[ReluctantSamurai]

Why?

Because the game adds up all of your expenses and then distributes those costs amongst your cities starting with the largest ones first. Therefore the big cities bear the heaviest financial burden.

what if, once taken out troops and set highest taxes, I destroy barracks? The next turn rebels shouldn't have units like Comitatenses First Cohort or Plumbatari, right?

Not necessarily. I've tried that very same thing and more often than not, the resulting rebel troops will still be of high quality. Even if you destroy every building that can be destroyed, you will get, at the very least, a full stack of "Super Peasants" with 9 exp chevrons, and gold weapon/armor levels. That's a handful for even a veteran army

I just don't get why some city revolt in WRE and some, instead, in grey rebels which are definitely easier to defeat.

As has already been stated, it's a probability roll. Sometimes the rebels will be lower level troops, and sometimes it will be high level troops...it's whatever the AI rolls the dice on stack composition.

[Matteo]

As has already been stated, it's a probability roll. Sometimes the rebels will be lower level troops, and sometimes it will be high level troops...it's whatever the AI rolls the dice on stack composition.

And that's clear, but I'm asking why some cities revolt normally (I mean grey rebels) and others in WRE, I mean, they don't even revolt in green romans, which would be more rational, don't you think? It sounds a bit unfair.

BTW, thanks to your advices I've successfully managed to refund my finances and WRE has remained with just two cities. The major part of my cities have become ZPG, so I could put only peasants and archers as garrison and move the best units to the frontline or to conquer new settlements.

P.S.: ERE just attacked me with elephants, where the hell they took them?

[Vincent Butler]

And that's clear, but I'm asking why some cities revolt normally (I mean grey rebels) and others in WRE, I mean, they don't even revolt in green romans, which would be more rational, don't you think? It sounds a bit unfair.

BTW, thanks to your advices I've successfully managed to refund my finances and WRE has remained with just two cities. The major part of my cities have become ZPG, so I could put only peasants and archers as garrison and move the best units to the frontline or to conquer new settlements.

P.S.: ERE just attacked me with elephants, where the hell they took them?

Those elephants are probably mercenaries, ERE cannot train elephants, if I remember correctly, I think only Sassanids can. About the heerbann, I forgot that you Autoresolve. Still, unless you fight Rome or a super army, Sword and Axe heerbann should still carry the day. Of course with Rome, even their basic Limatanei unit can hold their own. Realistically those were the garrison troops anyway. By this time, I think the Legio Lancarii were the main legionary unit, and the Comitatenses were more elite. Peasants are units I train to reduce population in one city and I move them to a city that needs population to grow, and I disband them. It kills two birds with one stone. The revolts to Red vs Grey, I think that depends largely on what faction the city started at the beginning of the campaign. It is not always that way, but that is a good rule to follow. Of course, if a faction is wiped out, any cities that they had owned will become grey rebel, and I just became Captain Obvious. To deal with those elephants, I don't know. Not many people get slingers and skirmishers in BI, Rome does not, I know that (or am 99.9% certain of that). I know Sassinids get Kurdish Javelinmen and slingers, and Celts get their Kerns. I imagine Berbers get slingers and/or skirmishers as well. I guess that is where your archers come into play.

[Matteo]

WRE is gone, now it's a fight between me and ERE (and ERE rebels when they revolt).

Samurai, I'd ask you what is this thread you mention here, about ZPG. You say:

For ways to get to ZPG, take a look at the "Really Need Help in this Game" topic. There are some in-depth discussions on how to do it, along with some screenies demonstrating the results. There is also an excellent discussion in the Ludus Magna concerning the effects of garrison on population loyalty. I highly recommend you read it.

Can you link me that? I couldn't find it, thanks a lot.

[Vincent Butler]

If ERE rebels revolt, you may want to side with them to help against ERE, they will be less relevant anyway than ERE. Once ERE is gone, there will not be much ERER to deal with.

[ReluctantSamurai]

Discussion on the effects of garrisons on unrest:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showt...rrison-Effects

A general discussion about population unrest:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showt...lation-Loyalty

The ZPG discussion (starts at post #20):

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showt...-game%21%21%21

[Matteo]

Thanks a lot, I printed them, so that I can consult whenever I need. I just gave up the thread about garrison, it's too complicated, too maths... I simply put 5 peasants and 5 archers in ZPG settlements, 5 archers and all peasants in the "normal" cities, am I doing right?

[Vincent Butler]

Something I just saw from reading this link, in BI, peasants have the effect of public order reduced, from the effect of a 120 man unit to the effect of a 60 man unit.