Age-old, still unanswered questions

[hrvojej]

It would be greatly appreciated, by me and, if I may say so, by the community if we could have the official answers to some old questions that have been asked several times in the past. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

1) Does dread have any effect on the battlefield? If so, what is the effect?

2) Some issues have been raised long time ago in these threads:
http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/Forum7/HTML/001666.html
http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/Forum7/HTML/001417.html

and more recently in this thread:
http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/Forum7/HTML/002865.html

The questions are (in short): What is the actual effect of the general's command rating on units' stats? Why are we seeing the inconsistencies (e.g. +/- 1) between rank and stats, valours, etc. in the f1 screen? How does all this work in general?

3) Does the old formula from Shogun for advancing in ranks still apply in MTW? In STW, we had a list of victories/losses, and could figure it out on our own, but here we don't have those. In other words, is this still correct:
Rank . Net Victories
1 . . . 1
2 . . . 2
3 . . . 4
4 . . . 8
5 . . . 16
6 . . . 32
7 . . . 64
8 . . . 128
?

4) If the original general dies, it seems that the "second in command" takes over (judging by the V&Vs of the new commander of the army). Is this true, and if so, what are the criteria for being "second in command"? Does he take over immediately on the battlefield, and does the army then get bonuses from the new general, or are the V&Vs of the old general still in effect?

The input would be much appreciated. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif
Thank you!

[Lord Romulous]

YES YES !!!

i would like to know this too..

please let us know......

im http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/confused.gif

[TheViking]

So all I have to do to get a 8 star general i need to win 255 times. No probs at all. (sarcasm)

------------------
There I see my father.
There I see my mother, my sisters and brothers.
There I see my line of ancestors back to the beginning.
They call on me and ask me to take my place with them in the halls of Valhalla where the brave may live forever.

[Veiny Eyeball]

Quote Originally posted by TheViking:
So all I have to do to get a 8 star general i need to win 255 times. No probs at all. (sarcasm)

[/QUOTE]

Makes you wonder what your 8 star heir was doing during his teens doesn't it?

[Kraxis]

Yeah... it takes time to get to that 9th rank... you can only get it by getting a Vice or a Title. Getting 128 victories with a Prince is pretty tough, especially when he has a limited lifespan.

And, very much yes I would like to know if Dread has any effect on the battlefield. I and others haves asked this 38768456 times now, and nobody can actually answer it. Everybody says "Well, the Almohads once ran from my 9 Dread general." I have experienced that too but that doesn't make it sure that Dread has any effect does it now?

We need an answer here...
I want to know it if actually can pay to get Dread instead of Happiness.

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BTW, Danish Crusades are true to history.

You may not care about war, but war cares about you!

[cart6566]

I would also like to know the answer to these questions.

[Terrax]

My King has 9 Dread (love the description of 9 Dread), so hopefully this will let me know what good he is as a Tyrant.

[cin.Thrawn]

Well if you want a rank 9 general is not so hard.

Pick a unit with rank 2 or more. Conquer a Rebel province and set taxes to high, more the general away and then wait for rebels to come. End turn

Rebels pop up, check what they are.
Then send the general with the minimun amount of troops u need to win the rebels.

if u win a battle with 100 man VS 800+ your general will get something like LAST STAND which is +1 command and also a Skilled defender +1 command

that will make him rank 4, attack rebels the same way with double the odds and ur general will win 2+ command for expert attacker and so on

http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/tongue.gif

[Kraxis]

Yes but you can only get +3 to command that way... that leaves you 3 shy of your goal

------------------
BTW, Danish Crusades are true to history.

You may not care about war, but war cares about you!

[tomppb]

Actually unless a prince becomes king. HE NEVER DIES just like all the other immortals! Generals should die of old age!!!!! ahhhhhh sorry getting a little out of hand http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif

[Wart]

Quote Originally posted by tomppb:
Actually unless a prince becomes king. HE NEVER DIES just like all the other immortals! Generals should die of old age!!!!! ahhhhhh sorry getting a little out of hand http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif[/QUOTE]

Nah, you're forgetting the 'Rings of Power' that your king hands out! It's the well documented 'Nazgul effect'! http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif

And yes, it would be nice to get the answers to these questions. Another one that occured to me is:

Are the number of victories you need to increase in rank calculated from the general's base rank, or from his actual rank, including titles, situation rank bonuses, etc?
If the latter, then what happens if I give a rank 4 guy with 15 victories a rank bosting title. Does it essentially just take him up to the minimum for rank 5 (16), or does it 'add' 16 victories to his total, so that he's at roughly the same point between 5 & 6, as he was between 4 & 5?
If it's the former than this implys that it's worth planning when you give a particular general a rank boosting title.

I have wondered if the added complications that titles and V&V's bring to the equation are the reason why we're not given the win/loss info for generals anymore?

[This message has been edited by Wart (edited 10-17-2002).]

[Niccolomachiavelli]

I have a 9 star general. He wont a few battles and then got a title after I took over Constantinople. Yup....got a 9 star and an 8 star. Egypt is good fun.

[longjohn2]

1) Dread has no direct effect on the battlefield. I don't know if it has any effects on VnVs which affect the battle.

2) I think that basically you get 1 extra factor per two ranks ( or maybe 1 per rank ). Exactly how these factors are added depends on the relative rank of the two generals. I forget the exact details of how the factors are added in.
You get the general's rank as a morale bonus if nearby, or half his rank if not.

3) Don't know

4) There is no concept of second in command in battles. If the general dies, you have a rank 0 general for the rest of the battle. Some effects from the dead general that were due to VnVs will persist however.

[hrvojej]

Thank you very much, longjohn, I appreciate it. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

[hrvojej]

I feel the need to speculate a bit about this now. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

1) Dread might not have a direct effect, but it could still be factored in, possibly in the same way that the command ranks are, as a difference in dread ratings between generals, and added as a morale bonus/penalty.

2) This would explain my recent example, where the SAP unit was shown as a valour 3 unit, although it only had bonuses added as being valour 2 (+2 att/+2 def). The difference in ranks was 4 (my general 6*, enemy general 2*), and it all fits perfectly then (valour is shown as it would be when fighting a 0* general, but the actual bonuses depend on the difference)! Also, the +1 to attack only that Arkatreides and Puzz were talking about could be from the the difference being an odd number. The morale bonuses from ranks are variable, i.e. situation dependant, and therefore not shown in the f1 screen, in the same way that other situation dependant morale bonuses are not shown either. But they do exist.

3) Still the most reliable way to think about this would probably be the Shogun formula.

4) The reinforcements will get no bonuses to attack/defense and no morale bonuses stemming from general's rank, but they still might have bonuses that are due to the dead general's V&Vs, for example bonuses to morale, which is why I sometimes see the reinforcement units being more resilient than they should be. I'll have to pay attention whether the units lose the valour flags when the general routs as they do when he dies, to see whether all this holds for both cases.

The more you know, the better it gets! Very exciting! http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

[This message has been edited by hrvojej (edited 10-17-2002).]

[hrvojej]

I am going to bump this thread just once, since I think it contains some very valuable answers. I am still very happy about getting them. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif