go the danes

[desdichado]

Just thought I'd relay my part of first campaign after installing WEsW med mod v1.71.

Playing as Kievans (they have replaced Russians and are playable in early) and i've come up against a couple of brick walls. No longer facing peasant armies of previous campaigns. AI armies are stong, upgraded and well led.

The strangest thing of all is the Danes have wiped out the HRE and have 3-4,000 men deep in the former german territory. They took on the HRE early (actually so did the French, Italians, Hungarians and Poles) and have taken large portions of land. They have really strong fleets along with the Spanish (who have taken land right up to Flanders, French and English in many sea regions so they have good trade income.

Still the Danes did not take Sweden so after 50 years i grabbed it from a small rebel army - still don't understand AI on that one. The Danes were easily powerful enough to take it as they start with Norway + Denmark now.

Still it is good to see them having a change of fortune though.

The Byz have taken out the Turks and were pushing the Egyptians back but then Hungarians got involved - I tried to help where I could (the byz have been long term ally) and relieved a couple of sieges but I think they won't stand.

I control most of the steppes and have good income but heavily reliant on trade. It is 1180 and I can see any war with the AI is going to a drawn out affair and will cost me many florins and then I will also have to deal with Mongols and I have no idea how strong they will be.

In short - WesW has put the fun back into the game for me. I am short on options too increase my holdings and it is frustrating causing me too heavily debate any aggressive actions I make. The Polish are very strong on my borders and have frustrated my attempts to move along the north coast - 3 years, 3 attacks on rebel provines, they sent in a larger army as well and got control. At least I let them do most of the fighting.

Anybody complaining AI is too stupid on strat map could do worse than install this mod (not if your in the middle of a current campaign though) as it has (for me at least) made a good game much better and harder.

[Heraclius]

thank you, desdichado. Finally a game where the Danes have done something other than sit in their little peninsula and lose money. Still, you gotta love them. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

[desdichado]

Heraclius,

Yeah, I have a big soft spot for the Danes. Must be the Australian obsession with cheering on the underdog. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[Heraclius]

we greeks are always the underdog. Who else can we root for?

[SmokWawelski]

Yes, I have heard a lot of good stuff about the MOD from Wess. I will need to check it out on my own someday...

[ChaosLord]

Yes, I love the mod, it improves the AI alot it seems. Makes for interesting games since all the AI factions seem to be able to do well. Infact, heres a screenshot from a recent game where the AI Danes conquered western Europe and were reported to have the largest army a few times. One they get going they really tear through people with those Vikings.


http://pages.sbcglobal.net/chaoslord/map.JPG

[Jeff]

The Byz have a good stranglehold as well in that screen. I am doing a Normal campaign as the Egyptians and the Danes have taken out the Poles but they still haven't gone into Sweden. The Byz on the other hand have been fairly agressive but in doing so have spread themselves thin. In fact that is my issue with the Byz, I am on my 5th campaign now and everytime the Byz seem to chew up a good chunk of land but leave themselves very vulnerable and spread way too thin. Has anyone else noticed this about them?

[lonewolf371]

To me as I'm playing my first full campaign it seems as if eastern nations get trapped in Asia to 'die', aka the Novgorods died there, the Byzantines died there, the Poles died there, the Mongols died there, and the Egyptians are dying there.

[SmokWawelski]

My guess is that the poor provinces are the main cause. If you compare these to the western Europe I mean...

But then, the Byz ??? Beats me http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

[ChaosLord]

I think its probably just due to the poor provinces in Eastren Europe, as well as the Mongol invasion. If they can get dominance over the Meditteraenen they do pretty well though, especially with WesWs mod creating alot in trade. That screenshot I posted above I was making 28k a year in trade as the Aragonese, the Byzantines were still beating me. That was from 1211 though, so i'm not sure how they will deal with the arrival of the horde. I think their success depends apon pacifing the Middle East though, otherwise once Constantinople falls its pretty much game over for them.

In my current game thats pretty much the situation, playing as the Hungarians for a change and was slowly chipping away at Byzatine lands, recently capturing several provinces in a few years. The reason I was able to do this is because they couldn't win the war against the Turks and Egyptians so they slowly lost ground. Constantinople itself is exposed now and won't be long before it falls, though how i'll deal with the 8 or so stacks and Egyptians and Turks both have each after that I don't know, hopefully they'll do me a favor and kill each other, heh.

http://pages.sbcglobal.net/chaoslord/map2.JPG

[cugel]

Chaoslord - How did you take that snapshot of the strategic map?

[ChaosLord]

I used the .matteosartori. cheat to reveal the whole map, then I hit print screen. Pasted it into Paint and cut out the portion of the map, re-pasted it and cut off the excess then saved as a jpg. Don't have anything to edit tgas so I just work around it that way.

[SmokWawelski]

Did I hear cheat http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/confused.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif