heirs?

[Heraclius]

I've played many games as the Byzantines, and a few as Western factions and the Russians. I've noticed that (mainly when I play as Byzantines) my kings produces eight star, fearless and great leader heirs but as the game goes on I find myself stuck with useless morons who probably can't tell their arses from their elbows, not to mention swords. I end up having to rely completely on the generals I've cultivated from the begining of the game. But that's not that bad as the byzantines who do not suffer from a lack of good non-royal generals.

[desdichado]

Heraclius,

This is probably happening cause you don't get your king & heirs into battle. Battle seems to be the best way to stop your royal line from turning into a bunch of nancy boys. My german king did a lot of fighting - no choice as too many fronts and not enough generals and I had a lot of 5 star heirs for a few decades.

Also, in my current Italian campaign after protecting my one heir kings for near on 150 years ( one king had his first son at age of 72&#33http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif I made an effort to marry other factions princesses and this has had a positive effect. I now have five heirs and they all have 2-3 stars (except one who has none). This may not sound a lot but compared to what I was getting before is much better.

On a different note how do you find playing as the byzantines - I have started two campaigns with them and found them boring and went back to Catholic factions. I think I am probably missing out on something but don't know what. As you seem to enjoy playing as the byz - what do you like about them (yes I know, apart from VG).

[Elwe]

The only campaign I've finished so ar was Byzantines. To me, the best part whas their real-life history, and I gave myself the goal of restoring the Roman Empire to the glory of it's hey-day. But aside from that, the Byz have a very difficult situation at the start of the campaign, caught between a rock (Catholic factions - Crusades passing through your lands are a pain) and a hard place (Muslim factions - Jihads are also a pain)... and to make matters more interesting, if they survive to 1240 they then need to deal with the arrival of the Horde on their doorstep.

Quite challenging to play if you don't go for the 'Conquer the World' style of game.

Cheers.

[Heraclius]

Thx desdichado great advice. I will definetly try this. About the Byzantines. My family is Greek so naturally I chose to play as the empire we came from. My grandmother tells me a stoy about how are family is descended from ALexius Comnenus, Emperor of Byzantium, but she is crazy like all us Greeks. Besides the VG (which are totally awesome) I love the trebizond archers and katapraktoi. It brings a tear to my eye to see them crashing into the flank of those dastardy AUM or Feudal foot knights. Like Elwe mentioned I love restoring the Roman empire to their true glory. In my current campaign I've brought back The Middle East, the Balkans, Spain and France to the imperial fold. I've kind of gotten off topic from the original post but what the hell I'll keep going. When playing the Byzantines I never invade north of Georgia until the GH arrives. Let the stupid Russians take the hit is my view. After they have advanced far enough into Europe, if they don't dissolve by then, I smash their armies out of Khazar and then its clear sailing.

thanks again

[Elwe]

I decided on a little bit more of a challenge... I never invaded north of Georgia, although I did take Crimea. By 1280 I had reclaimed Asia Minor and North Africa to Morocco, the southern Balkans, and the Italian peninsula, ala the borders of the Roman Empire of the 6th century AD.

The difficult part about this is having a land border of 7 provinces across central Europe... that is a LOT of territory to try and defend against the Catholics

It wasn't until the mid 14th Century that I invaded Spain and France, just after the Spanish launched a crusade against me for no reason, giving me the excuse I was looking for to restore Rome to her Glory.

In 1379, the capital of the Roman Empire was relocaterd back from Constantinople to Rome ;-)

Was a hell of a lot of fun.

Cheers.

[Nikitas]

As the Byzantines I had kept my kings and their heirs in Constantinople, before I knew that they need to be at the front for the royal line to retain its good stats. The heirs where gradually getting worse, but there were a couple of occasions where out of nowhere came a brilliant heir with 6+ stars so I killed off the brothers and had a fresh start with him.

Like most other Greeks I felt almost obligated to play the game as the Byz for my first campaign, getting the Byz as a faction option was one of the reasons I bought the game. I continue to play as them though, despite the lack of diversity in units, because they are challenging in all eras and get off to a good start.

[burma_mtw]

Keep an eye on your Faction Leader's Influence rating. If it is four or less then doing something about it will likely help.

[Jxrc]

Keeping your king fighting is indeed one of the keys. At the beginning I was always keeping may king out of harm's way but after the first generation of Princes I always ended up (as the Danes and German mostly) having cowards one stars heirs ... Now that the king remains busy slaughtering routing peasant (you do no want take too much risk) his sons gets better and better.

Marrying your king to a Byzantine princess also seems to trigger an upgrade in heirs.

A sometimes tricky decision is to decide whether you keep as a first heir in line an heir that has the vice captured or tortured since they give a nice moral boost but also make you lose a quite few stars. Since the fact that the heir's number of stars depend on how many the king has, having a tortured king can trigger an massive drop-off in the quality of you heirs (needless to say that inbred heirs a first in line when the times come to charge the arbalesters at the top of the hill)

Even if the coward or doubtful courage do not affect the number of stars you get it seem to me that it is a vice that is usually passed to the heirs. Thus heirs with doubtful courage must not live long enough to reach the throne ....


WARNING : killing your heir is not a good idea if you only have one and that your king is old. You've been warned do not sue me in case of civil war. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif

[Demon of Light]

There is a known bug(feature?) in the game that will ensure that 8 and 9 star kings are destined to produce ONLY 0 star heirs. Happened to my brother yesterday. 6 sons of an 8 star king were 0 stars. If you have a story that looks like my brother's then this is ALL that happened. I do not know if any of the ideas here have merit but I think this is the answer to Heraclius' concern. Frankly, I think this is a good thing. It keeps all of us from having a steady supply of incredible generals simply be handed to us. The general agreement among those who know of this bug is that it is best to have 7 star monarchs.

[cugel]

I like playing as the Byzantines because of a partiality to Rome. They are definitely an easier faction to play in early. You just have to take out the Turks before they attack you and maintain a defensive position in the west. After a while all catholic europe will unite against you. Nothing you can do about it. I had 5 crusades (including the Pope) coming against me in the last campaign at the same time. Interestingly enough, I fought one battle against 4 crusades at once. They didn't really help each other very well though. I was able to concentrate my forces against first 1 then the others. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/joker.gif

The biggest advantage of the Byz. are the high stars generals. With good dread, you can often get armies to flee before battle even gets underway.

As for the high valor kings producing 0 valor heirs, a 9 star king wraps round to 0 heir. This is indeed a bug. I always maintain my king in a seaside province so that my provinces don't drop in loyalty. If you use your king to fight, make sure that it is not in an interior province or an island province. If your king gets cut-off there will be a BIG drop in loyalty throughout the realm. The worst is if you invade an island and the port gets destroyed in the invasion. Now you're cut off for 4 years until it's rebuilt. You'll be lucky if you don't have a civil war by then http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/flirt.gif

[SmokWawelski]

I rarely commited my King toa battle, unless he has heirs, but I will do that now... Very valuable posts about the Byz too.

[Portuguese Rebel]

I haven't tested this but i think there is some kind of genetics at work in this.

I think that to marry a princess from a foreign faction influences the stars of the heirs. Does someone have some data ont this?

[MonkeyMan]

I put everything I know in Here (http://www.totalwar.org/cgi-bin/forum/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=15;t=5730).

[Dogmeat]

i too suffer from nancy boy princes. I guess i'm protecting my king and immediate heir too much.
My back-up heirs always seem to be strong and have many stars, and make bloody fine generals when their time for the throne has passed. Oh well.

[Heraclius]

wow. this really brings back some memories. whoever dragged this topic back out, thanks. it really took me on a nostalgia trip. I believe it is the first topic I ever posted. thanks again http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/pat.gif

[The_Emperor]

Anyone else have a really great king who pumps out heirs like there's no tomorrow... (Hard to see how he can find time to make all those kids when he's busy fighting all those wars http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smokin.gif)

And then when he dies get some old git (50 odd)take over who totally ruins the royal line? Yep royal families suck

[Dogmeat]

thats the trouble with having such a kick ass king, who lives for ages and has many heirs. By the time he finally pegs it, then the chosen heir is in his fiftys. Hopefully you'll have already married him off by that time http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

[Aurelius1]

I think the name of the game here is balance, as was stated before. Everything always degenerates to keep the game from being too easy. Even the V&V's conspire to make your high acumen governors garbage after a little while.

Throw heirs into action whenever you can be assured of victory, and don't bother holding back in an effort to wind up with lots of them. It'll just make you look bad when a 9 star general shows up to kick your door down.

[KukriKhan]

Decent advice Aurelius1; born of experience, sounds like. Welcome to the.Org http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif