Preventing civil wars

[Lare]

The last two campaigns I've played, as the Golden Horde and the Swiss, have both resulted in a civil war. How can they be prevented?

Is there no other way than to get a princess to marry an unloyal general, or to get the general killed in a battle? How about if the unloyal general is a member of royal family? Will the princess mary the prince then?

Any suggestions?

[Ryttare]

Try to give the unloyal generals Govenorship.

[eXistenZi]

Or just replace them.

[Nowake]

Or just succeed in your wars ... that will boost their morale.

[NewJeffCT]

I have no qualms about disbanding a unit if the general is 4 shields of loyalty or less.

[galingula1]

If you don't have it under control keep your low loyalty generals in the SAME province as the King and I think that will quell any rebelious thoughts on their part.

[sassbarman]

If you can't increase the generals loyalty with titles or marriage, all you have to do is take the general out of your army stack, that way he has no army to lead into revolt, but continues to give you his command bonus if the province is attacked. Just make sure to check that the new general has better loyalty.

[Hoplite]

Improve your farmlands. That boosts the loyalty of your generals when they and your ruler start gaining the steward virtues.

[Doc Holliday]

You can marry a general to a princess?
Damn. That would have solved allot of problems http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/joker.gif

[Red Harvest]

All good suggestions. I don't get civil wars with 3 shields of loyalty, but I don't like to spend much time in such a situation either. Another thing that helps is to move the suckers around by themselves. They seem less likely to rebel if you swap province with the disloyal unit regularly (but not the stack&#33http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif This is in addition to marriage, fighting and winning battle(s), assigning titles, stacking them under your King, and building up provinces to get steward loyalty boost.

[The_Emperor]

Sending Disloyal troops off in a Crusade or Jihad also works well, since they cannot rebel until it has finished and they return to being a normal army. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/idea.gif

And the increase in influence of a successful Crusade or Jihad helps to improve Loyalty. Of course if you fail, the loss in influence is bound to make matters much worse for you (For this reason pick soft targets such as rebels so you know you will win)

If you wish to embrace the dark side, you can always, burn them as a Heretic (A very good one for training up a Grand Inquisitor) http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif , then there's Assassination, and trying a general for treason with a Spy... However if the last two fail, you may have your rebellion on your hands anyway if your not careful.

[MizuKokami]

keep in mind that if the rebelling generals are better then the non rebelling ones, perhaps it would be better to allow a rebellion to increase the value of your royal line. back them, instead of your royal line, and you suddenly have a fresh king with better attributes.

[Sainika]

If you have disloyal heirs just add them in your kings stack. In that case they won't revolt until your king die or you loose several provinse due to war suddenly.
Keep an eye on your generals VV's. Disband immediately or kill those who got blackmailer status.