Best Accountants?

[Xiphias]

I was playing a game with the english last night and it seemed that every single governer was getting a vice that reduced trade/farm income.

Was it something I was doing causing this or do the English just make lazy accountants?

Is there anything I can do to stop this happening or which faction has the best accountants?

[Finn]

how big was your nation at the time ?

they seem to increase in frequency the bigger you get, kinda annoying really as it starts to get rediculous towards the end

[Bhruic]

Yeah, I had the same thing happen. It's a rather poor way to try and limit larger empires, imo, although I suppose the larger an empire gets, the more bureaucratic drain sets in. I used to go around removing titles until I realized that they just re-got the vice a few turns later. Even territory I'd just taken over would get negative vices. I just ignored it, as I was close to winning anyway.

Bh

[Accounting Troll]

Good accountant? There's a virtue I'd like to see added to the game http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif I'd love to be able to create a Heroic Accountant

I think CA stuck this feature in because it was very hard for the ruler of a sprawling medieval empire to keep an eye on each one of his officials. I think it makes it more realistic.

Does anyone know if keeping your king in a particular province make the governors of that province and its neighbours more honest?

[Xiphias]

My empire was pretty large.

It would have been nice if the ones who were honest or loyal were immune to negative vices like outlaw and avarice.

[katank]

well, at some point, I would still be training peasants nonstop and disbanding low acumen ones and use them as replacements.

however, once my empire gets to a certain size that it's almost invicible and replacements would be bureaucratic nightmare, I simply don't bother.

The Turks have good govs IIRC and I often start with at least 4 4 acumens when playing as them. Also, there is an event that gives your ssultan and a gov extra acumen.

[Satyr]

I haven't tested this, but it seems to me that if I remove the titles from the first few of these guys I get I don't get too many more. If I just leave them alone then all my generals decide I don't care and start stealing too. So behead some of those boys to keep the rest in line.

[son of spam]

lol heroic accountants...

Perhaps there will be natural born CPA too?

"This man has a natural instinct for killing cost overruns. +5 to acumen"

[katank]

what about negatives?

not so calculating. he has been known to repeatedly run from accounting messes, his own accountants are not amused and disheartened. -5 acumen

[son of spam]

LMAO That's great. RTW should have those V&V's

[Bhruic]

Or how about 'War Wounds':

"Excessive combat has left him without hands or feet, making him incapable of counting past 4."

Bh

[motorhead]

Govs and their negative income vices are something of an odd hobby of mine. I've done endless testing (and i do mean endless) on the what/why. My conclusions:

- the larger your empire, the more vices you'll see. Once you hold around 30% of the provs you'll see one or two every few turns. At 40 and 50% they get worse, usually 1-4 per turn. At 60% the floodgates open and I've seen as many as 14+ vices in a single turn.

- solutions? nothing having to do with the location or movement of the gov. I've tried keeping govs in the same stack as the ruler and in the same province with the ruler. I've tried keeping every gov out of stacks, standing alone. I've tried moving stacks of govs around every single turn. In each case nothing had any perceptible effect. Sure, some turns few vices will appear, but that's just probability. Nothing i did had any long term effect. In each of my tests i was over the 60% mark and gathered 40-50 govs to experiment with.
- The only govs who seldom got any negative vices were those who already had some +income virtue such as eloquent, materialist, thinker, etc.

- in a recent HRE campaign i kept nearly every non-general gov in sweden. I had 4 groups: 1) pure govs who never had negative income vices. 2) tainted govs with vices. 3) reformed govs - formerly had vices but they disappeared. 4) gov candidates for future provs. Every year i'd check each stack and re-sort the govs (a very odd hobby, eh?). Very roughly they broke down with 2/3 as type-1, 1/6 as type-2, and 1/6 as type-3. The type-2's and type-3's seemed to cycle back and forth between having a vice then losing it. Govs who had gone beyond the first level of a vice (such as connoissuer -> pleasure seeker -> voluptuary) never reformed, they're bad for life.

- The game never tells you when a gov loses a vice, only when one is gained, so it looks much worse than it actually is. Basically, I only change a govs title when he gets a serious vice, the smaller vices tend appear/disappear every few turns.

[Axeknight]

Quote[/b] (katank @ May 07 2004,01:02)]not so calculating. he has been known to repeatedly run from accounting messes, his own accountants are not amused and disheartened. -5 acumen
The next vice could be Accoutancy butcher.

This man has, on more than one occasion, had all his accounts burned alive. The province has no accountants left -15 acumen, +100% happiness

[katank]

numeric pride.

he has often disregarded his own accountants. -1 acumen

however, this make him more fearsome in numerical calculations?

[Accounting Troll]

I'm glad to see that you lot hold the accountancy profession in such high regard.

I'm just glad I'm not a lawyer

[mfberg]

Hidden books -5 loyalty
fearing questioning the accountant keeps a second set of books

Secret Hidden books -10% trade, -2 command
You notice the cost of armor in this province is increasing, but the quality hasn't improved.

Double entry bookkeeping +10% income, +1 command

Secret Double entry bookkeeping -1 loyalty, +1 command

Venice +1 valor accountants
Sicily 20% discount, all start with a secret v&v

mfberg

[katank]

what about a grand auditor unit? fries any accountants who cook the books.

for every culpable accountant tried, all others clean up their acts a bit?

[Xiphias]

More advanced balance sheets as you progress through the eras.

[katank]

perhaps with chancellery and buildings like that which grants acumen bonuses, we could also get better income and less greed from govs?

[Axeknight]

Fearless Accountant

This man is not afraid of any amount of paperwork, and has been known to slay thousands of sums with his bare hands. +5 acumen, +5 valour when doing mathematics

[Cazbol]

When I enter the cycle of deteriorating governors I adopt the policy of firing them and not replacing them. I look at this as the end of the feudal system, i.e. no more , dukes, counts etc. Once my empire has reached this size, money usually isn't hard to come by so I don't need governors to boost income. However, many of their vices bring with them a drop in happiness, which is a dangerous thing in the end game when mass revolts are likely.

I tend to keep the governors that have "positive vices", like compulsively charitable and such because these increase happiness.

[katank]

well, that's certainly an interesting contrast with the appoint every gov as a knight thing.

Interesting. I usually don't fire them after a while.

I would imagine if you go to the trouble of firing them, might as well appoint new ones.