Hi, need some help

[sandcaster]

Hi everyone, I'm new to medieval total war and I'm still learning the basics of the turn based game (i played a few custom battles a while back when I first got the game but didn't do much more than that). I'm doing ok so far using byz on normal difficulty but one thing is really annoying me, I can't work out how to transport units over water. What am I missing here? I have some war boats but no transport and it said I needed to discover the compass to transport units but I don't know how or where. Also is it not possible to move armies over allied lands without declaring war? Any advice would be appreciated.

[Mouzafphaerre]

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First of all, welcome to the guild

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wave.gif

Now, let's check:

Do you have a port in the province you want to move your troops from?

Do you have at least one ship in each sea region from the abovementioned province, forming an uninterrupted chain to the target enemy province?

Are you sure that there aren't any ships belonging to the nation you wish to attack in the abovementioned sea regions?
[/list]
Which version are you playing? I haven't heard about the compass restriction before.

As for your second question, unfortunately no. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-no.gif With the listed conditions granted, you can invade Egypt from Finland in one turn but it takes three turns to reach Wessex from Scotland on land. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-stunned.gif
_

[garion]

There's no compass rule in either MTW version 1.1 and the original, so I don't know what's wrong. Int he coding there is something on compasses, but that's only reerring to when you can build a certain type of ship

[Tricky Lady]

Quote[/b] (Mouzafphaerre @ May 16 2004,06:45)]Are you sure that there aren't any ships belonging to the nation you wish to attack in the abovementioned sea regions?
Add: you can check this easy and efficiently by pressing and holding the v button. All sea regions that are displayed in green will allow you to move troops. Red regions are blocked sea lanes.
Some sea regions will be displayed in yellow, but I am not sure what this means... Anyone?

[cutepuppy]

Quote[/b] (Tricky Lady @ May 16 2004,11:43)]Some sea regions will be displayed in yellow, but I am not sure what this means... Anyone?
I think that means that you don't have boats there, but if you place them there, it will be green.

[Tricky Lady]

OK, thanks http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-smile.gif

[Dîn-Heru]

Quote[/b] (cutepuppy @ May 16 2004,11:04)]
Quote[/b] (Tricky Lady @ May 16 2004,11:43)]Some sea regions will be displayed in yellow, but I am not sure what this means... Anyone?
I think that means that you don't have boats there, but if you place them there, it will be green.
It also means that there are no enemy ships there. It basically means that it is neutral waters.

[sandcaster]

Thanks, I was just missing the obvious. I have no idea where my manual is so there are a few things like that I am unaware of.

I have another question - how do I train heavy cavalry? I have upgraded to master horse breader but all I can make are horse archers and some light cav (from captured cities).

[katank]

heavy cav usually requires several building lines.

you are playing byz so

for katanks: you need armourer's guild in addition to horse guild

for pronoiai: spear guild and horse guild

for byz cav: bow shop and sword shop

if VI:

avar nobles in moldavia only amourer and horse breeder.

steppe heavy cav: armourer and horse guild.

that's pretty much all the cav you need as the byz.

[Xiphias]

Some units will only appear in some ages and some provinces.

Red sea regions only appear if you're already at war with someone. You have to check for ships of the person you're going to attack manually if you're not yet at war.

[sandcaster]

I'm sure I have all the guilds/shops needed for heavy cav but all I have access to are horse archers. Does the cities religion effect the units available? I did notice however that byz cav are a form of horse archer....are the horse archers that I can make actually byz cav or a completely different unit?

One final thing (sorry for all these newbie questions), why don't my units seem to be upgrading? I keep upgrading the buildings but the units never seem to improve. I still have the same basic spears and infantry that I had when the game started, I'm now past the year 1200 and its getting hard to defend or attack when the enemy is fielding feudal knights and infantry against my inferior troops. I did read somewhere that you can get royalty or generals to govern cities, how do I do that?

[Xiphias]

Religion doesn't have any affect. Only Era, buildings and province. There are lots of different Archers on horses. The standard horse archers are a different unit from Byzantine Cavalry. If you have the horse breeder, bowyer's workshop and swordsmith's workshop then there shouldn't be any reason why you can't get Byzantine Cavalry in that province.

Do you have viking invasion? That will affect whether a couple of units are availible or not.

Some factions (especially orthodox ones like the byzantines) don't have any units tied to some buildings. There is rarely a useless building however as they usually either let you upgrade to the next level of that building, give you extra valour (fighting ability) or give you a title. You should have the great vangarian guards until the late era starts and you should be able to get feudal sergents.

You can't give province titles to royaly but to give them to generals just pick up the scroll icon off the map and drop it on him.

[katank]

you certainly don't get feudal seargents by building.

I either bribe for good spears or stretch out a thin line of katanks to countercharge the enemy heavy cav.

then, I bring up my byz inf and varangians to maul their heavy cav in melee.

the knights aren't so tough once you varangians flank them and the katanks can hold for enough time.

[sandcaster]

Ok thanks, I got it now. I was trying to get to many building types rather then concentrating on certain tech lines.