How to get 9 feather governors?

[bretwalda]

Antioch with a 9 feather gov is twisted for revenue generation
So how do you get high acumen governors...? I hardly ever seem to get more than 4, max 5 feathers...

[Lacker]

I'm not sure there's much you can do to build them. I know certain provinces increase the accumen but aside from that there isn't much you can do.

Just look....A LOT for governors. Look in every stack, every back woods fort, EVERYWHERE. Give the province to the best one you find and always keep your eyes out for someone better.

Make sure once you give someone the province that you look down at their vices and virtues afterwards. Sometimes they'll have a full bar of accumen but have a vice that decreases trade/farming income. Depending on the province this could KILL your income. I've found people with 4 feathers that are better than people with 7 just because of vices like this.

A

[CherryDanish]

So how do you get high acumen governors...? I hardly ever seem to get more than 4, max 5 feathers...
Mostly patience. It isn't overly common.
1) recruit a former heir to the throne, you know those guys who got bumped by a nephew, or one of their descendants. These guys generally have more Vn'Vs and generally are better with money. The alternative ... build LOTs of troops and always scope their stats. When you find a 6-7 feather gov, you got your man.
2) add a provincial title. generally the provs with the best revenue give an acumen bonus, such as antioch and venice.
3) add titles from buildings that grant acumen, like chancellry, they stack with provincial titles.

With a 9 feather gov in a developed antioch, there's no reason you can't pull in 8-9k florins a year from that province alone, which in my case pays for almost all of my army. All other revenue is gravy.

[MidnitePiper]

1. Make sure your monarch has high acumen and influence - then produce lots of units. Generals trained during his reign will tend to take after him...
2. Keep the empire relatively small - less than 25% of the map. Sprawling empires suffer bad vices in their governors.
3. Assign only 4-feather governors or higher, then watch them for virtue development. Keep them out of the fortresss and place them in charge of a stack of units to encourage the development of VnV's. Some will develop good virtues, some will develop bad vices - keep the good, replace the bad.
4. Bribe minor provinces. When you see a neutral province with troops in it, take a look at the generals. Often you will see good governor candidates who are under another general's command - bribe the lead general then grab the guy you really wanted for a governor.


As the Turks I also use a lot of Jihads - first to see what kind of commanders the jihads produce, then by scalping scrub units; place all scrub commanders in a province a jihad is traveling through, let it scalp men from the unit, and see what is revealed - often a less-than-desirable commander will join the jihad, leaving a far more valuable (still 0-star) general in charge of the unit.

[ichi]

There's a file in the campmap/name directory called Default_Heroes, that lists the heroes in the game for each faction. Do not edit the file and save it unless you know what you are doing.

In addition to being quite interesting reading (there is one guy listed who is famous for sticking a red hot poker up the king's bum - i swear it is in there!) the file lists game characters that will appear in certain years. Some of these guys arrive with virtues - the high valor spy or the educated general.

You can use this info (some consider this cheesy, and I have to admit feeling a little cheddary myself here) to figure out when a general with high acumen virtues will appear.

Knowing this, you can then give him a couple of good acumen-providing titles, and you start to get a really high acumen guv.

Some folks probably wont be able to resist modding the game to cough up numerate guvs.

:bow:

ichi

[bretwalda]

Hmm, so the following rule of thumb is fine, what do you think?

Give all provinces at least a 4 (preferably 5) feather governor and then for the provinces worth dying for (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=40321) give the best you have (ex heirs, bribed enemies, etc) What would be your list for the favoured provinces?

[Procrustes]

In addition to being quite interesting reading (there is one guy listed who is famous for sticking a red hot poker up the king's bum - i swear it is in there!) the file lists game characters that will appear in certain years. Some of these guys arrive with virtues - the high valor spy or the educated general.


Ah, that would have been King Edward II of England - perhaps the "hero" was Roger Mortimer? (The lover of Queen Isabella - Edward's wife.) Happened during the reign of Robert the Bruce, King of Scotland.

It's a rumor, but one that's been around for a long time. Edward probably was gay. Here's the first link I googled on him - I'm sure you can find more if you want:

http://kinemage.biochem.duke.edu/~panther/scarborough/html/index.edward.p.html

Hope you get a kick out of it!

Procrustes

[Procrustes]

I've never seen it documented and I can't prove it, but I could swear that governors sometimes increase their acumen without gaining any v&v's. Seems to happen more often in wealthy provinces. I mean, I grab the best general I have to make him governor of say, Flanders. If I leave him there for a while and do what I can to improve the economy of the province, he gains a feather or two regardless of what virtues or vices he may have grown. Therefore I tend to leave my governors alone unless they grow some really nasty vice or unless someone who is much better appears.

One other trick you can use - perhaps not the best - is to assassinate poor generals. Another man in the unit takes over, and his stats are going to be different than the one he replaces. No way to tell what you will get, though.

HTH,

P.

[bretwalda]

I've never seen it documented and I can't prove it, but I could swear that governors sometimes increase their acumen without gaining any v&v's.
I think I have seen that, too...

Do you think it pays off to gather all the governors to the "royal court" so to the same province the King usually resides (in my case this is Venice). I read somewhere that only the top of the stack gets vices, soo by putting them into the same stack as the king can preserve them...

[henoch]

my best general line sofar (with reloading, of c...)

i got it after burying my generals(royals) under big army stacks and watch them all gather steward; better steward etc. Aybak (one of the turkish first sons) recieves a good income stat all the time, but thistime it was "9".

but the vices (although the big list reduced to one-three vices per turn) kept coming.

Trader: building 7 mines to recieve the trader vice doesn`t seem to work properly (actually it`s the opposi..) in VI 2.01

[Procrustes]

Do you think it pays off to gather all the governors to the "royal court" so to the same province the King usually resides (in my case this is Venice). I read somewhere that only the top of the stack gets vices, soo by putting them into the same stack as the king can preserve them...

I guess you could do that, but I generally leave them in their own provinces unless they are good generals - then I take them out to fight. I get a kick out of letting them develop V&V's - adds to court intrigue. If they get too nasty then I take them out with a spy, emissary, assassin or, if I'm desperate, disband them or put them into the first wave of an assault led by another general. (It's true that only the top of the stack gets the v or v.)

[ichi]

Do you think it pays off to gather all the governors to the "royal court" so to the same province the King usually resides (in my case this is Venice). I read somewhere that only the top of the stack gets vices, soo by putting them into the same stack as the king can preserve them...

This is a great idea for low loyalty guvs, seems to help reduce rebellions and civil wars for me.

@Procrustes: that was a great link

*curses his AM status for preventing the making of a great joke about a gay King and his favorites, both named Hugh Despensers*

ichi :bow:

[CherryDanish]

I've never seen it documented and I can't prove it, but I could swear that governors sometimes increase their acumen without gaining any v&v's.
don't recall ever seeing this, but it does happen when you dump units in a Jihad. They gain Piety without any V&V's.

[bretwalda]

Yepp it really makes a difference to get the best governors... especially when trade incomes are coming down and you empire is big and sprawling and every guv is getting vices... But it is a pain... Unless you keep track of all egilible units and check every new unit in every turn. Then you have to play really consciously... oh well, could have been made easier so that I don't have to look through all "back wood fort"...
Never mind, still great game :wink:

[henoch]

does only appeal "normal" generals;
the "thinker" vice. i have the feeling it helps to have a "multiple-religions" province, together with a merc unit. ..but i may be wrong.

ps: well yesterday i got three. two in multiple religious province and ..one in a 99%.., but the turn before, he was in such a place...?? thinker(+2/-2piety) is odd but it rises.

while my new "Aybak" is king, i don´t get 7-8 acumen from normal generals. 4-5. ..seen worse.

in a HRE campaign i gave titles to 2-3 acumen generals, because of either high piety or dread stats. it was interesting to see them become 5-7er`s quite regular.