how old do generals get

[adg]

i have been playing the carthage campaign on vh campaign / medium battles and have been using my faction leader as my major attacking general for much of the game. i think he's my second or third faction leader. anyway i just noticed that he's 106 years old. is this normal. this is only my second campaign after playing the scipii in my first, so i am unsure what is the normal lifespan. (i am much more familiar with M:TW, where after 50 years, your kings days were numbered)

[PseRamesses]

Haven´t gone over 100 yet but some have reached 97 and 96 years of age.
IMO this is better since one shouldn´t know when a person is about to die right?! Hell, I even got one that died on me when he was 56, which surprised me a lot. There seems to be a statistical cluster around 66 years though.

[Aetius the Last Roman]

Well i've never reach over a century with any of my leaders.
I do however think that most generals (drawing solely on my limited experience here) kick the bucket at around 60-70.

[Kyniskos]

In my last game I had one who got to a 100. Now I had one who died peacefully at 17! He was the one who was supposed to take over as Faction Heir. Wasn't to disappointed though, he was a no-good. My previeous Faction Leader survived all but the youngest of his three sons. It varies greatly me thinks.

[hrvojej]

It may be just coincidence, but with barbarians I was never able to get family members who were over 70. OTOH, I had a couple of 90+ year olds as the Romans and the Greeks. Especially the Romans seemed to be very long-lived. Otherwise I usually switch the retinue when a general gets past 60.

[Productivity]

I would imagine but there is probably some form of equation that it runs every turn, and as a general gets older the probabilities get higher. Given the amount of repetition going on over the entire community, it wouldn't surprise me if you had a couple that would seem to be really old.

[Es Arkajae]

Once your general reaches 60 years old you should take out all the good retinue ancillaries you can and give them to other family members and dump all the bad retinue members (if you have any) on him~D

[Kraxis]

In my last game I had one who got to a 100. Now I had one who died peacefully at 17! He was the one who was supposed to take over as Faction Heir. Wasn't to disappointed though, he was a no-good. My previeous Faction Leader survived all but the youngest of his three sons. It varies greatly me thinks.
Heh... Can you say assassin? ~D
When an assassin has killed one of your family memebers he get the 'died peacefully' end.

[Quillan]

106 is the highest I've ever heard of. I had one make it to 100, and he died at 101. Most of mine die in the late 50s or early 60s. It's so normal, in fact, that once a general or important governor reaches 50 I start having a backup standing by in the city/army to take over once the elder dies. The guy who reached 101 had a backup in his 70s, who had a backup in his 50s, who had a backup standing by for him. I had 4 governors in Capua that game.

[adg]

he made it to 109. he only died because Alexandria caught the Plague :(. I'm gonna miss him

heres a screenshot
https://img.photobucket.com/albums/v282/a_sleeping_god/rtw.jpg

[Wishazu]

my carthiginian faction leader once lived to be 98 and his bodyguard unit had 93 men in it, this was on large unit scale. man he charged and the enemy just melted lol

[Oaty]

Heh... Can you say assassin? ~D
When an assassin has killed one of your family memebers he get the 'died peacefully' end.


Quite wrong Kraxis.

I've been asassinated and when I mouse over the portrait it says asassinated.

Dying peacefully can be bugged. This happens when 2 or more generals go into combat in the same stack. If a general whos is not in charge dies, even though they died in battle it will display that they died peacefully

[Kraxis]

But I have lost a few family members in cities at a fairly young age. No Assassinated end there.

By the he looked pretty neat for a 109 year old man. I must say I wish I'm as good looking then.

[DukeofSerbia]

HrvojeJ you have right! When I played with so called barbarians I only once broke 70 with my Dacian faction leader (because he had herbalist retinue).
The longest living family members I had with Seleucids (over 50% of their riched 80).

[Malrubius]

my carthiginian faction leader once lived to be 98 and his bodyguard unit had 93 men in it, this was on large unit scale. man he charged and the enemy just melted lol

Dang! My Hanno the Cunning died in the eruption of Mount Etna at the age of 74. I'm lucky I had just given Hasdrubal his retainers and moved him to Lilybaeum or I might have lost them both. I was worried Hanno was about to kick the bucket since his wife had died a few years before and couldn't take care of him. I had no idea he might have made it that long, though!

I do think that public health buildings and the retainer Ctesibus can have a positive effect on how long a general lives, though (after they hit 60, I try to send them back to the capital or other developed city for this reason). I wonder if the good health VnV's help, as well? I'm guessing barbarian factions don't have sewers or public baths, right? :sick2:

I'd guess there's a check at the start of each year, with bonuses to the check depending on public health and virtues, but I don't have any empirical data.


Dying peacefully can be bugged. This happens when 2 or more generals go into combat in the same stack. If a general whos is not in charge dies, even though they died in battle it will display that they died peacefully

The Celtiberians under Caraunios attacked my unit led by a captain, and general Theophanes joined the battle as a reinforcement. He died in that debacle and his portrait now displays "died peacefully 261BC". Losing him and Hanno in the same year gives me a shortage of family members. :cry:

[Craterus]

i recently lost one of my oldest generals
you start with him at the beginning of the Egyptian campaign - Kiya, he reached 87
10 star commander traits like legendary commander +5 command!
he was really great! crafted my empire... ~:cool: ~D

[lars573]

I've only had a handfull of generals die before 60. And they usually had some kind of sickly trait. Most of my generals die between 60 and 80. I've only ever had a handful make it over 80 and never to 90.

[Craterus]

strangely my general (Kiya) had the trait "Given to Ill-Health - This man is plagued with many diseases, none of which have managed to kill him yet."
How do you swap retinue? i didnt know you could do that, can you fire retinue like "drinking companions" because they are useless

[Malrubius]

strangely my general (Kiya) had the trait "Given to Ill-Health - This man is plagued with many diseases, none of which have managed to kill him yet."
How do you swap retinue? i didnt know you could do that, can you fire retinue like "drinking companions" because they are useless


You can't fire them, but you can trade them between generals by merging the two general units together. Then you can pull up the list of VnV's for one general and click and drag them down to the one you want to give them to. :juggle:

If you get bad retainers, you can give them to your useless family members that you send around your backwater provinces building towers or fighting rebels or something. Some retainers conflict with each other and you can only have 8 per general. Same thing with spies, diplomats, etc. You can only swap retainers between like persons. No giving your spy's monkey to a general, etc. :ears:

[Craterus]

oh thanks for telling me that.. i will adopt more useless generals now to offload my rubbish retinue onto!
thanks again malrubius...

[katank]

Someone once had a general which was 113 or something and it overflowed the counter to 1! Dunno if they fixed it. I believe that the high level health buildings like aqueducts and city plumbing help with the longevity too which explains Romans and Greeks living long

[Sam Adams]

i had a useless general that was like 97 living in my capital. Active generals with armies tend to die in their 60s.