View Full Version : couple of noobish questions!
Almohdistani
12-17-2006, 20:10
Hi there,
first question is how come i seem only to build weaponsmiths in certain provinces despite fulfilling the construction prerequisite requirments of the guide?
And also, I get to a point in any compaign, where for some reason the morale in a large cluster of provinces suddenly drops and mass uprisings suddenly occur crippling my empire!
Probably really obvious but I cant figure it out...
Any help much apprecieted!
Dutch_guy
12-17-2006, 21:02
Hi there,
first question is how come i seem only to build weaponsmiths in certain provinces despite fulfilling the construction prerequisite requirments of the guide?
And also, I get to a point in any compaign, where for some reason the morale in a large cluster of provinces suddenly drops and mass uprisings suddenly occur crippling my empire!
Probably really obvious but I cant figure it out...
Any help much apprecieted!
To answer your fist question, I believe only certain provinces which contain the Iron resource are able to fully build up the weaponsmith buildings.
As to your second, once you hold a certain percentage of the map, the game tries to make it more challenging by dropping the happiness levels in your settlements - it's not a bug, it's an actual feature. It usually happens when you own around 60 % (or was it 80%) of the map. Irritating, but bound to happen sooner or later. It's basically why a lot of people prefer GA mode over conquest mode...
:balloon2:
Almohdistani
12-17-2006, 21:07
I own around 40% :embarassed:
If it's occurring at around 40% then it may be that your faction leader has become isoltated from the rest of the empire. If he gets cut off on an island or isolated territory and cannot reach the other lands, those lands will suffer a massive drop in loyalty, making revolts very likely.
The bloat effect, that occurs at around 60%, is indeed a feature. The way to counteract it is to build loyalty inmproving buildings in your provinces (town watch, religious buildings, brothel, watch towers, border fort.) and place a spy in each province. Keep a garrison of not less than 100 men in each province also, the cheaper to support the better. Also you'll want to lower taxes in those problem provinces to get the loyalty to 120% or above. Anything below this and a faction re-emergence can occur.
Almohdistani
12-17-2006, 21:51
The way to counteract it is to build loyalty inmproving buildings in your provinces (town watch, religious buildings, brothel, watch towers, border fort.) and place a spy in each province. Keep a garrison of not less than 100 men in each province also, the cheaper to support the better. Also you'll want to lower taxes in those problem provinces to get the loyalty to 120% or above. Anything below this and a faction re-emergence can occur.
I did not know this. Thank you!!!!!!!!!!! :egypt:
Welcome to the Org, Almohdistani! ~:cheers:
In regards to where you can construct the Metalsmith, Dutch_guy is correct. They can only be built in provinces that contain iron. It's yet another reason why I enjoy playing the Spanish--all those iron provinces allow me to produce troops with high attack values. :yes:
Adrian II
12-18-2006, 10:29
Good advice all around.
There are iron deposits in the following provinces: Leon, Castile, Navarre, Aragon, Tuscany, Franconia, Bohemia, Hungary, Carpathia and Sweden.
As for the Loyalty drop, this happens for a variety of reasons. Apart from the '60% of the map' drop and the 'isolated ruler' drop, there is also the 'worthless ruler' drop. The latter refers to the quality of your ruler.
Right-click your ruler's counter and look at his Influence (the number of crowns underneath his name) and his Character Traits. Four crowns is the least to maintain loyalty. You can increase your ruler's Influence in a number of ways:
let him win battles (the downside of this is that he will be way from his home province temporarily)
organise a succesfull Crusade/Jihad (the downside is that flunked Crusades/Jihads spell disaster for your ruler's Influence)
improve his character by balancing the traits, for instance:
if he is faint-hearted, increase his dread by killing all prisoners of war/rebels after a won battle or crushed rebellion
make him a Builder and/or Steward (causes +Happiness as well)
build churches/mosques to increase his Piety
skip your actual ruler (he will die sooner or later) and focus on 'raising' the Prince who is next in line into a fine (i.e. warriorlike, prestigious, yet friendly and steward-like) young gentleman.
check all your troops and governors and disband all units with Loyalty 4 or less, even if they are strong units
P.S. In my current English campaign (Early, Expert) the time is around 1240 and I own about 50% of the map in a sort of crescent from Friesland through Western Europe and North Africa into Palestine, which I conquered in a Crusade.
The Crusade was a hair-raising affair, yet on the same turn when my Crusade succeeded (yay, huge +Influence) my rather weak King Edward III died.
Alas, Edward IV was even more of a basket case (Doubtful Courage, also known as 'Screaming Girl' syndrome) and so was his oldest son Prince Stephen.
So - I let Edward exercise his muscles in Ireland by withdrawing all my troops and provoking rebellions there. I let him fight the rebels each time with an excellent army that was slighty smaller in number than the rebel armies. The first time, I let him counterattack (and win) in Ireland immediately, which made him a Skilled Defender. The second time I waited til Ireland had been taken over by the rebels, only then to let Edward invade the island as an attacker. This gave him Skilled Attacker status. After one more crushed rebellion he had Expert Defender. All I need to do now is raise him into an Expert Attacker, and I will have neutralised the 'Screaming Girl' factor. The added advantage of having him gallop around Ireland is that it is close to his home province, hence no unnecessary loss of Loyalty among the lads.
Meanwhile, in Portugal Prince Stephen is doing the same out of Castile, where I have installed an excellent governor as well to enhance his reputation. In between Stephen's Portuguese battles, his governor builds Nice, Shiny Things for him in Castile that help to increase Stephen's Builder status and Stewardship.
All in all, I have my Edwards nicely under control.
Yes, I am an old hand... ~:)
I was going to start a dumb noob question thread of my own, but I decided it would be better to piggyback on this one!
Basically my problem is that I have a lot of units that are high quality but have a massive yellow streak (low valour). This is the first GA campaign I've played (English, early), and although I totally fumbled my Crusading attempt (lousy Jihads!) I steamrollered Western Europe fairly easily and am well ahead on points. Because of this I've been tootling along for a while and not launching any big campaigns, while building all the nice, shiny new units as they become available.
But the Horde have now made a move against me (it's about 1300), and I'm finding that even when I have modern, elite units I'm coming off second best in a lot of melees because they've got no bottle.
What is the best/ quickest/ easiest way of boosting valour without getting streamrollered by battle-hardened MHC...?
Good generals, +1 valour for every 2 stars. Buildings at Guild level, +1 valour. Soldiers gaining battle experience.
Adrian II
12-18-2006, 13:00
What is the best/ quickest/ easiest way of boosting valour without getting streamrollered by battle-hardened MHC...?The quickest way is by boosting your generals' valour. Make your two-star and three-star gens fight rebellions.
The surest way is to up your home bases to Guild level, build monasteries, shrines, etcetera.
A more intricate way is by using your low valour units on the battlefield in such a way that they gain valour. Whenever you can, you should give your lowest-valour units easy tasks to accomplish, such as flanking enemy units that are already engaged, killing off enemy stragglers or attacking weaker uits (e.g. by pitting your swordsmen or cavalry against enemy archers or peasants).
Thanks guys.
Can valour be re-trained in the same way that you can get weapons/ armour bonuses by re-training units in a province that has been upgraded?
Regional valour bonuses and valour bonuses from buildings, e.g. a master spearmaker, will be passed into revelant men that are retrained in that province. The same goes for morale bonuses. Valour gained from combat experience is lost when the man dies in battle.
macsen rufus
12-18-2006, 17:57
Hi Ripken - when you say your units have "no bottle" do you mean they're running away before finishing the job in hand? If so your problems could be down to morale rather than valour. There are a few things you can do:
1) As well at using generals with good command stats that add valour, also check out their vices and virtues. Some of these will boost morale, others will undermine it. "Charismatic leader" will give a nice boost (+2 to morale I think IIRC), but "Unhinged loon" will do the opposite. I've found that a general can have high stars, but if he has morale-reducing VnVs his army will be less effective than a lower star general with morale-boosting VnVs.
2) Train your crack troops (preferably all of them :beam: ) in provinces that have morale-boosting buildings - eg for the English, these will be church, monastery, cathedral etc, to ensure your troops already have good morale before your general starts asserting his own influence on them.
3) Be aware which of your troops have high or low morale, eg halberdiers, although tough beggars, have bit of a lack of commitment to combat resulting in perilously low morale. They are apt to run at the drop of a hat.
4) Be aware of what will affect troop morale during combat:
- it is reduced by: being under fire, doubly so from fireams; if the general dies; if fighting uphill; if the enemy is on an exposed flank; if the enemy are behind; if the enemy seriously outnumber your troops
- it is improved by: having flanks and rear protected by other units (preferebly of higher morale themselves); if fighting downhill; when "winning"; if the general is close by.
Peasant Phill
12-19-2006, 09:52
don't forget that the moral of units will make a massive drop when they see a friendly unit rout what can cause a chain rout. Disciplined and elite units will only be affected by another routing unit if the routing unit also is disciplined or elite.
All the countermeasures have been mentioned already: build religious buildings in your troop producing provinces, keep your units flanks protected, keep your general close to endangered points in your line, try to move in a favorable position before committing your troops.
These are of course no hard rules as for every rule there are exceptions or situations where you could/should do something differently. But always be aware of the morale of your troops.
Hi Ripken - when you say your units have "no bottle" do you mean they're running away before finishing the job in hand? If so your problems could be down to morale rather than valour. There are a few things you can do:
....
Yes, that is what I mean really, they are tending to waver, panic each other and then make for the nearest exit under circumstances where I really wouldn't expect them to (like when defending against a smaller Papal army!!!:furious3: ).
Thinking about it the majority of my line was made up of halbardiers and chiv sargeants, which probably didn't help (incidentally, why are chiv sargeants so much more fragile than their feudal predecessors, is it just a quirk of the game designers'?).
Thank you for all the advice, I'll certainly be trying to apply a fair bit of what you suggest next time (although I'm a pretty rubbish general!).
Thinking about it the majority of my line was made up of halbardiers and chiv sargeants, which probably didn't help (incidentally, why are chiv sargeants so much more fragile than their feudal predecessors, is it just a quirk of the game designers'?).
Lower base morale. You'll need a good general to boost their valour, and morale.
macsen rufus
12-19-2006, 10:19
What Caravel just said during the time it took me to hit "Reply"!
gunslinger
12-19-2006, 22:11
RE: Valor
Remember that valor is calculated for each individual man in a unit. The number you see on the unit card is actually an average of the individual men. Keep this in mind when you're reforming units after a battle. I always turn off the "tidy up units" option (you get to it by clicking the arrow to the right of your minimap in the campaign screen) because the a.i. will always screw you when it reorganizes your army. If you have units that survived a battle, but took a lot of casualties, then chances are they gained a lot of valor too. If you combine these high valor units with each other instead of with green troops, then you concentrate your experienced troops which creates elite units. Just remember that if a unit is sitting in a stack led by a good general, it will show higher valor than a unit that's in a stack without a good general. Until you get used to compensating for this, try taking the generals out of the stacks while you re-organize the armies after a battle.
RE: Valor
Remember that valor is calculated for each individual man in a unit. The number you see on the unit card is actually an average of the individual men. Keep this in mind when you're reforming units after a battle. I always turn off the "tidy up units" option (you get to it by clicking the arrow to the right of your minimap in the campaign screen) because the a.i. will always screw you when it reorganizes your army. If you have units that survived a battle, but took a lot of casualties, then chances are they gained a lot of valor too. If you combine these high valor units with each other instead of with green troops, then you concentrate your experienced troops which creates elite units. Just remember that if a unit is sitting in a stack led by a good general, it will show higher valor than a unit that's in a stack without a good general. Until you get used to compensating for this, try taking the generals out of the stacks while you re-organize the armies after a battle.
I have often picked through an army of about 7000 using those methods. It's very tedious but does ensure that the high valour units go together. I usually start by pulling all of the generals out then work from there. You can't then drop stacks into each other as they may still merge, which is annoying, so you have to pull out the same type of unit from all the stacks first. If you're working in a small province, this isn't funny. I find myself doing a lot of this during my Turk campaigns. Especially in Georgia or Khazar vs the Mongols or in Constantinople vs Crusades or i.e. the Hungarians. Another option in the same place as the "tidy up units after battles" is the "display non critical messages" option, the one that shows all of the building construction, assassination/spy missions and generals death parchments. I tend to turn this off and instead get a nice summary list of my agents actions and buildings that were constructed ( abit like the vice/virtues summary). Leaving this checked means that you have to click through all of those building parchments at the end of the year, listening to the annoying sound affect, and then go through all the "your assassin was caught and killed" etc "whip whip, singe argghhhhhh" messages. :dizzy2:
The other ones I disable are the autosave and the tooltips. The tooltips are also a sort of an exploit, because if you pick up one of your agents and drag it over a remote province that you have no intelligence on, a tooltip appears informing you of which faction controls it. ~;)
I didn't know you could do all that, but I do know, thank you! :beam:
I didn't know you could do all that, but I do know, thank you! :beam:
Of course, I meant 'now' not 'know' the second time! :laugh4:
gunslinger
12-20-2006, 17:52
I like the tooltips because they allow me to find out what faction a boat, army or castle belong to if I'm not familiar with the colors.
On the subject of sorting out the armies, once my standing armies start getting bigger than one stack, I generally separate them into four groups: spears, swords, cavalry, and archers. This allows me to reorganize fairly quickly after a battle. It also makes it easier to figure out the composition of an army in each province. If I need to shift some troops to a province that just got hammered in a defensive battle, I can easily see if the surrounding provinces have a couple extra spear units or whatever. If you use this trick, just remember that the individual stacks will probably have 0 star generals, which is fine as long as there is a good general in the province in case of attack. You just have to make sure that whoever is the "general" for each stack has decent loyalty or you'll end up with a rebellion on your hands.
I always disable everything except for autosave (although I'll occasionally enable "see computer moves"). Everything else is a hamper for me and unnecessary besides. I don't need 7 messages telling me I've just finished building a Swordsmith's Guild, nor do I need to see where everyone's emissaries are travelling to.
Like gunslinger, I also organize my soldiers by unit type when I have multiple stacks in a province. It definitely helps with keeping them organized after battles, and also allows me to make sure I have the proper troop composition for the province in which the army is stationed.
Ok, another valour question: if I have units that have been involved in a particularly bloody battle (in this case an uphill attack against high quality troops with a 2:1 advantage in numbers, albeit only rebels) and have gained 2-3 points of valour but lost 70%+ casualties in some cases, should I send them for re-training and lose some of that valour, or cobble them together in to larger units where it is possible to do so?
That was a long sentance wasn't it!
Merge them with another high valour unit. I often stockpile these types of units until I can merge them with units of a similar average valour. Remember that valour is an average. The individual valour of every individual man is tracked by the game during a campaign. This means that you may have a veteran unit of 20 royal bodyguards with this sort of valour:
3 2 2 2 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
Average valour (3+2+2+2+1)/20=0.5 (valour 0)
They go into battle, don't fight, but ten of the worst are killed by missiles leaving:
3 2 2 2 1 0 0 0 0 0
Average valour (3+2+2+2+1)/10=1 (valour 1)
They're not really any better, but AFAIK they will now get any attack/morale/defence bonuses due to the unit having 1 point of valour. The downside is that the unit is much smaller and not as effective.
So those 0 valour tail enders make a big difference. If you had a remnant unit of 15 valour 6 Feudal Men at Arms and retrained it, you could expect to see all of that valour diluted by the green troops.
So those 0 valour tail enders make a big difference. If you had a remnant unit of 15 valour 6 Feudal Men at Arms and retrained it, you could expect to see all of that valour diluted by the green troops.
Yes, this is pretty much what happened! My problem was that my first 'gold' armour province came on line just after this particular battle, so I sent all the battered units there to get shiny new kit.
I was also rather annoyed that my general's valour 12 RK unit somehow ended up at valour 8 after the battle. It lost 3/4 of its strength, which may have been all the 'best' men, but it was in the thick of the fighting throughout so the rest should surely have gained plenty of valour?! Hey ho.
Adrian II
12-21-2006, 14:08
Like gunslinger, I also organize my soldiers by unit type when I have multiple stacks in a province.There is a downside to this: when your province has 960+ troops in unit by unit stacks and the province is attacked, the AI wil group those units into an army for you and it will stack them in order of their entry into the province.
Beware of this effect, or you may end up on the battlefield with a totally clumsy army composed of, for instance, 14 Spearmen units, one unit of 3 Royal Knights (whose commander is a 'Coward') and one unit of 11 Elite Crossbowmen...
macsen rufus
12-21-2006, 14:34
One other thing to consider with your fragmented units - if one of the unit leaders has a valour-increasing virtue/vice (like "Famously brave" or "Pride") you can give him the lower-valour dregs, as his VnVs will boost them to his level. Or alternatively, send this unit back to your gold-plating province to be retrained.
gunslinger
12-21-2006, 21:06
There is a downside to this: when your province has 960+ troops in unit by unit stacks and the province is attacked, the AI wil group those units into an army for you and it will stack them in order of their entry into the province.
Beware of this effect, or you may end up on the battlefield with a totally clumsy army composed of, for instance, 14 Spearmen units, one unit of 3 Royal Knights (whose commander is a 'Coward') and one unit of 11 Elite Crossbowmen...
I don't think I've ever had this problem. When you go to the pre-battle screen you can pull whatever units you want out of the reinforcements pool and put them on as your starting army. If you have the Viking Invasion add on you can even arrange your reinforcements to come on in whatever order you wish.
There is a downside to this: when your province has 960+ troops in unit by unit stacks and the province is attacked, the AI wil group those units into an army for you and it will stack them in order of their entry into the province.
Beware of this effect, or you may end up on the battlefield with a totally clumsy army composed of, for instance, 14 Spearmen units, one unit of 3 Royal Knights (whose commander is a 'Coward') and one unit of 11 Elite Crossbowmen...
Do you not have Viking Invasion, Adrian?
Sensei Warrior
12-22-2006, 00:55
I used to always retrain my units instead of regrouping vetran units. I've been playing a campaign as the Sicilians and started grouping vetran units together. Man it makes a big, big difference when the high valor units go into battle, especially when the majority of the soldiers have high valor instead of half of them being green.
Can't wait to get them shiny new equiptment, so I can watch them mow down my enemies.
Macsen rufus' suggestion about using valor increasing generals to boost the dregs could be used to give an entirely green army a boost so more survive, to gain valour, to merge with your high valor guys. I did that with an army where the peasant general had one of those virtues. How the General gained the virtue is beyond me considering he was on permanent garrison duty. Maybe he was just created that way, I wasn't really paying attention when it happened.
macsen rufus
12-22-2006, 10:18
When I can be bothered to go through all the micromanagement (not every camapaign, I admit!) I will ship all my "Famously brave" and "Proud" units into one province for a reall killer army. But you know how it is marching individual units from one end of the empire to the other, only have to march them back when war breaks out on the wrong border :clown:
And one other thing I try to do, but it only works if you have a lot of similar units (maybe five or more) in the province after a battle: empty the second weakest (valour-wise) into the weakest unit - this tends to leave behind the best men, and you often see the average valour go up. Repeat until you've found all the highest-valour fragments, then combine these into one unit - even if it's still a bit understrength it can come out a couple of points ahead. Don't move men around too much, as moving them back seems to set it so that they get spread evenly between the units. It's that FIRST move out that seems to filter the goats from the sheep.
Adrian II
12-22-2006, 14:33
Do you not have Viking Invasion, Adrian?Sure, I have VI with teh fancy pre-battle screen, but not everyone else has - and besides, if you autocalculate a battle without checking your troops you can get the same nasty surprises in VI as in ordinary M:TW.
Sure, I have VI with teh fancy pre-battle screen, but not everyone else has - and besides, if you autocalculate a battle without checking your troops you can get the same nasty surprises in VI as in ordinary M:TW.
Ah, I see what you're saying. Yeah, you're right in that auto-calcing battles can be even more disadvantageous than normal if you separate multiple stacks by unit type. Believe me--I still remember when I first made that mistake when I had just got the game! It wasn't until after reading through some threads about the issue that I realized why I was losing auto-calced battles even though I had superior forces in the province I was defending. :wall:
Adrian II
12-22-2006, 20:16
Ah, I see what you're saying. Yeah, you're right in that auto-calcing battles can be even more disadvantageous than normal if you separate multiple stacks by unit type. Believe me--I still remember when I first made that mistake when I had just got the game! It wasn't until after reading through some threads about the issue that I realized why I was losing auto-calced battles even though I had superior forces in the province I was defending. :wall:Another possible surprise when you autocalc is that the AI will skip your Jedi 3 star General with the ´Magnificent Warrior´ and ´Expert Attacker´ traits and put the 4 star loser with ´Screaming Girl´ syndrome and nine toes in command of your troops.
Still, I am amazed at the outcome of some autocalc battles. In some cases you bring an army that can not but lose, and you win. On the other hand, yesterday I lost a battle with my 500 Turks against 800 Byzantines on autocalc, but when I restarted the battle and did my own fighting, my THA´s shot a 400 man hole in their BI and Slav Warriors and I came away victorious.
https://img252.imageshack.us/img252/1270/gruebel2dm8.gif (https://imageshack.us)
Another possible surprise when you autocalc is that the AI will skip your Jedi 3 star General with the ´Magnificent Warrior´ and ´Expert Attacker´ traits and put the 4 star loser with ´Screaming Girl´ syndrome and nine toes in command of your troops.
Well that happens regardless of whether you auto-calc or not. Unless, of course, you've found a workaround for that of which I'm unaware (and in which case, it's time to share!). ~D
Still, I am amazed at the outcome of some autocalc battles. In some cases you bring an army that can not but lose, and you win. On the other hand, yesterday I lost a battle with my 500 Turks against 800 Byzantines on autocalc, but when I restarted the battle and did my own fighting, my THA´s shot a 400 man hole in their BI and Slav Warriors and I came away victorious.
https://img252.imageshack.us/img252/1270/gruebel2dm8.gif (https://imageshack.us)
That's because the the auto-calc function doesn't seem to take into account the abilities of missile/hybrid units to kill from a distance--it only factors in their melee capabilities and (if I recall correctly) their valour level. Given that Turcoman Horse have only mediocre melee stats, that's probably why you lost that battle on auto-calc. I can't say that with absolute certainty, but it is (unfortunately) consistent with what I've seen in almost 4 years of playing this game. :thumbsdown:
Adrian II
12-22-2006, 20:42
Well that happens regardless of whether you auto-calc or not. Unless, of course, you've found a workaround for that of which I'm unaware (and in which case, it's time to share!). ~D Um, Martok, bear with me: pick up the Screamig Girl and move her into your next door province.
Bob will be your Uncle. :laugh4:
Just joking, I meant to say you get these car crashes if you autocalculate battle after battle without checking for any newly-acquired traits of your dynastic management. Your Jedi may become 'Strange' and then 'Unhinged Loon' within just two turns.
Edit
BTW I think you must be right about the AI autocalcing only on the basis of melee stats and valour. Certainly explains my experiences.
That's because the the auto-calc function doesn't seem to take into account the abilities of missile/hybrid units to kill from a distance--it only factors in their melee capabilities and (if I recall correctly) their valour level. Given that Turcoman Horse have only mediocre melee stats, that's probably why you lost that battle on auto-calc. I can't say that with absolute certainty, but it is (unfortunately) consistent with what I've seen in almost 4 years of playing this game. :thumbsdown:
Exactly. The AI performs a statistical battle of your units against the enemy's. This simply does not involve missiles of any kind. Melee stats, morale, generals command, number of men, valour etc is all taken into account and goes through the number cruncher. When it comes down to missiles it doesn't happen. This is why I never autocalc battles when playing as the Turks, because you lose battles you'd have won very easily if you'd played them.
What is this "auto-calc" you people speak of?
~D
Another thing to note, the auto-tidy function seems to do the exact wrong thing when merging units with different levels of armor/weapon tech. Although some may consider manual manipulation for "free" upgrades cheesy...
Sensei Warrior
12-22-2006, 23:41
What I find terrible about the auto-calc thing is when I fight a battle manually, and after the battle is over I go back and autocalc the same battle.
The terrible thing is the auto-calc did better than I did kill, loss, prisioner wise. Of course this might have been due to operator error ~;)
In all seriousness, if the auto-calc doesn't take missile into account, wouldn't it be beneficial for less tactical players to auto-calc battles where the opposing army is comprised with a large number of missile troops. Typically missile troops have poor to mediocre stats? This less tactical player would like to know :shame:
In all seriousness, if the auto-calc doesn't take missile into account, wouldn't it be beneficial for less tactical players to auto-calc battles where the opposing army is comprised with a large number of missile troops. Typically missile troops have poor to mediocre stats? This less tactical player would like to know :shame:
While Caravel, Rythmic, or another more "numbers-conscious" player can probably give you an exact answer, I can still say with 99% certainty that yes, auto-calculating battles favors the army with fewer missile units (if all other factors are equal). As a result, I manually fight a lot more defensive battles than offensive battles (since missiles are generally more useful for the defender than the attacker).
Sensei Warrior
12-23-2006, 00:21
I fought a battle last night where I was attacking the French. I was outnumbered and the French had a horribly high number of Archers. I had typical early cannon fodder. Spearmen, Urban Militia, a couple of archers, and some hobbies. It was a tough battle since few of my troops were willing to charge into that much arrow fire. I won but now I can't help think I had a much better chance if I autocalced it.
Adrian II
12-23-2006, 12:07
Another thing to note, the auto-tidy function seems to do the exact wrong thing when merging units with different levels of armor/weapon tech. Although some may consider manual manipulation for "free" upgrades cheesy...What do you mean 'free upgrades'? Do you get those with your Happy Meal? In my case, they are the reward for hard-fought battles and go at the expense of troop numbers.
Some people .. ~D
Upgrades are always free anyway. There is no retraining cost for running your intact units through provinces with better armourers or metalsmiths. So it makes sense that "cheating" some upgrades through merging units should also be free.
Edit: Not so bad really. If they were under Tony Blair, they'd probably turn up for crusade with 10 men sharing a shield and breastplate. :no:
In all seriousness, if the auto-calc doesn't take missile into account, wouldn't it be beneficial for less tactical players to auto-calc battles where the opposing army is comprised with a large number of missile troops. Typically missile troops have poor to mediocre stats? This less tactical player would like to know :shame:
I'll give you an example, play a VI campaign as the Vikings. Autocalc every battle. You will win 80% of the time if not more. For the reasons Caravel gave, missiles are not taken into account, thus your uber Huskarls and Joms Vikings can defeat armies when outnumbered 10:1 if not more; even in situations where you could not as you would get shot up by those damned Kerns (or whatever).
Sensei Warrior
12-26-2006, 06:12
I guess that is another temptation I am going to have to avoid ... auto-calc-ing battles where the opponents have high numbers of missile units. It seems a little unfair to factions that have high numbers of missile troops, such as the Turks or the Mongols.
Deus ret.
12-28-2006, 16:28
It IS unfair. When playing as the Byz I regularly auto-calc especially in the beginning stages of a campaign, i.e. while still fighting the Turks. Suppose your army consisting of 3 units of Byz infantry plus ultra-slow katank general is attacked by a considerably larger force made up of mainly HA's of any kind. Since I'm not the best imaginable general, I'm pretty sure I would have a 90+% chance of losing when playing manually simply because the enemy would shoot my troops to pieces. But when I press auto-calc I lose less than one Byz infantry while killing off the largest part of the enemy army. Of course it's kind of cheap but then there are some constellations that you can't possibly win otherwise, and honestly can't be bothered to try yourself - trying to trap those HA's for an entire battle is already a tedious task with cavalry but with infantry I can feel a nervous breakdown approaching.
Speaking of it, this may be the reason why in my campaigns the AI Byz fare pretty well most of the times while they're still fighting the Turks but begin to crumble when they face more massive (Egyptian) armies.
Sensei Warrior
12-29-2006, 01:22
I often auto-calc when fighting the Horde. I really don't want to fight a battle with 8+ stacks of bad guys, especially the Horde with their HAs and everyone else that skirmishes. I never realized that some of the best auto-calc outcomes I had was while using infantry/cavalry heavy armies. Hmm.
The Unknown Guy
01-11-2007, 11:09
To answer your fist question, I believe only certain provinces which contain the Iron resource are able to fully build up the weaponsmith buildings.
As to your second, once you hold a certain percentage of the map, the game tries to make it more challenging by dropping the happiness levels in your settlements - it's not a bug, it's an actual feature. It usually happens when you own around 60 % (or was it 80%) of the map. Irritating, but bound to happen sooner or later. It's basically why a lot of people prefer GA mode over conquest mode...
:balloon2:
So THAT is the reason why when the AI in the other side of the world conquers a huge empire it tends to implode, and many of the slaughtered factions reemerge from the rebel remnants? I thought it was the AI doing something horribly wrong (I tend to turtle, so I didn´t encounter that yet)
In a byzantine vanilla game, it allowed me to get the Iberian Peninsula as byzantium by buying the rebelling armies which had been my Italian ally´s former grand armee. The Italians themselves were beaten and hamstrung, as that rebellion had synchroniced with a papal reemergence all through Italy. So the Italians themselves ended up being left with a few provinces in... Scandinavia, I think. :p
It's called the bloat effect. The ways to counter it is to build happy buildings (Town watch, religious buildings, border forts and watch towers, brothel) in advance, plant high valour spies on all of your provinces, increase garisson size and give governors' titles to high dread generals. Distance from the faction leader is another factor. Keep him in the central provinces.
When your empire gets big, the position of your king has a very direct influence on the loyalties of provinces you hold. You should make sure that your king can ideally travel to anywhere of your empire within a turn or one year. To see this effect, try isolating your king on an island, cutting off all shipping routes from that island and check the loyalties of your provinces. Some remote province with a small garrison may even revolt.
When your empire gets big, the position of your king has a very direct influence on the loyalties of provinces you hold. You should make sure that your king can ideally travel to anywhere of your empire within a turn or one year. To see this effect, try isolating your king on an island, cutting off all shipping routes from that island and check the loyalties of your provinces. Some remote province with a small garrison may even revolt.
Getting your leader cut off from some of your provinces is disastrous to loyalty (provinicial happiness). Also you may have noticed that as the Byzantine, starting in early, that the three islands of Crete, Rhodes and Cyprus start with quite low loyalty due to them being isolated. An enemy ship arriving on the scene where none of your own ships are present will cut loyalty in half. The most important thing is to ensure that the faction leader can reach all provinces whether by land or sea, irrespective of the number of years it would take him to get there. They must be connected in one way or the other. This solves the first problem. The "distance from faction leader" provincial happiness penatly is a separate issue, as is the "bloat effect" happiness penalty. The bloat also sees an increase in vices such as "family favourites" and other corruption related vices.
gunslinger
01-12-2007, 17:29
. . . give governors' titles to high dread generals.
I prefer to give the titles to high accumen generals. The increased tax revenue easily pays for a few extra units of peasants or vanilla spearmen to garrison the place. I always leave enough of a garrison to keep taxes on very high with happiness around 200%. That way if I get an unexpected excommunication or my king gets cut off, I have plenty of wiggle room to temporarily reduce taxes to normal or so and prevent rebellions.
Kavhan Isbul
01-12-2007, 19:32
An important thing to keep in mind is that you should have the province where you would like to have your new ruler appear better developped than any other provinces you own. If you happen to conquer a highly developped island or far away province (for example you play with the English and conquer Constantinople, which the Byzantines have built up), it is imperative that you destroy some buildings there - painful, but not nearly as painful as having your new ruler assume the throne in Constantinople, while at the same time a naval war breaks out and he is effectively cut off from the rest of the Empire.
I prefer to give the titles to high accumen generals. The increased tax revenue easily pays for a few extra units of peasants or vanilla spearmen to garrison the place. I always leave enough of a garrison to keep taxes on very high with happiness around 200%. That way if I get an unexpected excommunication or my king gets cut off, I have plenty of wiggle room to temporarily reduce taxes to normal or so and prevent rebellions.
Obviously. Under normal circumstances you will want to find those with both high dread and accumen, if they've got very high dread however you may want to use them as a temporary solution to help stabilise a province like Lithuania or Portugal when the bloat effect hits.
An important thing to keep in mind is that you should have the province where you would like to have your new ruler appear better developped than any other provinces you own.....
I should probably know this, but what determines where your new ruler appears when your old one dies? It doesn't seem to have any relation to where your heir was the turn before...?
I should probably know this, but what determines where your new ruler appears when your old one dies? It doesn't seem to have any relation to where your heir was the turn before...?
He appears in your most developed province. (This is why your new rulers often appear in Constantinople if you've conquered it.)
Sensei Warrior
01-23-2007, 00:59
Agreed. The King appears in the best developed provence. It's always funny to see the King trapped in Constantinople because he was cut off by a Naval faction you're at war with. The rest of your not-connected Empire (the English for example) rebells, and you're left with a provence of one. Although one could argue that since the one is Constantinople it might not necessarily be a bad thing.
Agreed. The King appears in the best developed provence. It's always funny to see the King trapped in Constantinople because he was cut off by a Naval faction you're at war with. The rest of your not-connected Empire (the English for example) rebells, and you're left with a provence of one. Although one could argue that since the one is Constantinople it might not necessarily be a bad thing.
One of the best campaigns I've ever played worked out like this. I was playing the English/Early/Hard and had crusaded to Constantinople, early in the campaign. The king passed away and the new king reappeared on the other side of Europe... and I had no way to return him to England, which rebelled. The French then seized the advantage and decimated the English, and I was left with nothing but Constantinople and the crusaders that had arrived there, whom of which were slowly expanding into the rest of Byzantine and Turkish Territory. In that particular campaign I didn't return to England until the late era. It was a case of billmen, Chivalric Foot Knights and longbows vs the Mongols in Gerorgia. Truly memorable campaign. I may try and intentionally do it again, which won't be quite the same, but should be interesting nonetheless.
Sensei Warrior
01-24-2007, 00:22
The poor English! They seem to have problems like that. Most of my for examples reference a game I played, as was that one.
I crusaded to Constantinople via ship and claimed it. The king died a few years later and was moved there. I was young (it was one of my first campaigns) and inexperienced so I left him there. The very next turn I was blindsided by an Ally who was a naval forcve to be reckoned with. With most of my fleet decimated and the rest blockaded, my English lands rebelled and I was left with little ole Constantinople.
I think it was the Spanish who consumed the rest of my lands as I slowly Crusaded into Africa, across to Morocco, and up the Iberian Pennisula. At one point when you looked at the map the English held all the initial Spanish lands and Spain held all the initial English ones.
The only reason it happened was because I didn't realize what a precarious position I put my Empire, but it was one of my more memorable campaigns. It's funny how someones experience helps make their campaigns more boring.
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