Influence (and how to get it)

I'm playing the Hungarians at expert and having to tread lightly so far. The only factions gone are the Turks and Aragonese so my neighbors (particulary the Byz and Germans) are better off financially and have larger forces.
I've managed to take Moldavia, Serbia, Wallachia, Venice, and Tuscany, but the last two only due to use of Crusades. (in WesMod it takes ten years to 'grow' a Crusade)

Anyway, I'm on my third Monarch and, without conquests, there seems to be little I can do to increase my King's influence.

So, in what manner can I increase influence? Also, beyond the nice 'Builder' benefit of +2 to loyalty, what good is that influence? Will it make other factions less likely to declare war? Give me their daughter's hands?

That's another problem.... Danes, Anglais, Poles, they all seem to want their daughters to die virgins, rather than let my heirs marry them. Anyone have any angle on how to make even allies let loose of their daughters?

I did have some luck recently when the Egyptians broke their alliance with me, and the Byz (with whom they are warring) offered me alliance on the SAME turn that I had two emissaries asking for two Byz daughters. They said yes to both

Insights, anyone? Thanks

Here's one way to pry loose their daughters. When a catholic or orthodox faction sends an emissary offering an alliance, reject it, but imediately send your emissary(s) after one(or more) of their princesses.

Generally, if they are after an alliance, they are usually amenable to a marriage too.

Building fortresses seems to improve long term influence, but I'm not entirely certain about this. Marrying foreign princesses and having your princess' marry foreign prince's seems to improve influence as well.

Successfully completing a crusade immediately gives your king one more thingy of influence (thingy being the technical term).

In diplomatic terms a high influence ratings makes acceptance of your emissaries proposals more likely. Also, when you engage in war, a country that is allied to both you and your new enemy will more likely break the alliance in favour of you. You'll notice two different images on the parchments that are titled "Alliance Broken", the weapon brandishing horseman (when they remain allied to your opponent) and the suplicant emmisary (when they remain allied to you).

Influence is the most important thing for your king, because it affects the quality of your heirs. So if your king has an influence rating of 6 or higher, your heirs are going to have better stats (both stars and vices)

There are two ways of increasing your king's influence that i'm aware of. The first is completing a crusade as Cactus said and the second is by helping an ally that is under siege (by breaking it of course).

I don't know if there's another way.

GAH

Vanya just finished a Turkish campaign. Vanya's last 4 sultans ALL had influence 9

How did Vanya do it? Easy When new sultan took throne, Vanya launched 4 Jihads at an enemy province. Vanya always made sure to raid some hapless province for this eventuality. When you take it, you get +1 influence for each successful Jihad. In this case, +4, since Vanya launched 4. The last sultan started with 5, so the Jihads alone got him the 9. The other ones got extra influence from enslaving prisioners and whatnot to get the full 9.

So, its real easy to get influence as a muslim. Vanya liked this since the Turks tend to have loyalty problems in general. Influence 9 king means nobody thinks outside the box.

Vanya sez... successful crusade give +1 influence too. But you can only do 1 at a time. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cg...ons/pissed.gif

Yes, you can get influence by helping an ally lift a siege or take a province. IE, you attack a province, and he does, but he sends more men and gets it as a result instead of you. Either gives you influence. Vanya has inadvertantly done this from time to time. Kinda hard to determine when the enemy will attack a province though so you can be sure to send a token horsearcher or something to sneak in the +1 influence.

GAH

In the case of civil war, high influence will help to prevent it, but it cannot stop it all together. also after a civil war is declared, you may lose some provinces to rebels. All it takes is a King who has high influence and those rebel provinces will declare their allegiance to you once again.

It has been my experience that simply successfully attacking other factions can gain influence.

As the Almohads I successfully wiped out the Spanish in two turns (not the first two, just two years) and recieved influence for it (I think). In the first year, since all Spanish were dead except their King-who always seems to escape the battlefield http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/mad.gif - all of my allies remained loyal to me. Since I wasn't all too influential at the time, I think it may have had something to do with the fact that the Spanish were about to be wiped out.

You're right Aelwyn - conquering new lands gives influence. BTW influence never bothered me - you just have to make total war all of the time and winning will provide all the influence you can get. And what king needs high influence if most of the map is his realm? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cg...icons/cool.gif GAME OVER AI

Thanks for the replies, folks

Vanya, you're a funny guy...hehe

I have a related question about influence. I'm playing as the Hungarians on normal with the VI expansion. I've conquered all of central, western and most of eastern Europe. I even own Scandanavia and most of Italy. My question is, how do I create alliances now? I have a 9-crown King, but every one rejects my alliance (or even peace) requests. It's as if they know I'm the Scourge of the Land.

With influence 9 and that much real estate, you don't need allies.

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Originally Posted by [b

Quote[/b] (Qilue @ Sep. 13 2003,17:38)]With influence 9 and that much real estate, you don't need allies.

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Yep when you have 9 Influence, chanes are your doing so well its sickening for them to watch You would be the power they wished they were... And the one they all want to hate.

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Originally Posted by [b

Commentaire[/b] (The_Emperor @ Sept. 14 2003,11:46)]

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Originally Posted by [b

Commentaire[/b] (Qilue @ Sep. 13 2003,17:38)]With influence 9 and that much real estate, you don't need allies.

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Yep when you have 9 Influence, chanes are your doing so well its sickening for them to watch You would be the power they wished they were... And the one they all want to hate.

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Any real life references? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cg...cons/joker.gif

Nah, outside that silly joke, you conquered half of the map, they expect you trying to conquer the other map... including them. That makes them cautious towards your intentions

Arranging alliances whether diplomatically or through marriage can increase influence. I think (not certain about this) that certain Virtues (like Steward of Great Builder) will imorive your influence too. But if I have a new heir to the thrown I usually send him on a couple of battles to prove his worth anyway. Gaining land seems to be the fastest way to boost it.

It also means you have to tread lightly, of course... In the early stages of the game, you can offer launch a quick war against a neighbour who is beating off someone else, grab a couple of lightly defended provinces, and then sue for peace. As you get more powerful, its difficult to avoid long, protracted wars... and in the middle of one you may well find yourself under attack by some other country as well. And you won't be able to quickly arrange a ceasefire to deal with the other guy either.

It seems to me that they won't accept your alliance or marraige proposals if they want to attack you in the near future. Sometimes I will marry off princesses to those I am already allied with. The ones that accept have the relationship strenghtened and the ones that refuse always wind up breaking the alliance and attacking not long afterwords. The more lands you have the more people will want to go to war with you and therefore practically impossible to form an alliance.

Asmodeus.....

You mentioned the 'Great Builder' virtue. I've found it's easy to acquire this virtue for a new monarch by building the cheap add-ons to castles. In two years I'll have built one in every province and my monarch has a 'rep' as a great builder

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Originally Posted by [b

Quote[/b] (Vanya @ Sep. 11 2003,09:18)]GAH

Vanya just finished a Turkish campaign. Vanya's last 4 sultans ALL had influence 9

How did Vanya do it? Easy When new sultan took throne, Vanya launched 4 Jihads at an enemy province. Vanya always made sure to raid some hapless province for this eventuality. When you take it, you get +1 influence for each successful Jihad. In this case, +4, since Vanya launched 4. The last sultan started with 5, so the Jihads alone got him the 9. The other ones got extra influence from enslaving prisioners and whatnot to get the full 9.

So, its real easy to get influence as a muslim. Vanya liked this since the Turks tend to have loyalty problems in general. Influence 9 king means nobody thinks outside the box.

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Wow, your not kidding one bit. I'm getting warnings about a number of my generals and a few turns after the 4 Jihads they're all the most trustworthy of men. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cg...cons/shock.gif

I observed something peculiar regarding my kalifah's influence in my current Almohad campaign. I was a total pacificst, as I tend to be when I play the muslims, so my kalifahs got some very low influence. I used the times of peace to improve the economy, build a navy and put alims or emissaries in every enemy province, so I could watch the other factions fight each other.

My kalifah had influence of 2 or 3 when I got an agent into the last province available. Actually it was second from last but I couldn't get one into Ireland because it has no port. The next turn my influence increased by 1. The next turn it increased by another one and then it just counted up until I had 9 influence. Seemed strange. No conquests or battles to explain it. No assassinations or anything.

Much later I discovered that I could no longer see Livonia on the minimap and then found that my alim had moved to Novgorod. Perhaps I somehow moved it accidentally, although I didn't think so. Lo and behold; my kalifah is back to the influnce of 2 or 3 Move the alim back to Livonia. The next turn my influnce increases by 1. Year++ Influence++ all they way up to 9.

So here I am thinking that having a network of agents covering the entire map increases your influence by 1 to the maximum of 9, this influence disappearing if the network breaks. What surprises me most is that I did not need to include the portless Ireland.

Hmm, that's an interesting observation: about the network of agents... gotta try it out... ;)

I'm sure I read a while ago that the better your influence, the better your 'control' over your provinces. I'm sure you're all aware that it's preferable to have your king near the center of your empire to evenly distribute his influence, but the stronger his influence is, the more productive your provinces will be and therefore the greater your taxes... I think. Can someone confirm that please?

Position of the king definitely has an influence on province loyalty, but I never bothered to look if there's a change in tax income because of it.
I also noticed the +1 influence thing in some campaigns, but I never connected it to the agent network, it might well be, but it could also be something else that happened at the same time.
Also, sometimes your king constantly gains influence until the counter flips over and restarts at 1 crown or more...

Pushing further one of the way described to gain influence;

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Originally Posted by [b

Quote[/b] ]....the second is by helping an ally that is under siege (by breaking it of course).

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Well, if you are lucky enough to have ally, it might get tough to help them if they don't face problem... And sure they won't get in trouble when you really need influence...

Or will they?

I had a French king allied with Novgorod some time ago...
Novgorod was barely hangin on Livonia... Hop, some spies and some inquisitor / bishops later, the province revolts

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cg...ons/tongue.gif


As expected, Novogorod moved back to the castle...

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cg...gc-curtain.gif

Guess who came to the rescue? The French...

A couple of years later, Livonia revolted again... Again, the French came to the rescue, and gained 1 influence point.

Who send all those spies and bishop to create revolts in Livonia, I don't know, and I won't tell.

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cg.../gc-jester.gif

But the French king was very happy to help an ally in trouble indeed.

Send strategic agent in ally province to cause them to revolt, then come to the rescue, and voila 1 influence point

Louis,

That's just smurfy ...And you don't need to tell..it's always the French, I know it http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cg...icons/wink.gif

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Originally Posted by [b

Quote[/b] (Kristaps @ Feb. 09 2004,10:06)]Hmm, that's an interesting observation: about the network of agents... gotta try it out... ;)

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Nopsy, tried it a week ago: covered the whole map with agents: the influence of the king didn't budge a bit...

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cg...cons/angry.gif

In my mind, the best thing about influence is the Happiness and Loyalty bonuses throughout the empire. This is what prevents rebellions and civil wars, and boosts productivity too, I believe.

Watch the loyalty of your provinces drop if your king should be cut off from the rest of the empire. Never use your king to invade an island because the port gets destroyed, and your king will be cut off until the port is rebuilt and you have ships connecting it to your other ports.

very true. Any province cut off from the rest of the empire will suffer terrible loyalty for a while, and of course you canl;t move in troops because it;s cut off.

This is especially noticable when you go into a naval war, and find that half your provinces revolt because your ships have been sunk, or are being blockaded.

I find the easiest way to gian influence is to inherit it. If daddy has it, then the son has most of it, usually at worse one or two points less, which can be crusaded up easily.

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Originally Posted by [b

Quote[/b] (Kristaps @ Feb. 20 2004,13:23)]

Quote:

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Originally Posted by [b

Quote[/b] (Kristaps @ Feb. 09 2004,10:06)]Hmm, that's an interesting observation: about the network of agents... gotta try it out... ;)

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Nopsy, tried it a week ago: covered the whole map with agents: the influence of the king didn't budge a bit...

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cg...cons/angry.gif

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That's strange. I'm still getting this effect. When a new heir takes over, the influence starts counting +1 to 9. Are all your agents religious agents? Mine are.

If it's just a coincidence that this rise started when i completed my network, then what is really causing it? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cg...s/confused.gif

@cazbol - i think yer experiencing one of the undocumented features of the game. I've seen other posts about the same strangeness (influence on a roller-coaster). Nobody had a clue as to what caused it. Some campaigns it happened, others it didn't.