Thanks for the help Monk I've noticed that I have to pay allot more attention to my characters in order to ensure they get good traits. Also, as Old Geezer said I can't believe I wasted so much time on vanilla (he had retrofit) when I could have been playing SS. Shadebeard after you finish your English campaign I recommend Genoa as a good faction because you can unite northern Italy and thus have a strong defensive position from the Alps (unlike vanilla were the Alps barely give any choke points), while your cities churn out tons of cash. Beware though, because your cities won't tec up as fast as in vanilla leaving you with Italian Spear Malitia but no Xbows for the first 100 turns or so.