Have a few questions!

[Valion]

Hi there i would like some tips so that to play better in EB.

1) What is the best choice to do to a conquered settlement?

2) Is it better for me to refrain troop movements in winter?

3) Does a Heroic victory help in gaining better traits/retinue? i challenge myself in battles by purposely making my invading armies fewer in Vh/Vh.

4) How come Very confident troops go down to confident troops even when in Roma?

5) What are the best trait(s) a Roman can get or i should hope to get?

6) I noticed that some of my family members had the pessimistic trait and it describes it can lead to depression what does this mean? what should i be doing to prevent something going bad?

7) Can Loyalty go down? if so how? if does go down how can it be increased?

8) I noticed Command Stars are harder to gain than in vanilla.. does this mean i have to constantly engage in battles?

Thanks very much in advance! i might ask some more questions in the future but for now i would really like to know the answers to these questions of mine.

[Thaatu]

1. Occupy, since other options seem to increase unrest. Depends on the situation though. You should do what seems natural at the time, not what's best gameplay wise.

2. Family members are more at risk during winter, meaning through traits like "on his deathbed" and such, so it would be best to restrict at least FM movement during winters. Of course, the historical approach is to limit troop movement altogether.

3. Yes. Also, if you expose your FM to real melee combat, he'll gain some traits that reflect on his personal fighting skills.

4. The best way for troops to gain confidence is through battle. Too long at peace and the troops lose their confidence.

5. No idea, but again, don't focus on "getting" traits. They come and go, like in life.

6. Pessimistic traits usually give penalties to troop morale and some other attributes, while there are some "positive" pessimistic traits. Usually you can't really prevent pessimistic traits. He'll always find something to be sad about. Depends on his level of pessimism.

7. Yes, and there are many ways. You shouldn't focus on "leveling-up" your FMs. Think of traits as their personality, not their stats.

8. Command stars are hard to gain, but they don't have as much meaning as "troop morale". Hard to explain, but focus more on trait bonuses and penalties, than on command stars. AI has a bonus in command to balance the battles.


I hope at least some of the answers were coherent.

[Ludens]

1) What choice are you referring to? What to do with the population or what government to install? In the first, it depends on how much unrest you are anticipating. If it's little or you can garrison it properly, chose occupy. Expelling the population simply moves the unrest to another place (it sends half the population to other cities in your empire that have governors), however it generally becomes more manageable this way. Enslaving is the easy way out, but may result in bad traits for your general, especially if he is unselfish.

For the government, it depends on what you want to do with the city. Type III and IV are easy to install and allow you to take control and quell unrest quickly. Type IV also comes with a handy client-ruler governor, although his bodyguard does cost a mite. Type I and II require more of an effort to install, but allow more advanced buildings. Type I allows recruitment of most factional units, type IV of most regional ones, while type II and III fall in between.

2) You can move in winter, just not very far. Remember also that if you continually move your family members to the max of their movement radius, they will grow tired and slow down.

3) Yes. Incidentally, recommended battle difficulty for EB is M. VH does not make the A.I. smarter, it simply gives its units insane bonuses. Also, it does not influence traits, so playing at VH will not make you generals get better fast.

4) Although not random, morale is somewhat fickle in EB. Troops never stay very confident for long in my experience, or they must be serving a very good general during a campaign.

5) There's so many of them! Basically, it depends on what personality your general is and what you are using him for, but you shouldn't expect to ever see all good traits on a general.

6) It means that their mood can turn sombre, impairing their ability. This can also lead to bad traits like alcoholism. In order to prevent this, give them something meaningful to do that is suited to their abilities. Vigorous generals generally like to go out in the field, lazy ones prefer to stay in cities. Family members can also chafe at having to manage some backwater instead of a bustling city.

7) All characters have a set loyalty, however IIRC it can go up and down a bit. Best make sure they are happy, if you want to prevent this, but unless the A.I. is very bribe-happy it won't make that much of a difference.

8) No, you don't have to since command stars are not that important for battlefield success. Morale is more important. The A.I. gets extra command stars to compensate for its stupidity.

[Valion]

Ahaha thanks for the answers guys.... so it's not only me who thinks the AI is still quite stupid>.> thus the reason why i play Vh/Vh to as you clearly stated compensate for its stupidity.

Another thing guys what does the "windows mode on" in configuration do?
Also out of utter curiousity will their be legionaires with special names latter in the game?

Thanks again guys you helped alot.

[Mediolanicus]

"Also out of utter curiousity will their be legionaires with special names latter in the game?"

No.

And VH battle doesn't compensate anything. It just gives stat bonuses because of which even levy slingers can defeat your elite soldiers in a one on one battle...

[Valion]

Hmm maybe it was in another mod where 1st legionarian cohorts get a name from where they were recruited.

EH? can slingers realy defeat my elite soldiers on 1-1 battle? .......well maybe so but it does'nt really matter since i prefer to play vh/vh in all my RTW campaigns including EB and still manage to utterly pawn them.