Any tips for getting through a campaign faster?

[Pikenier]

I believe I am right in saying that even in glorious achievement mode you will get offered a victory if/when you've conquered 60% of the provinces.

That is true. There is no need to choose conquest mode at all.
When selecting Glorious Achievement mode you can also win by conquering 60%. And if you continue also the 100% conquest victory is included. Or just wait until the endyear 1453 - then the Glory Points decide the victor.

Oh and GA has other adavantages as well. When a factions gets destroyed and reappears later in the campaign their Glory Points have been deleted. So they have to start new from zero points. Can be of some advantage for the human player.
And the greatest advantage is that all goals are optional. You (and the AI) are not forced to fulfill all of them. As long as you have the most points at the end it doesn´t matter if e.g. all crusades failed or something like that. ;-)

edit: When selecting a late (1321) campaign then the campaign is over faster obviously.
Glory Points help also as you can hold your empire smaller and don´t need to conquer 2/3 of the map. Fewer battles = fewer hours to play.
Try always to invade with superior numbers. Cause often the AI retreats to the castle or leaves the province resulting in fewer battles also.
Never fight siege battles - wait until the garrison surrenders. Use assassins or spies to open the gates and take over the castle at night. So you don´t have to wait three or four years and have to fear the enemies bringing a relief force from nearby provinces.
Try also to kill enemy royal families either in battles or with your assassins. Maybe a high trained Inquisitor can also burn some princes. When the faction gets destroyed (=no family members left) their troops get rebells. Easier to conquer as they don´t interact anymore. You can collect the provinces one after another.

[Trapped in Samsara]

Hi

All that Pikenier says is true. But I generally try to avoid killing off a faction in its entirety. Wherever possible, and obviously allowing for strategic geographic considerations (you do not want a hostile province in the middle of your empire's hinterland) I will leave a faction a single province for as long as possible. The reason: that way you avoid, or at least cut down on, faction reappearances.

Now these ARE one of the spicier, more exciting aspects of MTW, I feel. I'm sure all vets have had the 'OMFG! What the hell is that?!' experience when a souped up multi mega stack reappearance is announced in your empire (shoudln't happen unless you've not been managing province happiness and garrison numbers properly) or, more likely, in an adjacent AI empire which is tottering. And some provinces (e.g., Portugal IIRC) are more prone to this than others.

So, while I think reappearances are yet another excellent feature of this truly great game, if you're looking to shorten the length of the campaign, then 'managing' the AI dynasties is something you should think about.

Best regards
Victor

Sapere aude
Horace

[Trapped in Samsara]

"Never fight siege battles - wait until the garrison surrenders."

Not always possible. It's silly, but if a tiny number of defenders make it into the fortification it will hold out 'for ever'.

V

[cpgray]

It's silly, but if a tiny number of defenders make it into the fortification it will hold out 'for ever'.

But then the assault is quick and easy and so trivial it is worth automatically resolving it.

[Trapped in Samsara]

But then the assault is quick and easy and so trivial it is worth automatically resolving it.

Of course you're right. (I never auto resolve anything. Just my masochistic preference to see things through to the bitter end.)

V

[Gilrandir]

Hi

But I generally try to avoid killing off a faction in its entirety. Wherever possible, and obviously allowing for strategic geographic considerations (you do not want a hostile province in the middle of your empire's hinterland) I will leave a faction a single province for as long as possible. The reason: that way you avoid, or at least cut down on, faction reappearances.

Now these ARE one of the spicier, more exciting aspects of MTW, I feel. I'm sure all vets have had the 'OMFG! What the hell is that?!' experience when a souped up multi mega stack reappearance is announced in your empire (shoudln't happen unless you've not been managing province happiness and garrison numbers properly) or, more likely, in an adjacent AI empire which is tottering. And some provinces (e.g., Portugal IIRC) are more prone to this than others.

That's what I do. Moreover, if a faction leader is killed and the faction becomes a pack of rebel provinces, I always leave one province unconquered as there is a great probability that re-emerging of the faction (if it ever comes) will be limited to that very province. Although, that is not 100% guarantee. Once playing as the French I accidentally killed the last king of England. By that time the English were evicted north of the Thames (to Mercia and Wales and perhaps something else up there). But when the faction reappeared it popped up not only there but in the heart of my empire - Anjou where I didn't keep any significant forces it being my no-border internal province.
So, I would like to ask: are there any laws that determine the provinces subject to faction re-emergence?

[Plato]

are there any laws that determine the provinces subject to faction re-emergence?

To qualify as a site for a possible re-emergance, the province has to:

• have been owned by the faction at some point in the past (even one turn will do, apparently)

• have a happiness lower than 120%

Of course, this leads to some further questions to which I don't have the answer:

• Is there a limit to the number of regions that can be affected?

• Is there anything further which determines how the re-emergance manifests itself (unit types and numbers)?

I know that the provinces don't have to be contiguous (ie. sharing a border or sea); crusader factions sometimes get a plot in Europe, and either an island or a crusade target.

[drone]

A reemergence has to have a "seed" province, a province previously owned by the dead faction that is under 100% happiness and triggers an uprising. I think that if any of the other provinces previously owned by the faction are under 120%, they get sucked into the reemergence. So as long as you keep your provinces over 120% happiness, you don't need to worry about losing a province to reemergences.

[cpgray]

A reemergence has to have a "seed" province, a province previously owned by the dead faction that is under 100% happiness and triggers an uprising. I think that if any of the other provinces previously owned by the faction are under 120%, they get sucked into the reemergence. So as long as you keep your provinces over 120% happiness, you don't need to worry about losing a province to reemergences.

I think it's pretty clear from the manual, the game interface, and frogbeastegg's beginners guide, that rebellion only happens when happiness drops under 100%. It is recommended that you keep all your provinces at >= 120% because there are things that will drop the happiness in one turn so you want a bit of a cushion. Frogbeastegg says that the auto tax management in the original game aimed to keep happiness at >= 100% and that caused problems (for instance, when your monarch leaves the kingdom to a less competent son) when happiness dropped at times. With VI the auto tax management aims at 120% so that a small, quick drop keeps you over 100%.

[Brandy Blue]

With VI the auto tax management aims at 120% so that a small, quick drop keeps you over 100%.

And there was me changing my taxes manually because I thought VI did this the same way vanilla does. Thanks for the tip.

[Gilrandir]

I think it's pretty clear from the manual, the game interface, and frogbeastegg's beginners guide, that rebellion only happens when happiness drops under 100%.

It is not about rebellion, but reemergence chances, and as far as I understood Drone differentiates rebellion (which happens if loyalty is below 100%) and probable reappearence of a faction (if loyalty is above 100% but lower than 120%). Thus, to have 110% loyal province will not prevent it from going over to a resurrected faction.