Rome 2 Tips and un-/under-documented features

[Forward Observer]

I don't think anybody has mentioned this yet, but I just realized that when one recruits a spy from the pool, it seems to work out best to pick the one on the far right of the group. It appears that they will be the youngest. I was just picking from left to right and was getting 40 year old spies who obviously were only going to last 20 turns or so. By switching to picking from the right end of the list, I've started getting spies who were only 17 or 18 years old. I haven't checked to see if a younger ones comes with less starting traits than the older ones, but obviously an 18 year old is going to be around 22 turns longer than one who is already 40, so one can get the chance to really level them up.

I haven't checked this for dignitaries and champions yet, but it could be the same for them also.

Cheers

P.S.
I'm too lazy to take the time to check this out, but I guessing that unless the agents in the pool are in some sort of frozen stasis until they are recruited they are also aging each turn---and that new agents added to the pool are added to the right end of the list and therefore are the youngest.

[Bramborough]

Yep, that's exactly what happens. The left and middle candidates have been sitting around getting grayer since the last time you passed them over. And oh by the way, same for generals as well.

Would be nice if the game generated a new three-candidate "random sample" of three each time. At least for agents.

[AntiDamascus]

That's why their age needs to be listed when you pick them.

[Myth]

I pick based on starting trait as I'd rather get a bonus to unit xp while training with my champion than -2 unrest in local province.

[Forward Observer]

I pick based on starting trait as I'd rather get a bonus to unit xp while training with my champion than -2 unrest in local province.

I can't argue with the premise of choosing agents based on starting traits, but I think it that it could be equally important to also consider if there is a negative trade-off in said agent's longevity. Obviously, longevity would imply the ability to have your agent level up more and an extra 20 turns or more to do so could be significant.

It also could work out that picking based on traits works better for one type of agent and longevity for others. Of course this would also depend on how the player uses their agents with their particular play style. It's all good I guess.


Cheers

[Bramborough]

For me, champ and dignitary selection first depends on their military training and civil admin skills, as these directly impact how I use these guys. However, this usually doesn't play against also picking for young age. The older agents are older because I passed them over last time...which usually means they didn't have my preferred skill to begin with. It essentially comes down to a lottery over whether the newest, youngest candidate has the desired trait or not. When he doesn't, it means that none of the three have it, so then I can just pick the young one anyway.

Less clear for spies...I find their typical starting traits less useful, as I rarely embed them in armies or use them for intelligence/counter-intelligence. Most (not all) of their starting skills play into these type roles, where instead I use spies actively, converting/blocking enemy agents, sabotaging armies and towns. They quickly get pretty good at this regardless of starting skill, so I now generally default to picking the gal on the far right, figuring she's youngest.

[Slaists]

tired of "events" cleaning out your treasury? invest your treasury in expensive buildings before the turn end. voila - "events" all of a sudden become much more affordable ;) on the next turn, cancel construction to recover costs.

might be considered an exploit.

[Bramborough]

I understand the logic of your tip...but I'm not really sure what "events" you're talking about in the first place. You mean the political ones where you have to pay $$$ when someone spreads rumors about your family?

[Hooahguy]

If I had to guess its the political events. But to then go and reload and avoid it seems like cheating to me. Part of the fun is deciding if you need the money or if saving the reputation of that family member is more important!

[Sp4]

The annoying thing is... they only happen if you have the money to pay for them. Just about. Seems like it was made to be annoying. If they happened all the time and put you into negative cash, that would be cool and less.. oh you're doing well? Here, have a branch between your legs :D

[Hooahguy]

That seems to be true actually. I am always upgrading something so I rarely have an excess of 5k cash so they dont come too often. Annoying when they do though. I really wish though I can check my list of generals so I can make an informed decision.

[Slaists]

If I had to guess its the political events. But to then go and reload and avoid it seems like cheating to me. Part of the fun is deciding if you need the money or if saving the reputation of that family member is more important!

No reloading involved: just canceling construction ;)

And, yes: those are the "political events" that seem to serve the only function of emptying your treasury. Surprisingly: those events tend to happen right at the moment when you successfully accomplish a mission giving you + cash...

[Sp4]

Yes, the way these things delay a plan of yours by one turn is infuriating.

[Slaists]

For a short intro to how gravitas and politics work try this. Roll as Suebi. You start with 1 general, 2 statesmen from your faction and one general from the opposition. Check that none of your generals/statesmen have any negative gravitas traits. If they don't you're fine. Replace your faction's general with a candidate from the opposition (you should have one in the waits). Check if the opposition replacement has no positive boost to gravitas per turn; check if the old opposition general has none. If they don't, you're fine to proceed. If not, you might have to re-roll (to see the test to completion).

If all is well, scroll through a few turns doing nothing. Your generals will be playing politics (and gaining gravitas) at home while the opposition will be sitting in the field doing nothing (gaining no gravitas). Observe the changes in gravitas and the change in influence. Profit... You can go from the starting 67% influence to high 70'ies in no time.

[Slaists]

Maximizing your general's xp gain per turn: fight the armies camped outside the city first

Frequently, when you arrive at barbarian cities, they have one stack sitting inside the city and another one (or two) right next to the city. If your agent's carry out a sabotage mission on the army outside the city, it will not join the fight when you attack the town. However, that said army will retreat from the walls after you take the city. Your army led by the general whose xp you ant to maximize will be stuck inside the city for a turn and won't be able to reach the enemy stack (or two) that retreated.

In order to optimize xp, it is better to disable the army inside the city (and possibly also the one outside in order for it not to be able to retreat from battle) and attack the one outside first. That way, the city garrison will join (and can be annihilated in a field battle) but you will have at least one more battle for your general on that very turn: when you take the city. Of course, you have to plan your move points well to be able to pull this off. Even better if there are 2 enemy stacks next to the city. Then, you can have 3 battles instead of 1 (on the turn you take the city).

The disabling I mentioned above can be done by any of the sabotage missions of any of your agents. If you succeed at any sabotage attempt, the target army loses either half or all of its move points and cannot reinforce a battle. A side effect of a successful sabotage is that the AI seems unable to retreat battle either if it feels your force is superior.

Another tip: generals joining a battle as reinforcements earn gravitas too.

This is something I noticed recently. The generals who join your battle as reinforcements do not earn battle experience. However, they DO earn gravitas. Thus, if your main general wins the battle and earns gravitas, yet your reinforcing army was led by an opposition general who also gained gravitas, the total impact on your party's influence could be nil (both party's earned +1 gravitas creating a wash situation unless the ambition differential of generals skews it one way or another). So, better have your own party's general leading the reinforcing army if you have one.

[Sociopsychoactive]

Actually, with patch 7 the re-inforcing generals will earn experience too now.

[Bramborough]

Yep. Can be a bit of a pain if one is trying to manage internal faction politics, but otherwise a great help to developing general's capabilities.

[Slaists]

Yup, since patch 7, reinforcing gens do earn xp and can level pretty fast on the lower levels. Yes, it is another thing to consider when managing poltics. Anyone got CW with patch 7 yet? Just curious for the conditions of it happening.

[Slaists]

Patch 7, Seleucids, turn 34, VH campaign

Any sense of danger?

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[Bramborough]

Looks like you're doing pretty good to me. I guess that's your point...

[Slaists]

Looks like you're doing pretty good to me. I guess that's your point...

No, my point is... it's too easy. On VH. Still. Patch 7...

Actually, patch 7 spoiled Seleucids for me in a sense.

Before patch 7, I was oblivious to diplomatic reputation consequences since whatever I did, I was still showing as "steadfast" with everyone except my immediate target. So, my first action as Seleucids, pre-patch 7, would have been to declare war on Cyprus (or Egypt, depending on my mood). This would result in a cascading series of events (my Eastern satraps declaring war on me; some Greeks declaring war on my remaining satraps, etc.). It was exciting that way.

Post patch 7: I discovered that actually, there was a pre-exising truce with Cyprus; this, by extension is a truce with Egypt (since Cyprus is a satrapy of Egypt). So, fine, i decide to play 'by rules': no DOW on Egypt for 10 turns. No truce with Quidri (a truce with Quidri also results in a hit to diplo reliability and satraps as well).

The result you see: a very boring Seleucid game. All my Eastern satraps are still satraps some 30 turns into the game; Egypt I have conquered (waiting for 10 turns to do so); I have a bunch of extremely friendly Greek allies, etc.

I guess, the only way to have a fun game is to break all truces, DOW anyone you see :)

[Jacque Schtrapp]

The result you see: a very boring Seleucid game. I guess, the only way to have a fun game is to break all truces, DOW anyone you see :)

I haven't opted into the latest beta, so I can't guarantee it will play out the same way. Try Carthage as the Barcid family. They have a moderate diplomatic penalty with ALL factions. I played about 50 turns over the weekend on VH. The entire time was spent running low on funds and rushing half stack armies between cities in an attempt to stave off the latest invasion. The only faction willing to trade was the Etruscans. Everyone else declared war shortly after we met. I fought well over a dozen battles just to defend Qart-Hadasht. I finally gave up when faced with a turn that would have cost me Carthage and Lilybaeum.

[Slaists]

I haven't opted into the latest beta, so I can't guarantee it will play out the same way. Try Carthage as the Barcid family. They have a moderate diplomatic penalty with ALL factions. I played about 50 turns over the weekend on VH. The entire time was spent running low on funds and rushing half stack armies between cities in an attempt to stave off the latest invasion. The only faction willing to trade was the Etruscans. Everyone else declared war shortly after we met. I fought well over a dozen battles just to defend Qart-Hadasht. I finally gave up when faced with a turn that would have cost me Carthage and Lilybaeum.

@Jacque Schtrapp Been there, done that (Barcid, VH, post patch 5): got to around the same turn mark you had (50), but... had an extremely boring campaign. The difference was: the first thing I did was evacuate Qart-Hadast. Went after Sicily (an easy kill); then proceeded into Southern Italy. In these wars, I managed to drag Lybia along and as a result, they grew very friendly (no separation of that vassal); I also supported them in a war against some desert minor and that cemented our relationship even further. I guess, as a result of that power balance, the other desert tribes became friendly too, asked for NAP's, etc.

Ironically, it turned out, my troops sitting in Qart-Hadast were a trigger for AI's aggression there. Once my troops were gone, Spanish AI sued for peace and paid 5000 for it... by turn 50: no one has even bothered to take a peek in my empty Spanish province.

By the way, as Carthage, no one wants to trade with you mostly because you do not have any trade goods to trade (dunno why they made it so for a merchant nation). Once you conquer Italy, you have plenty to go around. Suddenly everyone wants to trade.

As to keeping Seleucid vassals friendly: the key seems to keep declaring small, manageable wars on anyone and dragging the satraps into those wars. As long as you beating up on the same enemy, satraps are happy. The satraps love when you behead captives, poison your enemy's wells, etc.

[Mhantra]

Suebi.

Impossible.

Go for THIS IS TOTAL WAR acheivement (declare war with every faction immediately when meeting them, including on the first turn, declare war on everyone).

Enjoy the challenge.

[Slaists]

Suebi.

Impossible.

Go for THIS IS TOTAL WAR acheivement (declare war with every faction immediately when meeting them, including on the first turn, declare war on everyone).

Enjoy the challenge.

That would do it I guess. Just would throw the diplomacy part of the game out the window :)

[Myth]

Why don't you play on Legendary? I think you're long past the VH threshold.

[Slaists]

Why don't you play on Legendary? I think you're long past the VH threshold.

@Myth, I've played legendary: the change from VH to Legendary (got to turn 120 with Pontus before patch 7) is not that significant in terms of AI behavior: the same World Peace AI (and stupid as hell on the battlefield)... Legendary just adds the annoyance of not having the radar map and the tactical overview. The lack of pausing I don't care about yet the lack of tactical overview is important since it allows one to get rid of the occasional frame-rate drop in battles. TAB'ing into tactical overview and back into the battle gets rid of the stutter. Also there is the rain slowdown bug. If it is raining I during the weather selection the frame-rate drops to practically zero. Frequently this gets inherited into the battlefield as well. On VH, I can opt out of that battle (lose it) and reload from my quicksave.

With I could have the AI bonuses of legendary but have the tactical overview map and ability to reload from the start of the battles (to work around the rain slowdown).

I am also playing a VH MPC with a friend (he is Iceni, I am Macedon). Due to time zone differences we can do that only on weekends. But in that campaign, things are different. Since we play as the AI in each battle where odds are less than 90% in favor of the player, we make progress very slowly. Every battle, every agent action matters in that campaign. By year 245 BC, Iceni have managed to add only 1 extra region. We've had some epic slinger battles in Britannia: the region is covered with heroic battle markers... Macedon has 6 regions total, but I just lost a region to an AI faction since I was defeated in a siege defense battle which I otherwise would have won (if the AI troops were not controlled by a human). And, to be honest, I am not sure for how long I will be able to hang in. 4 Greek factions have declared war on me. Every one of those incoming armies will be controlled by a human. :)

[Hooahguy]

Suebi.

Impossible.

Go for THIS IS TOTAL WAR acheivement (declare war with every faction immediately when meeting them, including on the first turn, declare war on everyone).

Enjoy the challenge.

Initially it wouldnt be terrible. Until you got to the Romans and Hellenistic states which have much better units than you do.

[Hooahguy]

Alright, little siege tip:

If you are choosing to sally out during their siege assault, do it from a gate which they arent currently near. Because if you do counter-attack from a gate they are near and your gates have boiling oil, the oil does not discriminate and your guys will drop like flies. I recently lost over 1,500 men of a 2,000 man sallying force because I stupidly charged them through the very gate that the enemy was assaulting and I lost the 1,500 is about 3 minutes. That was not a fun battle. I ended up having a very convenient crash before the battle ended.

So in short, be careful where you charge your guys out of in a siege battle.

[Slaists]

Patch 7, coastal Lusitania can have any resource you want (a wildcard option)

Not sure if this is WAD, but here it goes.

Last night, playing as Romans, I captured a coastal Lusitanian region (where today's Portugal is). I proceeded to destroy the barbarian town center as I usually do since they build them too high for my taste (and there was no resource in the town anyway). The next turn, I was surprised to learn I could have any resource I wanted in the town. The building options for the town center offered about a dozen town center options, basically for any resource in the game. I picked silk, LOL.

One thing I noticed, usually, when I destroy a barbarian city center, it downgrades to barbarian level 1. In this case though, the town center was wiped out completely: just an empty building slot there.