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Thread: The campaign is too easy???

  1. #1
    Member Member Wizard of Evil's Avatar
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    I started with the Turkish on early, at expert level. As the game says it is one level harder than the chosen difficulty. Of course this is because it is surrounded with two strong factions, but after a while it is just usual expert level.

    Well, i found it really difficult at the start because of the weak start of the Turks and i was thinking i have to fight with two factions at the same. I chose to attack Byzs first but the Egyptians always backstabbed me.

    I abandoned a few games till i find out the Byzs never attack you if you dont attack them. They are so peacefull. This happened every time i started a new campaign so first i finished off the Egyptians, at last pushed them till i get the crusade provinces. When Egyptians cease to be a real threat i marched on to Byzs till i get Constantinapole. Stopped there till the JHI is available. I made the buildings earlier so whenever it is late era i started to make JHI. They seem to be nearly invincible against any unit. I made a few armies with 5+ generals including 5 JHI, 4 turcoman foot, 6 Khwarziman and the generals unit. Guess what? this army is enough for nearly anything. The AI still continues to be dumb and making peasants, sucking at war. With this army combo i could win against an army of any faction which is 2 - 3 times bigger in numbers. I dont see myself very good in commanding the army, since i am only playing the game for one week.

    Now i have all the north africa, eastern Europe including Hungary, Austria. It is around 1280s, but i can finish this easily, i know. It will just take some time.

    Also one more annoying thing about fighting with AI is the fight takes too long. In almost every fight their general charges, and gets himself surrounded by JHI, dies eventually, the army gets routed. Since they always have a bigger army than mine, they keep on coming with reinforcements, but with a huge morale penalty because of both the death of their generals and routing units everywhere. They approach to my army, rout again without touching me. Since i dont have any light cav in my armies, i cannot chase them, but i take my army to the place where their reinforcements appear. They approach and rout, and it goes on and on... Sometimes i do nothing, speed up the game, put all army on loose formation, only attack the dumb units coming too close. They run away and withdraw before being able to rally.

    So as a conclusion, imho the game for the Turkish faction is really very very easy if you can survive the first era with gaining some land, esp constantinapole.

    Is the campaign so easy?

    And also one more question, can you mod the game and omit the production of the peasants and urban militia and other weak units that the comp sucks at using after some time passes, lets say after 1200 ?
    For he today that shed his blood with me, shall be my brother ...

  2. #2
    Member Member Exile's Avatar
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    so how many tries did it take you to succeed in the very, very easy campaign?
    - All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing. Edmund Burke

  3. #3
    Corporate Hippie Member rasoforos's Avatar
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    the 'i m better than you guys post of the day'
    Αξιζει φιλε να πεθανεις για ενα ονειρο, κι ας ειναι η φωτια του να σε καψει.

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    Member Member Dr_Who_Regen#4's Avatar
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    Just a thought but do you have the patch installed?
    The enemies general shouldn't charge you if you have installed the patch. There are also more problems with rebelions and the like.

    As rasoforos implies...is there a reason for posting this other then to say that you are better then the computer?
    If I could only find my TARDIS

  5. #5
    Member Member Wizard of Evil's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by [b
    Quote[/b] (rasoforos @ Jan. 31 2003,16:40)]the 'i m better than you guys post of the day'

    First of all, this post was in no means to prove anybody that i am better than anyone. It also didnt have the intention to insult the fans of the game. My posting in these forums and saying my ideas about any part of the game should be enough proof for my thoughts about this game, which is quite positive.

    Maybe my intention to post this is understood wrongly, or maybe i stated what i really wanted to say wrongly, i dont know.

    To clear the minds of you guys who are thinking that i am trying to say 'i am better than you'; i was impressed by the way the AI handled its provinces (build orders, garrisons etc) at the start of each campaign. But when time passes, it isnt as succesful as it is to stand up against 'any human player' because it still uses the cheap units, which are enough in early game. Apart from its garrisoning armies, their main armies show no balance of units, either they are full of horse archers, or spearmen etc.

    Since it's only been a week since i started to play the game, i still think that i have much to discover, and i do think that i might have been lucky in this specific campaign i talked about before; maybe found the right time to attack by luck, whatever might have been happened.

    To Exile's question; i didnt play it on very easy, i did the tutorials, and played in normal level for a while, then switched to expert level.

    As i stated in my original post, i DID find a way to get out the hard situation that the Turkish faction is in in the start by trying 'again and again'.

    Yes, i installed the patch, but nearly in all the battles the general of the enemy dies miserably, or at least routs and runs away. Maybe it just happend to me.

    And if you look at the title of the post, it IS a question, not a statement.
    For he today that shed his blood with me, shall be my brother ...

  6. #6
    Lord of the Kanto Senior Member ToranagaSama's Avatar
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    Hello Wizard of Evil,

    First question, How much money do you have and what is your income? Also what's you province loyalty like?

    Quote Originally Posted by [b
    Quote[/b] ]I abandoned a few games till i find out the Byzs never attack you if you dont attack them. They are so peacefull.
    I haven't really explored the Muslim factions, but your quite right, there are certain situations where some factions do not attack when it would be to there advantage to do. Thus, giving the human player a rather "unfair" advantage, but then the question would be how does one "better" balance that particular circumstance.

    A similar situation exists in the Early Campaign (don't know about the later periods) with the Danes. The HRE simply won't attack them which makes it rather simple for a player as the Danes to work one's way thru the initial "start" situation (weak troops, strong neighbor).

    I believe this s/b addressed in the patch that will never be. JFYI, one of the Devs advised the community about a "cheat" code that's supposed to pump up the AI aggression level. I haven't tried it yet, but hope it works in the above situations. You'll have to search the forum for the code, I don't remember.

    Quote Originally Posted by [b
    Quote[/b] ]Also one more annoying thing about fighting with AI is the fight takes too long.
    Its not the AI taking too long, its YOU

    Be aware that if you get ALL the AI troops to be in "flee" "mode" virtually simultaneously, then the game will end; with you as victor.

    So, two things:

    1) Once you get the "key" AI units fleeing, KEEP them fleeing and make all efforts to get the weaker units fleeing as well (s/b relatively easy). Every unit fleeing, Game Ends.

    Quote Originally Posted by [b
    Quote[/b] ]Since i dont have any light cav in my armies, i cannot chase them, but i take my army to the place where their reinforcements appear. They approach and rout, and it goes on and on
    Having Cav is a good thing, but you don't especially need them. Use your troops to do the chasing, just be prepared for the unexpected.

    2) Above you note how "easy" the AI reinforcements "rout", soo don't hang back---ATTACK KEEP attacking Attack the instant a AI unit hits the field. Again, get the AI units "on the field" to FLEE simultaneously. End Game

    Be aware there is a little risk.

    Above 1) Poor execution will lead to VERY tired troops spread all over the field. Making it difficult to re-group and repel any semblance of an "organized" AI counter-attack.

    Above 2) Having taken your troops to the other side of the map, poor execution will lead to VERY VERY tired troops meeting "fresh" AI reinforcements. This is expecially dangerous when AI reinforcements enter from multiple directions.

    Good Luck Have Fun
    In Victory and Defeat there is much honor
    For valor is a gift And those who posses it
    Never know for certain They will have it
    When the next test comes....


    The next test is the MedMod 3.14; strive with honor.
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  7. #7
    Corporate Hippie Member rasoforos's Avatar
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    sorry i didnt mean to say you were boasting . in fact your text had a content. However the last month or so there were a lot of people just boasting , telling us how good they are etc....it looks like an epidemic
    Αξιζει φιλε να πεθανεις για ενα ονειρο, κι ας ειναι η φωτια του να σε καψει.

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  8. #8
    Member Member burma_mtw's Avatar
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    Granted,the AI software doesn't attack as well as something like AOM. But to be playing only a week, and having started a number of games, you may have been lucky with the Turks at expert level.

    It takes awhile to figure out how to keep the Mongels from attaching the Province to the East of Rum (Armenia?) when they show up in AD 1230. Of course, if they didn't show up there in your game and you don't know why, then you were lucky.

    If the Almohads take out the Spanish early then winning North Africa after doing the Byzzies and Constantinople takes some effort. They will have 7-8 Star Generals, a zillion troops, Jihads waiting, and Metalsmith Upgrades. The Almohads usually stop at Navarre in North Spain and only go as far as Egypt to the East if you will let them. Untill the mid-1200's they just upgrade and increase the numbers of their troops. You can still take them out, but it is a long drawn-out effort.

    If the Spanish finished off the Almohads or gave them a lot of trouble then the game is much easier. It's a random thing.

    Without prior knowledge, getting to JHI isn't that easy. The basic documentation doesn't reveal that you can only build them in the one Province which has all the right buildings. Getting those buildings up is both expensive and time consuming, even if you want to build them without Armor upgrades. Regardless, by the time JHI's are available, you will already have a "won" position and they are just there to play with.

    The Turks don't have access to much cash even after taking out the Egyptians, which is a significant drain. Getting a trade route up for Antioch takes a long time. Even then, chance plays a big role. When you hit the waters, both Italy and the Byzzies will have your fleet outnumbered by a very large margin. Sometimes the Italians take out your ships right away, and sometimes they don't. Plus, if you are warring with the Byzzies, no trade revenue anyway. Even the Almohads will have a ship or two (they don't go in much for Navy's) and attack you early. Just the fact that you are at war with them stops the lucrative trading with their North African and Spanish Coast ports. I guess the point is that because the Turks have such difficulty generating revenue, knowing just what to spend money on, and knowing what not to spend money on, is a skill that takes most people a few campaigns to acquire. Even then, ramping up is still a slow process. But again, if the Italians have too much trouble with the Paupacy and their other neighbors then you wouldn't have to worry much about their fleet. It's a random thing.

    You are right about doing the Egyptians first and leaving the Byzzies alone until that conquest is over. Depending upon how successful they were in Eastern Europe, you either will or wiil not find some large and powerful armies waiting for you on your Western borders. You can still get Constantinople and Nicea, but if those armies are there then the process is both time-consuming and financially draining. Another impediment to ramping up. But again, it is just a random thing.

    When the Mongels show up and you have kept them from appearing inside your territory chance will still play a big part. Sometimes the Russians have been successful. Their presence will occupy and drain the Horde. But usually, they don't play a big part. In that case, you will have to defend Georgia, Constantinople, and something on the North African Coast all at the same time. I have seen the Mongels attach as many as four Provinces when they show up. Because they don't have to waste time or resources on the Russians, they will have gobs of quality troops to throw at Georgia. You are not dead if they get it, but keeping them out of your territory requires large armies in three Provinces. After a few failed attempts to penetrate past Georgia, they turtle up lots of troops. Again, this ties up lots of your troopos until you can re-take and hold Georgia. Another slow-down to your ramp-up and another drain on your war chest. They don't go down easy as they fight smarter the the other players and the combination of good heavy Cavalry and lots of Horse Archers is sometimes a tough nut to crack. As usual, it's a random thing. Solving the Mongel puzzle is less then a week deserves praise. Or, you could have got lucky. As usual, it's a etc., etc., etc.

    The Turks don't always start getting hammered by Crusades at the same time. If either France or Germany, and sometimes Italy, are especially successful early, Crusades will start arriving before you can take Constantinople. Handling them is, as you likely guessed, time-consuming and money draining with the known effects on ramping up. Random, etc.

    There are a few other problematic possiblilites but this is way too long already.

    If you have been playing only a week and delt with the "bad" things that can happen, especially when they occur in multiples, and you still find the campaign "too" easy even at expert level then you deserve high praise as a player. I am not a great player so, for me, it was a challange at times. There were many times that loading a saved game would have let me deal with events more successfully.

    Anyway, congratulations on you skill. These are just my opinions...I could be wrong.

    Oh, yeah. The army of "5 JHI, 4 turcoman foot, 6 Khwarziman" and a general might have a little trouble when attacking a Mongel army even if it wasn't "2 - 3 times bigger in numbers". There is nothing there to catch a Horse Archer. Defending is a different story, of course. On the other hand, even though you have never tried it, your boast could be justified.

  9. #9
    Lord of the Kanto Senior Member ToranagaSama's Avatar
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    Thumbs up

    NICE POST
    In Victory and Defeat there is much honor
    For valor is a gift And those who posses it
    Never know for certain They will have it
    When the next test comes....


    The next test is the MedMod 3.14; strive with honor.
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  10. #10
    Senior Member Senior Member Dionysus9's Avatar
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    So, you ruled all provinces with the turks on expert?

    Or no? Its not clear that you won the campaign. It sounds like things are going well, but until you are supreme ruler of the known world anything can happen.

    And if you have indeed installed the patch, and figured out the turks on expert--well, you still have a ton of other factions to figure out.

    By the time you win em all on expert, Viking Invasion will be out, so really, although the game is possible to figure out and defeat, I dont know if I'd call it "easy"

    good post and composure under fire.

    Welcome Wiz.
    Hunter_Bachus

  11. #11
    Member Member Wizard of Evil's Avatar
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    I am really glad to see that my point is understood. I am very new in these forums, so i didnt see any posts from people boasting about their skills; if i had known it, i would have been a lot more careful in my original boast for not causing any misunderstandings. I didnt rule all the provinces, but i was a little dissapointed when i saw that it seemed easier as the game proceeds.

    As far as i understood burma's post, i really was very lucky in this specific campaign. I was neither attacked by Byzs, or the mongols, and there wasn't even one crusade coming to my lands. The Europeans were really busy with Almohads in some part of the game. Almohads were at war with nearly all the European factions, that was when i took N.Africa from them. Mongols were somwhat slowed by Byzs and Hungarians. I chose to ally with Mongols while claiming as much as land i can take from the weakened Byzs. But Mongols never attacked me because they were busy with Byzs mostly. And again all these foreign policy werent done with careful planning, it was just the matter of luck for me. For all the campaign i was the one attacking, except from defending against Egyptians for which i was already ready. (thanks to the knowledge from the campaigns i tried before)

    And with the battles with AI, i guess you people are right, its me who makes it take too long .

    I still have much to learn in the game, and this thread really helped me to understand that in the campaign i was playing, the only thing was i was too lucky. I will start another one with the same faction, to see if i can do same. I am not so sure though, because it seems to be cahin of lucky events made me to achive that.
    For he today that shed his blood with me, shall be my brother ...

  12. #12
    Slapshooter Senior Member el_slapper's Avatar
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    You should conquer every province at least once. The last ones are usually tricky. Not because they are well defended, but because your king is far from many provinces(Switzerland anyone?) and mass rebellions are a pain to handle. I did it once, and was successful only trhu GREAT caution. Many times before, I had tried to finish too quickly, and was destroyed by massive uprising/civil war.....
    War is not about who is right, only about who is left

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    Member Member Wizard of Evil's Avatar
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    Thanx, too much to discover. And now i am realising that i was a bit quick to make a judgement.
    For he today that shed his blood with me, shall be my brother ...

  14. #14
    Member Member burma_mtw's Avatar
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    Mr. Dionysus9 brings up an excellent point. Some of the civilizations are especially easy to play, and some of them are not. Different techniques are required that are not intuitively obvious. Playing the Danes, for example, isn't the same as playing the Turks. In the long run, they are easier, but you still have to figure it out. Same with the Spanish. They can be easy, but only after you figure out the trick for dealing with the Almohads.

    I haven't tried it, but playing as the Russians sounds like a challange.

  15. #15
    Member Member BatkoMahno's Avatar
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    The year is 1241. me *Turkish Sultano* is happy, this year the mongol horde didn't attack Georgia from Khazar now they got *only* 15000 troops there and only 3 heavy mongol cavalrys left ..phew...
    Sins 1230 they hammered Georgia every turn. Thanks to be a defender I won every battle ending up with 9 star general which is now a Field expert defender(+3 in command when defending) and Skilled last stand(+1 command when defending and outnumbered more then 2 to 1) and troops with valour beetwean 5 and 6 - ArmHeav, Saracen inf, crossb, (muwahid fights good but they all die easy at the end),turcoman foot, even a catapult unit with 9 in valour During this *battering* all of the Turkish empire was working to pump troops to Georgia and my fleet keeping the rout there safe from Bysant and Italian fleets.
    I started like you Expert in Early. I went down and attacked egyptian so on onto almohads when I got to Iberia I found out that the Spaniards and Almos had somekind of stalemate there and Spaniards had Cordoba,Portugal.Well I finished Almos. In the mean while I had Crusades against me from everyone, luckely someone seased France. When I attacked Spain in Cordoba the Bysants finaly attacked me for the first time in the game in Antioch. On that point of the game my troops consisted of turcoman cav (they were superb in desert and against muslims) in large parts. So now I had to attack back to Lesser Armenia with this-- reasult hehe lesser numbered bysants hiding in trees butchered me with their varangians ( which I had big trouble killing while they had 5 in valour and silver armor) and ofcourse bysants had every general with at least 7 stars plus in all other provinces the bysants had crusades standing and not attacking me from England, Italy and HRE I even had a crusade from Aragonese So I started to build up troops and get more heavy cav and saracens. Well spaniards are history I have almost all of Spain except Navarra(aragonese) and Aragon(English with 3 stocks of troops) and all of minor asia except Constantinopol, when I got Trebizond and Nicaea then the Mongo appeared. It took time to fight in minor asia because I had to fight against the owners(bysant) and the standing Crusade.

    Strangely enough whatever faction I play the Mongols alwayse allie with Bysants. I had troops in Khasar 1230 and I attacked Kiev with some troops that I could afford of loose and the Mongols came and seased the siege and then left Kiev for freing the Bysants there.

    This is in short my lovely campaign. Many muwahid,ghazis,khwarasmians,ghulams and armenian heavy died in Georgia but at the end my armenians had so high valour so they eventually beat the crap of the Mongol heavy in head to head fights. The saracens died mostly of arrows. In some battles I had left 30 saracens out of 166 without many fights. Good news is that most of mongols generals got this nice v&V Good Runner.
    OK now I am off to there and decide where to push -- Constatinople or Northern Spain or Khazar....

  16. #16
    Member Member Knight_Yellow's Avatar
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    so the games too easy and ur too good heres a thought...

    who cares?

    if i see another noob posting a too easy topic ill cry

    British Army: be the best

  17. #17
    Senior Member Senior Member LordTed's Avatar
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    I like to be told i am shit

  18. #18
    Member Member burma_mtw's Avatar
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    Dear Mr. BatkoMahno,

    You are having way too much fun. You have inspired me to go play as the Turks yet again. Your battles seem more frequent and exciting then I am acustomed to. This time I won't take the easy route. I will live on the edge. It is a good day to die.

    Namaste,

    Burma the Miserable

  19. #19

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    Wizard of Evil: Don't take the implied criticism from some of these jokers too seriously. I read your post and it didn't seem like boasting to me at all. Your comments about the AI are quite right. There are many threads over in the Dungeon that explore the same issues and a number of modders have taken a stab at making improvements in the AI's performance. I would suggest that you might like to download a couple of these mods and try them out for interest's sake.

    If you want a bit more of a challenge and are willing to do a little modding yourself here are a few suggestions:

    1. increase the initial income of the AI factions to 250,000 florins to start.
    2. increase the rebellion factor of all provinces to at least 2 (this dramatically increases the probability that AI factions that were eliminated will reappear via rebellions).

    These changes can easily be made by modifying the early.txt file in the main MTW folder (just look for the starting income section). They produce vastly superior play balance and much larger AI armies, thus more of a challenge. This game was made by CA to be very modifiable so we can change whatever we want to get a different gaming experience. People have added new units, made historical variants of the game and even produced a (Patrician) mod based on the Roman Empire (there is also a Lord of the Rings mod in the works as well) So, the limits of MTW have definitely not been reached and there is much new gameplay available There's no reason for anyone to feel that it's too easy or not varied enough
    Yours was not at first a criminal nature. At 10 you stole sugar,at 15 you stole money,at 25 you committed arson. At 30,hardened in crime,you became an editor. Worse yet is in store for you. You will be sent to Congress,then to the penitentiary. But,all will be well. You will be hanged.
    -Mark Twain

  20. #20
    Slapshooter Senior Member el_slapper's Avatar
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    Advice : don't modify it. copy it and modify the copy(in the same folder). simpler to go back if something get screwed(as it happens sometimes to modders).
    War is not about who is right, only about who is left

    Having a point of view upon everything is good
    Having a view upon every point is better

  21. #21
    Member Member BatkoMahno's Avatar
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    Forget to mention one thing. The Jihads
    When you take a province and you stil got the enemy besieged it already considers by the Jihads as your land so you can retreat and launch a Jihad at it later for fun or something. You can launch jihad even against muslims if they have something that belonged to you. You can pick up a coast province in Europe and attack it and take it and not warry about killing the besieged, loose your troops there and then launch a Jihad which can take a route thrue Europe for fun (because I think it wouldn't last much time). That is a little explanation on how in %¤"# muslims can launch jihad in Europe or elsewhere. Quite an advantage this with Jihads. But I try not to abuse it..
    But I did wrote now this .nuttermode. wonder if this works when playing expert mode(level).

  22. #22

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    "Advice : don't modify it. copy it and modify the copy(in the same folder). simpler to go back if something get screwed(as it happens sometimes to modders)."

    That goes without saying

    I advise copying the entire MTW folder & pasting it into a new folder (entitled MTW II or something). Make all your modifications to the new folder copy. Then, if something goes badly wrong and you can't figure out how to fix it, you can simply copy the whole MTW over the screwed up version (I haven't had to do this, but it helps to have piece of mind). If you want to restore the game default settings you can easily do this just by re-installing the v.1.1 patch to the new folder(this will overwrite the modified files in most cases).

    While you're modding, before saving any change to your working files, always back them up to a separate folder (mine is called OOPS FILES ).

    Because I'm sometimes a bit thick, I had to learn all this the hard way, but you don't have to




    Yours was not at first a criminal nature. At 10 you stole sugar,at 15 you stole money,at 25 you committed arson. At 30,hardened in crime,you became an editor. Worse yet is in store for you. You will be sent to Congress,then to the penitentiary. But,all will be well. You will be hanged.
    -Mark Twain

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