Alliances

[Quokka]

I have read 10 pages in and found nothing obviously about this topic so....

What are their effects?

The reason I ask is that in my game my last two wars have been against two previous allies.

I am the Spanish and have been allied with the Italians and Byzantines for ages. The Italians married off their Princess to me on the third turn, the Byzantines in about 1140. I have alliances with almost everyone else except Egypt and the Turks.
I quickly killed the Almohads, then the French and Aragonese, so I owned all of Spain, France and West Africa. The Egyptians were losing a war against the Turks so I grabbed Egypt and Sinai easily. Then the Byzantines asked for alliance and were at war with the Turks. I agree by marrying a Princess, then help them wipe out the Turks, which is difficult and takes a while. About 1200 I start a massive build-up in preparation for the Golden Horde as I own Armenia and Syria and they coul be targets. In 1225 the Byzantine sink half my merchant fleet but don't attack any provinces because I heavily outnumber them. Everyone except Italy cancel their alliances with even though I was attacked, which is another question altogether.... Italy is at war with the Byzantines after snapping up Naples and Sicily.
It's now 1235 and Italy sinks some more ships and invades Greece with 300 Peasants????? Why would the country I am allied with against a common enemy attack me?

What do alliances do? Obviously not prevent attacks. What determines who stays allied with you when war breaks out? I lost alot of allies when the 1 province Danes attack me in Sweden, when I have the largest empire, income, tech, army and a king with 7 influence?

Do you get more trade from allies? Can your spies and assasins move through their territory without getting killed by Border Forts?

I do know that allied armies will fight for you if you happen to attack the same province on the same turn, but that is all and such a rare occurence.

Any light shed on this will be helpful.

[bighairyman]

making alliances w/ other factions just lessent? the chance of them attacking you, but i can find any proof to back it up.

but listen to a wise hairyman, in the world of medieval total war, there are no allies, only enemies, and potential enemies.

and to answer your questions:

1. your influcences will determined in a war, who will be ur ally and who will be ur enemies.

2. ur assains and spies will still be kill by their assasins and border guards.

3. and i don't think they will trade w/ u more.


so in cluclusion, allies in medieval total war are useless, i don't waste time to sent out emeesiers to get allies. but due to the fact that i play as the mongols, i can't built emmersires.

[|OCS|Virus]

I usualy train emasaries for the sole purpose of bribing specialty units that I cant build myself.

[Sir Chauncy]

I'm affraid that allied units don't do a great deal in the long run. You seem to have hit the boundary that the whole world decides to attack you in. When you own a certain number of the provinces, the whole world gets a lot more hostile to you and declares war, allies or not. A bit daft and rubbish? Well I think so and a lot of others do to. The thing is though, when you get to a certain point, it would be silly carrying on the fight as you could crush everyone underfoot without a problem so the game just makes it hard for you.
As for the alliances and what do they do bit. If you attack somewhere that your allies have a neighbouring province with, they do sometimes join in and help you, this happens far far more with the Viking Invasion and is actually a very good way of getting a lot of land quickly. I also believe that being allied to someone actually brings in a bit more trade income. What makes me think this is that if I look at the economy screen before and after an alliance, the money coming in goes up. I could be having you on though as I don't know for sure.
One final thing is that countries are far less likely to offer or accept a ceasefire with you if you own most of their (old) lands. they just keep fighting. I have also noticed that if you take one of their provinces, they seem keen to take one of your back before they stop fighting. Of course, all of this breaks down in the late game because no one ever stops fighting you.

Best of luck.

[RZST]

the diplomatic ai isnt so good in mtw atleast not as good as Civ3 or GalCiv.

anyways reason you were probably attacked is that your province was lightly defended, hence why he sends 300 pesants, also always make sure you have the more ships than the enemy in one sea province, that always stops them from attacking.

i dont know about trade with allies

one thing i do hate is when you marry princesses to another faction but then they just break the alliance the next turn Oo, that is so messed up.

[Quokka]

I seem to be falling in with standard thinking pretty quickly. I started another game as the Italians, I'll still play the Spanish game but I don't always have time for a 4 hour turn.
This time I have used Emissaries solely to bribe rebel armies and as spies. I have married my Princesses to the new Governors and it has paid off already. I got a 7 star, 7 Acumen Byzantine Prince to have 7 loyalty this way as the Duke of Lithuania.
Very different game this time, by 1140 the Byzantines were reduced to Cyprus, the Almohads dead and Sicily, Aragon, Egypt and the Turks all huge. The Byzantines had some sort of civil war or rebellion because I managed to get Lithuania, Rhodes and Crete through bribery.
The Turks own all of the steppes and Byznatine provinces except for Greece and Bulgaria, which Sicily owns along with Naples, Moldavia, Kiev and Volhynia. Those two are now tussling over Constantinople.
Egypt and Spain split the Almohads in two with Spain getting as far as Morocco and allied to Egypt until launching an ill concieved Crusade against Egypt from Cordoba?? I have just bribed Leon and will get Portugal this turn with a beautiful army of 500 Italian Infantry, 120 Spanish Jinettes and 180 Archers all for ~5000 Florins.
My empire looks like a patchwork quilt. I love it, I think of it as the frozen and shattered Terminator from T2, I just have to warm up a little and ooze it all back together.

[Sir Chauncy]

he he. My empires all end up like that. I started as the English and just hammered outwards, but that didn't make mu much money. So when i started as the Italians I just tried to have as much money as I could, Getting all of the best provinces like Flanders and Sweden as well as Sicily and Antioch. To be honest, at the end the only one I didn't have was Constantinople. But the The Bystantines were hard core and not going to budge. it was pretty cool actually.

[Dimonstre]

Diplomacy did not work in MTW neither the strategic AI of the game.
The last night I was playing as the France on expert, after conquering western Europe i was having ~1,300,000 florins. Then I decide like pious catholic to support the Pope and christianity at all. Started build churches, monasteries, reliquaries and so on in all my provinces. Pumping out hundred priests, cardinals and inquisitors I raised the zeal in every province about 80-90%. Never been excomunicated, allied with the Papacy from the begining of the game. Launching crusade after crusade - all of them successfull, having liberated most of the Holy Land.... And what you think the wise Pope did to show his gratefullnes? Attacked me himself with 200 spearmans and 180 urban militiaman in Naples where I was having 500 or 600 both feudal and chivalric knights + some halbardiers with a general 8*.
No comments.

[Sir Chauncy]

Sounds Bad.
Sometimes though the AI just seems to take a bit of a hump. You may have just hit the 'whole world gangs up against you' threshold. That was one of the things I really never liked.
Still if you were immortal and had all the elite troops you could ever want at your disposal, I think I might try a few suicidal attacks once in a while.

he he

[Quokka]

What would be good is if your allies told you what they were going to do.
I was reading another swath of 'Since you are at war with .... we can no longer be allied with you' pop-ups and one stuck out this time.
The one province Byzantines attacked me and the Sicilians broke our alliance (I am Italy), but at the bottom it had a line something like 'He hinted that he was going to doing something like this, but there was nothing I could do about it'.
Now it would be good if your allies did hint that they were going to do this, and maybe even ask if you wanted to support them. Even if they didn't ask but told you what was up, then you could support them anyway.
I think I would help quite often, it would certainly help break Mexican standoffs, or create them if you wanted to,

[o_loompah_the_delayer]

A word of warnig - If you move in to a province where your lly is being besieged and break the siege, your ally will get the province not you

Even worse if your army has no where to retreat to (ie a bordering province, if you had sent a force across the sea) you will get a ransom demand

Presumably if an ally relieves one of your besieged castles the reverse occurs, but I have never seen this.

The only time allies have been useful is when one of my Crusades to Tripoli and a German crusade to Palestine ganged up on the Egyptians in Tripoli.

[ToranagaSama]

Here are the Facts:

1) Alliances work.

They simply may not work in the manner that each individual mind above thinks it should.

Alliances have LESS effect if you Ally with EVERYONE Example, if there are 8 factions and all offer to Ally with you and you accept then you have 8 Allies.

Alliances effect Influence, Influence effects Alliances (and more.)

In the above example, at some point, YOU (or another Faction) will wish to war upon another faction. Obviously, if YOU do so then you will be forced to break an alliance. Doing so negatively effects Influence, which negatively effects a GREAT many things within the Campaign.

These effects are often subtle, BUT definite.

Sooo, in the above example, simply by going to war, which you must do, a Player has negatively impacted his ENTIRE Campaign with numerous Subtle and non-Subtle effects.

The Key is to have a plan from the Start of a Campaign. Decide who you *need* to Ally with and which will be of use in the Present and Future. DO NOT Ally with EVERYONE

Choose your Alliances--Strategically. Example, if Playing Spain for the first 3/4 of the Campaign (and probably for the entire Campaign), is there really any necessary or desireable aim in allying with, say, the Novogrod, or the Danes, or the landlocked Poles? In the average circumstance, obviously NOT So why do it? The only result will be an eventual negative Influence effect; and NO you will NOT inherent another faction's lands. This happening is an extremely ODD occurence.

Allies *will* help out on the Battlefield on Occaision, but in most circumstances, it cannot be anticipated. Such is NOT the true value of Alliances in TW.

The *TRUE* value in Alliance is simply this:

Alliances work most obviously and effectively with *border* Factions. That is factions with whom YOU share a border or borders. In the usual circumstance, the *border* Faction you Ally with, will guard its border with YOU by utilizing a low number and often low quality of Troops.

*If* you have effected a good alliance, you can witness situations where a former neutral or enemy *border* Faction with a FULL stack or more guarding his border with YOU, after Allying, will reduced that Stack (or more) down to the lowest level of *necessary* Troops.

Necessary is dependent on the *Player*. In the PRE-ally circumstance above, both the Player and the AI Faction are normally faced off at the border with countering Stacks. That is YOU will have a Full stack (or more) and so will the potential Ally. If YOU do not respond, by reducing your Stack, then the AI will NOT (or will rebuild his Stack); and the Alliance fails to give benefit to anyone. Sometimes, though, in the above, the AI is *pressed* to Trust in the Alliance AND will reduce while the Player does not. This is rare and usually when the AI is in dire straights. *If* the Player takes advantage the Player will lose Influence in the Campaign

The above behaviour is VERY beneficial to both the Player and the AI, as it allows BOTH to free Troops to be used elsewhere. The Troops in those faced-offed Stacks above can NOW go beat up on somebody else.

In Shogun, the above senario, was a GREAT deal harder to implement and you can imagine there was much GREATER dissatisfaction than in this thread. As a result, CA caused Alliances to MUCH more effective in MTW.

YOU simply have to comprehend that Alliances in MTW are NOT, Diplomatic tools. There is *NO* Diplomacy in MTW [TS puts tongue in cheek]. Alliance are simply a Tool to use to effect the above limited, but hugely valueable benefit(s). Nothing more

The above Allied circumstances can maintain itself for an extraordinarily long period of time, *IF* the Player conducts himself honorable throughout the Campaign (most do not). Simply pick one or two probably Allies at the Start and stick with them throughout most of the Campaign. Do not enter and break alliances in a willy nilly fashion as the winds of war change.

Rules I use with regard to Allies and Battle:

1) NEVER expect an Ally to join you in battle under any circumstance. This way you WON'T be dissappointed.

That being said, there are definite occaisions when you may find your Ally by your side on the battlefield. (Now, learning to fight effectively is another thing.) I will tell you that this is almost completely unpredictable

Having said that, after long experience from the release of Shogun til presently, it is possible to get-a-feel for when the AI might decide to aid the Player in battle. BUT, if you are in dire straights, and you NEED the AI Ally to help you out---IT WILL NEVER HAPPEN

The few times I've been able to anticipate, have been circumstances when I've been in COMPLETE control of my Campaign.

2) *I* personally NEVER aid an Ally in Battle, unless its to *my* benefit. That is, the province after being taken will become *mine*. In order for this to occur, the Player MUST have the larger Army on-the-field once the battle has ended.

Most of the time, I ignore opportunities to aid my Ally(ies) in battle, finding little advantage to it. (Similarly, which is why the AI probably doesn't help the Player.) *Aiding* your Ally is important, though, there are a several more subtle and effective ways of doing so.

---

Another Alliance tip, I posted in another thread:

Strategic Alliance

[bighairyman]

nice job

[Queen Daenerys I Targaryen]

From my point of view, allies are nothing but someone that's off my back while I try to consolidate my holdings. They're good for little else.

[motorhead]

My own observations agree with ToranagaSama. Recent Turk campaign I allied with 2 Western Euro powers far away and with the Horde when they arrived. At first, even as they expanded and moved westward, we'd settled into a 2+ stack standoff between Georgia and Armenia. Over a few turns I began withdrawing 2 to 3 units each time, they responded in kind to the point where we both had less than 500 troops facing each other (I staged majority of my pullbacks in Rum, never truly trust your allies). Even as we came into contact north of Constantinople, they kept their border armies at less than what I had. The GH had arrived with alot of units so if they had wanted to, it would have been no strain to bulk up on our borders. It seems to help if you yourself are at war with others ( I was battling the Almos, Italians, and Sicilians). I'm guessing your border ally thinks Well, we're allies and both very busy kicking someone else's @$$. I actually felt a tinge of regret when I finally decided to backstab the GH and invaded 5 of their provinces in the same turn. Quickly led to a civil war for them which made things even easier and I was able to snap up bargain basement GH generals

edit: Up to the point of backstabbing the GH, I hadn't broken any of the few alliances I had. Keeping your word over time does seem to have an impact as to how trusting your allies are. Also, in current campaign, I bumped into English in north africa. I had 2 1/2 stacks in Cyrencia and they had about 1 1/2 stacks west of there. After loyalty in Cyr stabilized, I pulled back to Egypt with everthing except 200 troops and 2 spies. Two turns later the English asked for alliance. Other than some agents (which meet unfortunate ends) the English have been quiet.

[mosborne]

When you relieve an ally's besieged province and it is returned to them, the message says something along the lines of ...they send their thanks... or ...they will be eternally grateful... has anyone noticed whether there is a manifestation of this gratitude in gameplay?