Oh cr...

[Tomassi_Rossino]

Have you ever been on a really good run on something, like you had raised an empire, but suddenly it all crumbled down?

It has to me like today. I was the Danes. I had successfully conquered Sweden and had established trade routes from the Baltic right down to Leon and Morocco. With an impressive fleet in the North Sea I decided to invade 'wee' Scotland, whom had a fairly small army lead by Adam Bunnock (who hadn't died in a hundred years ) whereas I had an army lead by my King and all of his princes all but one with about 400 vikings. I got massacred on a hill because I had not taken into account the valour bonuses because I had 0 but they had 2-5 With the king dead I went back to life as normal, building an army again. My provinces was raking in 1290 Fl. a year so it was no problem. I decided to take my new army to Norway, with the king in tow. Not learning from my mistakes last time I lost the battle, all my princes killed and oh, my king was dead too I was amazed at how a florishing kingdom as I had was reduced to a rebel clan system because of one battle. I mean...

So has this happened to any of you before? A mighty, rich kingdom reduced to zilch because of a few rebels?

[Clown_Killer]

Yea, its happened to me twice. Once in VI and once in MTW. One thing I learned is that if the king is going to die of natural causes, there seems like no way to stop him.

It seems pretty obvious, but after losing my faction leaders a few times, (Im a slow learner, lol) I save every Campaign Year. Is it cheating to go back in time and do it again? Maybe, I dont know. I dont have the problem of losing my King and having spent all that time conquering the known world for nothing.

[Spartiate]

Please remember that it is your King that commands an army and not the best general if he is present on the field of battle.If your king has a low command rating then it's a bad idea to bring him to the fight.
Try flanking the opposition with your royal knights(while keeping the enemy occuppied with your advancing vikings) as there is no reason why even high valour Rebels from Norway or Scotland should beat an army boasting 2/3 units of Royal Knights.Better luck with your future plans for world domination

[massamuusi]

My king likes to chill out in Istanbul with all the princes and some HJI in the same stack. F**k it if he gets something like 1* 2piety and 3acumen, and hedonist and coward. I don't care. What I care for is, plenty of heirs, at least one young heir. This is the priority. Of course, if the situation allows, I can always sacrifice some dull princes and exp some, but I've learned that
1) Never attack with your king with your heirs in the stack onto an island, if you want to fight with king, take the heirs out of the stack.
2) Don't send the king out of capital- who knows what may happen. Last time he left the capital 3 revolts occured. Should be glad that there was no civil war.
Early in game it can be useful to use the king in combat, so long he has no cowardly vices, he still ranks at least as a lesser jedi. Also the self replenishing bodyguard is something to think about.

But usually it's better to have a fat dull headed figurehead of the state sit in some cave guarded by HJI or the like, than to have 1 65 year old über king without heirs.
So long the king isn't crackbrained or the like, the bad vices have little overall influence, even the lesser profits are tolerable.

[massamuusi]

Sorry everyone
I forgot to mention that it's not that useful to get kings high command ratings, as it has been seen that 9 star king can get a heir with 4 stars.
Using a general is way better, as the general never loses his stars, unless he gets some very bad vice, but even then he can still reach 9*, as there is virtually infinitely time for him to fight.
Just try to get your generals to be preferably heavy cavalry, or at least heavy infantry, and if they're weak units, keep them out of battle at any costs, for I have bad experience...
6* peasant general was standing over there, enemy cavalry made a charge against his unit, and guess who dies in the frontline to the charge

[Sir Price]

@ Spartiate: I've seen my king being led by another general (Joms Vikings) in VI, with higher command rating. Is it only in VI that happens, or is it because the Joms are a more advanced unit, or how come my king wasn't the 'commanding officer'? I almost got him killed, thinking the unit was just another bunch of Huscarles. After I first notived it, I've seen it a number of times.
Anyways, maybe I'm just lucky, but my king always fights in the frontline, and only got killed once, with 4 or 5 sons to take over, so never lost my empire due to bad luck with the bloodline.

[Sociopsychoactive]

I've had a few monumental screw ups.

My king as the english almost never entered into combat himself, staying in the capitol along with the spare, while the heir goes off to do the fighting and getting good virtues. This works quite well as long as you keep the spare there incase your crown prince dies, an then your king dies of an illness.

Then, all of a sudden the world rebels, the french, spanish, germans and italians all re-emerge in random places. The rest of th world revolts against it;s masters and as I had been slowly decomitioning my armies to make up for the lack of trade I was making now I had very little to fight it all with, so nothing to come bail my king out.

He and the spare both die at the hands of the french, the crown prince wins in italy, but then gets promoted to the king and immediately teleports back to next to the capitol, only to get crushed by the french the very next year. All because I forgot to check loyalties one year, when they had been fine for the past 20. I had just about hit the 60% mark or so....

By the way, the king will always lead the battle, that is true, IF he is one of the initial units on the field, assumign you have VI and therefoe the pre-battle arrangement screen. If the king is part of your re-inforcements, be it first or last, then he will not lead the battle, and you can leave someone else to do it.

[HicRic]

Quote[/b] (massamuusi @ July 24 2004,21:45)]2) Don't send the king out of capital- who knows what may happen. Last time he left the capital 3 revolts occured. Should be glad that there was no civil war.

Never seen anything like that. You sure? I've always been under the impression that the number of turns it would take a king to move to a province affects how loyal they are-so leaving him in a port province and having most of your empire connected by sea enjoys good loyalty. I've never seen rebellions occuring due to the king leaving the capital-I'm pretty sure the game doesn't even acknoledge any place being a capital, anyway.

[Papewaio]

King takes control so your best general becomes practically a normally unit. AS DOES YOUR PRINCES.

So unless you want to kill an insane heir or three do not put your princes with your king.

Typically my king sits in the capital and all the princes are spread out through the kingdom... the successor is normally somewhere on the mainland near the capital.

As High Star Kings can create low star (but high accumen etc) Heirs, it is best just to have your King spend his time in his court courting his Queen. Also Kings die of old age while generals live until killed in battle... so it is better to get the generals battle hardened.

Kings are useful for province loyalty, accumen and trade... not warfare... treat him like the Chess piece and put him behind the lines.

[lonewolf371]

I never use a king that way, I always have him out fighting as many battles as possible. Heck I have about 20 other heirs, why not have him fight? If you get high influence and your king starts cranking out 6-7* heirs then you're in business. Some people might encounter succession problems, but usually you can make those go away by spreading your high star heirs across the empire to defend.

[Spartiate]

Quote[/b] ]@ Spartiate: I've seen my king being led by another general (Joms Vikings) in VI, with higher command rating. Is it only in VI that happens, or is it because the Joms are a more advanced unit, or how come my king wasn't the 'commanding

I have no idea how your King ended up being commanded by another General as it has never happened to me.It even says it in the manual that he ALWAYS commands after all he is King or something like that.
I'm afraid i cannot help you there.
To avoid this leave him sitting in the capital getting a Magnificent builder virtue.

[Ragss]

My king is always leading my main battle front...this is probably a bad decision seeing as how I have numerous 6+ start gens sitting around defending other fronts, and my king is usually 3 stars or less. I like it though, having my king and his sons in the fray together. His heirs are usually great leaders, great warriors etc etc. I'm usually very careful, and I don't think I have had a high level general or royalty die in battle in a very long time.