Hi there,
I would like to learn other players' tips on making campaign game more efficient/speedy. Here's what I have learned from experience (some of you may find these old news, but they are seldom mentioned in the guides).

Tip #1: Keep auto-tax on. Before hitting end year ALWAYS hold shift key and then use the mouse on the minimap to survey around for yellow/red provinces. Takes literally 3 seconds and avoids rebellions.

Tip#2: When surveying for possible rebellions with the shift key, also hold the V key . Again, use mouse and minimap for quick survey Takes zero seconds if doing tip#1 already :-)

Tip #3: Use bihops and emissaries to efficiently explore the map with agents . Assign a province to build a pile of emissaries/bishops (preferably province with port). Use C, Z and X keys to hide everything but your agents . Then move them to provinces you do not currently see. Hiding other units/cities makes it SO MUCH faster to spread your agents on the map. On PBM games I routinely use this to have the entire map explored in 5-10 years (unless using .matteosartori.)

Tip#3b: Use C, X and Z keys to reveal ships and hide other armies when moving your ship line . Makes it easier to see.

Tip#4: Peasants and only peasants stay in garrisons. Fighting units are kept in non-garrison armies. Every few turns I take out whatever troops the province has produced and move them out. This way I keep garrison and fighting units separate. Only exception is that I garrison governors who are not multi-star generals in their respective province (this way they gain acumen from buildings and they do not die in battles, so I do not have to replace them. No point in losing a high acument governor in a field battle. So I prefer peasants for governors whenever possible).

Tip#5: To efficiently replenish depleted units (which allows your first 16 units on a field to pack more punch and preserves valorous troops), I keep "tidy units up after battle" option ON and the computer will merge compatible units in a single stack automatically. To replenish a stack from another one in the same province, I take out all full strength units in a stack and put them in a separate "full-strength" stack and then merge the remaining depleted units with another stack of depleted units. Once a merged unit reaches full strength, I move it the "full-strength" stack. Out of convention, I place full strength stacks in the east side of a province and depleted ones on the west side (assuming the province is large enough. Trebizond and Algeria are my favorites for doing replenishing).

Tip#6: Use "Esc" key to dismiss all the events dialog . It will not dismiss the last one about vices and virtues. [I prefer no to turn off the "display non-essential messages" because I like to know when important buildings get done]

Tip#7: Learn to use the left-hand shift key on the keyboard to check map for rebellions. Otherwise you will one day hit the return key by mistake


Tip#8: Avoid putting medium-star generals especially princes in the stack of a higher-star general. You may lose track of them on the battlefield and have them killed. Use them to guard other provinces if possible (of course, sometimes you absolutely need that particular unit in a fight, but generally speaking use lesser command units if possible).


Ok. That' all I recall.

I like to hear what others do. In particular, I am looking for tips to solve the following:
***How to quickly move an agent/army from one end of the map to another . I hate waiting on the map to scroll and it is so SLOW. Any way to speed scrolling on the main map up?)

***How to remember which province is teching up for what. Right now I write it down. I also queue up all possible buildgins that lead up teh tech tree to the unit I want, but often some of them are not available until you build earlier ones, which makes it hard to queue them.

***A way to "mark" armies that should do something on the next turn (e.g if I am sending an army back to its home province for retraining, I often forget to move on the way and it ends up taking YEARS to get back. I tried positioning it on a particular place in a province, but the computer does not save the exact spot from turn to turn.)

please post your tips and hints

afrit