spies and the pope warning

[Procrustes]

Hi,

Something odd happened to me when using spies to end a siege. I am playing as the French (vi, patched, hard, GA). The Spanish broke our treaty and attacked me across the Pyrenees. I drove them back and besieged their forces in Navarre and Aragon. I got the Pope warning - "finish up in two years or I'll excommunicate you". (He offered his daughter's hand in marriage at the same time - yeehaw!) I had a bunch of spies sitting around, so I waited out the first year and on the second year I assaulted the castle in Navarre and dropped three spies on the keep in Aragon - figured it would be nice to keep the port and some other buildings that were there. The spies all had a reasonable chance of success so I figured one would get through. Well, one did - a spy ended the siege, but I got excommunicated for it! I re-loaded, and instead of using spies I assaulted the keep (and destroyed all those building I wanted in the process.) This time I didn't get excommunicated - things worked just like always.

So, has anyone else found that spies don't work with the Pope warning? Was it something else I did?

Many thanks,

[Blodrast]

Hmm, but you see, if you had attacked the citadel in the second year, you would have got it in the same year. That means that at the end of the second year (well, more precisely the beginning of the third) you were no longer at war with them.
But using spies, after two years you were still at war with the Aragonese, and therefore got excommunicated. I think it kinda makes sense, because the spies unlocking the gates succeeded in _the following year_. Had you done that in the first year (with the spies), you would have been fine, I'll bet.

[Procrustes]

Hmm, but you see, if you had attacked the citadel in the second year, you would have got it in the same year. That means that at the end of the second year (well, more precisely the beginning of the third) you were no longer at war with them.
But using spies, after two years you were still at war with the Aragonese, and therefore got excommunicated. I think it kinda makes sense, because the spies unlocking the gates succeeded in _the following year_. Had you done that in the first year (with the spies), you would have been fine, I'll bet.

So if I'm understanding you, it sounds like the trick is to assault the fort/keep/castle/citadel at the same time you drop spies on it, right? I think my mistake may have been to keep letting the siege continue and relying only upon the spies.

Thanks again,

Procrustes

[Blodrast]

No, because then it would be pointless to use the spies. I probably wasn't clear enough.
What you should have perhaps tried was to use the spies in the first year; if it worked, great, you'd own the place in the second year; if it didn't work, you could still assault in the second year, that doesn't get you excommunicated.

good luck ;)

[eadeater]

This may be slightly off the point, but I am never worried by the Pope excommunicating me, because as soon as I can train assasins, I will train half a dozen, and send them off to harden themselves up on some emmisaries. This will mean I lose one or two, and continue this until I get a level 5 or 6 assassin, whom I use to kill the Pope whenever me and him disagree about my foreign policy. Vary the targets for the assassin, some princesses and 1 or 2 star generals are good as well. This usually works really well as the Pope is always a bit useless as a general. The highest I've seen had 3 stars, huh, thats gets my level 6 assassin a good 60-70% chance of success.

[Blodrast]

well, you may already know this, but as far as assassins go, they get a +2 valour bonus in Syria.
With full upgrades you get them 5-stars out of the box.
I don't know off the top of my head what the GA reqs are for French, but if you can get and hold Syria, you can also play assassins: Total War.