Has anyone actually LOST before

[ShadowMagnet]

To be fair if deleting a campaign counts as losing it - then I have lost dozens and dozens. Only because of waning interest in a faction and urge to try something differnet next time round. Losing the game with Polish was indeed so refreshing that I stuck with them until the bitter end. Trying to overcome the odds was so challenging I barely got an hour's kip before going to work for 11 hours.

[TheWingedVictory]

I don't care, for I still dream about my grand Spanish Empire which I have forged with my own 10 fingers about a year ago... WHY WHY did I deleted that campaign?!!!

[jadast]

I have never won as Poland. Three times in a row my growing Turkish empire crumbled into civil war and was swallowed by Spain twice and the Byz once.

[bretwalda]

Yesterday I overextended myself Turks/Late/Hard and could not cope with rebellions, etc. so I quit. I don't know why the game says it is easier than the difficulty level selected...

I might try later but I feel that late campaigns are less interesting than early or high. But with most factions the most enjoyable period is early - for me. What do you think?

[ShadowMagnet]

I absolutely agree. Early is the most enjoyable starting era and the later you start the less development you witness. Going through all the farming/mining/military/naval/urban upgrades is the most intersting bit of the game to me especially when you desperately try to find money for all that as well as beefing up your humble starting forces.

Unfortunately the vastness of the map and the very length of early capmaigns often tends to put me off a little, so I usually start in high. Everything else aside this also gives me immediate access to polish retainers which somehow are one of my favourite units in the whole game. Don't ask me why, they just are.

[Don Corleone]

I didn't get a message from the computer or anything, but I did lose according to my rules as the French over the weekend. When I play, I require that any specific event GA must be met or I fail. Well, the French have the Krek de Chavliers GA. You have to build a citadel in Tripoli by 1200. NOT EASY. Assuming the Egyptians haven't developed it beyond keep level, and your storming of it knocks it back to fort level, you have to take it no later than 1164. As it turns out, a Tripoli crusade is also a GA event for the French. So, you have to launch a successful crusade and storm any fortifications by 1164. If you're worried about loyalty issues of any form, add a year or two for watchtowers & border forts. If you want to regenerate your troops over there, you better add in time for those buildings as well.

I have always played that to launch a crusade, I build a fleet all the way a province to the province I intend to crusade. After the disaster this past weekend, I always, always, always will do this... Why?

Another thread in here stated that you don't have to be allied to borrow somebody's fleet. This is not true. The AI doesn't have to be allied with you to borrow your fleet, but you cannot use a neutral party's!!! I sent my crusade from Toulouse into Province, thinking when I got to Venice, I'd just hitch a ride on the Italian's fleet. Well, the Italians let me in, but no, I couldn't use their ships. I had to go the Looooooong way. What's more, Byzantium wouldn't let me pass so I had to fight my way through. It destroyed my crusade, well almost..... this was the part that really ticked me off.... it took 9 years for my crusade to fail once it got under 100 men. They wouldn't quit for love or money. I admire their spirit, but it really, really sucked because I couldn't launch another crusade until it was too late.

Anyway, I learned my lesson... I don't mess around in Aragon or the Brittish Isles anymore. I get my borders sealed, I start cranking ships, and I get that citadel built PRONTO

Interesting trick i learned... I made a rule for myself that I wasn't going to take and hold anything East of Champagne, North of Flanders or South of Toulouse/Aquitane. BUUUUUTTT.....if you don't want those pesky English shutting down your fleet periodically and keeping you from making your due off of Flanders, RAID . I wait until they've built the port, the keep and then the dockyard. I then wait 2 more years, then invade Wessex with enough troops to carry the day. I storm the keep, destroy it and everything else in there, then, buh-bye.... Let them deal with that mess.

It's working well so far, I'll let you know how it turns out. Sucks to have no steel, but it does make the game pretty challenging. Maybe I'll start a French colony up in Sweden, seeing as how the Danes clearly don't want it...

[Satyr]

Sure a lot of whining in that post Don. What fun would it be if everything always was easy with no setbacks?

[Don Corleone]

I agree. I only made the point to highlight that I have lost. The only real whining I meant to do was about the 1 way nature of using non-allies fleets to launch your crusade. The rest of it was just why I play the game.

[King Henry V]

If what you mean by losing is actually getting the screen saying "You've lost", then I only had that happening once, and that was on purpose (I put all my royal family together and invaded a country and refused to pay for the ransom). However, on several occasions I just found that there was no possible way of winning the game and quit. This happened with the Viking campaign when playing the Vikings and after a while there was only me and Mercia on a 1/3-2/3
territory ratio in favour of the Mercians.

[Martok]

I've had a number of campaigns where I didn't lose per se, but I wound up quitting anyway. Usually, however, these aren't campaigns where I'm losing. I actually rather enjoy getting my arse kicked, in a perverse kind of way--it's nice to know that the AI can still beat me.

The campaigns I wind up quitting are the ones where I'm boxed into a corner and can't make any real headway. That's a big reason why I don't play as Aragon and the Danes very often. When I try and play those factions, I usually wind up in a stalemate situation; I'm too weak to expand much, but I'm just strong enough that no one can completely conquer me. So in the end, I wind up just sitting there with 1 or 2 miserable provinces and can't get anything done.

[FadeAwayNot]

I've lost twice.

The first time was when I first started playing. I was the Danes and had built a nice small empire and had a trade network set up around the map. I decided to do some expansion in the mediterranean and invaded Sicily with my king. I take the province but wind up with a massive civil war. I stupidly side with the king, he dies in battle and game over.

The second time was just last week. I was playing a very fun game as the Italians. I was mainly just trying to see how much money I could build up. I had taken Sicily, Naples, and the three coastal Crusader states and was turtling. I left minimal garrisons on all borders and was having a great time fighting off the Hungarians, Germans, Turks and Spanish against great odds. However, in the late 1370s, my king had grown quite old and so had the heirs. I couldn't marry off any of the heirs because of the late game bloat effect. When the king died at age 72, his lone remaining heir was 54. Two years later, the heir died and game over.


A couple of other games I have quit when there was some possibility of losing, but I'm pretty sure I would have turned it around.

[Shambles]

I keep getting pummeled as the welsh on hard.
with only a few starting provinces I usualy find my self at war with the saxons and the irish,
And if i moove troops to attack either one,
I get rebellions,
Then a civil war,
Then some 1 bribes an army away,
and i haft to buy mercinarys,

then my economy gets hurt.
Then i notice all the destroyed buldings i need to re build.

And Then the dumb blue faction re aprear Right in the middle of my kingdom,
Just as the nortumberland people decide they want some of my land before its all gone,

Its prety much the same story every time i try :)

they usualy get me surounded with 1 province left then propose an aliance,
I thought that was a Bit strange,
never the less its still Good fun

ShambleS

[Sir William Wallace]

i have lost a few times before,,, just recently i was playing the scots on hard, and i tried to take over too much land from the picts and got caught in monetary problesm and was back stabbed by the irish, no one wanted to marry my daughters, so i had them marry in the family b/c all my generals were already married,, to get money back i destroyed all the buildings i had in outlying and unproductive provinces and moved out of there, but with my luck,, no rebels or other factiosn wanted my abandoned provinces, so i was stuck with them, so i tried to launch attacks on the picts for more money, but my king eventually died in battle and had underaged heirs, so the suffereing was put to an end, thankfully, i started a new campaign, witht he scots and doing everything opposite of this last one and im doing failry well