The Plague

[Marcellus]

Once settlements/characters/armies are hit by the plague, how long does it take for them to recover? Is there any way to speed up the recovery process? It's just that the plague is really hurting one of my armies. Any help on this issue would be much appreciated.

[Quietus]

Build the public health buildings such as sewers.

[Kekvit Irae]

If there's a spy or assassin or emissary or general in your employ that is infected, he will make sure the plague stays in that town. Remove him and the town will eventually recover.

[Marcellus]

Thanks Quietus and Kekvitirae.

Is there any way to speed up the recovery of the spy/assassin/emissary/general once they have been taken out of the city?

[Mahrabals apprentice]

I think sometimes its inevitable, suchas the plauge in macadonia near the start of the game. Or atleast I have never been able to dodge that 1

[pezhetairoi]

8 turns max for an army if it stays in a city with health buildings. And I think the higher-quality the health buildings the shorter the plague duration.

[Megas Alexandros]

I am quite confused, you mention this plage in Thessaloniki, which is fix programmed, although, I started as the Macedonians, played for 25 years and no plage erupted. I have to admit, the city is very dirty, but still no disease. Odd, but I can live with it.

[pezhetairoi]

That is, indeed, very odd. Perhaps it passed and you did not notice it? Because the plague in Macedonia has come faithfully every campaign I played, regardless of faction. Well, clean up the city, anyway. I'm sure your Thessalonians will be thankful to you for it :-) But no plague, well, lucky you.

[bippukt]

I am quite sure that plague in Thessalonica is programmed. I checked the descr_events file of the imperial campaign and it says:

event plague_in_macedonia
date 14 winter
position 138, 67

I guess this translates to plague in Thessalonica in winter 256 bc. It has always happened to me.

[antisocialmunky]

You could always send strategic pieces with plague to enemy cities to 'spread the love.'

[Barbarian_King]

shit I spreaded the "love" to my own capital.
Right now I've got two of my largest cities infected, I've got a huge army to feed and the income is taking a heavy hit, also have to keep the war going.
Those two cities have like three hearts for each growth and public happiness.
what do I do!!??

[Megas Alexandros]

Disband the army or let them eat the neighbour's food for a while. He would be grateful for that, I am sure.

[professorspatula]

My favourite plague is when the AI decides to punish you endlessly by spreading it back and forth to your cities. Two infected AI spies entered one of my cities, then four or five turns later, moved into a neighbouring settlement and infected that. Then, just as the first city has recovered, it moves its plaguebearers back to that city, then keeps going back and forth to each one just when they are recovering. Despite having 6-10 spies and assassins (many 5 star or more) in each settlement, I couldn't stop the AI spies murdering my population for a period of 30 years or more. I even tried surrounding my cities with agents to stop the AI spies entering but to no avail. Finally, after 10,000 deaths or more, I killed the plague-bearing spies.

The next best plague is when you accidently infect your best fleet with the plague. For fleets, there is no cure that I recall, only death.

[Barbarian_King]

wow 10 000 death. I cant afford to loose that many.
So what is the cure? I've got one of my governors infected and he is not getting better even though the settlement had already recovered.

[Slug For A Butt]

I believe the only cure is public health buildings and time.

[Megas Alexandros]

You say the infected NPC spies roamed around for 30 years. Did they not die from the disease themselves?

[professorspatula]

Agents can have the plague for years without dying. Sometimes it kills them in a few turns, other times they're almost immune to its ill effects. I've had mine infect AI settlements for over 20 years at a time. One of the enemy spies might have died from it, but the other one I couldn't get rid of for ages.

[Horatius]

Play Mongolian Style and send an infected agent into an enemy city.

[pezhetairoi]

Mongol style /= Mongolian style. Ahem.

Anyway. If you played Mongol style where would that get you? The infected region essentially is a no-go for you thereafter, because you would get the plague should you try to take it. It takes too much time and doesn't weaken the enemy -that- much. I'm wary of that tactic.

[M.T.Cicero]

When plague hits, I just leave the town as it is and wait until it's gone, garrisons are mostly town watch anyway and who cares about them? If there's a governor in there I leave him too, cuz he doesn't neccesseraly get infected while being in a diseased town, but he always gets infected if he moves out of it, same for agents. Sometimes plague can be useful tho, once a city is up to Huge, population is no longer needed and only causes squalor troubles so sometimes I spread plague in my own big cities intentionally if I feel economy is strong enough to bare with it. And I don't ever spread the plague to AI, the damned thing has no idea how to deal with it and it just lets it rage for decades infecting his cities and young family members - which I don't like since both are usually soon to be mine.

[pezhetairoi]

wrong, he gets infected when he's in a diseased town. It shows up on his detailed bio readout as a skull in the top righthand corner whether or not he moves out. He will infect any city just as well as any spy can, and yes, he can die. I forced 2 macedonian factioners to die of the plague when my Brutii army besieged Thessalonica and the last Macedonian fullstack one turn before the plague broke out.

Plague is troublesome because as much as it removes squalor, remember it decimates your garrison too so things will cancel each other out.

[player1]

The only thing I fear about plaque is losing good general or my veteran Cretan Archers (not retrainable).

[pezhetairoi]

Minimise chances. Build health buildings in all your cities, spy on enemy cities beffore deciding to storm it or force its surrender. I besieged Thessalonca for 15 turns, lifting the siege and renewing it to ensure the city didn't surrender to me, because the plague struck when I had only 2 turns left to go before it surrendered. Through these precautions you can minimise getting the plague, unless of course the enemy plaguebearer spy comes in to spread the love in your city.

[M.T.Cicero]

wrong, he gets infected when he's in a diseased town. It shows up on his detailed bio readout as a skull in the top righthand corner whether or not he moves out. He will infect any city just as well as any spy can, and yes, he can die. I forced 2 macedonian factioners to die of the plague when my Brutii army besieged Thessalonica and the last Macedonian fullstack one turn before the plague broke out.

Plague is troublesome because as much as it removes squalor, remember it decimates your garrison too so things will cancel each other out.

I've been doing this for a long while and 90% chances are the plague passess and the governor gets by without a cough.

[Severous]

Bump.

Wish I had seen this thread before today.

My first ever plague.



I had seen somewhere that Thessolonica gets the plague early in the game. But I thought early means something like within 5 turns. I didnt own Thessolonica that early so thought the Plague had been and gone.

So its appearance over the end of turn for the summer of 256BC was a surprise. (I never saw plague in my Julii campaign as came to Macedon lands years later in 232BC.)

I am one turn away from completing a sewer. I have just moved in a governor. To top it all...I had just moved my Brutii capital from Larissa..to..you guessed it..Thessolonica.

Now I need to decide how to use this new dimension to the game. Ive seen comments about using it as a weapon...and also that it is a liability as it kills your own people.

Im thinking that I want to stamp out the plague in my lands and not let it spread to the east. Brutii want to capture all the lands in the east. But maybe one spy and one ship. Which I send to the western end of the map and use it to attack any strong factions there.

Infect lands and weaken factions I do not plan to conquer. Is that a safe stragegy?

[teja]

A well. Nobody should stop playing when a plague comes in. Keep the following in mind:

You can infect:
ONLY cities directly!

* Any charakter (general, spy, assasin, diplomat) will be only infected, if he is in a city or fleet that became infected!
* Cities and fleets will loose permanently mens due a plague. With fleets there is a very small chance that the plague will end (good to spread infected spys over enemy cities)!
* Health installations like sewers will raise the chance to cure a city AND prevent cities to become infected in any OTHER way but due enemy spies!

What to do when a charakter or an army became infected?
* Move out charakters and armies out of the city. It does not affect a character, when a city they are in became cured during a round! The program make its own math for any charakter AND city! Make sure that NO unit is with a charakter!
* Charakters die slowly! In opposite to fleets and cities they do not loose mens permanently (yes, they will loose their mens, when a general, but can resist better personally!)
* Armies without a charakter with them will be cured very fast in the wilderness!


Important:
Never make an infected city becoming your capital! If a plague hits your capital, MOVE it immediately!
Reason: Any family member that comes to age will start in the capital often. When there is a plague, he will get infected.


You always have the chance to leave a city with a plague alone. If they rebel, you may take it back later.....

[Ciaran]

Playing with Egypt I found the Plague an asset rather than an obstacle. Especially the cities of the Nile valley grow way too fast for their own good, even without any growth updates whatsoever. So a population-reducing plague every now and then helps to keep them manageable. Much the same goes for conquered cities. Especially later in the game cities are pretty much developed, often up to the second largest level. If the population of these cities is allowed to grow at their normal rate, they tend to become rebellious due to squalor and garrison demands when they reach about 14,000 inhabitants. Obviously, that´s still a long way to go to the 24,000 required for the highest level cities (or even worse, if you´re playing the barbarian faction you can´t upgrade the governing buildings at all, making it all the worse), and then it´s better to get rid of those excess population.

[teja]

For sure a good point Ciaran. A Rebellion can have it's benefits too ;)

[kburkert]

I think sometimes its inevitable, suchas the plauge in macadonia near the start of the game. Or atleast I have never been able to dodge that 1

When i play as the greek cities i never get the plauge in macedonia happen. But if im anyother faction it happens.

[Severous]

Another reason to ensure your capital is not infected with plague :

- Senate mission rewards of new units appear at your capital...they wont be infected.