Mars-maddened governors

[Zenicetus]

Newbie question here. I'm partway through a Brutii campaign, rolling through Asia Minor at the moment with Greece, Macedon, and Thrace all mine, Pontus down to the last city, and the Selucids next on the chopping block. I've moved my capital to Athens, and I have Athens, Corinth, and Sparta as my main recruiting cities, built up with blacksmiths, etc. All have Mars temples for the experience bonus.

I've been keeping governors out of those cities so they don't get the "angry" trait line from the temples. However, that means the population growth is very low because I keep draining it for new soldiers. And without a governor I get no increased population when I enslave enemy settlements (and I do a lot of that). So I'm thinking I need to move some of my lesser generals into these three cities, mainly for the enslavement bonus... or they're never going to grow to the point where I can make buildings to recruit the better units.

But what happens if I do that? I mean, what's the end-point of the Mars thing? Do they all go stark raving mad, and start eating babies and setting the city on fire or something? Is there any serious downside to just letting them go nuts?

[bubbanator]

I just finished another Brutii campaign and have had a few problems with that. Most of my temples are to Mars and I have governers in most of the cities. I forgot however, that they do give you the 'madness' and 'angry' traits. This was only a problem in the begining when I actually needed my governers to fight because I had so few family members. One thing you can do though, is keep a governor staitioned outside each of those cities. When you are planning to attack, put the governers into the city then after you enslave the city you are attacking, take your governors back outside your cities.

Don't know if that made any sense or not, so just tell me if you need me to clear it up a bit

[Zenicetus]

Bubbinator, that makes sense, thanks! It would add some more micromangement on the strat map, and I'm already having trouble losing track of what I'm supposed to be doing as my territory gets larger. But I think I'll try it. That would also let the generals pick up any interesting mercs that were available, to add to the recruitment flow moving out of those cities.

I suppose I could also take all my "behind the lines" new family members as they come of age, and make them spend just enough time as governors in the major recruitment cities not to pick up the worst traits, before moving them on towards the front lines. But that sounds like even more trouble to keep track of.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

B'nators advice about stepping in and out is sound.

Also, it might be worth it to station a "shrub" (little or no oomph in any category) in there for several turns if you want a lot growth in one city. If he succumbs to madness, you can host a family party, load him up with all the bad retinue members from the entire family, and then let him hire an army/take dregs and send him off to win glory for the faction. Do NOT provide him with a route home or let him govern anything but the town he just razed.

This quasi-alexandrian anabasis should generate lots of revenue, some slaves, and allow you to pummel some factions with troops and a FM who you really don't want near home anyway. If he does come back in 20 years, he'll have more battle stars than a constellation, so who cares if he foams at the mouth and urinates without dismounting -- he's a killer!

[lars573]

Basically Mars crazied up family members have 0 command 0 managment and low influence. At least they always have in my experience.

You should, based on starting traits, set aside a few guy's to be "ruined" by the Mars temple. That way since they would only have ever been a mediocre governor or general his getting turned into a demented, abusive, phychotic maniac it won't be such a loss.

[swirly_the_toilet_fish]

If you know anything about modding you can create a seperate script for Romans, Macedons, etc. to reduce the chance of becoming either "mad" or "angry." This could be plausible because they were supposed to be more "civilised" than Germans (who also can build a temple of violence).

[player1]

These are the lines from trigger that awards traits for govenors in cities with temple of Mars (2nd level and higher)

Trigger temple_of_violence_vnv_trigger
    WhenToTest CharacterTurnEnd

    Condition EndedInSettlement
          and RemainingMPPercentage = 100
          and SettlementBuildingExists >= temple_of_violence_temple

    Affects Anger  1  Chance  10 
    Affects Bloodthirsty  1  Chance  10 
    Affects Energetic  1  Chance  15

As you can see, having Mars temple has benefits and flaws.
Extra experience is always a benefit.
As well as gaining Energetic line of traits (Lively, Very Lively, etc...)

On the other hand Anger and Bloodthirst take thier toll too.

[Ludens]

Since the trigger requires the governor to have full movement points left at the end of the turn, you can prevent it from being triggered by moving your governors a little every turn. This way you will still gain the benefit of management, influence and enslavement bonuses. This kind of micro-management does get tiresome after a while. Also, it prevents you from getting many other bad and good traits, because many triggers require full movements points.

[Cheater]

Deleted: Someone already gave the same advice I did

[Shadar]

A good player should not require constantly training units in EVERY single city every turn (after all, you should have the ability to not simply rely on sheer numbers to overwhelmn the opponent in battle - which mostly lowers your losses). Only set aside a few strategic locations for the Mars stream temples and put other temples in your money-making cities (economic cities). And if you really requiring a troop production centre to expand, you can simply dump in a governor before the taking of a city. That way, you only need to keep in range a FEW governors because the rest will be booming in growth from not having troops produced within them (and they will get better economic buildings because you don't need to spend much time on military structure.. only require basic buildings to build emergency forces in case of any trouble).

[Zenicetus]

A good player should not require constantly training units in EVERY single city every turn (after all, you should have the ability to not simply rely on sheer numbers to overwhelmn the opponent in battle - which mostly lowers your losses). Only set aside a few strategic locations for the Mars stream temples and put other temples in your money-making cities (economic cities). And if you really requiring a troop production centre to expand, you can simply dump in a governor before the taking of a city. That way, you only need to keep in range a FEW governors because the rest will be booming in growth from not having troops produced within them (and they will get better economic buildings because you don't need to spend much time on military structure.. only require basic buildings to build emergency forces in case of any trouble).

Right, if you read my original post this is only about a core recruitment area with three strategically located cities (and sometimes the nearby ones, if I'm in a recruiting crunch). Right now that's all I need, to ferry replacements to the front line armies. But they don't maintain a healthy enough growth rate to get the building upgrades without slaves to make up for the recruitment drain. All the other cities have either Juno or Mercury temples. Actually Mercury temples are looking like a waste for the Brutii, because they have such an economic advantage anyway.

I'm lazy enough that even the idea of popping three governers in and out to synchronize with enemy city takeovers (for slaves) sounds like a lot of work. But I'm trying it now. Actually I'm going to leave one governer in place to see how bad he gets.

[Kourutsu]

The only problem with keeping a govener out of a city, is that he won't produce any heirs.

[Cheater]

I say that just hacking the character traits file should be enough for everything and keep the generals inside to govern.

Personally, I almost never use my family members to fight, I always keep them inside and look after things in the cities. With my hacking some traits, I realized that I can actually make a LOT of money from my super-man characters! ~:P

And I don't need to worry about my enemies... as I've invented quite a bit of negative traits for them, too! !:D

[Kourutsu]

I can see now how fitting a name that is for you...

Where can you find this trigger? I would find it helpful to see the statistics of other cultural buildings.

EDIT

Found it. A priceless quarry of information.
Hey do the Woden buildings make Govenors crazy too?

[AntiochusIII]

Found it. A priceless quarry of information.
Hey do the Woden buildings make Govenors crazy too?

Yes. Unless you meddle with the trait files.

If you do not mod the files, be careful with Woden. The "Berserker" trait gets bad after a while.

The temples of violence, trade, love, and a few others are very dangerous to your virtuous governers. Sadly, luxurious cities are, as well. I did get annoyed after a while and overhauled the trait file to remove many of the negative triggers. [It made the game a little too easy so I modded to give AI family members more stars and acumen.]