MTW bugs/problems/strangeness

[EightDeer]

3) The AI doesn't really know how to set up a proper trade network, but some factions tend to get lucky more than others. It's more accidental than deliberate.

Pity. The import income from the Danes is a nice little bonus.

4) One really good Assassin is nearly essential, but I like to have spares - sooner or later the odds will catch up with your "uber" Assassin, and he'll get caught. I feel you can't go wrong with the "one per province" guideline - that's what I try to set up in my campaigns.

I guess I'll get some more; it's going to be a definite PITA to train additional Assassins up to being really useful, even with fresh V5's from Syria.

8) I too love Swiss Halberdiers, especially when gold-armored (except in the desert). There's just a certain "panache" to mountain fighters, isn't there?

Panache is right. They're absolutely impossible to rout, and it's almost scary to watch them battle Knights.

9)If that charging CMAA had better morale and had actually come to grips with your Arq, the results might have been disastrous.

They did come to grips, and there was a right proper punch-up but there were several factors in the Arq's favour:
1. The CMAA were charging uphill.
2. The Pope had just died of Varangian causes.
3. The Arq's were deployed in a long, thin 2-rank formation. When the CMAA charged directly into the center of the Arq's, they lapped round the CMAA in a rough U-shape to get at the front and both flanks simultaneously.
4. The Arq's were V5 and the CMAA were V1.
5. The Arq's were trained in a province that had a Master Armourer/Gunsmith/Metalsmith, all religious buildings including a Cathedral as well as the College of Surgeons and Military Academy. They were not the standard Arq unit.

12) There can't be too many useless personal anectodes - that's part of the great flavor of this forum!

Well then, I'll continue to be my long-winded self.

I'm a little surprised at that as well. Usually the AI will choose to wait out a siege rather than storming the castle, particularly if a large garrison (like yours in Khazar) will succumb quickly to starvation. The exception is if your defending garrison is so small that the AI would have to wait forever before the castle fell. I believe the Golden Horde may be programmed to be more aggressive, however; so that may be why they chose to assult the castle instead.

Ah well, the Emperor isn't overly concerned. However, Silk Road traders report that large numbers of highly disrespectful things are being said about him in Mongolia. Some of them are downright factually inaccurate! Everyone knows donkeys aren't that flexible.

Shogun Total War (the original Total War game, and Medieval's predecessor)

I actually got a copy of that (without MI) before I got MTW. I discovered that STW doesn't run under XP SP2, so I threw it in with the rest of my games and forgot about it.

I want to say War Galleys can travel in deep water.

Sadly, they don't.

Since the Emperor's navy's activity centered around the Black Sea and eastern Med, they didn't really have much need of a true deep-water vessel.

The Black Sea is more-or-less the Emperor's private lake here, and Byzantine warships can be found anywhere from the Egyptian to the Irish coasts. I will admit that the lack of a deep-water vessel is a minor irritation rather than a true handicap, but it still bugs me.

I often wonder what Byzantine society is like in this strange alternate history I've created with CA's tools. MTW is decent at simulating economic and military aspects of a vast empire, but it says nothing about the culture of said empire. Byzantine art, literature and social customs would surely be radically different to what they were in our history. I wonder what daily life is like in Anatolia, Greece or Wallachia, which have known 2 centuries of prolonged peace. Then I remember that this is not alternatehistory.com, and I shut up.

Oh, and congratulations on your promotion to full membership!

What? When did this happen? Should I thank the Academy?