Diplomacy, Agents and Campaign Map AI

[Phalaxar]

Trade rights, assasinating generals and spying out the enemies' strengths were really important for me :o. It'd be hard for me to play without; far less trade early on (which is always your biggest cash cow), some real tough cookies to face, and even worse you don't know if you're running into twenty peasant units or twenty generals.

Even if you didn't find them useful, I thought they were, and obviously a lot of other people did.

[Furious Mental]

Maybe in Rome assassins aren't fantastic. However in EB they are the only way to stop your whole empire being bribed by diplomats.

[Aracnid]

Even on medium they are really useful, on harder difficulties you can't win without them. Though I will admit that diplomats are useless, after all if the AI doesn't except peace treaties whats the point of being able to offer them, and spy's are better at recon. Also before any siege I send in one or two or even spies to make sure that the gate is open (much easier and better than building siege equipent and wreaking the city).

[wraithdt]

I find that all 3 agents types are useful and use them on all total war games I've played. The Assassin's role is the pretty much the same in both MTW and RTW; killing other agents and characters/generals. Spies were slighty less effective in RTW cuz they don't increase public order like they do in MTW but still usefull cuz they have huge "line-of-sight" for exploring and a high level spy can cause serious unrest in a rival's settlement.

Now Diplomats, on the other hand, I find very useful in RTW. If you're you're a filthy rich kingdom with lots and lots of cash to burn then your diplomat can be a deadly weapon. I've bribed away countless stacks of armies that I would otherwise have problems dealing with cuz my armies were elsewhere fighting. Also, who said that money can't buy friendship? If you offer huge sums of money you can often secure alliances you normally wouldn't get. I also found it very usefull to fund other kingdoms who are enemies of my enemies. That way my opponent will be distracted trying to subdue the other kingdoms while I pummel/bribe the rest of his armies to dust. I also rescued a number of factions on the brink of oblivian by giving them hordes of cash this way and most of the time they end up with decent a decent sized kingdom and armies to annoy my enemies after that. Just watch out though cuz they might turn on you if they become too powerful lol.

[Aracnid]

Yeah well I prefer to use my money to build up my empire or cut taxes, rather than splurge money to my future enemies (everyone is a future enemy after all).

[wraithdt]

Well thats true but I always find myself with a huge surplus of cash. I could just keep it but theres a downside to it; governors and generals will become corrupt if you start hording money. I think it makes the campaign a bit more interesting if you spread some wealth around with your diplomats.

I hope to do this again in M2TW. Eg. Playing as the French and funding Scottish insurgents.

[Polemists]

Yes plus as we know from video's this time I see a couple brand new ways to use assassins. One I can use him to assinate the other canidates I don't like for pope hat so I can get a pope who is mine or one of my allies. Secondly if there's a certain general my princess I would like to coherce and assasin can make sure no other princesses get there first

Diplomats are going to be unique this time around I think because supposedly computer remebers more things. So if I see my ally start to buff up his borders I definetly want somebody to talk him out of it.

Spies I love for same reasons others said. I mean you thought Rome was bad, I've a good chunk of demo battles but they cost alot of men, and that wasn't even against a 3 ring wall tower of doom hammer. So if seige weapons fail and I have no spy my men resort to