Hardest Faction

[Darkmoor_Dragon]

Venice is fun, especially in a long game (turn = 0.75 or similar).

Milan, Hungary, Sicily, HRE and Byzies were all at war with me from about year 3.... If i hadnt managed to get on the right side of the pope RIGHT at the start (vh/vh) I'dve been toast.... only some highly strategic Crusading saved me.

High dependence on towns and militia made it entirely different to England and clones.

England is by far the easiest due to the security of the UK and the inevitable *sit behind stakes and pummel the enemy with longbows* tactics. Maybe when the passive AI is done for this might change.

England should be MUCH harder than it is, and the French more aggressive.
I find the Danes become dominant in almost every game in the far north europe. HRE gets creamed every time (so far).

In the longer games those factions with the better late period units struggle more at the beginning as you can find yourself at 1150 or so with many of the buildings max'd for the time and then a long wait using those units until gunpowder arrives.

Which can be very good fun - you certainly get far more respect for castles when you know the best weapon you will get for another 200 odd turns is still the trebuchet and getting those to work against a level 1 upgraded castle isnt easy.

Edit - i've tried playing at 1.0 but its too quick, 0.5 is a bit slow, so plumped for 0.75 atm which seems good so far... cant remember the number of turns offhand and dont even think about age-per-turn.