Anno Domini

[Gray Beard]

After playing version .93 for a while may I offer what is meant to be some constructive criticisms.

As you can see from my post on this board I generally play the Byzantines and I think that the Byzantines, Turks and Egyptians get short changed by AD.

The reason for this is very simply that the provinces in the Near East are to big to march from a city, attack another city, conquer it and then garrison your army in that city in ONE turn. When Other factions especially the HRE or the various Italians want to take a city they can do so in one turn if they have siege engines of some sort. What this means is that the Byzantines and Turks tend to sit there with a full stack in each city that they can't afford to move.

In many of the games I 've played against the computer the HRE ends up winning because it is very easy for them to reach the 35 province limit. What to do? These are perhaps not the best suggestions but they are things that have occurred to me

For the HRE make them have to duplicate the empire of Charels V. They have to take out the Hungarians AND the Spanish.

Byzantines and Turks maybe start with roads built between Turkish (Old Byzantine cities) to give troops ability to move between them in one move while dragging a siege engine, OR since many siege engines were built on location allow them to be purchased as mercenaries.

Alternately adjust boundaries and make one or two more provinces from Smyrna, Niceae, Sinope, Iconium, Ankra, Cesaria, Trebozond Adana, and that other one down on the coast but keep the total income the same for the combination. This would make the towns closer together.

For the French to win they should have to subdue the HRE

The Milanese, Venetians and Sicilians should have to control the whole of Italy and reduce the pope to a vassal.

Create a faction called "The Prussians" to help counter balance the HRE and give the Danes someone to worry about. It is a little early at the beginning of the game for them but not by the end.

Just some thoughts