What to do with useless generals?

[Alcorr]

Exactly what the title says...I am having trouble deciding what to do with generals that have no purpose governing or fighting.

Every game I play I always get several generals that have something along the following lines:

Corrupt
Aloof
Ugly
Wildly Extravagant
Utterly Insane
Dangerously Mad
Disloyal

etc...

[Omanes Alexandrapolites]

Hi Alcorr,
I suggest you send 'em on a one way cruise across the sea. Build yourself a cheap single unit of the cheapest and weakest boat type and send it out into pirate infested waters. The pirates attack, destroy the boat, it sinks and it takes the rubbish general with it

Another method could be to send the general out to fight an uber army of rebels. Charge him into the strongest enemy unit, and watch him die as the rest of the enemy army surround him!

Good luck with destroying your generals! Cheers!

[napoleon526]

The reason that they're acquiring those characteristics is that you're keeping them in cities, where they're picking up bad habits (drinking, gambling, whoring, imbezzelment). I usually build a fort and keep all my generals besides those commanding armies and commanding border castles.

If you don't put your generals in cities, then they don't have the opportunity to become corrupt or extravagant. There's not much you can do about ugliness, though.

[Zajuts149]

The reason that they're acquiring those characteristics is that you're keeping them in cities, where they're picking up bad habits (drinking, gambling, whoring, imbezzelment). I usually build a fort and keep all my generals besides those commanding armies and commanding border castles.

If you don't put your generals in cities, then they don't have the opportunity to become corrupt or extravagant. There's not much you can do about ugliness, though.

LOL!

My general is a drunk, yours is ugly. Mine can sober up

[Ars Moriendi]

1. Homeland maintenance : fight off the rebels, build watchtowers.

2. Frontline duty : Gen.bodyguards make excelent heavy cav. Just put them in an army with a good general with higher command rating, and use them as you would any other h.cav.

3. Commandos : suicidal missions deep in enemy territory ; raid & sack poorly defended inner cities, keeping thy enemies in the stone age. If the lunatic dies, he'll just make room for young upcomers.

4. Logistic manager : transporting troops from your developed castles to the borders of the empire is risky - they might turn rebels. Add a general in the stack to prevent it.

[Alcorr]

1. Homeland maintenance : fight off the rebels, build watchtowers.

2. Frontline duty : Gen.bodyguards make excelent heavy cav. Just put them in an army with a good general with higher command rating, and use them as you would any other h.cav.

3. Commandos : suicidal missions deep in enemy territory ; raid & sack poorly defended inner cities, keeping thy enemies in the stone age. If the lunatic dies, he'll just make room for young upcomers.

4. Logistic manager : transporting troops from your developed castles to the borders of the empire is risky - they might turn rebels. Add a general in the stack to prevent it.

Well I already do all of these things some of the time, just wondering if there was anything else.

Frontline duty I would rather have a unit of 40 man hvy cav rather than 20 man hvy cav with 2 hp each, maybe its just a personal preference.

Suicidal missions is what im doing now...mainly exploring and sending my useless gens across europe.

Transporting troops is something I rarely do with these gens...due to low loyalty...some have 0 or 1 its really bad...

[pevergreen]

The answer!

Download Medifix.

[Lorenzo_H]

"Ugly" can turn into "Scarred" which is good (+8 hitpoints in Battle and I think +1 dread) so don't worry about those Generals too much, just send them to the front line.

[sapi]

Lots of spare generals = no rebels in your territory :P

You might even pick up some useful traits

[Foz]

Frontline duty I would rather have a unit of 40 man hvy cav rather than 20 man hvy cav with 2 hp each, maybe its just a personal preference.

No way! Check it out:

1. Stats. Most bodyguard units (early) have pri attack 13/+8 charge, sec attack 14/+4 charge, and total defense of 16. Most knight units don't come close to touching these numbers.
2. Numbers. Often times general units end up with more than 20 members (don't ask how, but I've seen 23 and 27 at least), meaning they're better than even 40 equivalent troops (b/c they take 2 hits to kill so are essentially 2 soldiers each). You also get the ridiculous benefit of maintaining full combat effectiveness for considerably longer - each man can absorb one hit without ANYTHING happening to the unit's fighting strength. The same cannot be said of a normal cav unit, which begins to fight less capably as soon as 1 man takes a hit. This is especially important when you multiple charge, as you can usually get a second charge with almost the entire company out of a general unit b/c they just shrug off any hits they take as they withdraw.
3. Maneuverability. Due to the smaller unit size, the unit tends to stick together more, can get in harder-to-reach places, and is also considerably easier to withdraw than a similar 40-man cav unit. 40 man units tend to get twisted up in whatever you had them charge into, where the smaller general units do much better at breaking free quickly to charge again.
4. Experience. Due to having 2HP, each man in the unit typically gets far more combat experience than any rider in a 40-man unit does. This makes it much easier to level up the bodyguard unit in my experience.

[kublikhan3]

Give them to me. I would love to have another unit of self-healing, 2 hitpoint, charging machines. Half my generals end up cruely scarred anyway. And if they are disloyal, don't let them lead the army. Make them the patsy of one of your loyal generals.

[Alcorr]

No way! Check it out:

1. Stats. Most bodyguard units (early) have pri attack 13/+8 charge, sec attack 14/+4 charge, and total defense of 16. Most knight units don't come close to touching these numbers.
2. Numbers. Often times general units end up with more than 20 members (don't ask how, but I've seen 23 and 27 at least), meaning they're better than even 40 equivalent troops (b/c they take 2 hits to kill so are essentially 2 soldiers each). You also get the ridiculous benefit of maintaining full combat effectiveness for considerably longer - each man can absorb one hit without ANYTHING happening to the unit's fighting strength. The same cannot be said of a normal cav unit, which begins to fight less capably as soon as 1 man takes a hit. This is especially important when you multiple charge, as you can usually get a second charge with almost the entire company out of a general unit b/c they just shrug off any hits they take as they withdraw.
3. Maneuverability. Due to the smaller unit size, the unit tends to stick together more, can get in harder-to-reach places, and is also considerably easier to withdraw than a similar 40-man cav unit. 40 man units tend to get twisted up in whatever you had them charge into, where the smaller general units do much better at breaking free quickly to charge again.
4. Experience. Due to having 2HP, each man in the unit typically gets far more combat experience than any rider in a 40-man unit does. This makes it much easier to level up the bodyguard unit in my experience.

I have considered these points before, and I still use these insane generals in battle, but I must say I would take a unit of gothic knights over a 20 man gen unit any day. 20 men seems to be my average as some are 16 and some are a good 24...

Those are all true points but im talking about late game where units like gothic knights are actually better in melee (maces) than the general units.

But more importantly, like 90% of damage done on melee is during the charge, a unit with half the men is going to do (in essence) somewhere around half the damage on the charge. Thus twice as many enemy survive...

[snorky]

i had an ugly king

[Foz]

I have considered these points before, and I still use these insane generals in battle, but I must say I would take a unit of gothic knights over a 20 man gen unit any day. 20 men seems to be my average as some are 16 and some are a good 24...

I have a unit of 33 right now, and almost never see less than 20. Fairly often I see higher though. Does anyone know what controls the size of the general's bodyguard unit?

Those are all true points but im talking about late game where units like gothic knights are actually better in melee (maces) than the general units.

"units like gothic knights..." There aren't any others like them, lol. No other cav unit in the game boasts as high a secondary attack w/ AP stat. The few that have AP mostly have considerably lower attacks, and the ones that don't typically have attacks no better than that of a general unit. Even not considering that, if you are allowing your heavy cavalry to become entangled in melee you are using them incorrectly, so this should not be a concern.

But more importantly, like 90% of damage done on melee is during the charge, a unit with half the men is going to do (in essence) somewhere around half the damage on the charge. Thus twice as many enemy survive...

One would be inclined to think this a valid point, and to some degree it may be. However, when using a larger group of cavalry, it is usual for many of them to miss the charge target - half the unit is in the second row and often ends up not charging into anything, and furthermore the flanks of the front row are often even ineffective as they are boxed out from actually contacting the target unit by the interior men of their own unit. Only about 1/4 of the unit (~10 men) is actually in a good position to connect with a charge, and that's assuming a frontal attack. In side charges, this is even less. The narrow nature of a general's unit gives it an advantage here as well, as the same 10 men in the middle are in great position to charge, it's just that they are higher quality troops now with bigger attack and charge bonuses than most cavalry. If more than 20 men at a time could be reasonably expected to connect with a given charge then your argument would be valid, but as they typically do not, it holds no water.