V1.21 Rebuild-ProblemFixer BETA testing thread

[Bongaroo]

I was testing 1.2 on France. I'll give the byz's a try now with this new version. Anything in particular besides the spear's to check out? Just want me to try and rush?

[vonsch]

I'd say so. See how fast you can grab the rebel settlements, or take out a local faction.

And watch how well the local factions do at the same time.


Carl,

Okay, my rep is going up nicely, but not doing any active spying. Did you tweak that? I'll kick off a bit of spying and see what happens as soon as I can hire some. Waiting for them to pop on the hire list in Yerevan. I assume just hiring them is no issue. Or using them passively, as scouts. May need more population in Yerevan. Been 3+ turns since I finished the shisha bar and still no spy to hire.

Ok, first impressions of Turkey. Too easy. But not sure how to fix that without hurting AI more. And it will get harder when the hordes turn up, so maybe it's okay. Byz and Egypt are apt to declare on me too, as soon as the startup ends. It's turn 19. If I get until 30 I'll own the Holy Land. Except Jerusalem... maybe. Depends on if I can get another jihad off.

Byz, Turkey and Egypt do sort of balance each other out if they are all easy starts. And they are programmed to hate each other.

Okay, Yerevan shows 2 spies in the pool, but they are grayed out. Any idea what's up?

Seeing more bandits this game. Numbers seem about right to me so far.

Did you diminish the impact of tax rates on growth? I'm pretty sure it was 0.5% per tax level, but now it's only 0.5% to go from high to very high. Everything else is flat. The chivalry effect is definitely lessened. It looks like it's about 0.5 per 5 chivalry. If the tax adjustment did change, I think I prefer the hit for higher taxes each step. It still boosts the order penalty, but that isn't usually a big issue early. Growth is a compound effect, so having a penalty that's inversely proporational to the growth rate makes immediate cash flow versus long term cash flow a real choice. It's also a choice to slow down teching up for immediate cash flow.

Turn 25, first crusade heading in for Jerusalem. Good, Maybe they can take it. Be easier for me to take it away. But they'll probably just evaporate in the sun. Allied with all but Scotland, England (stuck up Normans!) and Poland of the Catholic factions, so probably won't see any action.

Waiting for Byz to backstab me. Just took Edessa. Next is Damascus and Acre. That leaves Jerusalem.

[Carl]

I was testing 1.2 on France. I'll give the byz's a try now with this new version. Anything in particular besides the spear's to check out? Just want me to try and rush?

I want to try and find out how hard you can make life for the local factions and how well they do with you there. The more someone can check the spears the better. We know they are fairly solid, but does it throw the Byzantine balance out of whack.

Been 3+ turns since I finished the shisha bar and still no spy to hire.

AND

Okay, Yerevan shows 2 spies in the pool, but they are grayed out. Any idea what's up?

Okay, first the recruitment system will display 2 spies even if you are at your limit, it's a UI bug I can't fix.

Secondly, to kill the AI spy/assassin spam that was always killing it's rep i put a limit of 1 spy/assassin per settlement with the appropriate buildings. If you already have 1 spy you'll be at your limit.

Okay, my rep is going up nicely, but not doing any active spying. Did you tweak that? I'll kick off a bit of spying and see what happens as soon as I can hire some. Waiting for them to pop on the hire list in Yerevan. I assume just hiring them is no issue. Or using them passively, as scouts. May need more population in Yerevan.

I put back the bonus to rep from alliances but heavily toned it down. Even with 8 alliances it will take 50 turns to reach perfect rep if you do nothing else to counteract it, however it takes 5 alliances to negate the rep hit for being at war so watch out.

I also added a small bonus to the AI's rep as it never seemed able to keep it high.

Building and passively scouting/defending with spies has no rep effects, same with assassins. It may give your Governor Dread Traits however/deduct from existing Chivalry traits.

OK, first impressions of Turkey. Too easy. But not sure how to fix that without hurting AI more. And it will get harder when the hordes turn up, so maybe it's Okay. Byz and Egypt are apt to declare on me too, as soon as the startup ends. It's turn 19. If I get until 30 I'll own the Holy Land. Except Jerusalem... maybe. Depends on if I can get another jihad off.

Could you identify any key factors which made it easy/easier for you to get enough money together to Field enough troops to so easily grab the holy lands?

Considering that in AI Vs. AI battles the Egyptians get Baghdad More often than the Turks do, buffing Baghdad's defender back up would probably not hurt the Turks, would that help do you think?

We discussed swapping Mosul and Trebizond around and giving Mosul a decent Garrison, would that have effected you? The Turkish AI always stalls if it fails to grab Trebizond. On the other hand it sometimes insists on grabbing Tbilisi first, hence the weak Tbilisi Garrison, since their are no other serious competitors I could easily buff the Tbilisi Garrison if Trebizond was secure from Byzantine strikes.

Byz, Turkey and Egypt do sort of balance each other out if they are all easy starts. And they are programmed to hate each other.

They're not so much easy starts as their are a few regions each has that they either require to get going, or that, (since no one else will get them), are made easier to get. A bit like Inverness for the Scots.

Did you diminish the impact of tax rates on growth? I'm pretty sure it was 0.5% per tax level, but now it's only 0.5% to go from high to very high. Everything else is flat. The chivalry effect is definitely lessened. It looks like it's about 0.5 per 5 chivalry. If the tax adjustment did change, I think I prefer the hit for higher taxes each step. It still boosts the order penalty, but that isn't usually a big issue early. Growth is a compound effect, so having a penalty that's inversely proportional to the growth rate makes immediate cash flow versus long term cash flow a real choice. It's also a choice to slow down teching up for immediate cash flow.

I just cut all Growth factors by half, but good point with the taxes.

Turn 25, first crusade heading in for Jerusalem. Good, Maybe they can take it. Be easier for me to take it away. But they'll probably just evaporate in the sun. Allied with all but Scotland, England (stuck up Normans!) and Poland of the Catholic factions, so probably won't see any action.

How are the AI factions doing then at this point? Especially the local ones.

Lastly, how may turns (approx), has the lowered money slowed you down by compared to before?

[Bob the Insane]

Twenty turns as Scotland...

Startng funds was a shock and even wit immediately abandoning my ships was still in the hole for ~250fl a turn. Concentrated on economic buidings while the cash held out. Took Innverness easily enough with the starting force and the moved on to Dublin. I besiged and dure there large force they had only 3 turns. Well they sallied and I with dreew my troops to some higher ground behind my starting position. I had the starting troops plus 4 units of Militia Spears (a gift for taking Innverness). The English where all over York like a rash and Walse soon followed so that was that, but at least now with some economic buildings, a couple of Merchants and a 3000fl gift from my nobles I am making forward progress. Now the pope has call a crusade and the Scotish King has taken a group of Highlanders to go and teach the heretics a lesson...

The rest of the world:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Spain has taken Zaragoza
Venice has taken Zagreb, Durazzo and Tunis
Milan has taken Dijon
England has taken York and Cearnarvon
Byz has taken Smyrna
Russia has taken Moscow
The Turks have taken Trebizond and Tbilis
Egypt has taken Jedda
Denmark has taken Hamburg
The Pope has taken Florence
Hungary has taken Sofia

The Danes are Besiging Stetten
The Russians are besieging Ryazan
The Hungarians are besieging Bucharest

Skip forward 12 years to 1112 and past the magic 30 turn mark..

Scotland Is still just three provinces but but taking the religious and chivalrous path we are now pretty rich (not have to fight much helps).

Our Crusading army is almost at Jerusilam after marching across most of Europe. The Ventians have been outside the gate for around 8 years but ahve been to intimidated to aly siege...

State of the world:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Only France, Portugal and Sicily have failed to take any land...

The HRE and Milan are fighting over Bologna.

The Turks and Byz and beginning to skirmish at sea...

I guess the money cript must be working because all the factions show constant zero (or near enough) cash and yet they are constructing building and troops.

France is the only one looking a little odd aas there are still rebel settlements around them and they have two full stacks not doing much..

Winner of the lad grab are Venice going from 3 to 7 and secind place Turks with 4 to 7... The HRE are 7 too but started with 6...

Additoinal: sent a spy to check on the French and there large stacks are decent troops (noting silly like lots of Siege engines). They do move troops around a bit and I think there is a full stack heading for Bordeaux, but still can't explain their apparantly lack of activeity compare to the other factions.

Ran the next turn with Toggle_fow off and it looks like everyone is doing something... The HRE agreed to become vassels of Milan after 3 truns of fighting ant not lossing any land? The HRE are bigger in land and equal in military force? Milan are Very Reliable and the HRE and Dispicable.

Vencie is now at war with the Byz and Milan (not bad for one turn). Not sure what started Venice and Milan but the Byz blockaged a Venetian port...

Finally Sicily and Milan are allied...

[Carl]

Thanks Bob. Lots of useful info their, at least the AI seems to be doing OK. France and Sicily are pretty normal, i'm not sure why though in the case of france. Sicily just seems to get intimidated by the Tunis Garrission and never moves.

p.s. Has russia got Helneski?

[Bob the Insane]

Yust started to attach Jerusilam with my Crusader army, I am allied with Venice now so their Crusader army three has joined the battle...

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

I am curious why with two full stack crusader armies my chances are still just evens...

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Now I see, and I understand why the Venetian Crusader army was too intimidated to attack... Yikes...

Additoinally: Russia, no... bu they have taken Riga and Moscow and are still besieging Ryazan...

[vonsch]

Secondly, to kill the AI spy/assassin spam that was always killing it's rep i put a limit of 1 spy/assassin per settlement with the appropriate buildings. If you already have 1 spy you'll be at your limit.

This should be per level of building, I'd say, but that explains it. The problem with this level is that line of buildings is a major trigger for negative governor traits, so the smart player avoids building many. This one will hurt the player more because the player by definition cares about governor traits. (AI can't care... so far.) If it's 1 spy per level, it's still a serious limit, but it's more workable. And the player can always go after the AI's buildings to limit the production.

I put back the bonus to rep from alliances but heavily toned it down. Even with 8 alliances it will take 50 turns to reach perfect rep if you do nothing else to counteract it, however it takes 5 alliances to negate the rep hit for being at war so watch out.

I also added a small bonus to the AI's rep as it never seemed able to keep it high.

On rep, I have 13 alliances, am Imaculate. Spying with my one starter spy isn't dropping it so far. But normally I have several going, so one I can build them we'll see. The factions I made alliances with early are also pretty solid on rep so far. But Venice is Untrustworthy (hah!) and France is Dubious (duh!) PS is Mixed, despite being an early alliance. Must be doing transgressions around Italy. I saw it got Florence again, but war with rebs cant count or I wouldn't be imaculate. Byz is very prejudiced against Turkey. I've been giving them maps and small bits of cash (200 a turn) and it's not moving. Egypt moves when I do thay, though I only have it to So-so. A lot of the others are Amiable to me (especially the Moors.) But it's interesting that some wouldn't ally: England & Russia, so far. I was tall poppy when I got to them. That may be the variable. I suspect there's some randomness in their reaction to proposals, but once they say no to an alliance, haven't gotten them to change their mind that same session. The second time I ask they stop talking.

Could you identify any key factors which made it easy/easier for you to get enough money together to Field enough troops to so easily grab the holy lands?

Considering that in AI Vs. AI battles the Egyptians get Baghdad More often than the Turks do, buffing Baghdad's defender back up would probably not hurt the Turks, would that help do you think?

We discussed swapping Mosul and Trebizond around and giving Mosul a decent Garrison, would that have effected you? The Turkish AI always stalls if it fails to grab Trebizond. On the other hand it sometimes insists on grabbing Tbilisi first, hence the weak Tbilisi Garrison, since their are no other serious competitors I could easily buff the Tbilisi Garrison if Trebizond was secure from Byzantine strikes.

I'm not sure the ease for Turkey is bad (yet) because of the hordes. Do we want an AI Turkey to flat die when the horde hits, or do we want it to have a chance? I think it's okay if Turkey ends up rated as easy for players... horde aside.

But swapping Treb and Mosul might help. Takes Byz longer to get to Treb than Turkey. If Turkey has a chance at it first try, rather than a sure thing (as AI) it will sometimes go to Byz, which is good for variety. I think garrison size there is fine. It's a 4 turns walk for player.

And bump Mosul garrison to maybe half the Adana one. The problem with Islamic factions is smart use of jihad. The AI just isn't up to player smartness standards. But Islamic factions WILL be hated as play develops by all the Catholics. Especially the Turks/Egyptians because of the Holy Land and crusades. So they need something to help them, and jihad is it. They can't manipulate the Pope to do part of their conquering.

In any case, my units are jihadis. They are cheap and have a high power to cost ratio. I hired up all I could in that first jihad, used the saving of making it a 3 turn (or maybe it was 4) jihad, when 2 would have done, to finance carrying the extra cost, then am cleaning up the close together Holy Land cities as fast as sensible (meaning, as fast as I can garrison them adequately), which is about 3 turns per city. Going to have all but Jerusalem at turn 30. That will take a second jihad. But there's a crusade (that at least Poland joined) incoming, so I will probably wait. The jihad units are good garrison troops too, until the appropriate town watch line buildings can be put up to get me into free garrison territory. They are great wall and gap attackers (with a few spears to block).

Because the Holy Land is dense, it's possible to do it fast. Those units are footsloggers, so not good for maneuver. Another aspect of blitzing is that the fast accumulation of cities means lots of adoptions fast. Generals are proportionately a large part of an early game force balance. Moving fast keeps that proportion high. It's also a dense part of the force. The power per unit is very high at this stage for generals. So stacks with a lot of them are very powerful compared to the early militia stacks. Compounding in action.

The best way to breakwater this is to give the AI the headstart that we are, I think. But some factions (like Egypt, Byz, Turkey, Poland, Russia, but especially the first three) have access to a large pool of reb cities to tackle, and the player is always going to be better at that.

Lastly, how may turns (approx), has the lowered money slowed you down by compared to before?

I think the I'm running at least 5 more turns slower. But hard to say because I now know how to play Turkey with your changes better. A few more bandits would not be bad. Seen 5-6 pop in the first 27 turns total. Seen no pirates off my coasts, but heard the Byz blow up something. I'm not yet building ships, the Byz beat me to Rhodes usually, or Venice does, because I focus on the HL and making Turkey contiguous.

But my knee jerk to the Turkey money-for-player issue is start us 5k in the red. Seen no sign of Egyptian armies, but they do have Jedda, at least. Let me check the graph.

How are the AI factions doing then at this point? Especially the local ones.

Turn 27:
0 regions: France (I suspect it needs help along the lines we discussed), Venice, Sicily, England, Portugal
1 region: HRE, Spain, Milan, Poland, Hungary, PS
2 regions: Scotland, Byz, Russia, Moors, Egypt
3 regions: Denmark,
8 regions: Turkey (me)

Looks like we still have an Iberian (lump France into that, since it heads for Zaragoza earlu) deadlock. Moors go south, I suspect. All the Ai factions rate pretty poor when I talk to them, so they are spending their money. Might bump up the turn dole a notch (say 2000 per turn more) and if you haven't put in a first turn 10k, do.

Also, see how they are doing in the other starts. It's certainly possible that something I do affects them. Diplomacy maybe? Italy will always be a bit of a mix, I suspect. Only so much local turf. But Sicily looks broken to me. Used to be really aggressive. And Zagreb is a bit of a breakwater for Venice. Is the Durazzo garrison beefy too? Zagreb is showing beat up, so someone is trying. Probably Venice. Sofia fell to someone, can't see who. Bucharest still reb. That garrison needs halving or more. It's a poor region, or at least very slow developing. Zagreb is the local prize. Not sure if Hungary got that or Iasi. I know one of Byz's is Smyrna. Looks like Hungary may have Sofia. Durazzo is probably Byz. I think Rennes garrison is too beefy too. Saw France and Spain break on it 3+ times last game. Spain did grab Zaragoza, so that's probably ok. Valencia is still reb, so Moors did go south and east. Tunis is held by someone other than rebs. They probably got Timbuktu, but not the other. Egypt is Jedda and probably Dongola. Small chance they went west. Rhodes is still reb too.

Spain has taken Zaragoza
Venice has taken Zagreb, Durazzo and Tunis
Milan has taken Dijon
England has taken York and Cearnarvon
Byz has taken Smyrna
Russia has taken Moscow
The Turks have taken Trebizond and Tbilis
Egypt has taken Jedda
Denmark has taken Hamburg
The Pope has taken Florence
Hungary has taken Sofia

The Danes are Besiging Stetten
The Russians are besieging Ryazan
The Hungarians are besieging Bucharest

Based on two data points with this version, and what we saw in the last:

Portugal and Sicily have troubles. Oh, and France too.

Turkey goes north because, I think, the council always gives them a mission for one of those two first. Adana is later.

Additoinal: sent a spy to check on the French and there large stacks are decent troops (noting silly like lots of Siege engines). They do move troops around a bit and I think there is a full stack heading for Bordeaux, but still can't explain their apparantly lack of activeity compare to the other factions.

I think the lowlands is to blame. I bet it's throwing the threat meter out of whack for France (and maybe England some too). And the Rennes garrison isn't helping. Haven't looked at the regions NE. France may be paralysed because moving the stacks it makes in enough force to Rennes, or Bordeaux, is leaving them too exposed on their NW flank to the lowlands. And maybe the NE flank. And vice versa. That same logic may be hurting England due to Caen.

Portugal just has only Zaragoza and Bordeaux as "threats" and it probably fails at Zaragoza early (as it almost always did) and can't concentrate force due to the split. One suggestion there that may help. Move the prince to Pamplona with Joao. Give them 2 generals to aim east and north. Lisbon is a deathtrap anyway.

No idea what's up with Sicily.

Might give Scotland a little more cash to start than 0. They have a lot of starting units compared to their income. But Inverness should have them in the black, and they only have one border to worry about.

Now I see, and I understand why the Venetian Crusader army was too intimidated to attack... Yikes...

Heh.

And now you know why it's last on my Holy Land conquest list. It has its own jihad scheduled, once I can pop that button again.

[Bob the Insane]

I succeed in the battle for Jerusilam but by the skin of my teeth... The end result did not look as close as it really was.. It stted I had ~500 left, but most of those had routed. At the end of the battle I had Two general's Body Guards and one Crusader Knights units left on the field (with one dead general) and then had suffered significant casualties. The Venetian assistance arrived at the end of the battle and while small, was pivitol... The remaining rebel spearmen where way to much for my depeleted cavalry to fight and the Ventians dealt the killing blow to them leaving the victory to me...

I took a screeny but it came out complete black??

Since I chose to "Occupy", only had 500 men left and had not prepared the ground with Priests I only keep Jerusilam for 3 turns before it revolted, but at least this full stack of defenders had no experience or upgrades...

Additionally Carl asked me to comment on the towers at Jerusilam.. Unfortunately I can't really as I have gained a healthy respect for the power of towers in this modso I avoid them when the flags are on... I withdrew my main line to be well out of range and when they are engaged by the defenders I used cavalry to flank and attack the archers. Once I actualy got some to route (not so easy against 3 gold chevron units) I follow them into the city with my cavalry grabing the maain gate and taking the square. This encourages the defender main line to peel away and retreat to the sqaure where my main line can take them in the rear. Again the high experince of the defenders made this less than effective and the enemy spearment successfulllly returned ot the city leaving my main line in disarray. That is when I lost my general and thus the large route started. I uesed my remaineing cavalry to cut down the dending archers outside the walls (much easier now the defending spearmen were inside the walls. The only time I saw the walls firing was when the ventins finially arrived and where fighting the last of the defending speamen just outside the agtes, but I was not paying to much attention in that as I was concentrating on keepng my cavalry inside the walls and out of trouble (capturing gates to let the Venetians in).

However I have finally captured Jersuilam a second time (field battle this time) and so if I am attacked I will let you know...

[Carl]

All right a lot of information to digest, give me an hour on it.

For reference i'm running a Moors campaign right now and I've already bounced of Valencia once, Moors are definitely MUCH slower as the player, I never played beyond about 3 turns as moors before. Now i'm over 15 turns in, loving it and haven't been able to scrape enough money together to get the troops to get more than one province so far.

Also, those mercs you saw the AI moors hiring in your V1.21 English campaign appear to be specific to Moors as I can hire them as the player.

This should be per level of building, I'd say, but that explains it. The problem with this level is that line of buildings is a major trigger for negative governor traits, so the smart player avoids building many. This one will hurt the player more because the player by definition cares about governor traits. (AI can't care... so far.) If it's 1 spy per level, it's still a serious limit, but it's more workable. And the player can always go after the AI's buildings to limit the production.

Good point really, the trouble is if I don't watch out the AI over-recruits and kills it's reputation. When it does that the AI won't respect any alliances with others. So I need factions to try to keep slightly above average reputation if i'm to get them to form power blocks against the player.

However I agree, it does need to get more available per level. I realized that almost as soon as you identified the issue.

On rep, I have 13 alliances, am Immaculate. Spying with my one starter spy isn't dropping it so far. But normally I have several going, so one I can build them we'll see. The factions I made alliances with early are also pretty solid on rep so far. But Venice is Untrustworthy (hah!) and France is Dubious (duh!) PS is Mixed, despite being an early alliance. Must be doing transgressions around Italy. I saw it got Florence again, but war with rebs cant count or I wouldn't be immaculate.

A bit of Bogola protrudes though the mountains near Rome and it likes to sit a stack their which hits it's rep constantly, i meat to exclude the Papal_Stats from that rep hit trigger for that reason actually.

Byz is very prejudiced against Turkey. I've been giving them maps and small bits of cash (200 a turn) and it's not moving. Egypt moves when I do that, though I only have it to So-so. A lot of the others are Amiable to me (especially the Moors.) But it's interesting that some wouldn't ally: England & Russia, so far. I was tall poppy when I got to them. That may be the variable. I suspect there's some randomness in their reaction to proposals, but once they say no to an alliance, haven't gotten them to change their mind that same session. The second time I ask they stop talking.

Generally if they refuse an offer the first time he only subsequent things they will accept are gifts.

I'm not sure the ease for Turkey is bad (yet) because of the hordes. Do we want an AI Turkey to flat die when the horde hits, or do we want it to have a chance? I think it's Okay if Turkey ends up rated as easy for players... horde aside.

True about the horde. I'm just worried at your speed.

But swapping Treb and Mosul might help. Takes Byz longer to get to Treb than Turkey. If Turkey has a chance at it first try, rather than a sure thing (as AI) it will sometimes go to Byz, which is good for variety. I think garrison size there is fine. It's a 4 turns walk for player.

The problem with Byzantium getting it is that when that happens the turks AI freezes and it never moves, after turn 30 the Byzantines just wipe them off the map in short order whilst Egypt has free reign to grab the whole holy land.

And bump Mosul garrison to maybe half the Adana one. The problem with Islamic factions is smart use of jihad. The AI just isn't up to player smartness standards. But Islamic factions WILL be hated as play develops by all the Catholics. Especially the Turks/Egyptians because of the Holy Land and crusades. So they need something to help them, and jihad is it. They can't manipulate the Pope to do part of their conquering.

A bit confused here,. are you saying don't make Mosul too strong so that it doesn't slow the AI too much? or something else?

In any case, my units are jihads. They are cheap and have a high power to cost ratio. I hired up all I could in that first jihad, used the saving of making it a 3 turn (or maybe it was 4) jihad, when 2 would have done, to finance carrying the extra cost, then am cleaning up the close together Holy Land cities as fast as sensible (meaning, as fast as I can garrison them adequately), which is about 3 turns per city. Going to have all but Jerusalem at turn 30. That will take a second jihad. But there's a crusade (that at least Poland joined) incoming, so I will probably wait. The jihad units are good garrison troops too, until the appropriate town watch line buildings can be put up to get me into free garrison territory. They are great wall and gap attackers (with a few spears to block).

Because the Holy Land is dense, it's possible to do it fast. Those units are foot-sloggers, so not good for maneuver. Another aspect of blitzing is that the fast accumulation of cities means lots of adoptions fast. Generals are proportionately a large part of an early game force balance. Moving fast keeps that proportion high. It's also a dense part of the force. The power per unit is very high at this stage for generals. So stacks with a lot of them are very powerful compared to the early militia stacks. Compounding in action.

OK, thanks for that explanation, so it's a combination of cheap Garrison troops, and the dense packing thats making this possible, not necessarily any particular single source of income.

What do you make of the availability of Turkomens/SIaphis/e.t.c for Turks?

The best way to breakwater this is to give the AI the head-start that we are, I think. But some factions (like Egypt, Byz, Turkey, Poland, Russia, but especially the first three) have access to a large pool of reb cities to tackle, and the player is always going to be better at that.

Russia and Poland don't really worry me as they have big distances to cover to do it, so that slows them down in of itself.

Egypt is a bit so-so, Turks worries me but Venice seems to be limiting Byzantium now.

I think the I'm running at least 5 more turns slower. But hard to say because I now know how to play Turkey with your changes better. A few more bandits would not be bad. Seen 5-6 pop in the first 27 turns total. Seen no pirates off my coasts, but heard the Byz blow up something. I'm not yet building ships, the Byz beat me to Rhodes usually, or Venice does, because I focus on the HL and making Turkey contiguous.

Thanks for that.

But my knee jerk to the Turkey money-for-player issue is start us 5k in the red. Seen no sign of Egyptian armies, but they do have Jedda, at least. Let me check the graph.

They probs have Dongola too and if you hadn't grabbed the HL so fast they'd probably have Damascus within another 10 turns.

Turn 27:
0 regions: France (I suspect it needs help along the lines we discussed), Venice, Sicily, England, Portugal
1 region: HRE, Spain, Milan, Poland, Hungary, PS
2 regions: Scotland, Byz, Russia, Moors, Egypt
3 regions: Denmark,
8 regions: Turkey (me)

Looks like we still have an Iberian (lump France into that, since it heads for Zaragoza Early) deadlock. Moors go south, I suspect. All the AI factions rate pretty poor when I talk to them, so they are spending their money. Might bump up the turn dole a notch (say 2000 per turn more) and if you haven't put in a first turn 10k, do.

It's already 10K per turn~:O. But giving them a lump sum at the beginning would be nice I agree.

Also, see how they are doing in the other starts. It's certainly possible that something I do affects them. Diplomacy maybe? Italy will always be a bit of a mix, I suspect. Only so much local turf. But Sicily looks broken to me. Used to be really aggressive.

It's the Tunis Garrison thats doing it, that and with only 2 regions they never build a decent force up to take it. if you play a hot-seat a them grab Tunis for them and then relinquish control to the AI they do fine, (go crazy actually grabbing all of Africa barring the Egyptian starting provinces and cut chunks out of Iberia too.), in spite of the fact that you starting as them prevents them getting anything from the money script, even when you relinquish control.

And Zagreb is a bit of a breakwater for Venice. Is the Durazzo garrison beefy too? Zagreb is showing beat up, so someone is trying. Probably Venice. Sofia fell to someone, can't see who. Bucharest still reb.

Generally Hungary gets Bucharest by then. Zagreb will have had Venice, Hungary AND HRE trying, it's totally random who gets it. Durazzo tends to fall early to Venice.

Bear in mind that most Garrison bar Valencia and the HL have got weaker since last time. Even the HL have to a degree but it shows less as the troops are pretty high quality.

Zagreb is the local prize. Not sure if Hungary got that or Iasi. I know one of Byz's is Smyrna. Looks like Hungary may have Sofia. Durazzo is probably Byz. I think Rennes garrison is too beefy too. Saw France and Spain break on it 3+ times last game. Spain did grab Zaragoza, so that's probably OK. Valencia is still reb, so Moors did go south and east. Tunis is held by someone other than rebs. They probably got Timbuktu, but not the other. Egypt is Jedda and probably Dongola. Small chance they went west. Rhodes is still reb too.

Yeah, Hungary tends to get Sofia Early now. Possibly right about rennes, just don't want to make it too easy on the English. Zargosa is probs too weak actually as Spain is usually the first attacker and gets it every time, it never gives Portugal a chance. Tunis and Tripoli will be Venice or Moors, Probs Venice IMHO. Moors tend to get Timbuktu first but it really slows them due to so many armies going rebel on them. They lose an army every few turns after that trying to take Arguin too. That one of the reasons I'd like to start them with those two regions. Not sure about how that will throw balance though, they aren't rich regions without merchants really, but still...

Denmark has similar issues with Oslo and Stockholm, it losses loads of armies just getting their.

Based on two data points with this version, and what we saw in the last:

Portugal and Sicily have troubles. Oh, and France too.

Turkey goes north because, I think, the council always gives them a mission for one of those two first. Adana is later.

I'd agree, you can add england to that too.

I think the lowlands is to blame. I bet it's throwing the threat meter out of whack for France (and maybe England some too). And the Rennes garrison isn't helping. Haven't looked at the regions NE. France may be paralyzed because moving the stacks it makes in enough force to Rennes, or Bordeaux, is leaving them too exposed on their NW flank to the lowlands. And maybe the NE flank. And vice versa. That same logic may be hurting England due to Caen.

Good point, I'll look into it.

Portugal just has only Zaragoza and Bordeaux as "threats" and it probably fails at Zaragoza early (as it almost always did) and can't concentrate force due to the split. One suggestion there that may help. Move the prince to Pamplona with Joao. Give them 2 generals to aim east and north. Lisbon is a deathtrap anyway.

Agreed. Might try a few other tricks too.

Might give Scotland a little more cash to start than 0. They have a lot of starting units compared to their income. But Inverness should have them in the black, and they only have one border to worry about.

About the same thoughts as myself their.

Now I see, and I understand why the Venetian Crusader army was too intimidated to attack... Yikes...

Heh.

And now you know why it's last on my Holy Land conquest list. It has its own jihad scheduled, once I can pop that button again.

, wonder how hard you'll find it...

[vonsch]

Quote:
And bump Mosul garrison to maybe half the Adana one. The problem with Islamic factions is smart use of jihad. The AI just isn't up to player smartness standards. But Islamic factions WILL be hated as play develops by all the Catholics. Especially the Turks/Egyptians because of the Holy Land and crusades. So they need something to help them, and jihad is it. They can't manipulate the Pope to do part of their conquering.

A bit confused here,. are you saying don't make Mosul too strong so that it doesn't slow the AI too much? or something else?

Mosul is a ways off if Yerevan is the closest Turk city. I think it's over 3 turns. So it should have a garrison (to slow the player from taking it as soon as he can get there), but doesn't need one like those of Adana or Aleppo. About half that should be a challenge without being a big obstacle like the Holy Land ones.

You could tone Adana down a little too, since that's sorta supposed to go to Turkey. The Turk player will take it anyway; it's easy to amass units there and they just roll on into the Holy Land after. Might actually slow the player a turn if they don't look at cost benefit and bypass it for Antioch. Silly to waste force on Adana before Antioch which is one move farther and a LOT richer and more developed. The Antioch-made units fuel the rest of things (jihads aside). But if Adana looks a bit more tempting...

I often bypass it completely until later to beat the Egyptians to Jerusalem. But you made that something less desireable. Let the Egyptians try! I wish the AI was smarter about bypassing strongpoints.

What do you make of the availability of Turkomens/SIaphis/e.t.c for Turks?

I'd say they are fine now. I have almost a full stack which I use in support of my seige army(s). It's really intended as a counter to Byz knives, which I feel coming. My faction heir is a good general and happens to also already have the cav trait, so he gets that one. It gets most of the bandit suppression work too. It's SO nice when I can dump that whole stack into a jihad though. Upkeep isn't cheap on it. And the bump in exp is nice. (I actually send my jihad armies to the target though, I don't pull the trick of dumping everything into jihads the turn I know the target will fall.)

[Carl]

Mosul is a ways off if Yerevan is the closest Turk city. I think it's over 3 turns. So it should have a garrison (to slow the player from taking it as soon as he can get there), but doesn't need one like those of Adana or Aleppo. About half that should be a challenge without being a big obstacle like the Holy Land ones.

Ahh, thanks for that, good point really.

You could tone Adana down a little too, since that's sorta supposed to go to Turkey. The Turk player will take it anyway; it's easy to amass units there and they just roll on into the Holy Land after. Might actually slow the player a turn if they don't look at cost benefit and bypass it for Antioch. Silly to waste force on Adana before Antioch which is one move farther and a LOT richer and more developed. The Antioch-made units fuel the rest of things (jihads aside). But if Adana looks a bit more tempting...

Well WAS planning on turning Antioch into a second Jerusalem, (the AI will get it eventually, don't worry, it just takes a couple of Jihads to do it), and upgrading Acre to a Citadel out the gate. that will REALLY slow a Human down without hitting the AI too hard as Fortress/Citadels include Ballista Towers out the gate, plus Citadel walls are twice as tough as before, (although all other walls have dropped 30-50% in terms of durability since last time). So a Player would have a proverbial Nightmare getting that even WITH a weak Garrison.

I'd say they are fine now. I have almost a full stack which I use in support of my siege army(s). It's really intended as a counter to Byz knives, which I feel coming. My faction heir is a good general and happens to also already have the Cav trait, so he gets that one. It gets most of the bandit suppression work too. It's SO nice when I can dump that whole stack into a jihad though. Upkeep isn't cheap on it. And the bump in exp is nice. (I actually send my jihad armies to the target though, I don't pull the trick of dumping everything into jihads the turn I know the target will fall.)

Glad to hear it, I'll work on the rebels BTW.

Moors is interesting, 1111 right now, the Spanish have just attacked Corbara and I've got a full stack half way to Timbuktu with a mixed stack of Desert Cav/Tuareg Camel Spearmen under construction.

A couple of points have stood out though to me.

1. even without caravan stops castles get FAR too much trade income.

2. Moors are actually quite rich overall early on, it's just the lack of starting ports that makes them seem poor.

[vonsch]

Well WAS planning on turning Antioch into a second Jerusalem, (the AI will get it eventually, don't worry, it just takes a couple of Jihads to do it), and upgrading Acre to a Citadel out the gate. that will REALLY slow a Human down without hitting the AI too hard as Fortress/Citadels include Ballista Towers out the gate, plus Citadel walls are twice as tough as before, (although all other walls have dropped 30-50% in terms of durability since last time). So a Player would have a proverbial Nightmare getting that even WITH a weak Garrison.

Bad idea. Gives the player a fast track to top units after one jihad. I'd beeline. Be smart for Catholic players to ask for a crusade on it to, and flat move to Holy Land. I think it should be a castle. Or a large town.

Beef up Antioch, but not with extreme experience units. It's not the first crusade target programmed into the script.


As far as the bandits go, be conservative . If they are 50 now, try 60 next time. Not 90! They are better than the default settinig, which is high, but I think still a bit low. And use a separate number for pirates (don't lockstep the two). I think it can go up more than bandits. Sea voyages need more risk since they benfit the player more. AI is pretty good at pirate patrol too, from what I've seen.

Ship upkeep still has issues. 50 for dhow is fine, but 10 for war galley is odd... is that a typo for 100? Heh, the baghlah has the wrong unit graphic. Is that a CA bug? It's a peasant instead of a ship.


Moors are interesting in that their starting units are pretty trashy. But they get nicer ones later. But the starting ones are also pretty cheap, so they can just spam them and overwhelm with numbers. I take out Portugal first turn (which is why I say Lisbon is a deathtrap!) Then Spain before turn 12 or so. I just ignore the rebels until those miserable infidels (even if they are People of the Book) are made dhimmi. I do try to grab the Pyrannees regions fast to keep the Frogs (unclean beasts!) out. Then I backfill. Sicily has been the only issue since they go for Tunis (in prior versions). Sometimes they will turn up (or PS or Milan will) at Valencia, but they rarely are much threat to take THAT one.

I've never yet played far enough to get to Urban Militia or Camel Gunners though. The fun stuff! And I agree that they aren't poor. Cordoba is rich on its own. Granada isn't. But Marrakesh and Algiers are both pretty good. And Toledo and Lisbon are quite nice added into that mix. Never gotten the sub-Sahara online so haven't seen how well they do (aside from the merchant income). Suspect they are good due to the trade goods, but more so later when the Atlantic is open for trade routes.

Don't cut castle income. You'll hurt the AI more. Players are better at swapping cities for castles and vice versa. I rarely have more than 1 castle per 6 settlements. Only VERY early. At the moment I have one castle and 11 cities. But some of those cities are being forced grown to citidel size. In fact, I'm tempted to play with making Nottingham a city with England. It's pretty rich.

Also, the castles are only really good trade if they are on a coast and can build the higher ports. They lose out on the doubling that the market line (and merchant guilds) give cities. If you think a castle pays in trade, try replacing it with a huge city and the full complement of trade support.

And another point on that issue, that market line (and the guilds) not only boost the city they are in, but all the markets connecting to them. So castles, which can't get those, are pulling down overall trade too. The penalty is much higher than immediately obvious.

Now, what I don't understand is why castles get the two high-end shipyards. Those should be in cities. That would also curb castle trade a bit. And boost cities even more. Shipyards have always been city things, not castle. They need large labor forces, which castles lack. I suspect it was to spread around the buildings. Moving them to the cities would also put them with the admiralties, wouldn't it? Makes sense to me.

[Carl]

I'll answer you in a second Vonsch. Give me a moment.

HolyCow for some reason sent his thoughts via PM so I'll quote them here:

I played Byz and Eng last night till ~turn 15.

1. no starting cash really slowed beginning expansion. If people notice though, this should be OK, since most factions are surrounded by rebels so, it's a small gamble to take almost all units to assault one rebel settlement on turn 1 or 2. 

1.a the rebels have a lot more units, and diff units from vanilla. this is interesting and good but the units weren't hard to defeat - I think the general unit is a lot stronger than before. My general was the only cavalry unit I had and it proved critical to victory. both Eng/Byz general killed ~200-285 and earned 3 silver chevrons on turn 1. 

1.b love the way archers fire, especially treb archers. it seems arrows fly faster and flatter trajectory. it feels more accurate? if that can be said. honestly who among us can say what a mass of arrows flying at you looks like? I wasn't able to eyeball the arrows, but it looks like no more high angled shots.

1.c byz spears held their own against militia spear and routed their opponents losing 5-10 men each. still can't stand spear animation where it looks like spearman is trying to punch opponent w/ back end of spear, is there a way to change that? 

1.d peasants are much weaker v/ vanilla and routed each/every time.

2. enemy merchants are easier to acquire

3. pirate ships easier to sink

4. merchants fly across map, whereas generals and units can't make it across one province/turn.

5. every province has roads, not sure if good/bad at this point.

6. spy/merch/diplomat skill points harder to earn

7. easer to acquire general ancillaries, more diverse ancillaries, and saw a few unique? named? ancillaries.

that's all I have at this point. will try France/HRE later.

is there a way to adapt/integrate this into big map or what do I need to change? thanks much.

I'll number my replies according to the way you've numbered yours.

1a. I think thats down to the fact that Generals bodyguard are as good as Knightly Orders in melee plus they haven't taken a Morale hit so they are significantly less effected by the fact that Spear now frighten mounted units. Most mounted units are only 2-4 morale vs. spears early on so they break pretty easy. Gen Bodyguard are at 9. I guess in hindsight I should have dropped them from 11 to 8 like I did every other high morale unit.

1b. As far as I know i haven't touched archers, but I'll check to be sure.

1c. Can't do anything about the animation, but thanks for the info. Considering how well they do, do you think Byzantine Spears are available too early?

1d. Yep, they have lowered Morale and the Shield Bug has been fixed and most peasants have had a stats hit on top.

2. They shouldn't be and aren't for me. But that may just be the faction your playing.

3. I weakened them slightly as they where very OTT.

4. Intentional change, cuts the micromanagement on agents. generals are kept slow because the player could exploit the movement in ways the AI would not and can't be re-programed to do.

5. Thats to help speed the AI up, the player tends to build them pretty quick anyway so it barely effects him but it really slows the A down, especially in reb territory.

6. & 7. The traits and Ancillaries where modified by Simone else before I added my ow tweaks so the harder to get skill points are someone else's doing, (hadn't noticed myself TBH). The historical figures are my doing, they existed before but could only be got inside VERY narrow time periods. I'd removed that limitation so you can get them any time, this does get strange with William Wallace being able to turn up turn 3 if the situation is right, but it's better than before where many where very hard to get and had very minimal effects.

I'm afraid theirs no easy way to integrate them as things like starting buildings, Who owns what starting Province, and Starting Reb Garrisons are dealt with in the same files you'd have to modify to add extra regions. You could just install the Big Map mod to the ProblemFixer Folder but it would undo several changes.

Bad idea. Gives the player a fast track to top units after one jihad. I'd beeline. Be smart for Catholic players to ask for a crusade on it to, and flat move to Holy Land. I think it should be a castle. Or a large town.

Good point, hadn't thought of that.

Beef up Antioch, but not with extreme experience units. It's not the first crusade target programmed into the script.

Good idea, I'll do something similar to Jerusalem, but only 3 Silver chevrons and no Armour/weapons. Thats be OK you think?

As far as the bandits go, be conservative . If they are 50 now, try 60 next time. Not 90!

I know better than to do that. i once set it to 100% by accident and couldn't move for super sized reb stacks, and 2-3 per province too:faint:

They are better than the default setting, which is high, but I think still a bit low. And use a separate number for pirates (don't lockstep the two). I think it can go up more than bandits. Sea voyages need more risk since they benefit the player more. AI is pretty good at pirate patrol too, from what I've seen.

Ship upkeep still has issues. 50 for dhow is fine, but 10 for war galley is odd... is that a typo for 100?

, a typo.

Heh, the baghlah has the wrong unit graphic. Is that a CA bug? It's a peasant instead of a ship.

I think i introduced that, not sure how though...

[vonsch]

Heh, ok, let me be clear. I think Jerusalem should be tougher than Antioch. Jerusalem is a bit extreme right now. Maybe 6 experience (instead of 9) and no weapons/armor.

Antioch I think would be fine with just the full complement of units, no upgrades. I think the player (AI doesn't seem to go after it aggressively anyway early) should be forced to work a bit harder for Antioch than any of the other HL cities except Jerusalem. But it's not the first crusade target, so don't make it nuts. It's not trivial now, but it's a lot more valuable (and larger) than the others. It is a full city when taken early even, and it has great trade goods, and it's very strategic and defensible. That river loop is nice, 2 bridges, plus you can strategically drop a fort or two and encourage them to use those bridges. One south at the notch in coast, other just south of the river blocking the road east and the north-south valley. If you hold Antioch, you have 5 cities in two-move range.

In comparison, Adana and Aleppo are weenies in population and economy. Acre is decent, but far south to be strategic. Damascus is decent too, and Edessa, but neither gets a port, and both, like Acre, are on the spokes, not the hub of the strategic wheel. Antioch is more important to conquering and holding the HL than Jerusalem. The latter is just THE major target due to crusades and victory conditions. Jerusalem is the hub to 3 cities, 2 less than Antioch.

Aleppo is also strategic in that sense, though not all that valuable as an economic seed. No port, less trade. But a nice hub too. Not as easily defended.

But it won't matter that much to the smart player. Target Antioch with a decent jihad or crusade (2+ stacks) then use the significant leftovers on the rest.

Speaking of which, it's turn 29 and my jihad button lit up. And I can afford a few more stacks to throw at Jerusalem. But I should bring in the God Squad. Lots of heretics there. But a hard place to govern. I'll wait and see if that crusade comes too.

[Carl]

Moors are interesting in that their starting units are pretty trashy. But they get nicer ones later. But the starting ones are also pretty cheap, so they can just spam them and overwhelm with numbers. I take out Portugal first turn (which is why I say Lisbon is a deathtrap!) Then Spain before turn 12 or so. I just ignore the rebels until those miserable infidels (even if they are People of the Book) are made dhimmi. I do try to grab the Pyrannees regions fast to keep the Frogs (unclean beasts!) out. Then I backfill. Sicily has been the only issue since they go for Tunis (in prior versions). Sometimes they will turn up (or PS or Milan will) at Valencia, but they rarely are much threat to take THAT one.

I've never yet played far enough to get to Urban Militia or Camel Gunners though. The fun stuff! And I agree that they aren't poor. Cordoba is rich on its own. Granada isn't. But Marrakesh and Algiers are both pretty good. And Toledo and Lisbon are quite nice added into that mix. Never gotten the sub-Sahara online so haven't seen how well they do (aside from the merchant income). Suspect they are good due to the trade goods, but more so later when the Atlantic is open for trade routes.

Well their tech trees taken a major re-arrange too, (just like everyone else's), so I'd like the opinion of someones who's previously played them when you've got time.

Don't cut castle income. You'll hurt the AI more. Players are better at swapping cities for castles and vice versa. I rarely have more than 1 castle per 6 settlements. Only VERY early. At the moment I have one castle and 11 cities. But some of those cities are being forced grown to citadel size. In fact, I'm tempted to play with making Nottingham a city with England. It's pretty rich.

Also, the castles are only really good trade if they are on a coast and can build the higher ports. They lose out on the doubling that the market line (and merchant guilds) give cities. If you think a castle pays in trade, try replacing it with a huge city and the full complement of trade support.

I didn't mean to imply that castles are as good as cities, just they bring in too much IMHO as when both the Moorish starting castle got their ports up the same turn my income jumped almost 3K. Thats too much. What I was thinking was to cut the trade bonuses of Ports for castles, and replace the non-working trade fleet bonus on wharfs with extra trade bonuses.

It would still probably help the human too much more than the AI though.

And another point on that issue, that market line (and the guilds) not only boost the city they are in, but all the markets connecting to them. So castles, which can't get those, are pulling down overall trade too. The penalty is much higher than immediately obvious.

I didn't know that.

Now, what I don't understand is why castles get the two high-end shipyards. Those should be in cities. That would also curb castle trade a bit. And boost cities even more. Shipyards have always been city things, not castle. They need large labor forces, which castles lack. I suspect it was to spread around the buildings. Moving them to the cities would also put them with the admiralties, wouldn't it? Makes sense to me.

Cities get them too, i think it's just because they want navies t be producible anywhere.


Random Idea:

I consider conversion ab bit easy and too penalty free, whilst you may lose investment on any building, you gain so much income it barely matters plus the income from here on in is more important, (as what you've lost is already gone and your strategy is actually revolving around the lower income and Treasury total that this losses have caused).

Why not increase the conversion time and cost. currently a conversion from castle to city can be mad back in 2 turn. If it was 20 turns to make it back and much longer doing the conversion it would be a much less attractive option, and much more difficult to do early on, it would also slow the player some more without ever effecting the AI.

[vonsch]

Those Moorish African ports have pretty good resources, I think. Most ports aren't that great.


Heh, I was looking at the building browser and it doesn't show the top end shipyards for cities, just castles. Don't have a city quite there to test with, though Antioch getting close.


With regards to long delays to convert:

It's EASY to convert a castle into a city in reality. It's the opposite that's hard. You just let the castle grow outside its walls, and the market forces are doing that anyway unless they are actively counteracted by government decree and enforcement. Often shanty cities were put to the torch to clean them out as they posed a risk to the castle if they were near the walls. (sort of like cleaning up slums to protect property values today!)

So making that conversion hard/very long would bother me.

What I do with flip-flopping cities I have not seen about as a regular economic tactic. I mean flipping a castle to a city to grow it, then back to make it a big production center. For one thing, it's of use only in special circumstances (like the Holy Land buildup against hordes). Generally the front is moving fast enough that you produce in captured castles along the way and convert them to cities as your front gets too far ahead and you capture new castles.

And its risky in that I cut my production rate way back in the process. I run skinny on castles early. If I'm attacked and need more castle units now, I'd have to try to grab one because I couldn't get one up and running fast enough. Or delay a lot with horse archers and militia units from cities.

Castles are better defensively, especially with your towers. So converting to cities is risky if they are in key spots where they can be attacked.

I don't like gimping a player choice by brute force because the AI is dumb.

That said, a modest increase would be another thing. As usual you are WAY out there. Maybe double the turns to convert. The player is still going to do it. The player loses nothing by converting a castle he doesn't want as a castle. No income is lost from the castle. Units can still be produced. Just can't build any other buildings, but wouldn't want to anyway as they end up lost (aside from the basic tier 1 set). And the reward in increased income is large.

The downside is that cities are not as easy to defend, but that matters only to the most defensive players. Most AI attacks come at the "line" regions anyway. And those will have armies supporting them.


But I don't think it's a major balance issue. It's actually slowing ME down in the early part of the game. I could be producing units faster. I am sacrificing that rate now for more stability later when I will need it.

You could make cities LESS defensible, but we're right back at the balance thing. Then the player takes AI cities easier and cripples their economies.

Oh, and another downside to cities... cities are FAR more prone to revolt with a little help from our "friends."

[Carl]

Those Moorish African ports have pretty good resources, I think. Most ports aren't that great.

The problem was Valencia, Granada and the other castle where all only about 500 florins behind Corbora. Which was actually about 300 florins behind Marrakesh.

Heh, I was looking at the building browser and it doesn't show the top end shipyards for cities, just castles. Don't have a city quite there to test with, though Antioch getting close.

You shouldn't be able to see 3rd level ones in either cities or castles till gunpowder is discovered, and the 4th till the world is round event has come and gone.

What I do with flip-flopping cities I have not seen about as a regular economic tactic. I mean flipping a castle to a city to grow it, then back to make it a big production center. For one thing, it's of use only in special circumstances (like the Holy Land buildup against hordes). Generally the front is moving fast enough that you produce in captured castles along the way and convert them to cities as your front gets too far ahead and you capture new castles.

And its risky in that I cut my production rate way back in the process. I run skinny on castles early. If I'm attacked and need more castle units now, I'd have to try to grab one because I couldn't get one up and running fast enough. Or delay a lot with horse archers and militia units from cities.

Castles are better defensively, especially with your towers. So converting to cities is risky if they are in key spots where they can be attacked.

I don't like gimping a player choice by brute force because the AI is dumb.

The strategy you describe doesn't bother me, it's risky as you point out. What i'm complaining about is the strategy, (especially early on as it's a good way round the zero starting money), of switching front-line towns to castles and interior castles to towns/cities.

Their are 3 reasons it bothers me i it's current state:

1. it's an automatic thing, theirs no real penalty to doing so so the player always will. This typically allows his economy to outstrip the AI's and makes his production much closer to the front making replacments easier to get.

2. I've been led to believe that CA does it's balancing by simply letting the AI control all factions and watching the results. That means the income from many castle regions has been balanced on the idea that they will NOT become cities, that means by switching certain castles to cities you are gaining income that CA never expected you to have from those regions.

3. They have included a cost and time to convert cities/castles to castles/cities. If it wasn't intended to be penalty they'd have made it free and instant in effect (i.e. no need to end turn).


Point 2 bothers me the least, although if you follow that line of reasoning to it's conclusion you could argue that switching should be outright removed as CA never balanced the game around it's effects. Personally I like the switching mechanic and think it should stay. It's a nice strategic option.

Point 1 bothers me a bit as it really helps some factions out of the zero starting money as they can convert badly placed initial castles to towns. Italians can get away with just cities for the first half of the game nearly.

Point 3 is the big one for me however, right now the supposed "penalty" isn't their. as a result it's not a strategic option at all, it's just a pure player advantage. if converting an interior castle actually required serious thought, (i.e. is the extra income compared to the monetary cost of doing so really worth it), or vice versa with border towns to castles, (is it better to switch, or should I leave it as is as i'm going to expand soon and will then want to switch it back).

Right now it's a total no brainier to switch an interior castle to a city, and nearly always a no brainier to switch a frontier city to a castle if the city isn't too big to do so.


By making it more expensive to do I make sure people can't get round low starting money with it, (not enough money to afford to do it early on), and also make sure people actually consider weather a province should be a city or castle more carefully, not switching just because the merits of defense vs. income favor one or the other. It become hopefully a more considered decision.

Ohh, and watch out for the AI once it starts invading you, the money script means it really hits hard, you'll need those buffed wall defenses I can tell you.

[vonsch]

Well, there's no answer to dumb AI. Forcing players to play dumb isn't fun for the players. CA needs to work on the core AI and expose more for modders. Economic decisions, like whether to convert, just aren't processed well, if at all. Ditto for deep raids, amphibious invasions, and bypassing strongpoints. As long as the AI's view of strategy is brute force, we'll have these problems with players easily outperforming it.

To up difficulty, "give it more stuff." I hate that mentality.


But I'm less and less sure that the economy is really a castle versus city thing as much as it's touted. As you point out, castles do fairly well (though not explosively well) with trade. And you can dump in the farms without worrying about revolts. The large problem is poor management.

If castles really defend better, you need less field army, no? especially with larger free garrisons. So, if you prefer, make it more expensive in time and florins to convert. Some still will, others will adapt in other ways.

I think the scaled tax penalty is a missing brake at the moment. Put that back and take another look at growth. Or just uptweak conversion costs by a small factor in both cost and time (double both). Then see how it affects the growth of cities and castles, it will show in player expansion performance over 50 turns.

If cities (and castles) are growing slower, taxes and trade will be less. Tech will be lower.

AD reduces this a LOT. But it adds a lot more regions, so the time scale fits the geographic scale better. All build times are increase, as are costs. And growth rates are lower. Deciding which building to build next is not a trivial process. After 30 turns, you may have built 3 buildings in one city. But it feels like a whole new strategic game. (if the turn updates didn't take as long as waiting for a seige to time out...)


Anyway, decided to postpone tackling Jerusalem to hit Rhodes, which is still rebel. Almost there and see Venice had the same idea. It brought 2 units though. I brought a whole stack. I'll wait for it to fail. Unless I cross the Black Sea, or head north from Tbilisi, I'm left with Jerusalem, and islands or coastal regions. Maybe I should go take Valencia.

I refuse to break an alliance though. So will be waiting on Byz or Egypt... or the horde.

[holycow]

hey carl, sorry for the pm, but just looking at all these posts makes my head swim. i don't know how you have time to read all this and still mod & play.

anyways,

1. re generals, I didn't charge spears head on. i let the rebels comitt to my spearwall - ran general to enemy rear and demolished crossbow & archers - then as missile units routed, flanked spear units w/general - then chased routed units to town center. but it was a surprise to get 3 Ag chevrons and did get brave lvl 1 trait.

2. re byz spears, it might possibly be too early, but still unsure as zero starting $$. By turn 10 i was able to build and recruit as normal. Before that, didn't build anything but $$ generating building and didn't recruit a single unit. and only took one settlement by that time. w/out starting $$, definitely made me turtle until i could recruit units reliably. so if anyone else turtles, they would have to depend on byz spears. I'll have to play a little more and see how or if overpowering byz spears might be.

3. re merchants, almost immediately, Venetian, Hungarian, HRE, Milan, merchants showed up outside Constantinople, and later on Egpytian. most of these were lvls 3-4 and my merchant was lvl 3. so acquired them w/ anywhere from 13-27%, and the byz merch acquired 5 of those merchants before it backfired. my merch did not advance lvls through those 5 acquisitions.

have you tried playing on different computers? i ask cause i play on both desktop and a laptop depending on who is the house is doing what and i get a different experiences from each. and i noticed this from other games as well, not just tw series. but logically this shouldn't happen, right?

[Carl]

hey Carl, sorry for the pm, but just looking at all these posts makes my head swim. i don't know how you have time to read all this and still mod & play.

I don't play much LOL. Do more testing, reading, and replying than playing TBH. Just been playing some moor Moors though.

1. re generals, I didn't charge spears head on. i let the rebels comitt to my spearwall - ran general to enemy rear and demolished crossbow & archers - then as missile units routed, flanked spear units w/general - then chased routed units to town center. but it was a surprise to get 3 Ag chevrons and did get brave lvl 1 trait.

What I meant is you'll have got most of the experience running down routers, it's now much easier to make people run, so you'll they'll be more routers.

2. re byz spears, it might possibly be too early, but still unsure as zero starting $$. By turn 10 i was able to build and recruit as normal. Before that, didn't build anything but $$ generating building and didn't recruit a single unit. and only took one settlement by that time. w/out starting $$, definitely made me turtle until i could recruit units reliably. so if anyone else turtles, they would have to depend on byz spears. I'll have to play a little more and see how or if overpowering byz spears might be.

OK.

3. re merchants, almost immediately, Venetian, Hungarian, HRE, Milan, merchants showed up outside Constantinople, and later on Egyptian. most of these were levels 3-4 and my merchant was lvl 3. so acquired them w/ anywhere from 13-27%, and the byz merch acquired 5 of those merchants before it backfired. my merch did not advance lvls through those 5 acquisitions.

Acquisitions give the GoodMerchant line a boost, but the starting Byzantine Merchant is already at the max for this so you need to start picking up monopolist line if you want skill increases.

Well, there's no answer to dumb AI. Forcing players to play dumb isn't fun for the players. CA needs to work on the core AI and expose more for modders. Economic decisions, like whether to convert, just aren't processed well, if at all. Ditto for deep raids, amphibious invasions, and bypassing strong-points. As long as the AI's view of strategy is brute force, we'll have these problems with players easily outperforming it.

To up difficulty, "give it more stuff." I hate that mentality.

Whilst i understand (and even to a degree share), the sentiments, no AI is ever going to be good enough that we DON'T need to use the "give it more" mentality. In fact thats exactly what where doing with the money script. Although the stacks breaking against Corbara haven't been that powerful TBH, just repetitive in that the AI is hitting me with a new one as soon as it can get it trained, and since Recruitment slots are a bigger limitation than money when you only have 3 provinces the Spanish just don't let up. on the other hand the recruitment slots limit how far we can go with the give it more stuff, and by about turn 80 the AI income should reduce the money script to a band aid rather than a major source of income.

But I'm less and less sure that the economy is really a castle versus city thing as much as it's touted. As you point out, castles do fairly well (though not explosively well) with trade. And you can dump in the farms without worrying about revolts. The large problem is poor management.

I agree, thats one of many things i'm trying to correct TBH. CA goes on about the distinction, and for those factions with really good late castle units and for inland castles without a port it's true. The castles are a major source of good units and when they don't have a port they don't tend to make too much money compared to cities. But give them a port and they skyrocket. If we cut castle income though we risk hurting the AI.

The other problem is that things like where the AI attacks ARE controllable, but the AI is only capable of looking at the local provinces bordering it. you can't make it look at a distant province and see if it's well defended, plus once the AI sets out on an attack it won't stop, it will launch it even if the defenses increase 10 fold in the time it takes to get their. The AI basic Hard-code is VERY simplistic. It would probably work fine with a risk style map but is useless with something so dynamic.

I think the scaled tax penalty is a missing brake at the moment. Put that back and take another look at growth. Or just up-tweak conversion costs by a small factor in both cost and time (double both). Then see how it affects the growth of cities and castles, it will show in player expansion performance over 50 turns.

If cities (and castles) are growing slower, taxes and trade will be less. Tech will be lower.

AD reduces this a LOT. But it adds a lot more regions, so the time scale fits the geographic scale better. All build times are increase, as are costs. And growth rates are lower. Deciding which building to build next is not a trivial process. After 30 turns, you may have built 3 buildings in one city. But it feels like a whole new strategic game. (if the turn updates didn't take as long as waiting for a siege to time out...)

I think the Taxes IS having an effect, but it's also I think mostly to do with ports. Without ports castles work as advertised economically. Give them a port though and they end up coming worryingly close to a city in terms of income. it gets less as the city size gets larger and the wharf/market series builds up but still...

Anyway, decided to postpone tackling Jerusalem to hit Rhodes, which is still rebel. Almost there and see Venice had the same idea. It brought 2 units though. I brought a whole stack. I'll wait for it to fail. Unless I cross the Black Sea, or head north from Tbilisi, I'm left with Jerusalem, and islands or coastal regions. Maybe I should go take Valencia.

I refuse to break an alliance though. So will be waiting on Byz or Egypt... or the horde.

You got your war/islands yet then?

[vonsch]

Byz declared turn 34. I'm about to play out the seige of Iconium defensively. Don't think it's an issue. I passed on attacking the stack with my HA to see how the defenses do. The HA intercepted another, though, and I saw reinforcements for that one just before this seige popped, so my HA may be pressed too .

Venice still beseiging Rhodes. Brought in a general, but Rhodes has about 6-8 units and Venice has two plus the general. Unless more turn up...

My stack is sitting there waiting its turn.

Well, siege defense was easy.

Diplomacy seems to work. PS declared on Byz instantly. I was at perfect with the Pope. Next turn Poland and Venice declared. Of course, Poland may be due to that crusade inbound still.

I see Venetian reinforcement in a fleet off Rhodes, enough to do the job. But the garrison sallies next turn. Not sure those reinforcements will be in time. But I have a better use for my stack there. Byz stripped Smyrna and Nicaea . Oops, they left Nicosia without a real garrison too. One unit. So landings near Smyrna and on Cyprus. That will hit them in the purse, and cut reinforcements, and secure the eastern Med for trading. If Venice plays nice.

I have nearly two stacks facing my HA stack-3. And for once they deployed them in an interesting fashion, all the HA and archers are in the stack sitting next to mine, with the infantry in the reinforcing one. Means I take losses, then the spears show up when I'm out of ammo. Not good. Hmm, do I have a handy night-fighter? Heh, yep, the Sultan, and he's almost 60 anyway. Darn can't reach the infantry stack though.

Egypt has a half stack at Jerusalem. Good luck, allies!

I hate night battles... so much confusion! 5:4 odds. But loads of archers on their side too. Ouchie.

Bloody. And the Sultan died. But he was old. Best to go in battle. At least the heir picked up night fighter in that battle. Bought the Egyptians up to amiable to try to avoid a two-front war at least until I control the straights. Now I see if I over citified. Only one castle to crank out replacement for HA force. But a couple cities can build saracens. And button is up on jihad. But that second stack will probably hit my HA. If so, I may only pull out a close defeat as I'm at about half strength. Filled up some gaps with mercs though. It's almost 100% infantry and very few archers, so if my ammo doesn't run out, it will be ugly for them. Don't see any other stacks in Turkey. Maybe they will strip Constantinople for me.

Oh, that infantry stack is all militia except one Byz Infantry. No problem. No general either. They are going in the bag if they come on! Surround them, shoot them up until they rout or I run out of ammo, then mass charge. Usually instant mass rout at that point. Hope my heir gets a few replacements for his guard before the battle though. He's down to 9.

Only second turn of war and I only attacked once, and on my own land. Still at perfect rep. But I landed two armies on Byz lands, so may start seeing a slide.

Heh, like everyone has a seige engineer. Architects are not popping now though. May not be staying in cities during building completion as much as I was with England. More cities means more shuffling. And in the field and in sieges more too.

Heh, infantry army turned tail and hustled off towards Smyrna. But I have a ballista. They won't be in time. Oh, there's the Pole crusade! Near Smyrna too. Bandits popping now. Does being at war trigger more? Second in two turns.

10:1 odds at Smyrna. My kind of siege. That's my second castle, and nice and near the front. nice of them, a Knight's Stables for replacement HA up to Sipahi and a range for Turkish Archers. But no love on the barracks. Tier 1. No econ upgrade besides the port. Next turn Cyprus will be mine too.

HA army hitting that infantry stack. Don't want it getting away to pose trouble elsewhere. Good slaughter!
Darn, let 61 get away. Well, my guys were tired.

Looks like Venice failed to get reinforcements onto Rhodes on time. Heh, and now they are back with a FULL stack. This time they will take it.

I have one full stack of Byz in Nicaea, decent garrisons (half stack) in Nicaea and Cons, and a lot of riff raff loose. My HA army cleaning up gradually. The full stack is mostly infantry. Arrow fodder. Next turn is 40 and I think it's time for a jihad on Cons. Then I'll use that region as my barrier and start cleaning up the Byz since they refuse to love me. No drop in rep so far. Mostly attacking on my land still. My sieges went fast, one lasted 1 turn, other was instant. Three spies working now too. Working on their skill and watching rep. Not a twitch.

The Polish crusade is just sitting in Smyrna province. Since they are allies, no issue for me, but wondering why they do that. Jerusalem is sitting there rebel.

Byz stack is after Smyrna. Time to stop that nonsense. Must be mostly militia again, 5:3 odds and my units are smaller, mostly Turcomen. More good slaughter. They had no cav or archers. Now they have nothing. I see there's no garrison (1-3 units) in Corinth and Thessalonica. This war will end inside 10 turns.

Oh, heretics seem scarce. Don't know if I've seen any this game. I saw 2 regions with over 10%, but cleaned them up fast. Most are under 4% now.

I predict Venice will reach for the knife next. Dubious rep and relationship omly reasonable, which it's been. Should be better since I'm attacking our mutual enemy. Egypt is amiable and very trustworthy. Probably safe there for now.

Heh, Byz bribed my -2 influence diplomat. Good riddance! I wish we could fire those.

Turn 43 I backdoored Corinth. So Byz has a production problem. Byz has taken Iraklion from Venice though. I beat down 3 of their small fleets (including one with an army aboard ) near there. Still no twitch on rep: Imaculate. Do we know for sure being at war drops global rep? Also spying pretty steadily with my 3 spies.

Haven't lost a battle yet. Does that affect rep? (Been lucky with my small navy.) Okay, lost one now. No twitch on rep (massive naval engagement with PS as allies. About 7 stacks.)

Thanks, Byz! My most advanced castle instantly.

[Carl]

Lots of information their. I'll pick out a few bits.

Did you encounter Byzantine spears at all? If you did what did you make of them as the opponent?

Heh, like everyone has a seige engineer. Architects are not popping now though. May not be staying in cities during building completion as much as I was with England. More cities means more shuffling. And in the field and in sieges more too.

I couldn't find the trigger that was causing it. I'll look some more though.

Looks like Venice failed to get reinforcements onto Rhodes on time. Heh, and now they are back with a FULL stack. This time they will take it.

Keep an eye on Byzantium, they may try to grab it.

Oh, heretics seem scarce. Don't know if I've seen any this game. I saw 2 regions with over 10%, but cleaned them up fast. Most are under 4% now.

Interesting.

Turn 43 I backdoored Corinth. So Byz has a production problem. Byz has taken Iraklion from Venice though. I beat down 3 of their small fleets (including one with an army aboard ) near there. Still no twitch on rep: Imaculate. Do we know for sure being at war drops global rep? Also spying pretty steadily with my 3 spies.

Yeah, watch out that they don't come back at you from their.

The Polish crusade is just sitting in Smyrna province. Since they are allies, no issue for me, but wondering why they do that. Jerusalem is sitting there rebel.

It's an annoying thing they do. Try gifting them military access.

Do we know for sure being at war drops global rep? Also spying pretty steadily with my 3 spies.

Yep, can confirm from moors campaign, trouble is that with 13 alliances you'd need to be at war with 3 people to see a drop.



Alright, try to give you a description of my moors campaign to date.


Turn 1 started moving my spare general and stack near Tunis to Granada, kept going, about the time I got their a general came of age and the Sultan died of old age so I used the non-faction Heir as the chiv on the other guy would have a rep effect.

Was about turn 10 at this point and I spent the next 10 turns building troops and moving to attack Valencia. Was a mixture of Desert Archers, Arab Cav, Merc Spears, and Merc Xbows. got beaten back 300:80 (that 300 odd and 80 odd BTW). I rebuilt my stack with more units from Grenada and went and grabbed it for good with about 200 dead to their 500.


At this point I converted Granada to a city and was starting to build a mixed stack of Tuareg Camel Spears and Desert Cav. Spain then attacked me. Beat the off, so Portugal Attacked me. beat them off. Then Portugal again, beat them and got all their family in one battle plus a big Spanish reinforcement army but lost my commanding general when the enemy Cav got into the city. Fortunately their infantry was dead by this point, (they waited till all their infantry had died assaulting the walls before taking advantage of the open gate with their Cav). So they got a mass of spear/town militia in the rear and Tuareg Camel Spears, (a gift for mission completion), and my general in the front.

Spanish reinforcement stack just sat their and I lured them into my towers range one at a time where they where torn to bits.

I'd started a Jihad at Toledo by this point and disbanded the Cav stack I as working on as it wasn't any good for sieges and the upkeep was killing me when I needed infantry in Cordoba. Valencia has been besieged a few times but I've sent them packing every time so...

Grabbed Toledo and now have an explorers guild mission on Lisbon.

[Bob the Insane]

INteresting little tit-bit as the Scotish.... I havd run a Diplomate around europe making alliances anf ended up with an immaculate reputation and a perfect relationship. Well England (my ally with a good relationship?) blockaded Edinburgh...

This is despite it still bordering rebel lands in Farance and the French having parked an army stack on their lands for ages...

Well the result of them blockading Edinburge was that the Pope excommunicated them and then delared war!! Cool...

However their relationship with the pope inexplicably improved and I found myself mo longer at war with them??

[Carl]

INteresting little tit-bit as the Scotish.... I havd run a Diplomate around europe making alliances anf ended up with an immaculate reputation and a perfect relationship. Well England (my ally with a good relationship?) blockaded Edinburgh...

This is despite it still bordering rebel lands in Farance and the French having parked an army stack on their lands for ages...

They clearly see you as an easier target that the rebs.

Well the result of them blockading Edinburge was that the Pope excommunicated them and then delared war!! Cool...

However their relationship with the pope inexplicably improved and I found myself mo longer at war with them??

The first bits nice, the second bit is weird, best I can geuss is their diplomat found the popes and asked and got reconcilliation and an aliance. If that happened then it automaticlly ends any wars the Papal States allies have with the target. In fact if they allied with any of your allies and you are Trustwory rep and oustanding relations it will end the war for you.

Alright, A quick update on things.

First a map of the World as it was at 1136 with me as moors I quit 4 turns later as I was getting too bogged down.





It's interesting to note that once France grabs something, (it started with Bordeaux), it tends to explode. It even wiped out Milan. and up to a few turns ago all the English owned stuff bar cean belonged t France too. I got Portugal as noted earlier. Spain just Bribed Valencia Away from me BTW.

I'm now going to implement a bunch of changes and start a new campaign as someone else. Probs either Byzantium or Venice as I want to leave the whole western Europe area to it's own devices and i'm still not confident enough with Muslims/HA cultures to start Egypt/Turks/Russia/Hungary/Poland.


Keep letting me know how your getting on guys. Vonsch sounds like it's about to get really interesting and i'm sure others are in interesting positions too.

[vonsch]

Okay, a note from just before I went to bed.

Turn 34 I was at Amiable with Egypt. They were Very Trustworthy and I was Imaculate. They blockaded Acre with Jerusalem still reb.

That seems wrong. A relationship that strong should have to decay below amiable before they attack, IMO. I think the trigger mentioned in the thread I read (when a setting or two is changed off vanilla) was below amiable and below very trustworthy on their end and mine.

But then I was tired and mis clicked and decided to reload (bad misclick). So am back at turn 33. I'll experiment with some things to see if Egypt's behavior is constant. Mind you, I'm rated as THE power in game, and I'm not exactly weak on that border. But Egypt has a stack in Jerusalem, I have about a half-stack in Acre. I was surprised they would attack.


I don't have a diplomat close to that crusade stack, but if I can make one in the area I'll try gifing Poland military rights and see if that kicks it into motion. Hadn't occurred to me that being allied might make them leery of moving on, especially since they're already in my land. They have a fleet right there too.


I'll look for the trigger on that siege engineer too. It's silly. Most of my generals have siege engineers now.

Don't forget to tweak spy count. 1 per building level should be reasonable.

I don't know how the alliance affect on rep will play out. That will take deeper testing. I suspect alliances will break up as wars get going though, and later as the player starts expanding. That should help trigger more player wars. If not, the positive nudge of alliances should be decreased by half or so. It's not hard to get 10+ alliances in 20 turns before the rebs are thinned out. It's easier as a Catholic if the Pope dies. Just use the election screen to ally with all the other Catholics.


Hmm, I only see triggers based on the siegeworks line, and that's NOT what's triggering them for me. And it's a low odds trigger for being in the city with the siege buildings. I'm getting them in cities, and only castles get that line now too. Odd. You could try taking out triggers 1 and 2 and just leaving in the one based on being there when the building is built. Change 3 to cat level if so. Don't see mention of anything in error logs either.


Seems much harder to get admiral stars. That a change? The Ai gets them easily though, it appears.

This is interesting. PS has a lot of fleets, mostly 2 ship fleets. Byz has 2-3 ship fleets. PS is shadowing Byz everywhere but rarely attacks them (they remain at war too). But this helps me a lot because I can sail up a fleet and the PS is pulled in as allies. So between us we win every engagement. Never won so many naval battles before! Still lots of Byz fleets though. I'm cleaning out their upkeep roster for them. Hopefully their production capacity is trimmed back to keep it from becoming a problem on land though. A bit intimidate by the two Nicaea stacks. No room for maneuver there so need to plan on pulling all of them, and they are effectively pinning my main HA army bacause if I move off the path to my cities, they ARE a threat there. Think I'm better taking on Iraklion or Thesalonica first at this rate. Soon as I can survive a fleet transport to either. Council says Iraklion too. Would help cut their ship production. Iraklion is making ships it appears. Darned siege gear really slows down fleets (and probably should).

Oh, I positioned single ship fleets just off my southern ports and Egypt hasn't moved. There's something juicy about blockade targets it seems, that overrides diplomacy logic. That's silly. If the AI is going to war, it should open with a REAL attack and get something from the surprise.

Interesting. I gave the Poles military access and they boarded their ship next turn. Let's see if they hit Jerusalem. At least they will stir up the Eggies.

Finally got the Byz to move out of their protective huddle at Nicaea. They moved a full stack and a piece of another together towards Smyrna. But my HA leader is a night fighter. Small stack screening dies first. Then the bigger one. This should open things up for a move on Constantinople and/or Nicaea. The Thesalonica stack moved over to Durazzo. Suspect Byz may be eyeing PS. My invasion force for Crete is aboard ship, but it's 2 turns there, so trying to clear out the Byz fleets and arrange a screen for the transport. PS everywhere, which helps. Eliminating that port and shipyard as Byz will really help the naval war. Gives me safe ports to sally from to sink theirs. But they might switch from building fleets to garrison units, in which case I might not have enough to handle them, though I'm packing extra and a ballista to make it a fast attack. But that also slows the fleet. Choices...

Meanwhile, Egypt getting addressive. Landed a short stack on Cyprus (should be safe, building a couple more garrison units). Another short stack is between Acre and Antioch in the valley off the road. A full stack is in the desert to east of Jerusalem threatening Damascus or points east. I expect war with them anytime, though relations remain amiable and they are very trustworthy. Building another HA army to handle them until Byz is slapped down firmly.

Had hereticism in Edessa leap to almost 20%. And one of my priests there (my theo guild is Baghdad) go whacko. I burnt him immediately, so not sure how much of the 20% was his preaching. I haven't been overrun with heretics, and considering I had things pretty controlled, it's an interesting twist. As long as it's not going to happen every 5 turns or less.

More rebels popping too, but not huge numbers. A general with 3-4 HA/cav handle them well. They've been mostly in the Antioch to Baghdad highway.

[Carl]

That seems wrong. A relationship that strong should have to decay below amiable before they attack, IMO. I think the trigger mentioned in the thread I read (when a setting or two is changed off vanilla) was below amiable and below very trustworthy on their end and mine.

Actually that wasn't very strong at all.

Just let me clarify. ignoring bad rep/relations the scale that diplomatic relations are measured on ranges from 0.0 to 1.0 for both rep and faction standing

Reasonable Faction Standing is anything between 0.0 and less than 0.2.

Amiable ranges from 0.2 to just less than 0.4.

Good ranges from 0.4 to just below 0.6.

Very Good ranges from 0.6 to just below 0.8

Outstanding ranges from 0.8 to just below 1.0 and perfect is 1.0

your standing needs to be equal or greater than 0.6.


Amiable simply isn't very good, it's the way factions look at one another when they consider them a possible permanent Friend, but not yet a full, (but untrusted), Friend.


Rep is simpler, but you need Trustworthy or above now.

I'll look for the trigger on that siege engineer too. It's silly. Most of my generals have siege engineers now.

AND

Hmm, I only see triggers based on the siege-works line, and that's NOT what's triggering them for me. And it's a low odds trigger for being in the city with the siege buildings. I'm getting them in cities, and only castles get that line now too. Odd. You could try taking out triggers 1 and 2 and just leaving in the one based on being there when the building is built. Change 3 to cat level if so. Don't see mention of anything in error logs either.

I've figured it out after staring non-stop at things for a while. What it is is that with the Siege equipment buildings gone the condition relating to these buildings for governors in cities is invalid and is ignored, so they are getting a chance every turn as the only requirement to trigger a character getting it anymore is ending the turn in a city. and their are 3 city triggers so it's a near certainty you'll get it.

I don't know how the alliance affect on rep will play out. That will take deeper testing. I suspect alliances will break up as wars get going though, and later as the player starts expanding. That should help trigger more player wars. If not, the positive nudge of alliances should be decreased by half or so. It's not hard to get 10+ alliances in 20 turns before the rebs are thinned out. It's easier as a Catholic if the Pope dies. Just use the election screen to ally with all the other Catholics.

I'm beginning to agree, plus I think the war based rep hit is too large for the AI as the AI then never gets a good alliance and spends far too long backstabbing each other and not long enough dealing with the player.

Seems much harder to get admiral stars. That a change? The AI gets them easily though, it appears.

If the combined forces, (yours and allies), attacking the enemy fleet exceeds a certain percentage in the strength calculator you can't pick up a star as your considered to be too strong.

A bit intimidate by the two Nicaea stacks. No room for maneuver there so need to plan on pulling all of them, and they are effectively pinning my main HA army because if I move off the path to my cities, they ARE a threat there. Think I'm better taking on Iraklion or Thesalonica first at this rate. Soon as I can survive a fleet transport to either. Council says Iraklion too. Would help cut their ship production. Iraklion is making ships it appears. Darned siege gear really slows down fleets (and probably should).

LOL, whats in those stacks? And what did you make of Byzantine spears as the opponent?

[vonsch]

I thought Amiable was above good/very good. You sure those ranges are right? I THINK that's what I've observed with Papal bribing, but by no means sure. That would explain it. The rep is good enough, but the "liking" isn't. Which isn't surprising as Egypt is a programmed conflict too. I just expected to see some decay in the relationship due to that.


Aha! Brilliant on the siege engineers. Good catch! Slippery logic.


As far as the war/rep logic goes, I don't think a state of war should decay rep. On the other hand, invading, even invading an enemy you're at war with, should. A transgression trigger tied to territorial transgressions and taking settlements would do that, right? Have the former be a smaller hit though. The AI does that a lot. Is there one for besieging? If so, that would be middlin bad. But taking settlements should apply a decent drop. Expansionism should be worrying, even if the perp didn't start the war. Don't think there's a way to check for "just wars." (Outside the whole crusade mechanic, at least.)

Having lots of alliances should help: being a team player, consensus, etc. But it shouldn't override expansionist behavior. So the player might get some "free" expansion if careful and allied up well, but it won't last. Or it would have to be paced carefully.

If the combined forces, (yours and allies), attacking the enemy fleet exceeds a certain percentage in the strength calculator you can't pick up a star as your considered to be too strong.

Suspect that was it. Suddenly picking up some stars. I've cleared out a lot and am getting more solo now. Mostly the leftovers.

LOL, whats in those stacks? And what did you make of Byzantine spears as the opponent?

Byz spears are just arrow fodder too. But they are better offensively at tackling cities and if you try to melee them. I am seeing some, but mostly melee. Are they a castle unit? If so, I created some supply issues for Byz.

The stacks are some spears, some militia, some archers, some Byz cav, decent mix for AI. The pure spears/militia, without archer or cav support, are simply dead. But they'd have little chance against Smyrna at this point. It has about 3/4 stack, Saracens as hole-blockers, some milita spears as fodder, Turk archers, and a ghazi or two and a muta... along with a general. Played out on the battlescreen I would expect to do just fine. With some losses. The Iconium defense convinced me of that. But it's even "cheaper" to have my HA take them down in the field. And it builds experience where I want it.

As far as my intimidation, it's strategic more than tactical. I can beat them, but if I get chewed up in the process (as is likely with two stacks in a place with limited room to retreat, should I feel the need) it might let another stack wreak some havoc while I am arranging replacements, a 4-5 turn project at the moment. So I aim to preserve my force as a high priority as in a holding action it can do a lot of damage and retreat with few casualties, and do it over and over. If I have to "win," it can get expensive.

But they came out. So they will die. And that will leave each of those two cities with a half-stack garrison, so jihad and sieges will follow. I'll bottle up both same turn if I can. Only reinforcement can come from the west then, and that should be too long since they mostly are in Durrazo at the moment. May be some floating around in fleets somewhere still though.

If I can land on Iraklion at the same time...

Well, Egypt would be smart not to provoke me.

Heh, money getting tight too. Still building mostly everywhere. But my force ration is growing rapidly so my surplus after ongoing costs is slipping as the cost of each building goes up. Am starting to prioritize. Some cities hitting the growth barrier too. Jihad would help, just don't want to risk desertions. The risk of dumping high experience HA into a crusader army is if they have to react to reinforcements they move off the siege and can see desertions. Unless they can hit and return in the same turn, at least.

WhEN do the hordes turn up with your timer settings? Is it getting close? I', not ready for them, that's for sure. But your walls will help there.

Wow, that was an odd battle. Nasty terrain for attack, loads of clilffs, hard to know where to deploy since it was dark. But the enemy ran while I was trying to figure out how to get to them. No losses either side. So the short stack is now making a full stack with the garrison of Nicaea. And I am about to meet the loose full stack. Slightly better terrain, I hope. Yep, lost 21 men, killed or captured 623 of 846.

Heh, the remnants retreated to a second short stack I had out between Smyrna and Nicaea, so I get another bite. Bloody. That was their faction leader in a single unit reinforcement. And I had a 0 star general and 4 inexperienced HA. Won, but left with fragments of 4 units and no general. But wiped out that stack of theirs. And my main army is intact.

A side expedition from Treb took Caffa with a town militia force (about 13-14 of them).

[Carl]

Why do the hordes turn up with your timer settings? Is it getting close? I', not ready for them, that's for sure. But your walls will help there.

The warning should hit somwhere between 1144 and 1152.

I'll answer the rest in a moment but I figured you'd want the info fast on this one.

I thought Amiable was above good/very good. You sure those ranges are right? I THINK that's what I've observed with Papal bribing, but by no means sure. That would explain it. The rep is good enough, but the "liking" isn't. Which isn't surprising as Egypt is a programmed conflict too. I just expected to see some decay in the relationship due to that.

Theirs no programmed decay that know of, you just start with worse relations. trouble is since I have to delay AI attacks on the player by an extra 20 turns it often takes the bite out of this as you have time to build up. I have cut the power of bribes so as to make pope bribery harder, and that should help as even a generous diplomatic offer includes a rep boosting bribe effect.

Aha! Brilliant on the siege engineers. Good catch! Slippery logic.

Thanks, took enough spotting LOL.

As far as the war/rep logic goes, I don't think a state of war should decay rep. On the other hand, invading, even invading an enemy you're at war with, should. A transgression trigger tied to territorial transgressions and taking settlements would do that, right? Have the former be a smaller hit though. The AI does that a lot. Is there one for besieging? If so, that would be middling bad. But taking settlements should apply a decent drop. Expansionism should be worrying, even if the perp didn't start the war. Don't think there's a way to check for "just wars." (Outside the whole crusade mechanic, at least.)

I've already cut the war trigger and heavily toned down the alliance trigger so that 10 alliances will still take a good 250 turns to hit immaculate from mixed. The rest of the things you describe are already their.

Byz spears are just arrow fodder too. But they are better offensively at tackling cities and if you try to melee them. I am seeing some, but mostly melee. Are they a castle unit? If so, I created some supply issues for Byz.

their a castle unit available from the second level barracks. I asked mainly because they are pretty well armored as things stand so they won't fall over in a hurry to HA attacks, I wanted to check that they weren't overpoweringly good in that respect. I wanted them to be tougher than usual, but not overpowering. Mainly because I want to see Byzantine as a mixed army of HA/Heavy Cav/Light Cav/Foot Archers/Melee Infantry, as apposed to concentrating on one thing. Thats pretty much how they where working to begin with with the exception that the foot units didn't really work due to the lack of a good foot spear unit.

The stacks are some spears, some militia, some archers, some Byz Cav, decent mix for AI. The pure spears/militia, without archer or Cav support, are simply dead. But they'd have little chance against Smyrna at this point. It has about 3/4 stack, Saracens as hole-blockers, some militia spears as fodder, Turk archers, and a ghazi or two and a muta... along with a general. Played out on the battlescreen I would expect to do just fine. With some losses. The Iconium defense convinced me of that. But it's even "cheaper" to have my HA take them down in the field. And it builds experience where I want it.

As far as my intimidation, it's strategic more than tactical. I can beat them, but if I get chewed up in the process (as is likely with two stacks in a place with limited room to retreat, should I feel the need) it might let another stack wreak some havoc while I am arranging replacements, a 4-5 turn project at the moment. So I aim to preserve my force as a high priority as in a holding action it can do a lot of damage and retreat with few casualties, and do it over and over. If I have to "win," it can get expensive.

But they came out. So they will die. And that will leave each of those two cities with a half-stack garrison, so jihad and sieges will follow. I'll bottle up both same turn if I can. Only reinforcement can come from the west then, and that should be too long since they mostly are in Durrazo at the moment. May be some floating around in fleets somewhere still though.

If I can land on Iraklion at the same time...

Well, Egypt would be smart not to provoke me.

OK, what turn are you at now then?

Heh, money getting tight too. Still building mostly everywhere. But my force ration is growing rapidly so my surplus after ongoing costs is slipping as the cost of each building goes up. Am starting to prioritize. Some cities hitting the growth barrier too. Jihad would help, just don't want to risk desertions. The risk of dumping high experience HA into a crusader army is if they have to react to reinforcements they move off the siege and can see desertions. Unless they can hit and return in the same turn, at least.

Glad to hear your finally being slowed down. Take it from your comments that Egypt finally got Jerusalem.

Wow, that was an odd battle. Nasty terrain for attack, loads of clilffs, hard to know where to deploy since it was dark. But the enemy ran while I was trying to figure out how to get to them. No losses either side. So the short stack is now making a full stack with the garrison of Nicaea. And I am about to meet the loose full stack. Slightly better terrain, I hope. Yep, lost 21 men, killed or captured 623 of 846.

Heh, the remnants retreated to a second short stack I had out between Smyrna and Nicaea, so I get another bite. Bloody. That was their faction leader in a single unit reinforcement. And I had a 0 star general and 4 inexperienced HA. Won, but left with fragments of 4 units and no general. But wiped out that stack of theirs. And my main army is intact.

A side expedition from Treb took Caffa with a town militia force (about 13-14 of them).

Wheres caffa??? I don't recognize the name, sorry...

[vonsch]

The warning should hit somwhere between 1144 and 1152.

I'll anwser the rst in a moment but I figured you'd want the info fast on this one.

Well, don't have any control over it, just curious. Haven't met them to date, so if I hang in here it will be my first meeting.

My invasion of Crete is at sea. 3 small fleets with it to try to slip it through. Only one Byz fleet in sight though, at Crete.

Poles still sitting there in their crusade fleet. err, no they aren't, it's empty. Oh, there they are, moving towards Jerusalem on foot again.

Turn 47: Pre Iraklion Invasion.


Whew! That was closer than I like. Landed at Iraklion, garrison was down to one unit. I had ballista so I stormed it. Pulled reinforcements off a fleet there! (Didn't know about that, cute trick, I'll USE it!) Ended up 2:1 odds. Beat them. Got lucky. They retreated to their ship so now I try to sink that viper.


Heh, Egypt just attacked one of my troop waystation forts. So it's war there too. PS declared on them instantly.

And I agree that a lessening of bribe effects is good, with the current system of alliances. Just don't overdo it. I'm not rolling in bribe money as it is. One thing missing, I'd say, is something to decrease Muslim faction rep with the Pope. Apparently, we don't take the hits the Catholics do for our actions, as long as we don't attack crusades, at least.

Wheres caffa??? I don't recognize the name, sorry...

Um, blanking on the modern name... Penninsula in the Black Sea... let me find my atlas. Sevastopol. Oh, those slaves in Caffa are nice income that's fairly close too. For Turkey, at least.

OK, what turn are you at now then?

Turn 48. Year 1127.


On the Byz Spears, as long as it's not an army of 50% plus Byz Spears my HA chew them up fine. But they are tougher. The key is to bag them: set up so you're shooting into them from both flanks and rear, while giving them something to chase around. Get them to shaken fast, and then have something with some charge oomph smack into their backsides. They rout. Then they die. My generals usually run over and through them from the flanks or rear. As long as they keep moving, they do fine. Bog down more than an instant and they get hurt. Badly.

Egypt is bypassing Jerusalem. It's still rebel. I kind of like it that way. At least as long as it draws crusades away from me, and keeps Egypt busy.

Darned Poles can't make up their minds, now they are back aboard their ship!

Heh, a Sicilian fleet was next to a Byz one. The Byz one had the Crete reinforcements on it, so I attacked it. The Sicilians declared on Byz and joined in. We're building to world war! So... since Sicily is helping... sink the other two fleets at Crete too. I am learning to love allies. Have to use them shamelessly while they are playing nice, since it won't last.

Jihad time. Sideswiping Nicaea on the way to Cons.

Oh, Egypt did take a rep hit for that backstab. Probably not enough, cosidering. Went from VT down to Reliable. Breaking an alliance with an attack should really dump rep.

AI navies in my area are making serious use of fleets to move troops. But they aren't good at protecting them. Two Egyptian fleets sunk with about 15 units total. That will help. Another Byz one hit, but it's lost in the fog. Meanwhile, my invasion fleet headed for Thesalonica got pushed back. Won first engagement, but got hit again, so is back in port for repairs. AI not smart, but it's not doing badly with its fleets on the whole. Environment is just nasty for my enemies with allies all over too. Actually, the big difference is the AI doesn't run for port for repairs if damaged. That means they end up dead versus delayed, which costs them good admirals and good experienced crews.

Nicaea fell to a quick siege turn 49. Overwhelming force. Object not immovable. I had a fleet right there to transfer armies across the strait. So with two in place at the walls, I moved my HA stack to the NW side... and ran into an ambush party in the trees. Heh. Problem. For Byz. It was ALL infantry. Bagged them with 16 losses. 496 of 496 killed or captured. Now moving last army into place and then will do another quick siege. Siege engines move slowly, but they sure help with lightning attacks.

This will leave only Durrazo to Byz, unless the scooped up another to the north. Meanwhile, nearly have a full stack to go at Egypt with. But they have a lot of Mumlaks salting their stacks, so going to be bloody. I lack archers in my southern cities (no militia archers, at least so far), so need to rectify that to toughen up their defenses to attacks. And I'll put together a nice little "storm the sands" force to swoop south from Crete into the Egyptian rear. Gaza should be easy too. That will kill off their forward base.

Racing the horde clock.

30:7 odds against Constantinople. Onward to Thesalonica!

Result of a half stack of Byz Spear & Byz Infantry ambush of a full stack of Turks HA:


That's a bag pulled closed over them. There was one more solo guy running off west, but he didn't make it. You can see my ammo supply is pretty low. A full stack is too many. 3/4 is iffy.

[Carl]

30:7 odds against Constantinople. Onward to Thesalonica!

I am watching you, just letting the info flow in for the moment, it's as fascinating listening to you play as it is discussing potential issues.

I take it your enjoying yourself a lot then?

How's it compare in terms of fun and challenge to Vanilla/V1.13?

I WILL go into some of the points you've raised a bit later though.