Questions about an upcoming Byzantine campaign.

[Shao]

Hi, folks,

having just finished the long English campaign - my first on M2TW - I'm now looking forward for a Byzantine one. The ERE is my old favorite from MTW and I have done a fair bit of forums' reading so I kinda know what to do strategy-wise. However, I definitely want to make the campaign as challenging as possible - something that the English one lacked. Hence my questions:

1) Difficulty levels? I have 1.2 installed and have been playing on VH/VH. Got a lot of "passive AI" cases in all the battles - not just the sieges. Also got the stupid strategic moves when they make a completely doomed incursions into my territory... Can reducing the difficulty level actually make the AI smarter, like more aggressive on the battle-map?

2) Long or short?
- in a short campaign the goal is to eliminate 2 factions. Does it mean they'll be more aggressive?
- I am going to play with 1 turn == 1 year, and I don't blitz. Given that, do you think an average Byz game is going to be challenging in a long run? I understand that Mongols and Timur-i Lang warriors will attack me, especially if I conquer the East, but with all the wealth I'll get would they be a real threat?

3) Modding?
Any useful mods out there? Especially the ones making the life on an aspiring Basileus harder? :-) Stainless Steel has got some good reviews, has anyone played Byzantium on it?

Any advice is appreciated :-)

[Didz]

Hi Shao, welcome to the forum.

1) Based upon what I've read elsewhere I think in future I will play using M/VH. I've tried VH/VH but in my expereince the Strategic AI just goes into imbecilic suicide aggression mode so I won't go there again. Whereas, I'm reliably informed that playing anything other than VH for the battles puts the AI at a disadvantage.

2) Likewise, I personally prefer the Short Campaign mode as it restricts my goals by forcing me to eliminate specific factions rather than being able to go on an indescriminate rampage of destruction against any target of opportunity that crops up. Of course, you can still do that but I tend to play to my own rules and stick to the plot.

The other thing to remember about the Short Campaign is that if you finish it and don't want to stop playing you can simply choose to switch to full campaign mode and carry on playing. So. basically you are not sacrificing anything by choosing the Short Campaign in the first place.

3) Not sure about Mods, I think The Long Road looks interesting but I haven't tried it.

[BattleN00b]

If you want a real challenge, go for The Long Road. After so much Vanilla I get frustrated I can't build a large empire :P

[Shao]

Thx for the prompt responses!

Didz, thx, I didn't know about the possibility switching to a long campaign mode after doing a short one.

And yeah, I'll probably choose H or even M for the strategic part... those silly little raids really annoyed me...

As for The Long Road mod - doesn't it require more economy micromanagement than vanilla?
I am financially challenged :-) so all this merchant thing is probably the worst change from M1 in my case. Well, maybe I should say the 'Agents' part... I seem to have less pitched battles (not counting vermin fighting and silly raids :) ) and much more intrigue in Medieval II which is frustrating. Well, anyway, if 'The Long Road' leans towards the economy part it's not good in my particular case...

[DVX BELLORVM]

The other thing to remember about the Short Campaign is that if you finish it and don't want to stop playing you can simply choose to switch to full campaign mode and carry on playing. So. basically you are not sacrificing anything by choosing the Short Campaign in the first place.

Are you sure about this? I know you could switch to Long campaign in RTW, but I don't think you can in M2TW.

When I won my English Short campaign, I wasn't asked if I wanted to switch, just if I want to continue playing. I continued, of course, and the victory conditions weren't updated to long campaign. The Faction overview clearly stated that I won the game.


Shao, I would also recommend M/VH, because IMO it provides the most balanced game. BTW, welcome to the Forum!

[a_ver_est]

I am playing a long H/VH campaign as Byzantine, the main problem is that I have had to put almost all my money in a effort to stop the Mongols so my other battle fronts progressed very slowly.

Now with the Mongols reduced to 2 cities and their armies near to be eliminated, the Timurs has arrived so my hopes for a fast conquest of Italy has gone. It's time to stop another horde.

I usually based my armies in heavy infantry but now playing the Byz I am using a lot of Lotinkon and Vardariotai, with some other less advance cavalry units as complement. At Asia I am fielding all cavalry armies, I mainly fight against yet anther mongol full stack at the open fields where I can take as much advantage as possible of my superior mobility. The small number of infantry units in the Mongol forces becomes the axis of the battle, if you attack them their cavalry will come to help losing their mobility and becoming a great target.

At Itally I use a mix of all kind of troops, mainly because I spent far less money in this front. Anyway The Papa seems to have a lot of resources because he is fielding several full stacks also, but they are easier to defeat.

At the north I have a more or less stable peace with the Russia and Poland, but it needs a good number of troops at the borders provinces to be "stable".

To summarize, a very funny and challenging campaign.

[Didz]

Are you sure about this? I know you could switch to Long campaign in RTW, but I don't think you can in M2TW.

When I won my English Short campaign, I wasn't asked if I wanted to switch, just if I want to continue playing. I continued, of course, and the victory conditions weren't updated to long campaign. The Faction overview clearly stated that I won the game.

Well I'm certain about the ability to continue playing, but not 100% certain about whether the game switches to monitoring your capture of 45 provinces. I thought it did, but in essence it wasn't that important to me at the time as I wanted to play on for specific goals of my own.

Even if it doesn't its not hard to moniotr how many provinces you have taken and award yourself victory after 45, the victory screen isn't that impressive anyway.

[Grog]

I am coming to the end of my byzantine campaign (vanilla 1.2 Vh/Vh long)

I have really enjoyed it, but would change a few things if I played it again. Anyway in answer to your questions:

1) Difficulty levels? I played on VH/VH. If I was to play again, I would choose M/VH like a lot of other posters on here, mainly to give diplomacy more of a chance. I did make allies with turkey and hungary at the start of the game, both backstabbed me by turn 30-40ish when I was in a fairly heavy defensive war with venice while I consolidated rebel conquests. I took Sofia from under hungarys nose, then had venice marching a stack of mercs + general every other turn or so for what seems a lifetime. However, mobile Byz armies make 3 front wars more of a challenge than a chore, so I don't really regret Vh too much, but constant aggression from venice meant I had little cash/resources to appease my neighbours with (I don't tend to blitz, I prefer to expand/consolidate/expand.)

I did also defeat the mongols open field, no chokes and no assasinating their generals and destroyed them as a faction which provided a fine challenge (if a bit costly at times...) I was lucky at the start as they went north and settled in kiev at the start, so I didnt have the entire horde trampling my lands. However, the timurinds have now appeared smack in the middle of turkish byzantine (yerevan) and have thumped/sacked my tbsili garrison, so I will have to go and have a word with them...



2) Long or short? I play long campaigns, mainly because I wanted M2TW as a 'long' progessive game. In many respects for me, M2TW fits the bill perfectly. I may play a short 'islam' game next, but I am really tempted by the idea of going for a max chivalrous/good world standing long game with a 'clunking' catholic faction, no sacking/assasins/blitz etc while keeping the pope happy at all times.

This brings me to one point of critcism for the Byz game, I really missed the 'pope element' of my english early game, as to me this added an extra dimension, especially in the early game before the holy lands are converted/cardinal monopolised. The pope element is somewhat offset once you have rome, and can play 'whack-a-pop' with impunity

3) Modding? I have not played any mods, but found the 1.2 game a vast improvement over 1.0/1.1. As mentioned before, I think the M/VH setting would have made the game a bit more rounded for my campaign, but mounted dreadlord armies do have a certain appeal...

[Shao]

Thanks again for all the replies. :-)

I have started to play a short campaign on H/VH (want to try that and M/VH then) with Stainless Steel installed. At first I was a bit disappointed as there are a lot of new provinces for Byzantium to take in Greece and Asia Minor - and it means money and money mean victory. :-)
I even slowed down my advance not just by avoiding wars with Venice and Seljuks (which was planned fro the beginning - no rushes) but by refraining from taking some border provinces. But for some reason Venice didn't attack Durazzo for the first 12-13 years and I got a mission to take it then - and I almost try to do the missions. Well, at least Turks were bold enough to get Trebizond.

However, once I conquered Durazzo Venice decided to attack it with a really powerful stack and it turned out as a great battle where the power of the HA was confirmed yet again. :-)

And not having Vardariotai at the start is a very, very good thing, thanks SS for that.

So I'm determined to see this campaign to the end and the either try ERE on Vanilla or with 'The long road' installed... another idea is to play Milan or some Muslim faction (never done that in MTW).
And then come Kingdoms and being a great fan of Henrik Senkevich's "Crusaders" novel I can finally bash some Teutonic heads. :-))