total war grand campaign gunpoder invention

[pontypool]

i completed englands objective of taking jerusalem and other regions BEFORE gunpowder was invented, the mongols already invaded but ive not seen gunpowder invented, come to think about it i never saw the timurids invade either. does this mean events dont happen once you reached your goals? when should gunpowder be invented and where can i tell what the date is on my game.
thanks.

[pevergreen]

You can change the turns number to year by:

medieval2.preference.cfg

open that with notepad/textpad/wordpad

there will be a line saying

show_years_as_turns = 1

or something like that

switch the value from a 1 to a 0 or a 0 to a 1

[homefry]

Gunpowder becomes invented after the Mongols arrive.

Even though the Mongols have rocket launchers that's just the way the game works.

[pontypool]

That isnt what i wanted to know. Because i completed my objective with england and won the game, i then choose to continue playing for "even greater glory"
at that point do events not happen anymore, such as the mongols invading? because i thought this might be why gunpowder is never invented or the timurids not invading.

[Moah]

If you keep playing things keep happening. Gunpowder will be invented and the timurids will arrive.

As to a Mongol invasion that depends on your game.

Sometimes you get the Great Mongol Shuffle instead, where they wander here, they wander there, they have a picnic, they wander off again. Very annoying when your best armies are parked at all the bridges and mountain passes expectantly.

[Ciaran]

It depends on when you finished your objectives. Gunpowder comes along somewhere around 1260, the Mongols arrive aound 1230 and the Timurids... I think somewhere in 14th century.

[icek]

in 1.2 gunpowder event is in 1290.

[lars573]

If you want to know the date look on the scroll where it tells you your campagin objectives.

AS for when things happen.
-1220 to 1240 Mongols, they come in several waves. A small probing force of a stack or two shows up around 1220. The main invasion of the horde is in 1230. With reinforcements in around 1240.

-1290 (1250 before 1.2 patch) Gunpowder. As for why the Mongols have rocket launchers. Well at the same time Heraclius was invading the Sassanid empire, the Chinese were building their first rockets.

-1370 The Timurids invade. Starting in Baghdad.

[Ramses II CP]

The Timurids don't necessarily come in at Baghdad, they can come in further north at Sarkel or Bulgar as well (As they did in my AAR). As the Danes I alternately used river crossings with primarily infantry and open field attacks with all cavalry armies. The key to the all cavalry battles isn't having superior cavalry, it's using them better. A player is by default much better with their cavalry than the AI, so you can take inferior cavalry (Like Scouts) out against Mongol Heavy Lancers and bring home a victory.

The Timurids are nasty. Just remember to train enough cannons to outduel them at range.

[pontypool]

oh wow... the year is only 1240 so i actually managed to conquer all of the map until russia and the most eastern provinces and turkey in crimea before all of that stuff happend.. wow didnt realise i did that so fast.

[alpaca]

oh wow... the year is only 1240 so i actually managed to conquer all of the map until russia and the most eastern provinces and turkey in crimea before all of that stuff happend.. wow didnt realise i did that so fast.

Welcome to the club. If you don't severely handicap yourself chances are you'll never, ever see the tims and rarely see gunpowder.

[Walternat0r]

You guys finished before the Mongol invasion?!

What the hell am I doing wrong? Lol, i'd consider myself an ok TW player and as Spain i'm 114turns in and only have 25 provinces. I mean, yes I am focusing a lot on economy but crikey, you guys move fast!

[pontypool]

if your focusing on economy then warfare is the fastest route not province improvement, the more provinces you have the more revinue you generate and the more merchants you can train, take preference in the middle east because those provinces have rich resources like spices cotton and marble, youll make a lot more money by being a warmonger and taking those provinces than staying in spain... go for Gaza first cause its a decent sized fortress to build your elite units in, from there spread out and take the rich provinces...


anyway .. its 1260 now, still now gunpoder. ive stopped my conquests ive gone as far south and west as granada in spain as far east as russia and taken egypt and all of turkey except for the crimean territories, im just gonna hold my ground here coz i wanna enjoy using cannons on the last nations left.

[Walternat0r]

So do you guys make extensive use of merchants? I pretty much gave up on them as they just got taken over by foreigners with 7+ merchant skills. I do have about 6 or so in Timbuktu region harvesting ivory and gold mines though but apart from that I don't bother, the way I see it they only bring in about 20 florins ish a year and for the 550 cost, they get killed in 10 turns so not worth it! Of course i'm probly doing something wrong, advice?

[lars573]

You gotta remember the AI uses it's merchants for taking out other merchants most of the time. Only when they are like 6 or 7 merch skill will it plunk them down on a resource and leave them there for a turn or three.

[PrestigeX]

Gunpowder becomes invented after the Mongols arrive.

Even though the Mongols have rocket launchers that's just the way the game works.

Thats because the 'invention' of gunpowder, is relative to the context of how it was brought to the European continent...
The very first gunpowder weapons were actually used by the Chinese as early as the 10th century (AD) with a weapon known as a 'fire-spear' which could shoot a spike a few meters and a flame would spout for 10 seconds which would burn the enemy,

but it was the europeans who really developed the technology into an effective field projectile weapon later on.

[alpaca]

So do you guys make extensive use of merchants? I pretty much gave up on them as they just got taken over by foreigners with 7+ merchant skills. I do have about 6 or so in Timbuktu region harvesting ivory and gold mines though but apart from that I don't bother, the way I see it they only bring in about 20 florins ish a year and for the 550 cost, they get killed in 10 turns so not worth it! Of course i'm probly doing something wrong, advice?

I usually use them because I like them as a feature. Merchants in general are something of a high-risk investment: Once you get one through proper they generate a ton of cash (e.g. playing Milan a 8 or 9 Finance merchant standing on Silk will generate something like 1000 florins per turn).
However, only one in ten or maybe even more will survive to that stage - so if you are tight on money I wouldn't advise to build them but if you just sacked a settlement, buy some of them, let them rob AI ones (also partially setting up their cost as they don't have maintenance) and those that pull through are probably good enough to stand on a resource.

As an alternative you can use the fort exploit/feature: put a fort on an expensive resource and then park up to 20 merchants there.

Besides, I haven't rushed for some time. It becomes boring - now I concentrate on house rules (see the "Iron Man house rules" thread where I mentioned most of what I usually play with when I try something in vanilla, which doesn't happen that often either)

[Zenicetus]

So do you guys make extensive use of merchants? I pretty much gave up on them as they just got taken over by foreigners with 7+ merchant skills. I do have about 6 or so in Timbuktu region harvesting ivory and gold mines though but apart from that I don't bother, the way I see it they only bring in about 20 florins ish a year and for the 550 cost, they get killed in 10 turns so not worth it! Of course i'm probly doing something wrong, advice?

I mainly use merchants in the remote and safer areas like Timbuktu, and the slaves near Kiev. They're less likely to be taken over in really remote areas like that, after you've removed the neighboring factions.

Aside from that, and using the first merchant at the start because it's free, I don't bother with them. Its too much micro-management to level them up and protect them from stronger AI merchants. When it comes to agents, I'd rather spend my micro-management time on spy and assassin warfare because it has a more direct impact on the game. The AI is very good at managing agents, and it can hurt me a lot more with spies and assassins than it can with merchants. I also put a strong emphasis on ports and marine trade, and there is always sacking if I need a quick cash influx, so I don't miss the relatively small income you get from merchants. But that's just my approach, and I know some folks enjoy the merchant warfare aspect of the game.

[ReiseReise]

I'm guessing the reason that your Timbuktu gold is not profitable is because Spain has gold in its home territories. If you have gold (or any other resource) near your capital, you don't get a lot of money for it even if your merchants find another one all the way across the map.

[Walternat0r]

About 2 days after I posted the stuff about useless merchants I discovered that actually they aren't so rubbish =/

I have a bunch that are in Timbuktu/Arguin regions all producing between 300 and 1200 florins a turn. I also have a couple in Uk and one or 2 in Italy making me about 150 a turn.. I think it got fixed in my patch or it just decided to make merchants effective, not really sure!

Also, Q, what's best tactic on Mongol-beating? I have maybe 4 stacks of triple silver chevrons coming at me through Tripoli and I only have Tripoli as a castle producing units.. I do have 3 stacks myself but they aren't fully retrained or tech'd up. Or even my best units.. Fighting HA with heavy infantry and knights is a nightmare lol.

On another note, is the Pope really so easily pleased? I was on only 1 cross rating with him for about 15 turns, then gave him Milan as a gift and now he's bumming the crap out of me!

[Viking]

On another note, is the Pope really so easily pleased? I was on only 1 cross rating with him for about 15 turns, then gave him Milan as a gift and now he's bumming the crap out of me!

I think I payed 10K for peace and another 30 for reconcilation. That cash got me 4 more crosses also.

[FactionHeir]

If dragging out a game is not in your interest or you generally just want to spice things up, my sig's got a nice and easy tutorial on how to fix it.