A Few Problems

[mark-2008]

Hello, just joined here today, so hello, this is my first post.

I have a few problems that I'm hoping you could all solve, if you'd be so kind.

First: I can't seem to get trade links right. I'm the Italians in my game, with a huge navy stretching to the sea in Constantinople. Ships are in every sea lane from Venice to Constantinople; those two provinces have ports and I'm allied to the Byzantines too. Yet when I right-click the port info in Venice, it says 0 income is generated by trade. Could anybody suggest what I'm doing wrong?

Secondly: This huge navy, whilst it expands eastwards to the Byzantine Empire, will not go westward for some reason. I move my ships from Venice down the tip of Italy and up past east Naples, but they disappear in Sicily! The same happens when I manage to get them up to East France, they disappear before I can get them to the English channel! I click on the menu that shows generals and they're still appearing on that, but I can't see them or move them anywhere, so they're pretty useless. Again, any help with this one?

And lastly: I play on easy (wimp ) and I've never yet seen a civil war occur. Not to me, or any other country. Does this only happen on harder difficulties?

A few questions flying around too, if you don't mind. How can I kill an incompetent heir so that a better Prince can take his place? Assassins take a long time - so by the time I get enough to be successful, he may have became King- and I want to keep my surrounding allies - so no invading bordering provinces with my heir in a weak army.

Thanks for the answers.

[King Kurt]

Mark - welcome to MTW!!

Your no trade could be 2 things - enemy ships blocking the trade route or no trading post in Venice check those first.

Disappearing ships - the only thing i can think of is that they are hidden by other people's ships. If they are on the list of armies click on the fleet on the list and you should get taken there

Poor princes - if you can't wait for an assasin then a one way trip into battle is the only way - just send him by his self to a well defended enemy province - he should loose and with luck he will be killed or captured - so you can refuse to ransom him.

Try those - if no joy come and ask again

[caravel]

Hello, just joined here today, so hello, this is my first post.

I have a few problems that I'm hoping you could all solve, if you'd be so kind.

First: I can't seem to get trade links right. I'm the Italians in my game, with a huge navy stretching to the sea in Constantinople. Ships are in every sea lane from Venice to Constantinople; those two provinces have ports and I'm allied to the Byzantines too. Yet when I right-click the port info in Venice, it says 0 income is generated by trade. Could anybody suggest what I'm doing wrong?

You can't trade with your enemies and you also can't trade if you haven't built a trader in the province. Also if the AI provinces have already got the goods you're trading then no trade will occur for that particular type of good.

Another thing to look out for is blockades. Hold the 'v' key and the sea zones will highlight showing you neutral(orange/brown), friendly(green) and hostile(red) waters. Any hostile waters indicate that enemy ships are present and blocking your trade route. Neutral waters mean that your ships are not there this may also explain a broken trade link.

Secondly: This huge navy, whilst it expands eastwards to the Byzantine Empire, will not go westward for some reason. I move my ships from Venice down the tip of Italy and up past east Naples, but they disappear in Sicily! The same happens when I manage to get them up to East France, they disappear before I can get them to the English channel! I click on the menu that shows generals and they're still appearing on that, but I can't see them or move them anywhere, so they're pretty useless. Again, any help with this one?

Whoa... that's a new one for me... are you quite sure that your ships aren't getting attacked and sunk? Hopefully someone else will have some input on this.

And lastly: I play on easy (wimp ) and I've never yet seen a civil war occur. Not to me, or any other country. Does this only happen on harder difficulties?

You need to get off the easy difficulty and at least play on normal, moving on to hard after your get the hang of things. Easy really is too easy.

A few questions flying around too, if you don't mind. How can I kill an incompetent heir so that a better Prince can take his place? Assassins take a long time - so by the time I get enough to be successful, he may have became King- and I want to keep my surrounding allies - so no invading bordering provinces with my heir in a weak army.

Thanks for the answers.

To get rid of any poor heirs or generals you can use your spies to orchestrate a treason plot. This increases your spies valour when they pull it off so it can be a good thing. Generally the success rate is dependent on the loyalty of the individual being framed. It is a good idea to valour up the spy through counter-spying first however as a 0 valour spy won't have much luck against anyone except the most disloyal and worthless of your generals. To have your spies counter-spying, simply leave them in your provinces and don't build any of the border forts (you can still build the watch towers but don't upgrade to the forts) and this way your spies will be the ones catching enemy assassins and spies as they pass through - gaining valour as they do so. Another way for spies to gain valour is to place them en masse in a rival province and with a bit of luck they will spark a revolt. It is important to remember that only 1 spy is effective and only one spy will cause the revolt so numbers won't make the rival's province any more rebellious but if he succeeds all of the spies will gain valour. If there is a border fort in the rival's province however you're probably wasting your time and money as all of the spies will likely be caught and killed at the end of the year.

As to alliances - don't trust them. Alliances in MTW can fall apart when you least expect it. Always be prepared and don't rely on keeping them.

[drone]

Secondly: This huge navy, whilst it expands eastwards to the Byzantine Empire, will not go westward for some reason. I move my ships from Venice down the tip of Italy and up past east Naples, but they disappear in Sicily! The same happens when I manage to get them up to East France, they disappear before I can get them to the English channel! I click on the menu that shows generals and they're still appearing on that, but I can't see them or move them anywhere, so they're pretty useless. Again, any help with this one?

I think King Kurt might be correct about this, the ships are probably hidden behind others in the sea zone. If you are not seeing the sea-battle scroll during the end-turn sequence, and they still show up in the generals scroll, I'd say they are behind other ships. If you zoom in on the campaign map, and move left-right, you can see and select markers that appear stacked on top of each other at full zoom out. It's annoying, but you can move your markers around in the sea/province they are currently in, to give you a better view of what you have. Unfortunately, enemy markers and markers moving between provinces always go to the middle spot, so you can miss things at times.

Do ships merge fleets if auto-tidy is on? Maybe the ships are there, but have merged together with existing fleets. Check your fleet markers to make sure they have the right number of ships.

Welcome to the .Org!

[Taedius]

Just thought of one thing about the disappearing ships: Are you trying to send them to the Western Med? That's deep sea, and the Italian galleys won't go there. They pop back to where they came from when you drop them. If not, they are probably hidden as stated above.

[Martok]

Welcome to the Org, mark-2008! Enjoy your stay here.

First: I can't seem to get trade links right. I'm the Italians in my game, with a huge navy stretching to the sea in Constantinople. Ships are in every sea lane from Venice to Constantinople; those two provinces have ports and I'm allied to the Byzantines too. Yet when I right-click the port info in Venice, it says 0 income is generated by trade. Could anybody suggest what I'm doing wrong?

I have a hunch you might have forgotten to build the trading post in Venice. In order for a province to export its trade goods (if it has any), it *must* have a trading post built there first.

It's still also possible you're being blockaded by someone you're at war with -- and as caravel said, pressing "v" will show if you have any sea regions inhabited by enemy ships -- but I somehow doubt it. If there were enemy ships interrupting your trade network, they would likely be trying to actively attack and sink your vessels instead of just sitting there.

And lastly: I play on easy (wimp ) and I've never yet seen a civil war occur. Not to me, or any other country. Does this only happen on harder difficulties?

I believe civil wars are still possible on Easy, but it's probably far less likely they'll happen than on the higher difficulty settings.

It's of course been a long time since I played on Easy; but if I'm not completely off my rocker, I seem to recall that on the Easy difficulty, generals tend to be more loyal and less likely to rebel. I also think princes are born somewhat more often on Easy, which obviously cuts down on the chance of a faction leader dying with no direct heir. My brain cells could just be making all that up, though....

[macsen rufus]

Hi Mark, and welcome to the Org

Most of your questions have been covered, so this one I can expand on for you:

I click on the menu that shows generals and they're still appearing on that, but I can't see them or move them anywhere, so they're pretty useless. Again, any help with this one?

When you have this military parchment open you can click on a general's name and the game will zoom on to him - it also tells you the province/sea region he's in. It's a useful way to find missing generals And also remember they do die of old age and get replaced by younger men, so don't be surprised if the Doge of Venice is Luigi one year, and Enrico the next - it can make them hard to find if you're looking for the wrong name

[mark-2008]

Hello again everyone, thanks for all your replies, they've been very helpful.

I managed to find out that - whilst the port in Venice does not indicate any trade income - I can click on the expenses and income list and it says I'm getting 200-300 florins from Venetian trade. So it turns out that I do have quite a widespread and wealthy trade network after all.

My biggest problem is the ships disappearing. I've tried clicking their names on the General List and it switches to a completely empty stretch of sea. There's not even visible enemy ships around in that area, so they're not hidden behind. It's like they only exist in name, they've totally disappeared otherwise.

Oh, and I didn't know spies could do so much, I need to start churning them out, I've also discovered the awesomeness of emissaries and bribing armies! Got Navarre, Provence, Champagne and Flanders through it (I cheat by the way, shame on me ).

It's really annoying how the idiot child is the oldest and inherits the throne before his genius younger brother!

I might move up to normal difficult, I find easy hard enough though, and I've had the game for a few years now!

[macsen rufus]

You haven't been naming your ships "Marie Celeste", have you?

That is a wierd one I've never seen or heard of before. Congratulations, you've discovered a new bug I'd love to know what's going on there.

It's really annoying how the idiot child is the oldest and inherits the throne before his genius younger brother!

Mediaeval family planning = "I plan to send my heir apparent on a hopeless invasion of an island with no port". Family trees, like apple trees, fruit better with some judicious pruning....

[mark-2008]

Hello again, about the ships: I could try get some pictures on them but I'm not sure how I'd portray them in screenshots.

You haven't been naming your ships "Marie Celeste", have you?

That would explain a lot, haha!

I agree with your "pruning" methods, spies are good to try your heir for treason, worked well for me!!! In the same game, I witnessed my first civil war. I am the Italians and the Germans had just sent a crusade my way (I wasn't even excommunicated though, eh!?). Then the Holy Roman Empire tore itself in two, good news for my Italian forces, which would have been crushed by the German army.

Unfotunately, the game crashed not long after, and I hadn't saved.

[Peasant Phill]

I might move up to normal difficult, I find easy hard enough though, and I've had the game for a few years now!

Move to normal difficulty as fast as you can. Nothing better to hone your skills more than to face a new challenge. I was hesitant to, at first, to play at a higher difficulty as I was intimidated but believe me you'll soon learn and adapt and the game will be much more enjoyable.

[mark-2008]

Here's a screenie of my problem with the disappearing ships. There should be two ships in the Spanish Coast region but, as can be seen, there's none.

Say whut!?

[drone]

That's pretty messed up, I've never seen anything like that before.

Maybe toggle off Fog of War? Shot in the dark, but it can't hurt.

[macsen rufus]

Thanks for the screenie - a quick question: are you playing a mod? I ask because your "Sahara" is a rebel colour on the minimap, whereas in vanilla it should be blank (non-playable). In which case I wonder if maybe your provinces might have got out of sync, somehow?* Also what happens if you press "v" - do the sea regions with "invisible ships" light up in the appropriate colour (ie green, unless it's shared with an enemy ship then it should be red)?

Curiouser and curiouser

* also if this is the case you can expect some of the land provinces to be messed up in the Middle East

[mark-2008]

Thanks for getting back so fast.

I dunno what Fog of War is though , fill me in perhaps?

Also, I have no mods at all installed. As far as I know, I'm playing the 'vanilla' version. I noticed the Sahara before too, you can't invade it and there is never any armies there. When I type in the .conan. cheat to take the rebels side I can't play as them. Pressing 'v' doesn't light up the screen though.

[drone]

Fog of War in games is used to limit your map knowledge to only areas that you have units viewing. Toggling it off will reveal enemy units, ships, etc that you would normally not see without spies. While in the campaign map, if you type ".matteosartori.", the whole map will be revealed. Now that I look at your screenshot again, it looks like you already have that toggled off though.

I think macsen rufus is closer to the root of the problem. You might have a corrupted game file.

[macsen rufus]

I think it might be time to either re-install, or at least start a brand-new campaign and see if the problem re-appears

[mark-2008]

It does it with every new campaign I start. Might reinstall it.

[mark-2008]

Hi, sorry for the double post, I don't know how to edit my last one.

Just saying I uninstalled the game. Later, I put Disc 1 back in and the little window popped up. Play MTW was shaded out (as I expected), so I clicked Install MTW and then allowed access, but then nothing happened. I can't get the game installed now!

Any help please?

[drone]

A couple of questions about your problem. Did you reboot your machine after uninstalling? And what edition of MTW do you have (original, Eras, etc.)?

[caravel]

Go to start -> run and enter "cmd".

In the terminal do the following:

net start dcomlaunch

net start msiserver

Then try to install again.

[Ravencroft]

Go to start -> run and enter "cmd".

In the terminal do the following:

net start dcomlaunch

net start msiserver

Then try to install again.

Fog of War in games is used to limit your map knowledge to only areas that you have units viewing. Toggling it off will reveal enemy units, ships, etc that you would normally not see without spies. While in the campaign map, if you type ".matteosartori.", the whole map will be revealed. Now that I look at your screenshot again, it looks like you already have that toggled off though.

apparently, there's a glitch that sometimes hides your ships if .matteosartori. is activated. try turing it off (or turn fog of war back on).

[Ironside]

Hello again everyone, thanks for all your replies, they've been very helpful.

I managed to find out that - whilst the port in Venice does not indicate any trade income - I can click on the expenses and income list and it says I'm getting 200-300 florins from Venetian trade. So it turns out that I do have quite a widespread and wealthy trade network after all.

While I can't really help with the curent problem, the port shows import (aka others trading with you) and the merchant shows export (your trade).

[mark-2008]

Okay, thanks for the help everyone. I reinstalled but it still happens so I might try without .matteosartori. although I'll miss knowing everything about everyone.