Chivalry or Dread?

[tanker]

Sorry if its bad form to revive a 3 month old thread, but this one caught my attention. In my first game, out of the starting gate, I was trying to build a "chivalrous" general, but since he was my only decent cavalry early on, I had to throw him into the fight alot. So he kept getting +1 Chiv for releasing prisoners and +1 Dread for fighting in the battle. In the end, he stayed zero balance anything for a while, which I think is the worst of all. So I gave up on Chivarly, and just racked up Dread, which turned out to be a lot easier. He's a right dreadful bastard at this point. When I get a chance to turtle a little and build up decent cavalry arm, I'll have to try for a chiv general again. Seems to me its better if he doesn't get his boots too dirty to avoid the Battle Dread. I've got my faction heir travelling the realm building churchs and recruiting priests to boost his piety. As a nice side effect, that seems to pump up his chivalry as well, albeit slowly.

[Adelaide]

Thanks sharpshooter! I need to try have a better reputation next campaign I play. Right now my faction is very untrustworthy and many of my generals and even my king has lots of dread! He is called "The Tyrant" and I noticed getting more dread sometimes when I assassinate my enemies generals. :)

But I wanted to have an alliance with the Polish (I'm French) before and it was impossible because they didn't trust me. But right now I don't care so much because all the cardinals are french and soon (very soon!) only the Polish, Papal States and Russia are left in the old world to conquer!

[Zim]

If I recall the criteria for getting chivalry or dread for battle is pretty arbitrary, and once you get a point either direction you can only go further that direction for that particular trait.

Very frustrating if you pick up the "wrong" one.

Sorry if its bad form to revive a 3 month old thread, but this one caught my attention. In my first game, out of the starting gate, I was trying to build a "chivalrous" general, but since he was my only decent cavalry early on, I had to throw him into the fight alot. So he kept getting +1 Chiv for releasing prisoners and +1 Dread for fighting in the battle. In the end, he stayed zero balance anything for a while, which I think is the worst of all. So I gave up on Chivarly, and just racked up Dread, which turned out to be a lot easier. He's a right dreadful bastard at this point. When I get a chance to turtle a little and build up decent cavalry arm, I'll have to try for a chiv general again. Seems to me its better if he doesn't get his boots too dirty to avoid the Battle Dread. I've got my faction heir travelling the realm building churchs and recruiting priests to boost his piety. As a nice side effect, that seems to pump up his chivalry as well, albeit slowly.

[Bow-wow-wow]

Well I think chivalry is better for mantaining cities because of the public order benefits but Dread is better in battle, so it really depends what you want the general to do.

[tanker]

Yep. I'm also finding that Dread-producting acts also hurt my faction's reputation, so I try not to overdo it. One or two super-high Dread generals commanding the main armies and fighting the really big field battles seems enough - at least for how I play. I try to use the the Chiv generals to go take territory that I want to keep; they are better to "Occupy" anyway to keep the population up. And even if I don't want to keep the settlement, you can "occupy" it to boost Chiv and then sack the crap out it by selling off all the buildings, jacking the taxes up to very high, and leaving.

[Beggarman]

Also important are your troops. As Milan, I find that Chivalry and it's morale boosting is much more important than being dreaded: I need my Broken lances to stick around and fight, not run.

[edbenedict77]

right now i'm playing as scots in hd/hd mode and fighting generals with dread is better than chivalry. and governers with chiv are better than dread :)

[Barra]

I prefer chivilarly. But if I have general with high dread, I try to make him even more dreadful. I often have very chivilarious generals and king that has only two or three chiv, cos I make assasins and then he get those assasin traits.

[Russian bear]

Yep. I'm also finding that Dread-producting acts also hurt my faction's reputation, so I try not to overdo it. One or two super-high Dread generals commanding the main armies and fighting the really big field battles seems enough - at least for how I play. I try to use the the Chiv generals to go take territory that I want to keep; they are better to "Occupy" anyway to keep the population up. And even if I don't want to keep the settlement, you can "occupy" it to boost Chiv and then sack the crap out it by selling off all the buildings, jacking the taxes up to very high, and leaving.

You forgot, than selling/giving it away to a sworn enemy of your enemy. (preferably someone of another religion) Than the town will rebel and you take it back :D