dread on a unit

[drone]

The unit commander starts out with an apparently random amount of dread, from what I've seen it's usually between 0-2 skulls. After that, dread is increased/decreased based on various vices and virtues that the commander can pick up. Not all dread-related VnVs are battle related (Fanatic, Alcoholic, Bad Temper, etc.).

Regarding VnVs stemming from prisoner executions, if I'm not mistaken those get applied only to the ranking general of the battle.

[Jxrc]

The unit commander starts out with an apparently random amount of dread, from what I've seen it's usually between 0-2 skulls. After that, dread is increased/decreased based on various vices and virtues that the commander can pick up. Not all dread-related VnVs are battle related (Fanatic, Alcoholic, Bad Temper, etc.).

Unless I am mistaken, the amount of dread depends on the dread of your faction leader. Just start a early campaign with the English (king with max dread) and you will see that most of your new generals a subtantially higher dread than usual.

The sames goes with command stars. For instance if you have a king with 4-5 stars all units that you create will appears with a few stars. Some low quality units, i.e. peasants and basic spearmen, are immune to that and always appear with a 0 star general. On the other hand, vanila urban militia can be affected. I guess that any unit that can appear with an historical general can appear with a few stars if your king is "worthy". With a good king, units with three stars general are a common occurrence (never seen four though).

I would say that the rules also applies to piety and dread but I have not really watched closely enough to be sure. For the few early hungarian campaigns that I've been trough, I would say that it works fine with piety.

For acumen, I think it works but I have a strong feeling that 4 quills is the max you can get.

To summarise, I would say that all stats for new general are influenced by those of your ruler but:

- piety and dread for all units are influenced;
- acumen for all units is influenced but capped at 4;
- command for all units other than peasants and spearmen (perhaps it applies to similar units such as nubian spearmen) is influenced but capped at 3.

[drone]

I've always heard that command stars was related to the king's influence, not command. Usually they will both be high or low, so it might be the one or the other. Makes sense for the other stats to track the king's.

In the unit_prod file, column 10 is "General Candidate?", with Preferred, OK, or Discouraged as the options. Most cavalry units are Preferred, missiles and peasants are Discouraged, and infantry a mix of all three depending on quality. I've got two guesses on this column, 1) that this affects the command rating of the unit leader combined with the Influence/Command of the king, or 2) this determines if the unit leader will be a Noble (Sir).

[Knight of the Rose]

Or it could be wether or not the unit leader will be the general of a battle where all units have a 0 command leader?

But yeah - only some units will support a 1-2 star commander when produced, and there is a random at that as well.

I've rarely seen high dread commanders that hadn't been "heroes", though. I'll guess I have to play the english next...

/KotR

[Jxrc]

I've always heard that command stars was related to the king's influence, not command.

It's true but only to some extent.

We discussed it quite extensively a few years ago (we discussed heirs but I would guess the same is applicable to some extent to other non-historic generals) and my recollection of that discussion is that influence has only an impact on the average roll you get when the stat of the new general is determined but that the basic value from which the result of the random roll is added is the command rating of your ruler. The result is of course further affected by V&V that the character/heir gets.

To give a few examples with respect of heirs:

- you have a king with six command stars. The result of the random roll can vary between -2 or +2 (IRRC) compared to your king's command rating. If that king has a high influence, you more of your heirs will have 7-8 stars. The opposite will happen if your influence is low and most of your heir will have between 4-5 stars before the V&V kick in.

- you have a king with 0 starts. The best you can hope is a two stars heir. Chances you'll get one depend on how high your influence is. If it is low, the odds are that all your heir will be as worthless as their father.

- your have an 8 stars king. Same principle apply but beware that for the game a result of ten, you will end up with a 0 star king. Thus getting what would be the best possible result for other kings give you the worst possible heir. Check the Byz in early, most of the heir have high command value but very often one of them has 0 star (great news when if affect the eldest son - unless you play as the byz yourself of course).

For standard generals, I would assume that the same applies (together with the cap I mentioned before) and that the odds that you get a three stars general out of the blue depends on high the influence of your highly skilled ruler is. I have played a few campaign when I had a great ruler with loads of stars and influence and any decent unit that I produced during their rules had two or three stars (it can even becomes a bit tedious when you want to reorganise units after a battle).

There is nothing scientific in the above since nobody has examined closely the inner working of the game on that point (which I believe is hardcoded) but it fits with all others and I have seen after playing the game for quite a while.

Hope it helps