[Traveller]

Lots of people have been experiencing crashes in the later part of the game - a mate at work is now having problems every time he exits a naval battle. The patches are being worked on now; there have already been a few updates, which should automatically update your game through Steam.

I've had about 3 or 4 now; they were mainly designed to fix the trade glitches and sound problems, the newer ones should sort out the crashes, as a lot of people are finding it gets unplayable after a certain date. (Many have completed it with no problems at all, though.)

Gentlemen are a good way of controlling research, but I rarely send them out anywhere. Rakes are just crap. Even after sabotaging/killing a few people, they don't gain in experience, and invariably end up getting caught and killed. Which I really don't care about, as they are so useless.

My assassins in medieval were essential though, blowing up buildings to cause riots, and then killing generals, family members, and Popes. And they could see everyone on the map - the agents in empire can walk right past an enemy army and not even notice it...

I am enjoying empire - but I keep thinking more and more about reinstalling Medieval and playing that instead.

This post has been edited by Traveller: 16 April 2009 - 09:20 AM

[cerveza_fiesta]

I was getting all crashy with Medieval 2 every time I'd get attacked in one of my own forts....which pissed me off since that's the best part.

Anyways, I deleted the buggy p1r4ted one I had and bought it on Steam in the hopes that whatever update fixes the crash would be applied to the steam release. That Steam service is really cool...plus I finally got an admin password on my work computer so I can install it on here too...muahahahaha

I do a lot of experimentation, which involves looooong periods of sitting on your ass waiting for data so it should be good for strategy gaming later this summer.

I have yet to use an assassin too. I've heard a lot off talk about them on here however so I think I'll give them a try when I restart the game (due to the reinstall).

What's the funnest faction in medieval 2? I started Britain and it was kinda boring and was looking for something a little more tenuous/intense. Spain any good? I was thinking of Venice too.

This post has been edited by cerveza_fiesta: 16 April 2009 - 04:56 PM

[Traveller]

I played as Venice, got quite far, too - initially you start off with enemies on all sides though.

Assassins are great, they gain traits making them better at sabotage/assassinations. If you make lots, you get a guild in you cities too.

[cerveza_fiesta]

FUCK YES. ASSASSINS GUILD

im drunk so I'm stoked on the above

seriously though, thats pretty dang cool.

word

[Traveller]

Hope it's BEER!

The assassins guilds appear in cities when you start producing quite a few assassins - after a while, if you have more than any other nation, you get an opportunity to buy the master guild. It costs a bit, but it's basically the assassins guild base, of which there is only one of in play at one time, unlike the normal guild.

I think you get cost reduction making agents, and they all start off with better experience.

Worth it so that when, just as the Pope is about to excommunicate you for taking other christian regions, you can take him out with a cross-bow during mass. (Good video to go with that one, too!)

Getting a Bishop from your own faction to become next pope just finishes it off nicely.

[Puppet Master]

archers, definately unless there arent many of them. if you have many archers you will be able to keep continuous fire. very effective
skirmishers, because you can send them in while the archers back them up
trebushe, you already have a skirmishers and archers, now you need somthing powerfl to back it all up
cavalry, so you can use hit and run tactics
spearmen, i alread have archers
sword, usually much faster
plate, more effective
longbow, faster

[Tapper]

Spain is cool, but you lack spearmen for a large part of the game, so you'll have to go for mercenaries with them. I really like them.

German Empire is a generic all-around faction, they only get their special units late in the game, but their position allows them to take out Denmark fast and build northwards. Sweden especially is a money maker and seldom threatened.

Myself, I like the middle eastern factions: Byzanthium, the Turks (early period, until you get Jannissaries) and to a somewhat lesser extent the Egyptians are all about mobility and have quite exotic unit rosters.

If you want to finish many factions fast just to unlock them, playing as Germany (poland, hungary, moscovy, denmark) can unlock quite a few. Venice (get into Yugoslavia asap, gold mines there!) allows you to take out Milan, Sicily, and Egypt easily, and might allow you to take out Portugal as well(although Spain is the better option for that one and the Muslim faction just beneath them in North Africa. Byzanthium works best against the Turks and Hungarians.

[Cause]

Cavalry in this game sucks! Even my god damned life guard cavalry just dont cut it. I have charged line infantry from the rear and had them destroyed and routed. They exists soley to chase routing infantry! Have ny of you had better results? Further when I experiment with the diamond formation I have found they lose all sense and wont move and get stuck most of the time.

Grenadiers. My love affair continues. Throwing grenades coolest ability.

Also why are light dragoons better than dragoons. AT least these units work though

[Impirion]

I have found that heavy cavalry really packs a punch in this game.... some of the lancers in particular are absolutely devastating when you charge a couple of units into the rear of a unit of line infantry or even the front sometimes. There was one battle where basically 2 units of indian lancers turned the battle for me. It was a siege battle, I was defending and they had battered down a section of my wall, the enemy was was streaming through until the 2 units of lancers charged in and routed 3 of their units just on pure impact of the charge.

On another occasion, in battle with the French, 3 units of heavy cavalry absolutely mangled the right flank of their line in two charges, reduced 2 units of line infantry down to about half strength.

They do take much heavier losses if you don't withdraw them immediately but as long as you use them as shock cavalry I find they are really useful.

[Traveller]

I really only use them for routing units, or on units that are about to rout. I like the realistic risk of using them - after an initial charge, they often get caught up, and get dramatically reduced in number.

Dragoons are supposedly soldiers that ride to the action, and fight on foot - not the same as the heavies.

[Tapper]

 Impirion, on Apr 20 2009, 11:30 AM, said:

I have found that heavy cavalry really packs a punch in this game.... some of the lancers in particular are absolutely devastating when you charge a couple of units into the rear of a unit of line infantry or even the front sometimes. There was one battle where basically 2 units of indian lancers turned the battle for me. It was a siege battle, I was defending and they had battered down a section of my wall, the enemy was was streaming through until the 2 units of lancers charged in and routed 3 of their units just on pure impact of the charge.

On another occasion, in battle with the French, 3 units of heavy cavalry absolutely mangled the right flank of their line in two charges, reduced 2 units of line infantry down to about half strength.

They do take much heavier losses if you don't withdraw them immediately but as long as you use them as shock cavalry I find they are really useful.

I agree on the lancers, 10 melee, 19 charge bonus is awesome.

[Impirion]

I think he meant dragoons compared to light dragoons. Light dragoons aren't better in every way.... I think they are more accurate in terms of fire and faster but melee wise they are weaker or something...

[cerveza_fiesta]

started a spain game last night.

That's certainly a tougher starting position than the brits have. I can see already I'm going to have to ally with the French and the portugese in order to wipe the moors off the face of the planet. Then the Portugese get it...big time.

I still suck ass at assaulting cities. Actually I mostly suck at taking forts.

I've figured out that 2 battering rams are a good way to go since the first is a writeoff.

Also, very hard to do without loads of infantry. Cavalry basically useless as far as I can tell. What's the best kind of siege thing to build...ladders or towers?

Towers seem to take forever to open their drawbridge once they reach the city walls, making them vulnerable to attack and such. Are ladders a quicker means of access to the walls?

[beru]

sige towers are slow moving and slow to open the drawbrige but once its open you can spit out an army in a matter of minutes on a low space but its vunerable to artillery fire (from tower or trebuche later mortars)

ladders are fast (you can run with ladders) but dont give arrow cover. once up you can get many soldiers on the walls but you dont get a brigehead as you do with sige towers (they wait to open the drawbrige until you got as many soldiers in thet top as posilble

[cerveza_fiesta]

oooooh...I understand. Just waiting for the little soldiers to all run up the stairs and mob at the top. I was trying to figure that out.

What are the best wall shock troops? Just regular light/heavy infantry or is there a trick to that too.

Seems when I get guys on the wall, even achers have no problem fighting them off since only 2 infantry guys can stand side by side on the wall. Everybody else just stands there and gets shot at.

better to advance on the obvious gate/wall sections or deploy siege equipment around to the sides?

I've already figured out that archers on the ground are next to useless against archers on city walls.

[Traveller]

I'd always spend a bit of time pounding down the gate and towers with trebuchets.

If I don't have a spy to open the gate, I take that out first - then the tops of the towers either side, and depending on ammo and number of trebuchets, any surrounding towers that are in range.

Then I knock a breach in the wall a short distance from the gate. Enemy troops tend to gather just on the opposite side, and are easy targets for catapults etc.. Two breaches are preferable. I then send in the soldiers, anyone who can defend well, all aimed at one breach. (For some reason whenever I try the main gate, the units stall or get stuck on the way in, getting doused in fire as well later in the game).

I wait until there's a big fight in the breach, put the soldiers on defend-area mode, and send my cavalry to the second breach, at a run. If done quickly, I can can get them through in order, and charge towards the first breaches defenders from the inside. This is all dependent on the enemy type and location, but I usually find that they flock to the ruckus in breach 1, so I can pile cavalry and reinforcements through breach 2.

IF their morale has been lowered by the trebuchet strikes, and the successive attack, then the charge is sometimes enough to break them. It doesn't tend to work if the enemy has a lot of heavy reinforcements inside; this first attack can be followed up with ladders and archers to get up on the walls though.

Cavalry tends to get massacred in a crowd crush though, so the initial charge has to be well timed. It can be used to lure enemy back-up units away from assisting in a big scrap, by standing still, and then legging it when they get too close. They can then be mopped up when the main bulk has been taken care of.

EDIT yes, archers against wall-protected archers are crap - that's why bringing down a wall packed with archers is so satisfying! They always run for the gate a bit too late!

This post has been edited by Traveller: 21 April 2009 - 12:14 PM

[Cause]

Okay Im having better experiences with cavalry so Ill withdraw my rant.

Also Just wanted to share. I own the world. Only greece remains since I need a trade partner else I lose too mcuh income and cant support my super army. Spain has one island I cant be bothered to go for at this time. Else the plain nation, the huron confederacy and one other indian nation is all that remain with one region each. Again cant be bothered to send an army to sack a city that is essentially a few shacks. Time to play a new fraction I think. The year is 1990

[beru]

how did WW2 go? did you win?


got a new pc and i will download (from steam the game is instaled there) when i get home from school

[Impirion]

1990? That's like nearly 600 turns!

[Cause]

Bastards. It was a mistake and you know it 1780