Stainless Steel Standards 6.3 is a resource listing to aid both SS players and Resource developers. Please take the time to thank those folks that have worked really hard to bring you these player aids.....
WELCOME TO STAINLESS STEEL: GENERAL INFORMATION GUIDE: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=357303
1. Stainless Steel 6.3 Released! {Gracul}: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=377824
2. Stainless Steel 6.3 Signatures (Requests Here) Y2Day: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=378128
3. Meneth's Great Stainless Steel 6.3 Compendium {player aids & guide} http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=378648
4. Release [Faster Turn times 2.0] {History Dude}http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=377983
5. SS6.3: Which factions are you playing? How's that going? What's missing from you're campaign? http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=378825
6. Stainless Steel 6.3 Impressions {Black_Rider}: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=378207
7. Save strategies: How often, how much, & why: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=323326
8. Which 6.3 AI are you using {John Glave}: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=377974
9. The Worship of Kong {Praise thread for SS}{illuminati2025} http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=149248
10. Byzantine or Roman Empire? {FairPrince}: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=378809
11. Ireland? What happened to them? {Brother Duncan} http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=378121
12. Do you prefer Late or Early campaign and why? { Beowulf1990} http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=378868
13. Kingdom of Georgia Project - {Y2Day} http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=379042
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I. Reference slow turn times:
+ Release [Faster Turn times 2.0] {History Dude}http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=377983
- Farewell to Stainless Steel? {caralampio} http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=342935
+ Meneth's Great Stainless Steel 6.3 Compendium {player aids & guide} http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=378648
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Compaign AI & Faction Guide: I just got the game up and running so 1st up to bat are my beloved Moors. Since it looks like SS6.3 is a new game SSS is going to start from scracth to. My oppologies for not finishing all 31 Factions in SS6.2, we'll double our efforts here in SS6.3.
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New Things for SS6.3:
1. Real Recruitment is now basically mandatory because without it some of the units cannot be built. It's a bug and they are working on a fix for it. RR adds strategic planning to the mix as unit replacement now becomes a major issue. For those that did'nt care for Mercenaries very much before, now suddenly they are commanding newfound respect...
2. On turn 12 the AI factions receive two additional buff merchants {level 4} so be prepared and don't get caught with your bloomers down.
3. The Byzantines will have Bari in hand by about turn 8 so be aware if playing an Italian faction, especially the Sicilians.
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Building Upgrade Charts:
VIII. Settlement upgrade sizes: thanks to bane_tw for reading the scripts....
upgrade to town 1000
upgrade to large_town 3000
upgrade to city 9000
upgrade to large_city 17000
upgrade to huge_city 34000
upgrade to wooden_castle 1000
upgrade to castle 3000
upgrade to fortress 8500
upgrade to citadel 17000
<!-- city -->
<level name="village" base="500" upgrade="1000" min="500" max="1500"/>
<level name="town" base="1000" upgrade="3000" min="500" max="5000"/>
<level name="large_town" base="3000" upgrade="9000" min="500" max="12000"/>
<level name="city" base="9000" upgrade="17000" min="500" max="25000"/>
<level name="large_city" base="17000" upgrade="34000" min="500" max="60000"/>
<level name="huge_city" base="34000" min="500" max="500000"/>
<!-- castle -->
<level name="moot_and_bailey" base="500" upgrade="1000" min="500" max="1500"/>
<level name="wooden_castle" base="1000" upgrade="3000" min="500" max="5000"/>
<level name="castle" base="3000" upgrade="8500" min="500" max="10000"/>
<level name="fortress" base="8500" upgrade="17000" min="500" max="21000"/>
<level name="citadel" base="17000" min="500" max="30000"/>
</population_levels>
taken from descr_settlement_mechanics.xml of my RR/RC version. Base values are the necessary upgrade values.
Chain of River ports: thanks to PerXX for reading the scripts & his presentation...
Originally Posted by
PerXX
Well, it needs to be atleast a Minor City (first stone walls) and the region needs to have the hidden resource River, in order for the building to be buildable.
Let me look up which regions have this resource..
Edit: The following regions have the hidden resource River:
Bulgar
Magdeburg
Krakow
Wroclaw
Kiev
Frankfurt
Metz
Prague
Nuremburg
Paris
Esztergom
Angers
Vienna
Tbilisi
Targoviste
Zagreb
Sofia
Baghdad
Cairo
Lyon
Belgrade
Salzburg
Plock
Sophia
Cologne
Yaroslavl
Kazan
Note, this is the Early Campaign. It might be different in other campaings, though I doubt it. The rivers are still there
Merchants - Minimal extra effort on your part can net you between say $4,000 to $10,000+ per turn just from your merchants. If that dozen’t sound worthwhile to you go ahead and skip this section……
Kay since your still here let’s get started….
1. Become a reload prince - Leveling up your merchants is going to require winning acquisition battles. If your gonna be a purist and not reload, getting your merchants leveled up is going to be rough.
2. Select your merchant center and only recruit merchants from there. This will ensure you get the Merchant guild and that you get the Merchant guild Headquarters. {gives you more merchants and makes your merchant highly skilled. Plus more trade stuffs for that settlement.}
3. Check the board and see where the money’s at. Each faction has a different set of favorite resources.
4. Build the Market place line of building in your “Merchant center” for better quality merchants.
Here's a quality guide to MTWII Merchants: "The glory of Merchants" by Landtuber Merchant Guide
Resources: Each faction has a decided preference for certain types of trading goods. Below is a basics list of some of the trade goods
and their locations…
Gold: Marrakesh, al Aqaba, Urgench, Yelabuga, & Belgrade
Silk: Constantinople, Nicea, Ankara, Iconium, Adana, Trebizond, Damascus, Alexandria, Bagdad, Luxor, & Aleppo.
Amber: Arhus, Oslo, Skara, Kalmar, Novgorod, Riga, Vinus, Mensk, Plock, & Krakow.
Spices: Medina, Jerusalem, Aleppo, Bagdad, Basra, Al-mu Miniya, Medina, & Damascus.
Glass: Frankfurt, Venice, & Damascus.
Ivory: Konjikala & Belebu el Anab
Marble: Bologna, Genoa, Rome, Corinth, arta, Pamplona, Lisbon, & Nicosia.
Slaves: Kerak, Benghazi, Tripoli, Kermanshah, Sarkel, & Caffa.
Silver: Vienna, Calgiari, Melilla, Hamburg, Bergen, Galway, Visby, Brason.
Salt: Leon, Rennes, York, Burges, Hamburg, Krakow, & Belgrade.
Sugar: Alexandria, Cordoba, Palermo, Adrianople, Ankara, & Antioch.
Merchant’s Bazaar: here’s a list of basic favorites for different factions’ Merchants.
Byzantium: Gold, Glass,
Denmark/Norway: Marble
Egypt: Salt, amber, silver, iron, ivory, fish. {gold, glass, & spices, but not when you move the capital to Jeruselam}.
England: Silver, gold, glass, amber
HRE: sugar, cloth,
Italians: Genoa, Sicily, Venice: Gold, Silk, & Amber,,
K-Shah: Gold, glass, marble, ivory, spice
Moors: Glass, Gold, amber, ivory, textiles.
Turks: gold, ivory, salt, amber, glass, & {fish and slaves. Not so much.}
Dread and Chivalry : No need to choose, use both. Some basic things to remember though. Chivalry is a City/Castle builder. {Governors with big-time chivalry}. Chivalry Maximizes & expedites settlement growth. Big cities equal big money to pay for all those Game-winner units you love to use . The quicker your settlements grow, the quicker your up and running…top. Once you’ve got the money….”burn the world” with Dread-Lords.
Building chivalry -
1. Once you have a town hall, and have maxed out taxes, drop them to minimum for four or five turns and your chiv. will grow. Taxes to back normal, then rinse and repeat. WARNING!!: don't keep taxes low with a Governor too long or you will get bad tax traits..
2. Release prisoners after battles. Playing as the Egyptians, I released the remnants of Four Crusader Armies and my chivalry went from 2 to 6 chivalry. Release!!! Release!!!!
3. Grow rates are what’s important. If the Governor is stealing left and right but giving you 3.5% - 6% growth rate who cares let him rob you blind.
building dread -
1. execute ALL Prisoners.
2. Build assassins and max their levels out.
3. Exterminate settlements.super fun watching the billowing smoke but.....your also killing your infrastructure so pick and choose where you do this.
Guilds :
DarkKnight's Guide to MTWII Guild's: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=77577 there's a treasure trove of info here..
St. John’s Minor House - {Hospitiler’ Military order} A must have for your 1st walled city. It carries a free upkeep slot and a 5% health bonus. {Hqs carries a 10% bonus.} It offers hvy cav and dis-mounted knights. These are the best quality troops you will be able to produce for some time. As a plus their cheap as dirt price wise compared to some other units. This guild triggered by joining a crusade I believe. This guild is a game winner folks. I highly recommend them in spades for the beginning/novice player.
Theology -
Catholic factions - pick one city as your Pope-Maker. Edinburgh, Paris, & Leon are great Places for this. Build that Max Cathedral and the Papacy is your oyster. Try not to make it a coast city cuz use miss out on building merchant and explorer guilds.
British isles - Edinburgh
France - Paris
Spain - Leon -Zaragoza
Poland - Krakow
Italy - Milan
Muslims factions - Builds Imams quicker, {for calling Jihads} and eases the religious taker over.
What city do you guys base your theologians guild headquarters? {a thread by Glade} http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=357047
Explorer’s Guild - Pick a coastal city and have this be your Navy builder. Greater ship range. Generals also pick up a +15% movement trait from a prolonged stay here.
Spy guilds - watch for these in AI cities. You really don’t need to build these unless you’re a Spy-master. Then build it in one city and let the Merchants have the rest.
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Unit Specialty Archive
1. Desert Cavalry/ Bretene Mercenary javlin Cavalry: {General/Knight killer} Warning, get your general anywhere these guys and it's instant death. Get behind armoured cavalry with these noble horsemen and enjoy the show. They drop like cordwood out of the back of a pick up truck. {drop like flys on bug spray}. Example: When Oporto fell three units of desert cav decimated the Portugeese Kings 40 man royal gaurd plus a unit of Jinetes and left none standing. This accomplished all at range without mellee.
2. Luthuanian Cavalry: It's the basic horse archer for the Lithuanian faction. They have long range and come with an arrow attack of 2, nothing to write home about on the surface. These to can be general killers. I had a Kievan Rus bodygaurd, give chase and the Lithuanian Cavalry took the Rus unit from 24 down to ten from the front while being pursued. At 10 another unit of Luthuanian cavalry cut that in half from behind and at five the Bodygaurd committed suicide on my spearline. All in all a very useful unit and with resonable hire and maintenance costs.
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Faction Guides, Megafied Strategum
The Moors
Initial Outlook: Well we picked up heavy spear & heavy archers, but we gave up a good city born spear from SS6.2. Looking at the board, here's what I decided to do. Portugal has a half stack and will be seiging Lisbon. Pull everybody west, take out Portugal then hunker down and wait for the fur to start flying. Marrekesh's mine's worth $900 per turn. Yep yep, that'll work...
On turn 5 Lisbon fell with the heir to the crown inside. Oporto is Portugal's last stand. With three units and limited recruitment power, this honored nation shall be snuffed out like a itred flame within the next three turns. Note that SS6.3's recrutment time have been increased, so please take caution with your recrutment plans. Finance wise The Moors are paying the streets with gold from the mines in Marrekesh. Libons mine yeild almost $500 per turn so the land of cordova is the envy of all,
A theologin Guild was constructed in Cordova to ensure that the spread of Islam shall wash across the world like a Sunami... On turn 7 the Gates of Oporto were stormed and it's Noble people assimilated into the embrace of Islam. The Caliph is considering a Jihad on Toledo, before the islamic brothers of the East call all Islam to their cause.
The French
Initial Outlook: We moved quickly to establish intimate ties with thr Germans. Unfortunately they spurned French gold and would only grant an alliance by our surrendering a princess of the Royal Court. We also extended alliances overtures to the Papacy but no matter what the cost they simply refused to speak of it. because of this we could not call a Crusade right away, Building French chivalry and building programs that would be unrivaled in the world.
In short order Rennes, Metz, and Dijon came under French dominion. The independent province of Toulose will require a major invansion to subdue, so the Crown cast it's eyes on the castle of Pomploma. The Aragonesse refused to reconigze French dominion so as of turn 8 we are at war...
Polowanie na wilka
Lithuania
Initial outlook: Take your initial two groups, one take Hrodna and the other Mensk. Your bleeding finances from the start so don't dilly dally taking taking these settlements. From there go on to Palanga and then Thorn. If you hurry you can beat the Poles to Thorn. Thorn can be upgraded to a castle as soon as it taken.
Palanga offers Prussian Axemen and Auxilla {mounted javlins} as enticement and Thorn eastern spearmen and woodsmen. Conflict with the dreaded Poles is always inevitable so the sooner the better. For the castles if you build the Perkunas Temple it gives you immediate access to Latvian crossbowmen. In cities I decided to forgo the health bonus and embraced the larger hapiness and order bonus given by the Dievas Temple. At this point it's about turn 10.
RollingWave was nice enough to add his knoweledge to the mix. Please thank him if you get a chance ...
RollingWave
Originally Posted by
RollingWave 
I disagree a bit with your Lithuania guide too, for me, although Thorn is important, Reval and Riga is also very very important, since they're by far the most reasonablly wealthy settlements you can get to early on.
For me, the key is to have one army go to Thorn first, and box out the Poles there before heading backwards to take Palanga, and the other army go strait up for Riga and Reval, giving you some actual source of income.
even on very high setting, it is possible to just marry your heir right off the bat to a Russian princess, that way you can insure peace with them for a whlie. which is crucial.
Although Poland will inevitablly attack you, they should not be your primary target of attack, your primary target should be to take Scandanavia and control the entire baltic area, which will give you enough resource and a relatively safe position, going deep into Novogod or Poland is just asking for even more enemies.
You have horse archers , which makes you the bane of the Norseman really. as their melee infantry heavy roster is basically utterly useless against your horse archer
.
Originally Posted by
RollingWave
Lithuania's basic roster is VERY strong, it's probably one of the best actually, but it also doesn't get a whole lot better. so you have to exploit the roster early and know how to deal with better armies later on.
You have a horse archer that have long range missile and good stamina that also comes cheap and relatively numerous, which should give you a HUGE advantage . they won't do too much to heavy armour units, but since they an almost always assured unloading their whole ammo without being touched, who cares if they only hit a little harder than levy archers? (levy archers might actually hit harder if two full units just shoot it out
but the Lithu cav shoot much faster)
in both your city and castles you can build above average spearmans and a average axeman almost right off the bat, which is a HUGE advantage. your basically the only faction that doesn't have or need spear milita, since your version of the spear milita is already roughly on par with mercenaries spearmans(!)
Your cavalry roster is also pretty good, though probably won't use it for awhile, since whatever horse duty you need can basically be accomplished by Lithuanian cavalry and then some.
In the field, later in the game, you can virtually field entire cav armies , with mostly (high experienced) Lithuanian archers backed up by some nobles / noble sons. (I usually like noble sons, since their jav can take care of whatever heavy stuff your arrows aren't killing). in the right hand it's virtually unbeatable except in some extreme terrains.
to add insult to injury, you also have Ruthean archers very quickly, which is basically a 90% longbowman that can be built at any era. even have stakes. (best way to deal with the super Teutonic hoard is to exploit them stakes ....)
Just to point out the strength of their roster... Baltic spear basically have the same recruit limits as spear milita (aka no limite if you have any structure at all) , yet it is a 2/2 11 defense unit(!) where as the common spear milita is 1/2 8 defense ( and also smaller unit). yes Baltic spears cost more and upkeep more, but essentially it's roughly about as useful as a spearman sergent. yet can be built anywhere at a much faster rate.
meanwhile, Ruthenian archers do 1 less arrow damage (4 vs 5) , have a bit more defense, and cost 1/3 of Longbows, and can be built right off the bat and doesn't have to wait for any events. and can also lay imbal stake.
Originally Posted by
gord96
Lithuania in early era. I am scooping up rebel settlements with the Grand Duke's sons and things are going well. The only issue is the Duke is not allowed to train a diplomat until he has a settlement with 3000 people so right now Lithuania is the mute of eastern Europe.
Originally Posted by
bubbathegump
Started first camaign as Lithuania, H/H, Savage AI. Went pretty good from the start, was pretty into the cheaper buildings that allowed full construction. Quickly expanded to 5 settlments in the first 25 turns or so. BUT THEN attacked by Novgorod from the east, then poland from the south the turn after that, then Denmark a couple turns after that.. Despite my best efforts i lost three settlments and got pushed back to the capital where i have one powerful full stack just killing all the invading polish and novgorod armies. This comes at a price tho as i dont have the economy to support the army so going to into debt fast, but its that or i get destroyed. When i ended turn 51 denmark offered me to be vassalized seeing how there were 3 full stacks of novgorod and denmarks armies of at my capital, i want to accept but cant get passed the turn 51 ctd even with the "fix".
Things to consider: bubbathegump's experiance shows how all of us need to hit the ground running in any campaign to make sure that we have a viable economy. Yes there are factions that literally drown in gold florins from the word go {Moors} but Lithuania is not one of them.
gord96 points out that Lithuania initially does not have access to diplomacy for some time and the player needs to bear this in mind.
Warning: Take caution is embracing the darkside {Dread} from the get go. I'll cite my own campaign as example. Right now I'm at turn 32 and paying the price for Dread. Very untrustworthy Reputation and could'nt buy an alliance for a million florins. At war, attacked by HRE & Poland. I attacked Kiev on it's way to take Mensk from me.
So here's the mudhole of my own making. Nine provinces, 4 castles, 5 cities. Thorn anchoring the west. Revel the North. Mensk and now Zhytomyr to the east and Halych to the south. No economy or trade to support Total War.
Armies: Three field stacks and a fluff and buster stack sitting in Revel. A stack's in Thorn smashing everything HRE throw's at it. One stack just took Zhytomyr and the last is eviserating Kiven rus' attempts at taking Mensk. The two eastern armies goal is to take Kiev and force a long lasting peace before Novgorod {Kiev's ally} smashes the north at Revel with it's three stacks and no enemies.
Poland was the 1st userper and paid for it by losing 2.5 stacks and it's only castle. {Halych} HRE has lost 3 stacks, two emperors, and three generals in the marshes surrounding Thorn. The HRE Gernals and heavily use of mailed knights played havoc in my ranks. Kiev has lost 2.5 stacks and Zhytomr. Even with that they will not consider peace. Hungary and it's 2.5 stacks have only the Cumans as enemies and look hungrily at the castle at Halych.
Lithuanian's Unit rooster: From the word go it's deep and filled with quality but no cheap by any stretch of the imagination. Your base spear unit. Baltic Spearmen 3-13 {3-2-7, amoured} has better stats the the Italian spear militia and has 152 men but maintenance is 240 per turn. Lithuanian axemen 2-10 {3-4-3, armoured} brings 113 men but 150 per turn maintenance. The cavalry other than light horse archers are quality butbeyond prohibative price wise in the beginning. Long story short, it's a VERY deep rooster but needs a upper teir economy to shine.
Again to Lithuanian players... Beware how you play the dread card.
On turn 33 I feel like a mix between Alexander the Great and Napoleon but in a bad way. With two stacks within one turn of beseiging Kiev {with 1st walls and max upgrades}, It's like Alexander seeing Darius and being filled with bloodlust only to have to choose between bloodlust and saving one's army {Novgorod just invaded the northern provinces {no stacks defending}and is two turns from Vilinus {Capital}. Now if I take Kiev will I turn into Napoleon peering out over a burning Moscow, only to return to a shattered homeland having lost everything on a gamble.
Under construction, WIP
Stainless Steel Standards 6.3 Player Resource Listing & Campaign Guide
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