Maybe I am lust lame at this but..

[wargameplaya]

So I played two games with this Mod. England and Byzantine. I really like the mods features a lot but it seems like the Byzantine Empire is a lot harder using the Mod relative to the game and to other countries. Like the Byzantines, I am feeling like I am getting it from all sides. Again, it could be I am just being retarded and doing some simple things wrong---but the Byzantines seem to have public order problems and income problems a lot easier than others. The AI mod shows incomes were balanced but given the Byzantine empire kind of has crappy units especially later on, maybe they went a little overboard. While I am not an expert at this game by any means, the poor old Byzantines seemed to be getting it pretty rough. My army expense just to keep my civilians happy just grew into the 20s and 30s way too quickly. What are some things I can do to make the Byzantines more workable while I try this again?

• Build more cheap troops like militia for garrison purposes? Seems like public order is impacted just by # of units, not how good they are. And I think maintence is a percentage of original cost.
• Send priests out first to get religion north of 50% or so before converting. Then leave them in there as province is built up.
• Expand slower to give time for building upgrades to boost order and religion.
• Cheat!

It’s a little hard as I am not sure of the exact math of some of the public order and troop maintenance calculations with this mod. But that’s where I came out. Seems like the Catholics have it a lot easier, especially those in the north. Any other ideas for what I am doing wrong?

p.s. as a side note. It seems incomes in the east should be a bit higher relative to the west. It was the Mongols that came in and ravaged the incomes, prior to that the East was much more of a jewel.

[Armoured Hoplite]

The Byzantines are widely regarded as the hardest faction to play, so don't feel bad. Historically the empire was in decline and the game is meant to reflect this to some degree. Some tips that may help from my limited Byzantine experience:

-Make sure to have as many priests as possible, in other words always have your limit reached as religious unrest can be a problem. I keep my priests at home for awhile until things settle down.
-At higher levels aquaducts and public baths help with public health and squalor. Also, upgrade city walls as soon as you are able as the population will become restless as there is no room for new inhabitants to live. Research farms last if this is a problem because they add to population growth.
-Remember that governers can help calm a city, especially those with high piety and chivalry.
-I "manage all settlements", but I let the computer "manage taxes only", this way taxes will be lowered in unhappy settlements and raised in ones that have a pacified population.
-Early on I almost always convert castles to cities. Cities generate much more income. I can't remember the name of the settlement at the tip of the Balkans that the Byzantines start with, but this always gets converted to city as well as the island to the east near the holy land.
-As far as expansion, grab as many rebel settlements as fast as possible. Be aggressive, but don't step on anyone's toes while doing so.
-Make alliances with your neighbors as fast as possible. Send your diplomat to Hungary, Venice, etc. If they come to you and offer trade agreement, counter offer with alliance agreement. If you click on "alliance" and the offer becomes "generous", it is as good as done.
-Keep spies in your frontier settlements, these act as counter-spies. Having an enemy spy in your settlement can increase public unrest.
-Try to use as many militia/city based troops in your cities as possible, the citizens of a settlement do not like paying for castle based units to sit in their town.
-Do not let rebels go unchecked, they decrease income greatly.
-Build ports, they are excellent for increasing income.
-The Ikoner's studio buildings are great for taking care of unrest, but are expensive.
-Alos remember to build churches often, this is especially important for Orthodox factions that are generally surrounded by differing religions.

Good luck, hope this helps. Hopefully I am not forgetting too much. Remember, if you can become good with Byzantines, the other factions will seem that much easier.

[HaveFallen]

Well, Armoured Hoplite pretty much awnsered everything. Just make sure to take your princess for trade agreements everywhere. There's 2 Castles south of Constantinople that you can take on fast. Convert those to cities and that'll increase your income.The Byzantine Empire's area is great area because you can trade through the sea. If you don't do high rep games just blast through Turkey because even if you ally with them, they will eventually go against you.

[wargameplaya]

Thanks. You know, one thing I did wrong was I didn't sign trade agreements. I did this on the premise that I thought their merchants couldn't park in my land if I did that. I think that is partially true but even if so maybe the balance is--don't do a trade agreement until my merchants get some experience then open them up for income.

I'll try another game and try not to suck so bad.

[Quark]

wargameplaya

Send Merchants down to Antioch region, and one to the right (memory stat fails), lots of money to be made there.

I ally with Venice or Hungry and have trade with the other.
Grab Sofia
Grab castle on west of greece
Convert Corinth after its generated some troops for you
Convert Cantakle (spelling?)
Grab Adana (keep as castle)
Convert Cyprus

Trade with everyone, but put ships on the crossing points of the bosphurus, so merchants/spies/diplomats/armies cannot cross over.

Follow Armoured Hoplite's advice on buildings.

Prepare for war with the Turks.

Enjoy

[Daergar]

Does this work in 4.1 since it uses the vanilla AI? I tried a byz campaign and good Lord did everyone hate me. When the pope moved a full stack into my lands on top of the four other countries out for my blood I just quit. I could probably have won the campaign in the end but it was getting silly, fighting stack after stack with militia units.

And by the way, what file regulates the required population for city/castle upgrades? I wanted to lower the byz back to standard and see if I enjoyed it more but I couldn't find the values for the life of me.

[Quark]

Daergar
descr_settlement_mechanics.xml controls the levels for all cities, but there is no seperate one for Byzantium.

Did you ally with the pope and keep him sweet?

I admit I have not got far into my campaign, just done the above really, but I like Byzantium being a struggle, its what keeps it interesting to me for so long.

Its a matter of using spies to watch the enemy and then stike while their forces are away (works with Iconium)

Anyway best of luck.

PS the templars have never backstabbed, but watch out for Venice.

[Daergar]

Daergar
descr_settlement_mechanics.xml controls the levels for all cities, but there is no seperate one for Byzantium.

Did you ally with the pope and keep him sweet?

I admit I have not got far into my campaign, just done the above really, but I like Byzantium being a struggle, its what keeps it interesting to me for so long.

Its a matter of using spies to watch the enemy and then stike while their forces are away (works with Iconium)

Anyway best of luck.

PS the templars have never backstabbed, but watch out for Venice.

Weird, I could have sworn I had a city that upgraded at 3000 pop instead of 2000. Guess I'm simply stupid, sigh.

Anyway, no, I forgot that I could once more gift stuff to raise relations with factions.

[Mike13531]

O_O, i had no problem i expanded east and west at the same time, i just killed venice and killed 3 turkish sultans
here is some advice, don't go to war with Hungary, very pointless, because their land is garbage, not worth time taking. Just allie them, with UAI installed, it's not very likely they will backstab. Also militia for garrison purposes like you said. Important thing is , don't bother , i mean it, DON'T bother building anything that has to do with military in cities. Only castles, first step is to rapidly develop Corinth and Constantinople, Constantinople will give you a considerable amount money , while Corinth will be your military center. If you want it easy, get better relation with venice, papal, sicily and hungary , and focus on turks. As for unit's toughness, KK messed up on byzantium infantry , because it's no longer possible to recruit them, that's what made it hard. Use the horse archers and dismounted byzantine lancers and spearmen. If it comes to the worst, go edit your EDU file(descr_unit), look for stat_pri and the first number is the attack, edit that to amount you want. Well, don't consider that cheating, just balance it, like Kataphractoi will get 15 charge, and 8 attack, more or less match Conquistador, which is fair. Raise your byzantium spearmen stat_pri to 4 and so on.

extra minor stuff that will help your campaign
use merchants, if people are playing in VH/VH mode and don't use merchants, unless they cheat 80% chance they will lose. So use them! they are there for a reason, there are valuable resources that's close to you. One in the west in middle of a pack of mountains, it's gold. Also, one in Antioch - sugar. Your merchant is probably in low level at that time, which will give you about 300 florins each turn. When your starting an empire, even 100 can be very valuable.

good luck in your campaigns

[Nightbringer]

after reading this i have decided on byz for my 4.1 campaign, i'm looking forward to a challenge as i just dominated most of europe in 100 years with HRE.

[HaveFallen]

after reading this i have decided on byz for my 4.1 campaign, i'm looking forward to a challenge as i just dominated most of europe in 100 years with HRE.

Yay, you play it. You will play it, and like it!

Being as the byzantines is awesome though, because if you play a high rep game and don't want to attack, Venice and the Seljuk will surely attack you.

[wargameplaya]

So I figured out what the problem was. I was trying out a game without trade agreements --I was under the false assumption that if you didn't do trade deals it would keep foreign merchants out. anyway, as Byzantium-it was more than a challenge.
I could barely afford priests. It was sad.
It was kind of interesting though, I swear it felt like I was the Byzantine emperor watching my huge empire crumble and I couldn't figure out how to stop it.

But yeah if you want a challenge, just don't do trade agreements.

[Chola_Kingdom]

i went back to the ultimate ai diplomacy and the faction standing because Vanilla ai using the kk money script like insanes in 5 turns moors will get pound up by the sicily and the all three factions in iberia so i went back to the ultimate ai policy to avoid early wars

[Mike13531]

wargameplaya, trade agreements are fine, it will give you more money by the way. Also, foreigh merchants coming in doesn't really do any damage, they just get extra money, you won't lose any. Try my tactics and start a new campaign with medium or easy mode, and then move to VH gradually, k?