How do I play Hotseat online?

[Pivra]

what are all the necessary programs I need and where do I download them?


rep for the first 3 responses

[Vince Noir]

Ok, it seems simple to log in, but for some it can be a nightmare to get working. First of, Google "Download Medieval Total War II Hotseat".

2. Run the installation. Easy, you might think but this is where many people go wrong at a certain hurdle- the insert CD-Key section. When it asks for this, you must make sure that you enter the code found at the bottom of the back of the manual you get with M2TW exactly. That means typing letters in capitals, and putting in '0' not 'o', or 'O'. DO NOT USE CAPS LOCK FOR THIS. Oh, and installing GamespyArcade is a waste of time- the game works perfectly well online without it.
3. Pop on over to GamesspyID.com and register an account. You will use the 'Preferred Nickname', Password and e-mail address to log into online play in M2TW, so if anything else don't forget these 3 things.
4. Make sure your internet's working. Yeah, we know, but anything can happen. Also, if you've an overbearing firewall, you may wish to disable it. Gamespy doesn't have any viruses or spyware, so you'll be OK.
5. From the Main Menu, hit 'Multiplayer', then at the right there is the option for 'Online play'. Enter the nickname, pass and e-mail (And, if you don't want to ever again, hit the 'Remember me' button). Finally, hit the 'Online play' bar at the top- yes, the one with the knotwork decoration. If your computer doesn't freeze up due to connecting up, or if your favourate gerbil doesn't nip one of the wires, you'll be online!
6. Still not working? It's entirely possible that you put the CD key in wrong when you installed so do not despair.
   Go to Start, then to the little 'Run' function at the side. In the little box type 'regedit', and you'll find the Registry Editor pops up. Open 'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE', then down to 'SOFTWARE'. Find SEGA, then the M2TW files (Vanilla). Click on the name, not the little + sign. The file you need is called 'CDKey'. Open, then correct your Key. Then try playing again

Hope this helps.

[Pivra]

if i want to send the .sav file to my friends on MSN and stuff what program do I need?

[spanish_emperor]

i think you mean hotseat not mulitplayer online? right. Well as the name hotseat suggests it is not played online. To play hotseat with other players you do not need any programs other than Stainless Steel and WinZip for uploading your saves.
The above comment by Norman_Knight is for multiplayer battles. hotseat is multiplayer campaign game. In hotseat all you have to do is go to SS, then press multiplayer, then press hotseat. You will come to a part where it will look exaclty like single player campaign mode (normally in early era. To play Late era you have to change some files). You will notice that when yoy press multiple faction sybols they light up. The ones lit up are those which will be played by humans (beware, if you press to many symbols too fast it will CTD). Then you can decide to play with passwords. Unless you truely trust the other players to not look at your game after they press "end turn" then i would highly reccomend to put passwords or they will be able to see your empire and where all your armies, agents, etc.
Once you have your turn you save and then upload it to a thread or you can choose to email it to the next player. Hotseats are for those who are tired of playing against the predictable Campaign AI and want to test their skills against human brains. You feel like you have accomplished much more by defeating someone who can think than something that can't.

Understand? if so, good now read the negative things about hotseats.

The problem with hotseat is that since M2TW is a turn based game by which the each player has their turn separately means that:

1. Battles can't be played vs humans because when your having your turn the other players aren't having theirs since they are waiting for you to press "end turn". This means that when a human player attacks with an army another human player army then the AI (artificial intelligence) takes over. So you play vs the computer or AI.
This can cause problems because many players argue that they could have won if they had been in command of their army when you attacked. Some therefore prefer all battles to be done in autoresolve. But then the question arises, how accurate is auto resolve. Considering that sometimes autoresolving battles don't count the arrows from your horse archer army then you would probably loose (if your army is with horse archers that is). Others argue that what is the point of playing if your not going to have battles to play. So in the end most agree that battles should be allowed and it just determines who will attack first so as to get the advantage of participating in the battle while the other player is hoping that 1. you didn't attack him or 2. the AI can make a good job and win (which nearly never happens). Another major flaw is that you will never be able to defend yourself, even against rebels, because when it is the rebels turn somebody else is having your turn (unless your the last player to have his turn before the rebels). So you might be besieging a rebel settlement but next time it is your turn that army is gone....probably because the rebels sallied out and beat your amry which was automatically autoresolved.

Still with me?...

2. Everybody must have the same version otherwise the save becomes corrupt and unable to play when the other player reaches his turn. For example: if it is a SS6.0 hotseat then everyone playing would need SS6.0 installed. If someone played the save with SS6.1 then he would be able to have his turn but the next player would not. The same is with sub-mods. If someone had for example: Xeryx's BAI but another didn't have any sub-mods or had Lusteds BAI then the player wouldn't be able to play afterwards.

3. Another problem with hotseats is that you need to upload the save to the site or email it. This is a problem because many players live in different parts of the world and therefore when it is daylight over here it is night time over there so you can't expect you to do your turn and immedieatly after somebody else to do theirs. They have to wake up first and then play their turn. And with so many having other commitments such as work/school, sports, friends, family, etc the person after you might not get their turn done till 2-3 days after you have uploaded. in the end you might not get to do your second turn after a week. So it might take a year or more to finish the game. Normally there is a limit to how long a player can take before his turn will be passed or subed by someone else. This is ussually 48 hours.

So there you go, the problems of multiplayer hotseats. if it were Online then yeah it would be much easier but unfourtunately CA didn't make it so nor does it seem Empires Total War will have online multiplayer campaigns.
But even with these problems i still play hotseats because you really have to think to win and beats the predictable AI. No matter how good the AI becomes you will always be able to defeat it because you will be able to adapt, change your strategies and find the weak spots of the AI while it is much harder to do this against humans because they can do it as well.


To be able to defend against rebels: Ok this is a very simple procedure but not used by most hotseats because it requires taking off the passwords and scrolls. So i use it, but only when i play against my brother who i trust. Go to Medieval 2 total War folder/ prefereneces .cga ? and open it with notepad. Then change scrolls and passwords for = 1 to = 0. Save and done.

Any questions just ask