Dave's Ironman Ruleset

[Dave Scarface]

Hey all, I decided recently that I would play hotseats less and start to knuckle down to some good old single player again With this in mind I would like to share with you all how I play to make things even more difficult for myself. As a result of using some basic house rules my campaigns end up being even more challenging and fun.

Ironman ruleset for KGCM

-No making alliances, don't restrict the number of potential enemies in your campaign. Its much more fun to try and keep the peace with your neighbours if they are not allied.
-No using spies to open gates in a siege, you must use siege weapons only against the AI.
-Assassins can only be used to take out other agents, no killing enemy generals as they are very important to the AI on the battlefield.
-Absolutely no exploiting of the Crusades mechanic! if you are going to join up on one then make sure you proceed to the Crusade target.
-If you ally with the AI and gain military access you must never trick them and attack them in their homelands.
-No reloading saves unless you get a CTD.
-Start a new game on VH/VH with the console disabled so you never get tempted to use the cheat FOW_off. I can't stress what a difference it makes keeping the fog of war on. This probably the single most important rule on this list.
-Never try to cheat the garrison script, in other words if the AI has a small army within one tile of a settlement with a garrison script do not attack it! This would bypass the garrison script forcing a smaller field battle instead to take control of the settlement.
-No using of the pause button in battles unless you need to go AFK.
-No radar on the battlemap, do you seriously need a radar to beat the BAI why? Get used to playing without it.

Additional less important rules

-No selling all the buildings when one of your settlement is about to fall in a siege.
-When a battle ends you must not continue to rout the whole AI army but exit the battlefield.
-No using agents to spread the plague in your enemies cities.
-After conquering a city destroy all buildings that do not belong to your culture must be destroyed, rebuild them if you like
-Once you move your factions capital you cannot move it back to the previous city again.
-You must try to follow the council of nobles missions even if they conflict with your current plans.
-No adoptions must be accepted.
-You cannot call Crusades or Jihads on any of your enemies. But you must try to join any that our called!
-If you successfully capture a Crusade target you must try to hold onto it! selling them off not allowed.
-Never build the Swordsmiths Guild and upgrade your weapons.

Feel free to add anymore rules to this thread if you want

updated 14/06/09
Dave

[Soul Firez]

just a small one no adoptions only blood family and mariages from within your country you wont be throwing your generals into as many dangerous situations then

[Henry of Grosmont]

-No making alliances, don't restrict the number of potential enemies in your campaign. Its much more fun to try and keep the peace with your neighbours if they are not allied.

I'm making historical alliances, like England-Portugal.
And with Pope, to keep him from threatenning you with excommunication, while improving his relations with your enemies, even if they defy him and attack you art will. But I always sease hostilities at his request.

-No using spies to open gates in a siege, you must use siege weapons only against the AI.

Agree. Mostly, I starve them out, because I have superiour troops. But if I need to move fast and see that they have a chance against me, then it's a direct assault.

-Assassins can only be used to take out other agents, no killing enemy generals as they are very important to the AI on the battlefield.

Agree. I do killed lots of enemy agents though...

-Absolutely no exploiting of the Crusades mechanic! if you are going to join up on one then make sure you proceed to the Crusade target.

Ok, I'm a virgin about this one. How can you exploit Crusades mechanics?
If I do join Crusade, I am sincere.

-No reloading saves unless you get a CTD.

Agreed.

-Start a new game on VH/VH with the console disabled so you never get tempted to use the cheat FOW_off. I can't stress what a difference it makes keeping the fog of war on. This probably the single most important rule on this list.

Very true. I used to use fow_off only to find out the whereabouts of foreing princesses (gave up on that) and while writing the guides, of course - to compare the effect and results. But never had it constantly off.

-No selling all the buildings when one of your settlement is about to fall in a siege.

I never thought of that

-When a battle ends you must not continue to rout the whole AI army but exit the battlefield.

Here, I again follow the Medieval history. Chase the bastards down.

-No using agents to spread the plague in your enemies cities.

Same here.

-After conquering a city destroy all buildings that do not belong to your culture must be destroyed, rebuild them if you like

Like Caravan trading posts? Well, I don't mind them.

-Once you move your factions capital you cannot move it back to the previous city again.

I never move my faction's capital. I'd rather deal with the "distance to a capital" consequences.

-You must try to follow the council of nobles missions even if they conflict with your current plans.

I'm trying, but sometimes they are just absolutely silly.

One of my most important rules is no adoptions.

[Bellingham]

For an extra twist of difficulty, although an admittedly unhistoric one, try a defiant game whereby you never sign peace treaties or trade rights.

Or even more brutally, taken from my Civ3 days, play an AW game (all war). Meaning you declare war on everyone you meet, the first time you meet them. Attack them however best you can to accomplish the declaration.

[Dave Scarface]

Added the no adoptions rule to post one thanks

Ok, I'm a virgin about this one. How can you exploit Crusades mechanics?

You might not believe this but we actually had someone cheat using a Crusade in a hotseat campaign. What they did was break the alliance with their ally, then join the Crusade against them at Toulouse. Build a cheap army of crusader units, send them to Frankfurt within one turn and besiege and capture it. Defeat the garrison script spawned their, then make peace with their ally and gift them Frankfurt, say no more.. I have actually heard of people exploiting Jihads the same way before too. What they do is call a Jihad somewhere, build lots of stacks with free upkeep. Then totally wipe out the AI, sad isn't it?

Like Caravan trading posts? Well, I don't mind them.

What I mean is say I am playing as Antioch and I captured Mosul I would destroy all the middle eastern building their like barracks. I think thats how it should work anyway but I don't know how to mod it. You should not be able to use buildings of another culture imo.

I never move my faction's capital. I'd rather deal with the "distance to a capital" consequences.

Believe it or not playing Norway I just moved my capital from Oslo to Adger and I got a slight boost to my income. The point is sometimes it works, sometimes it does not. If the change doesn't pay off then you should not be able to switch it back and forth. The way I play once I've moved capital thats it, you have to live with it.

Dave

[Henry of Grosmont]

You might not believe this but we actually had someone cheat using a Crusade in a hotseat campaign. What they did was break the alliance with their ally, then join the Crusade against them at Toulouse. Build a cheap army of crusader units, send them to Frankfurt within one turn and besiege and capture it. Defeat the garrison script spawned their, then make peace with their ally and gift them Frankfurt, say no more.. I have actually heard of people exploiting Jihads the same way before too. What they do is call a Jihad somewhere, build lots of stacks with free upkeep. Then totally wipe out the AI, sad isn't it?
Dave

Wow, just wow.

@Everyone else.
This never meant to be an historically correct mod. Or historically correct thread for that matter. It's to make the gameplay more interesting and challenging.

[Dave Scarface]

Agreed, everyone knows what the crusaders did in the 4th Crusade was utterly disgraceful. Christians massacred christians and sacked one of the greatest cities in the world. The Doge tricked the crusaders into sacking Constantinople with many of them believing they were going to die for Cross and not the Doge! Thats not what we are debating here though, this is about trying to keep to some rules and in some cases playing the game how it was meant to be played.

Dave

[Emporor Antonius Anubi Sextus]

another exploit fir crusades is too siege the city then when your about too take it take all ur stacks with generals and join the crusade then take the city. All ur guys get the xp.

[SanTzu]

dave, are you saying that in the history of our world, no crusade was "miss-used"?

these kind of things should be allowed but the price shuld be high.
i noticed the AI doesnt care much for reputation - thats the key word here i think.

[Dave Scarface]

Guys please remember that these are just my own ironman rules which I may update. Don't get upset if something is there on the list which you do. This is not to debate whats the right and wrong way to play. All I want to do is compile a good list of how to make playing the campaign harder and stick to these rules in single player. If any of you want to try playing along with these rules or with something similar, we can have a discussion on the challenge of playing KGCM with ironman rules in this thread.

Dave

[FortressofRain]

-Once you move your factions capital you cannot move it back to the previous city again.

Or an alternative rule is to only move your capital once per each king. In other words IC if your king moves the capital he'd likely not move it again as IRL you can't directly measure things is raw units of data. I'd say wait until your king dies and a new king is crowned, then and only then can you move your capitol back or somewhere else.

-No making alliances, don't restrict the number of potential enemies in your campaign. Its much more fun to try and keep the peace with your neighbours if they are not allied.

Unless they are historically accurate and won't affect the game too much. I like making an alliance with a small nation to justify coming in to save them if another ai is about to wipe that ai out. More like a protectorate. But limit this to increase potential enemies.

-No using spies to open gates in a siege, you must use siege weapons only against the AI.

Don't do this that much to consider this rule.

-Assassins can only be used to take out other agents, no killing enemy generals as they are very important to the AI on the battlefield.

Sometime I like to try to kill my rival king, or make them go insane trying, its just so much fun.

-Absolutely no exploiting of the Crusades mechanic! if you are going to join up on one then make sure you proceed to the Crusade target.

Blatantly cheating.

-No reloading saves unless you get a CTD.

-Start a new game on VH/VH with the console disabled so you never get tempted to use the cheat FOW_off. I can't stress what a difference it makes keeping the
fog of war on. This probably the single most important rule on this list.

Again. Blatant cheating.

-No selling all the buildings when one of your settlement is about to fall in a siege.

Well, unless you play with the following rule. Then I say destroy them so the ai follows the same rule set and has to rebuild barracks too.

-After conquering a city destroy all buildings that do not belong to your culture must be destroyed, rebuild them if you like

See previous.

-When a battle ends you must not continue to rout the whole AI army but exit the battlefield.

Depends. Do you plan on releasing or executing. Really I evaluate these options at a tactical level. Not just run down every routing army. If you are playing a chivalrous ruling family then by all means, hunt them down, show your authority then send them home to their families.

-No using agents to spread the plague in your enemies cities.

Never done this. Seems too much of an effort really. Finding cities with the plagues, marching an agent all the way down there, only to sometimes find the plague isn't there any more...

-You must try to follow the council of nobles missions even if they conflict with your current plans.

If they make sense.

-No adoptions must be accepted.

Unless they are uber good and/or I have a princess to marry them right away. Instead of the princess offering to wed some dude, I'd adopt him then march my princess off to merry him.

[FortressofRain]

I'm just giving my feedback on my personal playing style. Each person will inevitably create their own rule set and it's good to share ideas that other people might feel inclined to adopt. Those are definitely challenging though.

[Dave Scarface]

I'm just giving my feedback on my personal playing style. Each person will inevitably create their own rule set and it's good to share ideas that other people might feel inclined to adopt. Those are definitely challenging though.

I was responding to San Tzu who thinks there is nothing wrong with using and abusing Crusades/Jihads. Again everybody can play how they like but I think if people didn't take advantage of the free upkeep in Crusade armies they would find the mod a lot more challenging. Thats my point, not how historical it is, I couldn't care less.

thanks,
Dave

[Dave Scarface]

Going slightly off topic now but I just thought I'd say I fully support CA's decision to release Empire Total War without cheats. Forcing everyone to play the campaign with the fog of war is a very good thing imo. I wish I could disable the cheats entirely for this mod too.

Dave

[Humakty]

The way I do play hugely depends on what faction i play. I never ever used any of the ingame cheats, like lifting fow, as I love to manage my spy network, but I often used the more classical stuff, like assassinating a general before an important battle, or bypassing the garrison script. As I don't have that much time to play at the moment, I play the harder factions on h/vh (ie : TO), which cuts off half of the battles. (And I still don't have time to finish my campaigns) But I could solve the pbm by playing only 1 campaign at a time, so I'm guilty of all those Sins, but I've been told The All Mighty Dave forgives all to the faithfull...

Apart from that, i sometimes decide to play as 'The Nobleman', which is tax at high level at most, no pillage, no massacre, no prisonner racket nor execution ( and no assassins at all). And, of course, always respect what was signed, even a trade agreement. The plus side being you'll end up with an excellent reputation...

[FortressofRain]

Well that's part of the fun and the replay value, you can play the same faction twice in a row with two very different styles and outcomes. Its fun to play noble, but it is also fun to play the dreaded northern vikings, sacking and killing everything in your path, or virtuous Muslim faction by killing as many Christians as possible by whatever means necessary.

[angmodurian]

I will add one for the moment

- No sacking of city & no pillage (this is actually concerning my moral principles as i do not like to take lives, just imagine you have to kill so many people just to get gold. However it does rake up the difficulty if you dont sack cities and they will be hard to maintain due to unrest.)

Haha, try crusade a faction and just enter the settlement you conquer. In the end, the population will still be unhappy even if you station a full garrison there or even move ur capital to that city! lol

[Humakty]

Oh, I must admit the danish campaign is especially fun, fighting huge empires with your small kingdom is really fun, more so given the unadequate danish recruitment capabilities. (seriously, their archers are only good when in a melee ! )

Sure that people who only play their own country/culture miss most of what makes this game so great !

[Dave Scarface]

@Soul Firez,

I've been using your no adoption rule in my Norway campaign and I think its really cool. Its made me play differently to how I usually play. And I've been a lot more protective of my royal family members as a result. For the first 30 turns I had only a faction leader and faction heir that was it for male family members! At the start of the campaign Prince Magnus Haakonsson fearing for his life fled Scotland and sailed back to the Capital in Norway.

Meanwhile King Haakon Haakonsson successfully captured Skara and Stockholm with his royal army. But then seeing the danes make small raids into his newly gained territories he returned to Oslo fearing capture. Its quite scary having only two family members because if disaster struck the campaign could be over. Anyway with the King growing so old and no sons maturing of age yet. I was forced to accept a man of the hour award for one of my captains. I still haven't accepted any adoptions though and I intend to stick by the royal line as closely as I can

Dave

[Soul Firez]

yeah i find it adds alot more realism to the game i mean a good general makes a huge difference in battle but when you only have 2 to 4 of them you use them sparingly it slows your expansion right down as you tip toe to keep your family alive and losing one in a big battle really hurts making a huge impact on your nation kinda makes you play these guys as you would fight yourself all of this gives the ai time to build up and throw the war at you making for a great defensive campaign IMO.

i am trying a irish game now and well its rated medium but with no generals its very hard to expand so it making for a tough game specially seeing the welsh have turned there attention to me and at round 32 i am still struggling to hold all of ireland and castle town . the scots are struggling with norway for some reason leaving me to fight off the english and the welsh which is tough as to risk a family memember in battle brings me closer to a loss due to royals being wiped out not to mention my economy is frail barely out of the red so the drop in income will cripple what meager attempts i have been making to break into mainland britain