How to reduce corruption?

[Sir Dudeski]

Hi,

I'm about 80 or so turns into the game playing as Gondor, and corruption is ruining my economy, bankrupting me each turn, making me use the money cheat to stay afloat. How can I reduce this? It seems to be much more of a problem in my smaller towns that don't have as big of armies, or that don't get attacked. I have to keep large armies since my cities are constantly under attack from Harad, which constantly throws armies at me. (ridiculous )

Can someone help me? This is really ruining the fun.

[Blackorc]

Replace your capital in the center of your kingdom. For gondor Dol Amroth is nice.
Use good generals and replace bad generals with traits as corruption,alcoholic or other trade who decrease your income.

[Muffer]

Build the government buildings as high as possible. Start with the one in the Capitol.

[Sir Dudeski]

Thank you. I will try this.

[HolyDevil]

even tho i did this, the corruption sometimes was 2-3 times higher than the income, and i can't spend my generals on settlements they are a lot more useful on the battlefield

so i reduced it from 1 to 0.5 i think or 0.45,(can't remember wich file it was in /data ) i stil see a lot of corruption but it's playable, in my HE campaing every turn i had max 500 florins to spend with barely 1 full stack (if it was full) and all my border settlements were with 3 units max, while OotMM comes with 2 full stacks every 5 turns or so....+ at that time i even left the script on, so i attacked moria, all happy, and i see another full stack...won the battle but with terrible losses that costed me like 10 turns to recover, it was ridiculous...

[stocker]

can you post a screenshot of your financial report thingy

[HolyDevil]

can you post a screenshot of your financial report thingy

if this was for me, i can't, since i reduced the corruption and what i was talking about the HE was ta the first 30 turns or so, now im at turn 100 i believe, and i easily make 12-18k per turn, but the building cost a lot more and i made a stack full of eldars elite, wich costs quite a lot, but i still only have max 5 stacks

[TheBromgrev]

I thought corruption was a % value based on your total income and distance from the capital. Therefore you can't have more corruption than your base income from farming, trade, mining, and taxes. Anyway, there are three ways to fight corruption without cheating or changing files.

1. Move you capital to the financial center of your nation, as opposed to the geographical center. Example: As the dwarves, I took over all of the northern mountain regions and the entire Misty Mountain chain. Erebor, Moria, and the Iron Hills regions are my big money makers. The financial center city that gave me the highest profit was Framsburg. Easiest way to find out is to open the financial tab as you move your capital around to see which city gives you the highest profit.
2. Build buildings that give a bonus to law, which also lowers corruption.
3. Move generals with traits that increase law, trade, tax, farming, and/or mining into your rich cities.

Hope that helps

[Grand Admiral Thrawn]

Just do what the others have told but if this still won't help you then you must be more drastic with the corruption.

1. Go to SEGA\Medieval II Total War\mods\Third_Age\data
2. Find descr_settlement_mechanics.xml and open it with notepad
3. Search for <factor name="SIF_CORRUPTION"> and change the value next to it from 1.0 to 0.5
4. You can also change <factor name="SOF_DISTANCE_TO_CAPITAL"> from 16 to 8 if you want
5. Save it and enjoy

[P|A|ntZ]

I'd be curious to see how much you are spending on army upkeep, as that adds up in a hurry if you have non-garrisoned troops roaming about. The secret (other than implementing the good tips above in this thread) is to not over-recruit where you don't need troops, I've found. Any troops that aren't free upkeep garrison should be doing something important, or not recruited at all. Also, if you're short on cash temporarily, you can trade map info for cash, and/or disband unnecessary units.

[HolyDevil]

I'd be curious to see how much you are spending on army upkeep, as that adds up in a hurry if you have non-garrisoned troops roaming about. The secret (other than implementing the good tips above in this thread) is to not over-recruit where you don't need troops, I've found. Any troops that aren't free upkeep garrison should be doing something important, or not recruited at all. Also, if you're short on cash temporarily, you can trade map info for cash, and/or disband unnecessary units.

i never over-recruit, i do the minimum to guarantee a heroic victory, and still only have some cash left for the building....

[TheXand]

Just do what the others have told but if this still won't help you then you must be more drastic with the corruption.

1. Go to SEGA\Medieval II Total War\mods\Third_Age\data
2. Find descr_settlement_mechanics.xml and open it with notepad
3. Search for <factor name="SIF_CORRUPTION"> and change the value next to it from 1.0 to 0.5
4. You can also change <factor name="SOF_DISTANCE_TO_CAPITAL"> from 16 to 8 if you want
5. Save it and enjoy

Might be worth creating a small submod that reduces corruption and distance to capital penalties to help those who don't know what to edit.

[Blackorc]

Might be worth creating a small submod that reduces corruption and distance to capital penalties to help those who don't know what to edit.

Even without changing the files it's easy to make money...
In the begin expand verry fast and take as much rebel cities is possible.
Build mines in cities where can or docks by city with good trade place (Pelargir).
Exchange map information for gold if you have no money, Always normal tax only high if you really need money, Sacking settlements is good for money (don't do this with cities as moria,isengard it will destroy special buildings), Try to use only 2 armies with half stacks (full if you can pay it) and try to don't pay for units in cities.

[eclancy]

I have found the file successfully but it won't let me save the changes, it says to make sure my path file is correct. I'm not sure what this means because I haven't changed anything, any help?

[nein]

when generals are corrupted to the point that they damage your economy the best thing to do is march them into battle or send them to their death in a free ocean cruise... straight into some corsairs.

Never trust denethors free ocean cruises, theres a reason it's generals only.

I hear that destroying spy recruitment buildings helps to lower corruption, but ultimately EVERYONE gets corrupted barring, maybe, some of the more exceptional characters

[FarKenal]

I have found the file successfully but it won't let me save the changes, it says to make sure my path file is correct. I'm not sure what this means because I haven't changed anything, any help?

Likewise, Im running windows XP and when I open the file it seems to be a html file and I can neither edit the figures or then go to save it even if I did. Does anyone know how/what to do to edit the file?
Thanks

[SolarWind]

Just do what the others have told but if this still won't help you then you must be more drastic with the corruption.

1. Go to SEGA\Medieval II Total War\mods\Third_Age\data
2. Find descr_settlement_mechanics.xml and open it with notepad
3. Search for <factor name="SIF_CORRUPTION"> and change the value next to it from 1.0 to 0.5
4. You can also change <factor name="SOF_DISTANCE_TO_CAPITAL"> from 16 to 8 if you want
5. Save it and enjoy

If you alter thse files, do you have to start a new campaign or can you resume an old one now with reduced corruption?

[newt]

Just do what the others have told but if this still won't help you then you must be more drastic with the corruption.

1. Go to SEGA\Medieval II Total War\mods\Third_Age\data
2. Find descr_settlement_mechanics.xml and open it with notepad
3. Search for <factor name="SIF_CORRUPTION"> and change the value next to it from 1.0 to 0.5
4. You can also change <factor name="SOF_DISTANCE_TO_CAPITAL"> from 16 to 8 if you want
5. Save it and enjoy

The 'distance to capital' bit is for public order, it has no effect on money

SIF=income
SOF=order
SPF=population

If you alter thse files, do you have to start a new campaign or can you resume an old one now with reduced corruption?

No, you don't have to start a new campaign.

[Withwnar]

The 'distance to capital' bit is for public order, it has no effect on money

It has a big effect on money, as can be seen by that "move the capital around and look at the finances scroll" tip mentioned above.

[Sir Dudeski]

Yes, but how do you stop corruption? It just keeps increasing as time goes on. I have very high taxes in most of my settlements. I remember in regular M2TW that if you lowered taxes, so would corruption.