Game design, or Murphy's law?

[Nuxes]

I just installed SS 6.3 and started up an early campaign, normal/normal difficulty w/Savage AI, as Venice. By turn 10, I had taken Milan, bribed Zagreb, and was besieging Ancona with a full stack. I also had a marriage alliance and military access with the HRE.

So, everything seemed to be going well, when on turn 11, Genoa declares war and attacks Milan, Hungary attacks Zagreb, and my general leading the full stack (my entire military) defects. Needless to say, I am SOL.

This kind of thing seems to happen alot in all M2TW mods. When it rains, it pours. Is this just bad luck or is it something in the game?

[Meneth]

Bad luck, probably.

[rockman4417]

You're lucky you didn't play 6.2 when the Pope would ravage Italy with his armies.

[Nuxes]

You're lucky you didn't play 6.2 when the Pope would ravage Italy with his armies.

I did play a 6.2 game as France on hard and got steamrolled by the Pope. I controlled all of modern France, minus Normandy (I had been allied with the English since turn 1), plus the Low Countries. I wasn't involved in any wars with other kingdoms until around 1250, when Genoa attacked me, so I took over all their land, Genoa and Milan. This angered the Pope (even though I abided by all his demands), and he attacked me with about 4 full stacks of elite troops. I was pushed all the way back to Paris before he would accept a peace treaty.

[Chyeaaaa111]

I did play a 6.2 game as France on hard and got steamrolled by the Pope. I controlled all of modern France, minus Normandy (I had been allied with the English since turn 1), plus the Low Countries. I wasn't involved in any wars with other kingdoms until around 1250, when Genoa attacked me, so I took over all their land, Genoa and Milan. This angered the Pope (even though I abided by all his demands), and he attacked me with about 4 full stacks of elite troops. I was pushed all the way back to Paris before he would accept a peace treaty.

Why don't these things ever happen to me? I purposely get excommunicated in my campaigns so they will be harder.

[Concrete]

I recently played a game as Venice, hard/hard, savage.
Within 25 turns or so I had captured Milan, Bern, Pisa, Genoa, Innsbruck, Ancona, Bologna, Marsielle, Bari and finally, Rome. (Buying Pisa and Bari, while the Milan then Bern then Genoa campaign was made possible by bribing the army of Milan when it was in the field.)
And I had made Genoa my vassal, though they should probably think about changing their name.

I thought I was doing pretty darn amazing.
But then, Byzantines, Hungary and Aragon attacked(and I was already at war with the HRE), just before the pope ordered a crusade on Rome, which nearly everybody answered.

Havn't gotten back to that game yet, Christmas and all, buuut, I'm not sure I can get myself out of this one.

[PaleBlueDot]

Why don't you just revert to the last save like most people? Sure its just bad luck, but thanks to auto save (and every other kind of save).. The way I see it, the AI has a huge advantage in troop production etc, and you have that saving advantage. If you move your deserting general closer to one of the cities I'm sure the AI won't attack and he probably wont desert again.

[Chyeaaaa111]

Why don't you just revert to the last save like most people? Sure its just bad luck, but thanks to auto save (and every other kind of save).. The way I see it, the AI has a huge advantage in troop production etc, and you have that saving advantage. If you move your deserting general closer to one of the cities I'm sure the AI won't attack and he probably wont desert again.

IMO, the only advantage a human should use is logic and reason (and any other human only trait). The AI cannot even begin to rival a human brain, so it must be given a serious handicap if it is to function at all.

[Nuxes]

Why don't you just revert to the last save like most people?

The only savegame I had was the autosave right before they attacked, and when I tried reloading from that, they kept attacking the next turn. The general didn't defect again, so I guess that was just bad luck.

I know in some games, like Civ IV, a random list of numbers is generated at the beginning of each campaign, and this is used to help determine events. Not sure if M2TW does the same.

[Bund weicher Birnen]

This never happened to me that the AI wipes me out... I always win every game on very hard... (Not included in the calculation: the late game campaign with Portugal in which the Moors throw me out of Spain and I had no chance because they attacked every settlement with two full stacks)

[he219]

attacked every settlement with two full stacks…………

[Mega Tortas de Bodemloze]

I just installed SS 6.3 and started up an early campaign, normal/normal difficulty w/Savage AI, as Venice. By turn 10, I had taken Milan, bribed Zagreb, and was besieging Ancona with a full stack. I also had a marriage alliance and military access with the HRE.

So, everything seemed to be going well, when on turn 11, Genoa declares war and attacks Milan, Hungary attacks Zagreb, and my general leading the full stack (my entire military) defects. Needless to say, I am SOL.

This kind of thing seems to happen alot in all M2TW mods. When it rains, it pours. Is this just bad luck or is it something in the game?

Well, once your stats {production, and so forth} are near the top you does gain the AI's vision...{to my experience}. Milan is perhaps the diamond in the coal bin for a few of the factions. Just cuz you got their 1st doesn't mean they're going to be dissuaded from it as a target. Zagreb is most definitely on Hungary's yum yum list.

Seemingly this game you grabbed everyone else's goodies like a schoolyard bully and pissed them off...

The loyalty ranking of the general must have been abismal.... no'

[PaleBlueDot]

In Civ IV, there is a setting that allows you to decide whether to use the same, or load a different "random number" thread each time you reload your game. I keep the default setting, same thread, as otherwise you can win any battle, even with just 2% chance of victory if you are prepared to reload it over 50 times. My impression of M2TW is that the event play out the same if everything is exactly equal, but if you just move anybody just one tile, your general is unlikely to defect again. Unless he is disloyal and someone is determined to bribe him.
Either way, I save and reload constantly. Spies and assassins are pretty useless otherwise. There is no way of getting a high level spy/assassin as non-AI if you play "fair".

[Zipzopdippidybopbop]

I never find the game to be too much of a challenge but defenitely entertaining; playing as Byzzies I've reconquered the entire Roman Empire and am sitting snugly with the Danes and Teutonic Order + Mongols and Khwarezmians battling it out on my borders =)

Only challenge I ever had was from the English; they controlled all of France and parts of Germany; territories I wanted. So I sent my armies out of Spain and Italy and fought the English and steadily drove them back until I invaded and conquered England and Wales. Took me a day and a half in real time =P

My strategy is to simply turtle until you get one fortress/large city, then spam scoutatoi as quickly as possible =P

UPDATE - I ALWAYS play Very Hard/Very Hard