Kings so bad, they're good

**Marwyn92** · December 29, 2012, 08:50 AM

I was just playing the Teutonic Campaign and, as usual, I was using my worst assassin's to send my send a rival king beyond the brink of madness. He started off with around 2 authority, and before long, he dropped to 0 with the paranoid trait, among insane traits. All was perfect. Then, the next turn, he became deranged and developed developed the first tier of insanity. By all accounts, his authority should have already been in the negatives, and yet he went straight to a full 10. I've noticed this in the past playing vanilla Medieval 2 as well, and I thought it was a bug or something. The version I'm playing now is fully patched, so I'm less inclined to believe it's that and I'm starting to consider it's in their by design. Either as a balancing measure, so the player can't gimp the AI with 40 assassin's working in unison, or as a flavour thing, like everyone's terrified of their "mad king" and obeys unquestioningly, lest the be flayed and worn as a cloak.

I'm sure you guys have experienced this, and I'd like to hear your thoughts on the matter.

**Aymer de Valence** · December 29, 2012, 08:55 AM

How did your assassin send their king mad!?!?

**Marwyn92** · December 29, 2012, 09:05 AM

You just attempt to assassinate them enough times. Each time you fail, whether you're caught or not, they go a little more insane. First the pick up the "closed", "aloof", "morbidly mortal" etc traits, as well as food tasters and whatnot as retinue, until they start picking up the insanity traits.

I like the idea of having my top notch, elite assassin's roaming the land, slitting the throats of high end dignitaries and generals, and a merry band of tricksters who are pacifists at heart, with no knowledge of how to actually kill someone, but a fond love of freaking people out by dressing as assassins and making it look like they're trying to kill them. Their pranks drive people insane.