Dread.. or Respect?

[DJB_Halo]

I haven't played TATW yet but I am going to soon. If you play as Rohan, or Gondor, whichever good faction, and you capture an considerable enemy force.. if you execute them, will that incur dread or respect? Because I would hope since you are, from the "good" guy pov, executing the enemy that you would gain respect.

[Greymane]

It will still get you dread. To avoid getting dread, just ransom them. 99 out of a 100 times, your enemy doesn't pay for large amounts of units, so they will be executed anyway. That is, if you don't want dread

[LuckyPistol]

Dread is more useful than respect anyway

[Macilrille]

Depends what you want LP, for battles a general with 8-10 dread is very useful, but for governing nothing compares to a 7+ respect general. You want to grow those key cities (especially Annúminas if you are FPoE), and respect is key to that, and you want to win those battles, dread is key to that.

[Oneru]

Executing anyone can give you Dread, Ransoming anyone doesn't change your general, Releasing anyone can give you Respect. This is regardless of faction and opponent: whether you're an orc executing humans or an elf executing other elves, you will get Dread.

edit: based on Flinn's response in post #8, seems my summary is not correct.

[LuckyPistol]

Depends what you want LP, for battles a general with 8-10 dread is very useful, but for governing nothing compares to a 7+ respect general. You want to grow those key cities (especially Annúminas if you are FPoE), and respect is key to that, and you want to win those battles, dread is key to that.

In my opinion, its the traits and ancillaries that make a good governor, but I agree that respect is a good starting point to do that. I'd rather be able to make an entire army route after their commander has been slain in a BG cavalry charge in only a few turns than spend who knows how long building not just respect, but the right traits to make a good governor.

Executing anyone can give you Dread, Ransoming anyone doesn't change your general, Releasing anyone can give you Respect. This is regardless of faction and opponent: whether you're an orc executing humans or an elf executing other elves, you will get Dread.

I thought you gain dread simply by capturing routing units?


EDIT: The OP should have made a poll to go with this

[sacred9]

both are useful.

In cities:
Chivalry: Increased happiness and growth.
Dread: Increased law and tax income.

In battle:
Chivalry: Increased the moral of your own troops.
Dread: Decreased the moral of the enemy troops.

thats what i know.

(I use Chivalry, in my opinion its more useful.)

[Flinn]

quoting Incomitatus' guide

To gain BattleDread:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

- Orc Generals (OoTMM, Gundabad) who fight will gain BattleDread.
- Orc Generals (OoTMM, Gundabad) who personally fight in battle and personally kill/capture many enemies have a decent chance of gaining BattleDread.
- "Good" Generals who fight enemies other than Followers of Melkor have a very good chance of gaining BattleDread.
- "Good" Generals who fight other Good armies that are weaker gain BattleDread, especially if they get a Heroic Victory, in addition to what they get just for fighting other Good.

NOTE: In vanilla M2:TW, if your General had BattleChivalry, he was immune to most ways of gaining BattleDread. This protection has been removed in TATW for the situations listed above. This means that a chivalrous General could see his BattleChivalry reduced or even eliminated under these conditions!

To gain BattleChivalry: (is harder!)

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

- "Good" Generals who fight Followers of Melkor and personally fight in battle and personally kill/capture many enemies have a decent chance of gaining BattleChivalry.
- "Good" Generals from Eriador, High Elves, Silvan Elves, or Dwarves and who personally fight in battle and personally kill/capture many enemies have a decent chance of gaining BattleChivalry.
- Winning difficult (odds less than 7:10) and very difficult (odds less than or equal to 1:2) battles will give your General BattleChivalry but only if the General personally fights in combat.
- The always-impossible "general_not_chasing_routers" remains in the game and will give you BattleChivalry, but the odds of ever being able to meet its conditions remain so unlikely that I won't bother explaining it. You can see it for yourself in the EDCT excerpt below.

NOTE: In vanilla M2:TW, if your General had BattleDread, he was immune to most ways of gaining BattleChivalry. This protection has been removed in TATW for the situations listed above. This means that a dreadful General could see his BattleDread reduced or even eliminated under these conditions!

There is much more to read of course; I suggest to anybody interested in such details to have a careful read of the guide.

[eugenioso]

This is one of those... 'things' that cant really be explained or successfully applied to the game. For starters, Orcs could capture, and would hopefully capture, lots of people on raids and hell maybe throughout war, but never willingly (what soldier of gondor would not know the fate that awaits him should he be a prisoner of the orcs). Orcs needed slaves to toil the huge fields of Nurn, orcs being poor farmers themselves. Maybe if the orcs were lucky they would capture a human, but only to question him, torture him and eat him.

Humans (and elves, and dwarves) would also capture orc prisoners, most likely to interrogate them. Whether they would release them or not is left to the reader to imply (ing thranduil cutting off the orc's head was, IMO, a cheap blow to the 'less wise' and more agressive silvan elves, and their sindar masters). Releasing a mass of orc prisoners would be just no. They would certainly all get butchered, and have their bodies piled into a pyre.

[Macilrille]

Actually, Elves always gave Orcs the benefit of doubt; knowing they were corrupted elves, and tried to capture them to redeem them. They never succeeded though.

[Steward Denethor II]

Executing gives dread regardless of the races and factions involved, as said above. Dread is usually better, particularly and especially on the battlefield, but it can be useful to have a chivalrous general to be a governor, as some places are really difficult to grow.

Also note that a chivalrous general under a dreadful King will lose loyalty unless you really work on keeping it high, while a chivalrous general under a chivalrous king will usually be very loyal. Dread Lords don't care weather their king is honorable or feared as long as they themselves aren't ordered to release prisoners or occupy settlements. So if you have any chivalrous generals at all, either make your king chivalrous or make sure the chivalrous general has lots of loyalty traits, such as Upright, Loyal, Austere and Stoic. Or just leave him in a city where he can't rebel.

[LuckyPistol]

I think low authority has more of an effect on generals rebelling than their differences on handling prisoners But very helpful tips Denethor, I learn something new everyday!

[Steward Denethor II]

I think low authority has more of an effect on generals rebelling than their differences on handling prisoners But very helpful tips Denethor, I learn something new everyday!

I am fairly certain that you are right, a king with high authority will usually stop generals from rebelling unless their loyalty is absurdly low, but your orders do have an effect that builds up over time. If I was ambiguous earlier (or if I wasnt, for that matter) having a general do the opposite of what he wants with the prisoners and settlements gives him a considerable change of getting Discontent General (feels unappreciated, disrespected, etc), while having him do what he wants gives ContentGeneral (this only applies with generals with 4 or more dread or chivalry). Chivalrous generals want to release prisoners and occupy settlements, while dreadlords want to exterminate and execute them.

In case anyone is wondering, ransoming and sacking are neutral in this regard. Even the most chivalrous champion wont have any regrets about sacking a city with 30,000 innocents or butchering thousands of prisoners of war after the enemy refuses or is unable to pay a ransom.

[CatoTheYounger]

If you want the enemy to break faster dread is for you. If you want your own men to hold longer without breaking then Chivalry is the way to go. With Gondor I want that Chivalry so my men can hold the line against all odds. As the Dwarves I had generals with both. I wanted to be hardy but also a merciless orc bane.

With Mordor or evil factions I love dread. Mordor already has some morale breaking units so dread helps put them over the top.

[DrDragun]

I thought sacking gave Merciless Conqueror dread