The role of family member stats and influence in keeping order

[Septentrionalis]

As my campaign has advanced, I find myself having trouble with pacifying certain regions and allocating family members (FM) that would be suitable for handling chronically unhappy regions. In the original RTW, the influence stat was a really handy general indicator of how much a FM could do the offset problems in a region. In EB2, however, it seems like that is no longer the kind of indicator I am looking for.

I found some previous discussion of the stats on the board but none that would answer my fundamental question: do we have to keep some kind of cheat sheet of our own in which we track the individual FMs' traits and how their ability to improve order develops with the acquisition of each trait increase? Or can we still rely on some of the stats or a combination of them? I recently learned that the stats for fighting units is not directly comparable, but a superior unit can have an inferior stat such as attack (e.g. triarii appear weaker than principes).

As a related side note, it seems that keeping population growth from getting stunted is a real hassle as well. I have been wrecking temples to build different ones in hope of more population growth, particularly as the growth-inducing FM traits are quite rare. To be fair, I prefer that any day to the problems with runaway growth I had to deal with in RTW. Another observation I have made is that certain regions, such as Bononia, appear never to really get on board with the new rule in despite of building every imaginable thing that should increase their happiness.

[Jurand of Cracow]

My observation from the EDCT is that reading the impact of your generals from the traits may be tricky. I've also noticed while playing that getting a trait is somehow disconnected from getting the points - eg. after a battle you don't get a trait, but you can get it after a few turns.

[BailianSteel]

A cheat sheet would be helpful, there's a wide range of traits and the way to getting those traits isn't certain or obvious. There are a few lines of traits that will help, but it's not a sure-fire guarantee that there'll be good order. Different regions react differently to different factions, and some regions just don't like being under anyone's rule. Perhaps the biggest two issues with public order that can be countered are spies from other factions and a vast cultural difference between the region and it's owner.

It seems that EBII's Influence is more for converting the culture of provinces, traits and retainers are much more useful for maintaining order. The values you want are: - Unrest, + Law, and + Popularity. Leaving aside the governor's personality, you can encourage these traits through low or normal taxes, and by keeping them away from the big cities (or even just cities) which are hotbeds of crime and corruption. Though educational facilities do encourage Governor and Politician traits which give boni to Law. As for population growth, I'm not so sure. Keep an eye out for all things farming related. Also you can get retainers that are priests of a certain god. So it'd be in your interest to vary it up between Temples of Farming or Fertility.

[nvm]

Influence does nothing for public order in EB2, but it does help to convert cultures.
As for an easy way to get a governor that helps a city grow...Make sure it's someone unselfish and put the taxes on low. That will do it.

[qwertykov]

To increase a city's pop, you could try setting taxes low and increasing taxes in your other cities, which might help divert pop growth?

Station an FM with ancillaries that reduce unrest and improve law..

Prioritize farming buildings

For an unhappy populace, having a full garrison in the city would be helpful to suppress unhappiness, but is not ideal either

Worse case scenario, you could set maximum taxes to entice a civil revolt. Retaking it and sacking the city would most probably eliminate most unhappiness. X_X

[Septentrionalis]

Thank you guys; really helpful information and ideas. I am not against playing with a pen and paper and keeping track of things, and I in fact like to write a little bit of history of faction for the fun of it and to be able to check back what has taken place. Of course it would make sense to have the game keep track of things for me, and modern games have generally improved on that tremendously over the last few decades (automatically updating journals, stats screens, etc.). Too bad that these old Total War titles do so little, although there are so many interesting facts that could be stored (such as in-game bios and stats for FMs and histories for regions). I wish I had had the good sense to start calculating FM stats in the beginning of the game, as it seems quite a chore to go through all of them now.

As for population growth, I regularly end up having 0% pop growth for even smaller settlements with low tax rate; normal would make it a negative figure. With the building tree exhausted until next settlement upgrade, there is nothing else to do except to take down and replace temples unless there is a FM with population bonus available, which most often is not the case. As said in the opening post, that is by far less stressful and frustrating than the uncontrollable population explosions I had to deal with in RTW.

As for discontent in the regions, at least now I know that going through the traits one by one for all FMs will allow me to pick the best suited ones for problematic regions. Of course the way it works now is realistic. In real life one cannot rank order people according to their capabilities of leadership. One has to make rough estimates and find out how things go.

[Wulfburk]

Leaving aside the governor's personality, you can encourage these traits through low or normal taxes, and by keeping them away from the big cities (or even just cities) which are hotbeds of crime and corruption.

Whats the optimal way to deal with coming of age family members then? I always left them in my capital or other cities with the highest level academies i have. But i do am having problems with bad family members, in that among 15 or so only 2/3 increase the happiness in a city, while all the others decrease it.

[BailianSteel]

Thank you guys; really helpful information and ideas. I am not against playing with a pen and paper and keeping track of things, and I in fact like to write a little bit of history of faction for the fun of it and to be able to check back what has taken place. Of course it would make sense to have the game keep track of things for me, and modern games have generally improved on that tremendously over the last few decades (automatically updating journals, stats screens, etc.). Too bad that these old Total War titles do so little, although there are so many interesting facts that could be stored (such as in-game bios and stats for FMs and histories for regions). I wish I had had the good sense to start calculating FM stats in the beginning of the game, as it seems quite a chore to go through all of them now.

You're welcome. I also like imagining a wider history and context to things that happen in the game...just too lazy to write them down.

As for population growth, I regularly end up having 0% pop growth for even smaller settlements with low tax rate; normal would make it a negative figure. With the building tree exhausted until next settlement upgrade, there is nothing else to do except to take down and replace temples unless there is a FM with population bonus available, which most often is not the case. As said in the opening post, that is by far less stressful and frustrating than the uncontrollable population explosions I had to deal with in RTW.

One thing that might help out, you can transfer retainers between FMs. Put several FMs in the same stack, click and hold on the retainer's portrait, and drag it to the FM you want to transfer it to. This has helped me greatly in regards to getting cities to where I wanted them to be. It can also save precious retainers from being lost should a general die of old age.

As for discontent in the regions, at least now I know that going through the traits one by one for all FMs will allow me to pick the best suited ones for problematic regions. Of course the way it works now is realistic. In real life one cannot rank order people according to their capabilities of leadership. One has to make rough estimates and find out how things go.

Agreed. I can also now sympathize a bit with historical figures that made the wrong choices in that regard...

Whats the optimal way to deal with coming of age family members then? I always left them in my capital or other cities with the highest level academies i have. But i do am having problems with bad family members, in that among 15 or so only 2/3 increase the happiness in a city, while all the others decrease it.

Leaving them in the capital/academic cities is a good idea for the most part, but you do need to keep a watch on your FMs to see that they don't develop vices, or that they don't take these vices to extremes.

I don't say "Leaving aside the governor's personality" because it's the best approach. It's mostly because I'm too impatient to factor that into my decisions. The Governor's personality type is probably quite important to how they turn out. It sounds like you'd want high CHA FMs to govern your cities above all else, while high INT can come with bonuses to public order (such as the Politician trait) or maluses (such as the Atheist trait.)

Also, you'll want to stick your dedicated governors in places with Low/Normal taxes and have good public order to begin with. It seems that these two qualities can encourage the Nice Ruler and Happy People traits, which can result in a governor that can pacify any population.

[Septentrionalis]

One thing that might help out, you can transfer retainers between FMs. Put several FMs in the same stack, click and hold on the retainer's portrait, and drag it to the FM you want to transfer it to. This has helped me greatly in regards to getting cities to where I wanted them to be. It can also save precious retainers from being lost should a general die of old age.

You, dear sir or madam, are a life saver. I had no idea that one can do that. I will explore that option immediately and salvage some retainers off my old-timers who are enjoying a rather quite life taking care of a city and no longer fighting the good fight!

Also, you'll want to stick your dedicated governors in places with Low/Normal taxes and have good public order to begin with. It seems that these two qualities can encourage the Nice Ruler and Happy People traits, which can result in a governor that can pacify any population.

That is valuable information as well. I have been wondering why I get so many of those perks. Namely, I have taxes on low almost everywhere because I recruited as little as possible for the first few decades and put all the resources I could into developing economy and infrastructrure. No doubt that was made easy by being a Roman and never really picking fights but concentrating on sustainable growth.

[QuintusSertorius]

There are two "settings" for Influence (set in the descr_campaign_db), we're using the alternative one that increases cultural conversion.

[Septentrionalis]

One thing that might help out, you can transfer retainers between FMs. Put several FMs in the same stack, click and hold on the retainer's portrait, and drag it to the FM you want to transfer it to. This has helped me greatly in regards to getting cities to where I wanted them to be. It can also save precious retainers from being lost should a general die of old age.

I did this successfully for a couple of aged FMs with due regard to role playing considerations (things like evil mother-in-law should probably not be transferred, as enticing as it may seem to the donor), but now I cannot do that anymore. Is there some kind of limit to how often retainers can be passed along?

[Kull]

I did this successfully for a couple of aged FMs with due regard to role playing considerations (things like evil mother-in-law should probably not be transferred, as enticing as it may seem to the donor), but now I cannot do that anymore. Is there some kind of limit to how often retainers can be passed along?

There's a limit on total ancillaries per FM (8?) and some of them are non-transferable (to include the "relatives" like aunts and mothers-in-law). Also some of the really negative impact ancillaries can't be moved (since it's so easy to dump them on somebody else). Thanks for the reminder, as I need to scan through the list to find others who are quite personal in nature and thus should be immovable.

[BailianSteel]

Glad to put all the hours I've put into this game to use!

To add onto what Kull said, not just Negative retainers like evil mothers in law or "aunts" can't be moved. Certain positive retainers like Heroic Saviour can never be moved as well.

Since you're playing as the Romans and conserving your territory, preserving positive retainers should be easy enough. Station plenty of Roman FMs in the Vrbs to take advantage of the election system. You should have plenty of FMs to hold all the retainers that can be moved. Filter out the ones near death by sending them to retirement in the other settlements.

[Septentrionalis]

Station plenty of Roman FMs in the Vrbs to take advantage of the election system.

Wait, do what now?! I don't know about any election system involving staying in the Vrbs. I thought the cursus honorum does not require staying in Caput Mundi.

[BailianSteel]

Hm. When in doubt, consult the player guide. Come to think of it, the Vrbs may foster negative traits in your FMs, so that's something to watch out for. But I'd still recommend making a convenient settlement a depot for your FMs to collect retainers, especially if you're focused on conservation.