SSHIP v. 098 - archive of discussion during testing

[Macaras]

I wanted to test the Aragon's situations so I played 10 turns. No cheating, no any special tricks, no reloading. I made some screenshots:

1. Begining - attack before Moors grow in strength.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

2. Result - two cities conquered:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

It was nothing extremely difficult..

3 Portugal asks for an alliance:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

3. After that Moors attacked, I have maybe 4,5 battles. They have little heavy cavalry and I was using the hills to neutralize charges:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

4 After these battles my super general :

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

5. At some point I had enough money to ask Spain for alliance, even though I released almost all captives:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

6. Economy is not so bad:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

7. Many won battles and alliance with two christian factions gave me very good standing with the Pope, crusade would be an effect of it:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

In the end I could give Murcia to Spain for alliance, but I didn't have to. Also Moors asked me to become their vassal in the turn 4 and I disregarded that. Nothing that I did was super difficult. The battles I won because of using the mountains, the very good javelins Aragon has and using light cavalry (Alforrats) to surround the enemy and charge from the back + Garcia very good general. My reputation is only reliable, so potentially I may be backstabbed by Spain, but I just sign an alliance so I have about 20 turns of peace from them. From the north I have Toulouse that has a very strong rebel garrison and will not be conquered very quickly. I am just saying that its possible to win these game on VH and probably many people will be able to do it.

[Gaku]

I personally always wanted the VH difficulty setting to be representative of Legendary difficulty in Attila or Halo 2.
we've advertised that our mod is difficult on the highest settings. VH/VH was never difficult before and it finally is now.
the mod wants VH to actually be VH.

I suppose it's working as intended then.

I wanted to test the Aragon's situations so I played 10 turns. No cheating, no any special tricks, no reloading. I made some screenshots:
In the end I could give Murcia to Spain for alliance, but I didn't have to. Also Moors asked me to become their vassal in the turn 4 and I disregarded that. Nothing that I did was super difficult. The battles I won because of using the mountains, the very good javelins Aragon has and using light cavalry (Alforrats) to surround the enemy and charge from the back + Garcia very good general. My reputation is only reliable, so potentially I may be backstabbed by Spain, but I just sign an alliance so I have about 20 turns of peace from them. From the north I have Toulouse that has a very strong rebel garrison and will not be conquered very quickly. I am just saying that its possible to win these game on VH and probably many people will be able to do it.

It's not going to be turn 10 where you start encountering the problems I mentioned. It's going to be turns 60-100, once the AI steamroller kicks into full gear, while you're still stuck with garbage, barely staying afloat, winning heroic victory after heroic victory only to come out worse over all after every battle, and vulnerable to your economy getting wrecked from one turn to the next.
I guess I'll keep at it since many people will be able to do it.

[Belovèse]

Hello.

I'd like to play version .98, but I simply can't download the mod. Mega stops the download at 1.58gb and after I wait the 5 hours to continue my download, it just won't continue the download.

Any tips/ideas?

I uploaded a new link for you, try this one: https://filetransfer.io/data-package/jkChrYt8#link

[Belovèse]

I suppose it's working as intended then.


It's not going to be turn 10 where you start encountering the problems I mentioned. It's going to be turns 60-100, once the AI steamroller kicks into full gear, while you're still stuck with garbage, barely staying afloat, winning heroic victory after heroic victory only to come out worse over all after every battle, and vulnerable to your economy getting wrecked from one turn to the next.
I guess I'll keep at it since many people will be able to do it.

Do you know you can change the AI and it will not even require you to start a new game? Just run the bat file "Campaign_AI_switcher.bat" that is in the main SSHIP_098 folder.

[Shesgar]

I uploaded a new link for you, try this one: https://filetransfer.io/data-package/jkChrYt8#link

Thank you so much, Belovèse!

[LuckyPistol]

Alright, right now my Scotland campaign is at turn 160 and I have some thoughts:

1. Vassals. Yes, in M2TW it is nothing more than a military alliance with tribute, but I still consider it an effective strategy to vassalize a faction when I do not want to border another faction after a costly war, etc. In this mod the AI makes vassals left and right against each other. However, I have not been able to persuade anybody to become a vassal, even when they are down to a single settlement with a skeleton army and I'm offering more money than what their last region is worth ten times over. The AI is oddly extremely stubborn to accept vassalization from the player, possibly due to the mod's added resistance to creating alliances.

2. Negative traits. Ok, I know you guys want to make a more difficult campaign, but holy cow, let's cool it with the negative traits. I can't even maintain a siege to build equipment without my generals getting the "poor disciplinarian" trait. Having to micromanage each governor to make sure they max out their movement so as to avoid this trait before ending each turn is exhausting. I understand the reasoning on some of them, like when you have low taxes for too long, but it feels like negative traits are just hurled at your generals, which makes settlement management frustrating. I love what you did with the battle traits and things like "10 years governor experience".

3. I know it has been mentioned before, but you gotta fix the "every ship is an admiral" bug. Not being able to stack fleets with ships that haven't fought a single battle is such an out-of-character mistake for this mod.

4. Cavalry pathfinding seems less refined than in other M2TW mods I've played. Not sure if I've just had some bad luck, but I'll send a unit of cavalry to intercept enemy cavalry (which is just constantly gunning for my archers or best infantry units, to the point it's losing men by not engaging the units I screen with) and my cavalry won't attack it head on, but rather trail it as if mopping up routing units. This seems to only happen with my heavy cavalry like Mailed Knights, as my light cavalry have been super efficient (I've got a double gold chevron Border Horse that has carried me since my first turns).

5. I can see the "REPORT IF YOU SEE THIS SECTION" on the Pope's card that is apparently not supposed to be viewable.

6. Wtf do I have to do to call a crusade? Did you guys raise the settings necessary for the pope to accept a target? I've got high favor, I'm calling it on the Moors who are at war with me and at least one other Christian nation, but I keep getting refused. The current pope is even one of my own cardinals! lol

7. Watchtower cost. 2000 seems a bit...much. I remember one mod that takes the anachronistic towers and turns them into villages or some kind of outpost, but even then they were 1000 at most, IIRC. It's not super important, but watchtowers are critical in the early game IMO, especially with a difficult mod like this where you need to turtle more often.

8. Why do orphanages have such negative traits?

9. Somehow was able to build the Knights of Santiago in Murcia as Scotland when the textcard said I shouldn't because of my culture. I can recruit the foot soldiers so is this just a bug I can reap from? I like having my Scottish Santiago Knights

10. Lists. Are you planning on releasing a mercenary locations list? Any plans on a traits list for those of us who like to sandbox/take things casual?

[Jurand of Cracow]

Hi, @LuckyPistol, thanks for these comments, very useful and to the point!
ad. 1 - not for me, I've never used vassals :-(
ad. 2 - well, I've tried to limit the negative traits... Besides "Poor disciplinarian", are there more problematic traits? We've had the "Coward" problem, and I"ve deleted almost all triggers leading to that one. Perhaps I'd to similar thing with the "Poor disciplinarian".
ad. 3 - yes, this is one of the tasks that awaits my time. I need to fix it.
ad. 4 - I don't think we've messed with this aspect, at least over the last 5 years of the mod development.
ad. 5 - thanks, I have no clue what to do with it.
ad. 6 - me, I have no clue.
ad. 7 - well, this is the whole point.
ad. 8 - they exchange growth into health, what is very much desirable. The growth of population remains the same but the likelyhood of a plague drops.
ad. 9 - interesting. We haven't dealt with the military orders over the last 5 years.
ad. 10 - no, but it's very easy to decipher the merc availability from the relevant file. The traits - no, but again the file has a very long "Table of contents" and one may get his bearings easily. Well, up to a point, ofc.

[NotZaran5]

Alright, right now my Scotland campaign is at turn 160 and I have some thoughts:

1. Vassals. Yes, in M2TW it is nothing more than a military alliance with tribute, but I still consider it an effective strategy to vassalize a faction when I do not want to border another faction after a costly war, etc. In this mod the AI makes vassals left and right against each other. However, I have not been able to persuade anybody to become a vassal, even when they are down to a single settlement with a skeleton army and I'm offering more money than what their last region is worth ten times over. The AI is oddly extremely stubborn to accept vassalization from the player, possibly due to the mod's added resistance to creating alliances.

YES. I really like having vassals for roleplaying purposes but its literally impossible. I had the sicilians at one region, no army with a single unit defending the last settlement but they wont agree even when I hand over Palermo which is a metropolis (only sacked, didnt exterminate or delete any buildings, if that matters) along with 10k in damages but NO!?? It still says Just Rejected which is so incredibly annoying. I wonder if there even is a fix

[Belovèse]

I think there could be an easy fix, but we don't really want that: there is a but in the med2 engine, not fixable by modding, that makes any vassalized faction passive.

I understand the gameplay and roleplay interest of vassals, but unfortunately you would just have half-dead factions paying you tribute.

I would personally also love if we could have truly active vassals!

Sent from my FP2 using Tapatalk

[LuckyPistol]

Just a quick update/question: I have all the things I need for my King to be crowned (scotland). I have the regions and I built Edinburgh castle. My guy has 6 authority and 10 piety, but he's currently in Spain fighting off the Moors (funny story, the Fatmids just came to me and offered an alliance since they're also at war with them). Do I need to bring him to my capital to get him crowned? I've never actually had to crown my king yet.

[Jurand of Cracow]

Just a quick update/question: I have all the things I need for my King to be crowned (scotland). I have the regions and I built Edinburgh castle. My guy has 6 authority and 10 piety, but he's currently in Spain fighting off the Moors (funny story, the Fatmids just came to me and offered an alliance since they're also at war with them). Do I need to bring him to my capital to get him crowned? I've never actually had to crown my king yet.

Yes, you do, sorry - for a crowning ceremony the king has to be home.

;------------------------------------------- 0->1 Trigger Crown_scotland_Fit
WhenToTest CharacterTurnEndInSettlement

Condition FactionIsLocal
and FactionType scotland
and IsFactionLeader
and SettlementName Edinburgh ; coronation in Edinburgh
and SettlementBuildingExists >= wonder_edinburg4_castle ; already city level
and not IsUnderSiege
and GovernorLoyaltyLevel > loyalty_disillusioned
and Treasury > 20000
and Trait Crownholder > 1
and Trait Crownholder < 4
and Trait Fit_Crown_scotland < 1

Affects Fit_Crown_scotland 1 Chance 100

[NotZaran5]

I think there could be an easy fix, but we don't really want that: there is a but in the med2 engine, not fixable by modding, that makes any vassalized faction passive.

I understand the gameplay and roleplay interest of vassals, but unfortunately you would just have half-dead factions paying you tribute.

I would personally also love if we could have truly active vassals!

Sent from my FP2 using Tapatalk

I remember even in 0.97 vassals would attack me if they felt like it (Serbia) and would definitely break vassalage if I had a crusade or Ji had on me. Now, vassalage is impossible. Diplomacy absolutely sucks because the faction backs out if you offer two unacceptable offers in a row and by unacceptable I mean generous. I absolutely hate it now especially the send emissary missions.

[NotZaran5]

Might not be the right place for this but does anyone know how to reduce unit hitpoints? BY that I mean the damage units take over time. Soldiers die very quickly right now. I would like them to hold on for longer. It is more fun if you break the enemy but right now both sides take a lot of damage when historically the majority of casualties were cause by chasing down routed enemies. I played a small script mod that allowed me to change the hitpoints for units down to 0.1 which would let them last much longer. I am assuming there is a textfile I can change to accomplish the same

[Gaku]

Do you know you can change the AI and it will not even require you to start a new game? Just run the bat file "Campaign_AI_switcher.bat" that is in the main SSHIP_098 folder.

I was not aware of that. I'll try that next time. I don't really want to switch it mid-campaign, you know?


So I started another campaign. 168 turns in, and I wanted to describe the exact sort of problem that I was mentioning earlier.

started out, war with Poland who won't peace out. I take Krakow, Olomouc (from the rebels), and then Breslau (which I didn't really want, but they refused to peace out, so whatever). Finally they peace out. I notice Byzantines have Wallachia, which means they're going to come after me. And so they do, right after the Poland war ends. ridiculous war... I throw everything I have at them and win Naissos and Wallachia due to dumb AI being dumb. My garbage beat their elite BS. They absolutely refused to peace out, at any point, regardless of how the war was going, for like 40 turns (even before I counterattacked). Thankfully no one else declared war on me at the same time, otherwise they'd have easily taken my completely undefended [everything else] and that would have been a short-lived campaign.

So then there's peace. And I sit there, for the next 80 turns, doing literally nothing but building my economy, because I know what's going to happen "soon" and have to be as ready as possible. I'm allied with virtually everyone. I'm "very reliable". All's good. By about turn 150, I have a surplus of about 11k florins per month, and I'm investing it as fast as I can and building as fast as the constructions will let me. Nothing but economy.

And over time, "very reliable" drops to "reliable" because, like I said, I'm not doing anything. uh-oh. All of a sudden, Kiev backstabs me. immediately 3 full stacks up my ass sieging down 2 of my most lucrative cities. Before my turn even rolls around, mf-ing Serbia, who's someone's vassal, declares war on me (how did they even do that?) = 2 more full stacks + 1 siege. Poland, who was allied to both me and Kiev, sides with Kiev. The following turn, they declare war on me, too - more stacks and sieges. The turn after, Venice decides to backstab me as well, another elite stack sieging me down. So over the course of 3 turns, I'm now at war on every front except the West, all but 3 of my provinces are "front line" and subject to repeat sieges. My income has dropped from +11k florins to -4k (as in, negative 4k) florins per turn. And I'm cancelling constructions and destroying buildings to try to stay alive.

I managed to survive and came out on top. and I attribute that to having just enough of an economy to survive. had I not spent 80 turns turtling and building nonstop, this would have crashed and burned like every other campaign does at this point, where my economy collapses, I can't build/field anything but complete garbage, and then my army gets deleted from under me at the worst time possible.

Maybe this doesn't happen to nations that are rolling in cash. but for those with dirt poor settlements that can't produce anything, it's a problem.

If the whole dogpile thing is intentional, I'd say it's working well.

and now those wars are over... and all of a sudden, I can train spearmen and get free upkeep in my castles!? Why the hell couldn't I get that before, you know, when I actually needed anything with free upkeep?

anyway, I survived, and so I'll continue.

[Jurand of Cracow]

Might not be the right place for this but does anyone know how to reduce unit hitpoints? BY that I mean the damage units take over time. Soldiers die very quickly right now. I would like them to hold on for longer. It is more fun if you break the enemy but right now both sides take a lot of damage when historically the majority of casualties were cause by chasing down routed enemies. I played a small script mod that allowed me to change the hitpoints for units down to 0.1 which would let them last much longer. I am assuming there is a textfile I can change to accomplish the same

I'd think that if you'd like the units to fight longer, you'd rather increase the hitpoints (ie: how many hits a soldier can take before dying)? it's in the EDU (export_descr_unit.txt), in the \data folder.
iirc, in the SSHIP it should always be 1, because of the weird effects another numbers bring about (it was decided before my arrival to the mod, but I think it's also the case in other historical mods, while in TATW it's different - a troll can take many)

[NotZaran5]

ahh yeah I remember the term used was hit ratio instead of hitpoints . What problems will be cause if I change it?

[Jurand of Cracow]

ahh yeah I remember the term used was hit ratio instead of hitpoints . What problems will be cause if I change it?

ah, this is something different. I don't remember where it is, but I don't think there'd be any problem. But - iirc we've lowered for the heavy cavalry, much in line with your taste. But in EBII it's much lower.

[Gaku]

Turn 179, 1 turn to the next, my ability to train Magyar Cavalry was removed in all but 2 settlements: Varad and Wallachia. Is this intentional? If so, why?

[Jurand of Cracow]

Turn 179, 1 turn to the next, my ability to train Magyar Cavalry was removed in all but 2 settlements: Varad and Wallachia. Is this intentional? If so, why?

well, the evolution of the faction:

; 1st stage	HUNGARY landowners2 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
; no religion threshold for the typical Hungarian units: politically still some pagan influences


; - core of Hungarian elites: available everywhere as they signify the political rule of the faction
        recruit_pool	"Hungarian Nobles"					1	0.04	2  0  requires factions { hungary, } and not event_counter OSTSIEDLUNG 1		
        recruit_pool	"Hungarian Nobles"					1	0.03	2  0  requires factions { hungary, } and event_counter OSTSIEDLUNG 1 and not event_counter GOLDEN_BULL_HUNGARIAN 1


; - lesser nobles: only in Hungary core and in the steppes (HR serbia excluded because of Croatian nobility below)
        recruit_pool	"Magyar Cavalry"					0.9	0.04	2  0  requires factions { hungary, } and not event_counter OSTSIEDLUNG 1 and not hidden_resource serbia and hidden_resource hungary or hidden_resource tartars
		recruit_pool	"Magyar Cavalry"					0.9	0.03	2  0  requires factions { hungary, } and event_counter OSTSIEDLUNG 1 and not event_counter GOLDEN_BULL_HUNGARIAN 1 and not hidden_resource serbia and hidden_resource hungary or hidden_resource tartars  


; 1st stage - Croatian Nobility: historically a more westernised Kingdom of Croatia was in the personal union with Hungary, but kept separate institutions
;   (this is only for 1 province - even if Vrhbosna would get the HRs this coding will work as it will not be big enough to have this building before Ostsiedlung)
        recruit_pool	"Mailed Knights"					1	0.04	2  0  requires factions { hungary, } and not event_counter OSTSIEDLUNG 1 and hidden_resource serbia and hidden_resource hungary
        recruit_pool	"Mailed Knights"					1	0.03	2  0  requires factions { hungary, } and event_counter OSTSIEDLUNG 1 and not event_counter GOLDEN_BULL_HUNGARIAN 1 and hidden_resource serbia and hidden_resource hungary


; 1st stage - replacement for Magyar Cavalry in the east (axes)
        recruit_pool	"Dismounted Mailed Knights"			0.9	0.04	2  0  requires factions { hungary, } and not event_counter OSTSIEDLUNG 1 and not hidden_resource hungary and not hidden_resource tartars and hidden_resource norway or hidden_resource denmark or hidden_resource scotland or hidden_resource lithuania or hidden_resource poland or hidden_resource kievan_rus or hidden_resource russia or hidden_resource serbia or hidden_resource georgia


		recruit_pool	"Dismounted Mailed Knights"			0.9	0.03	2  0  requires factions { hungary, } and event_counter OSTSIEDLUNG 1 and not event_counter GOLDEN_BULL_HUNGARIAN 1 and not hidden_resource hungary and not hidden_resource tartars and hidden_resource norway or hidden_resource denmark or hidden_resource scotland or hidden_resource lithuania or hidden_resource poland or hidden_resource kievan_rus or hidden_resource russia or hidden_resource serbia or hidden_resource georgia
		
; 1st stage - replacement for Magyar Cavalry elsewhere (swords)
        recruit_pool	"Dismounted Sword Mailed Knights"	0.9	0.04	2  0  requires factions { hungary, } and not event_counter OSTSIEDLUNG 1 and not hidden_resource hungary and not hidden_resource tartars or hidden_resource hre or hidden_resource france or hidden_resource england or hidden_resource aragon or hidden_resource spain or hidden_resource portugal or hidden_resource moors or hidden_resource egypt or hidden_resource pisa or hidden_resource venice or hidden_resource papal_states or hidden_resource sicily or hidden_resource byzantium or hidden_resource rum or hidden_resource turks or hidden_resource zengid or hidden_resource jerusalem or hidden_resource abbasid


		recruit_pool	"Dismounted Sword Mailed Knights"	0.9	0.03	2  0  requires factions { hungary, } and event_counter OSTSIEDLUNG 1 and not event_counter GOLDEN_BULL_HUNGARIAN 1 and not hidden_resource hungary and not hidden_resource tartars or hidden_resource hre or hidden_resource france or hidden_resource england or hidden_resource aragon or hidden_resource spain or hidden_resource portugal or hidden_resource moors or hidden_resource egypt or hidden_resource pisa or hidden_resource venice or hidden_resource papal_states or hidden_resource sicily or hidden_resource byzantium or hidden_resource rum or hidden_resource turks or hidden_resource zengid or hidden_resource jerusalem or hidden_resource abbasid

[NotZaran5]

Turn 179, 1 turn to the next, my ability to train Magyar Cavalry was removed in all but 2 settlements: Varad and Wallachia. Is this intentional? If so, why?

omg I thought I was going crazy. I recruited a few scoutati swordsmen but when i sent them back to Constantinople, I couldnt for the life of me find any city or castle which could recruit or retrain them.