Host army sizes are ridiculous
- Thread starter killcreak
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He didn't 'magically' spawn in your capital. He was in your capital, and he was landless. You could have ended that threat by giving him a county, or even a barony.
Now the real question is, how did he manage to smuggle thousands of troops there without anyone noticing...
Two comments -
1. Theres a chicken and egg problem here - you have a state in disarray or want to roleplay a state in disarray. However, if somebody decides your chaotic realm is ripe to be managed by somebody else, you don't want to face that possibility. Doesn't that come very close to saying I want to roleplay a state in disarray without risking some consequences?
2. There is also a hint of self-importance creeping in here. Everybody gets bad successions, and bad rulers (heck usually you will start with 'bad' rulers). You are not some special unlucky snowflake. Mitigating that requires some precautions (like cash reserves and vassal management and, to be honest, getting bigger). Don't take those precautions and yes, things can go sour very quickly. Thats because not taking those precautions amounts to bad play. Problem is, if there are no consequence for bad play, then theres no real challenge. 'Roleplaying' isn't a valid excuse.
As I said above, I have read of some adventurers being unmanageable without reasonable precautions - but most adventurers are. Of course, if you don't want to take those precautions things are likely to go sour, but thats part of gameplay.
You are acting like an idiot now, if you play as a count and have an adventurer declare war on you and you can not win, then you lose the game. What you want to remove a mechanic because it made you cry? What other games do you play? Do you also complain about the mechanics in those games that make you lose and demand they get nerfed or removed so you don't have to actually play the game to win. You choose to play as a count because you want the challenge and when you get a challenge you what complain?
My rulers rarely have good relations with vassals, I typically run my vassals borderline rebellious, because with the current system it allows you to do it. I just took over a kingdom and inheritted another, sacrificed my brother, destroyed the two kingdom titles and probability of rebellion is "high" but I use my councillors to improve relations and stop faction joining. So they just never revolt, if there is a risk you can also use the free opinion modifiers called gifting cash and honourary titles, or if you are so inclined just use the free opinion exploit. If I have all vassals with 90 opinion of me then I'd be very surprised, I used to play the whole elective vassal love game, but that is actually not as effective as my current approach with Primogeniture and traits like cruel, wroth, greedy and the like. Vassals have become a side note in most of my games, and I only look at them every couple of years to move my councillors around and make sure everything is within expected parameters.
I never imprison and banish temples and cities for cash, you do not need it. If you have cash issues, then you need to learn how to tax your vassals. You set it to large or harsh, I typically just run on large but with my last game creating Isreal, I set it to Harsh straight away with an incoming holy war and never reduced it back. From there I was able to run 2 of the horse archer mercs for decades holy warring and expanding with little contest. Then add in the retinues later in the expansion and vassals very rarely for multiple war fronts, Isreal created before(pretty sure it was before) 1066. I had 1 adventurer claim against my realm, who was some catholic living Greece, who showed up with 30k troops. What a joke I just took my horse archers over and dealt with it (12k troops vs 24k after letting them seige a few holdings - no contest). The only other invasion was the Seljuk invasion which hotdropped from space 60k troops right next to my capital, I lost that war (first time I lost a war to them ever), but I didn't come here and complain. I have however noted it in several threads as something that could be improved(no warning), but you deal with it and move on.
Just because you or someone else likes to run elective rulers and grease the pockets of their vassals, does not mean others play that same way. I rule them with an iron fist and squeeze every cent I can, if they get upity, they go to meet kali(in my current game at least) and replaced. If I need troops, I hire mercs that is what they are for. So I guess I roleplay more than those other people you are talking about, not exclusively obviously. Currently thinking about switching to buddist to change my heir to my 3rd born who got strong, who is likely to be betrothed to his cousin who is also strong, because why the fuck not? My current heir is married to a tri kingdom princess so it is not very likely.
No claimant wars on me, or even adventurers, nothing planned and 100 years into the game, so either I am doing something right or those that get constant adventurers are doing it wrong. Don't want claimant host? Land your children and silbings, and tax them. You want troops? Hire Mercs. More than one way to play this game, whether you are being a kind and generous liege or cruel and wrothful. Both approaches I will point out however are roleplaying. You might call them "gamey" rulers (also gamey does not mean what you think it does) but in reality they are roleplayed by people wanting to be kind and generous to their vassals, sure they go the extra mile with elective and playing genetics but it is not needed and typically causes more problems in the long run.
By good management I mean, de jure drift everything you can into your primary title. Make sure your vassals are your culture/religion, do not exceed your grasp until these few things are done. When they are you are able to expand further and increase your de jure realm as you go. In my Jewish game I never created other kingdoms or even empires, once the duchies started drifting into the realm my power grew even faster allowing me to rush to Jerusalem and take it all inside 2 decades, even against the shia caliph who controlled all of Africa and the Abbassid/Seljuk alliance. If your realm is spread thin over several kingdoms and you have precious few de jure vassals, you are going to have a bad time. Realm management is important and part of the game, ignoring it leads to people not realising why they get hit by so many troops at once that they can not defend against.
ok, so my brother, who also happens to be my selected heir, decided to adventure against me.
I tried to imprison him (~90% chance). He escaped, and I got a tyranny penalty of -40.
I tried to assassinate him, failed. 350 gold per attempt, so I only tried once.
Then he attacked me with a 20k stack. The maximum I can get is 5k. I had some retinues, so that's 7k, and 2 merc bands, which makes 12k. He obliterated me, of course.
Oh, and byzzies are the largest, with 18k. So my brother managed to gather world's largest army in finland (that's where it spawned).
Game over.
This mechanic IS broken. Stop defending it.
I tried to imprison him (~90% chance). He escaped, and I got a tyranny penalty of -40.
I tried to assassinate him, failed. 350 gold per attempt, so I only tried once.
Then he attacked me with a 20k stack. The maximum I can get is 5k. I had some retinues, so that's 7k, and 2 merc bands, which makes 12k. He obliterated me, of course.
Oh, and byzzies are the largest, with 18k. So my brother managed to gather world's largest army in finland (that's where it spawned).
Game over.
This mechanic IS broken. Stop defending it.
Game over? Are you sure?
A) You tried to imprison him, then tried to assassinate him, lowering peoples opinion of you along the way. Thus meaning you get less levies, thus meaning you done goofed.
B) You made some decisions they didn't go your way therefore the game is broken.
From those 2 options, only one is actually true, think about it the game beat you. Sounds to me like bad luck along with bad planning, but are you telling me you have no landed relatives? No sympathy from me.
The only time i've had problems with adventurers is when they arrive while my realm is already deep in a war and all my available levies are called up and fighting on a different front. Thats happened very rarely because as soon as i get the warning, i evaluate my chances and if i'm already currently in a war, i will end it quickly and save up gold for mercenaries and troops for when they arrive. Then when they do its either a fair fight or more often than not i obliterate them with superior numbers. So i dont really understand where all these complaints are comming from.
Correct, my levies is normally around 6k I think. Which is not relevant, since his army would have crushed me anyway. Year is ~905, so remember, his 20k army is larger than that of byzantine empire's. Besides, why do my vassals think I'm a tyrant because I'm trying to imprison or assassinate my brother who's gathering an army to kick me out? WHILE HE'S STILL IN MY COURT?
Not that my vassals' opinion of me is relevant. I have no way of defeating a 20k army. None. And since I always play ironman, I can't savescum, meaning I lost hours of gameplay due to a broken mechanic.
Adventurers need to come from somewhere. What the hell does that even mean, "adventurers"? Are there 20k people sitting around in some village in finland waiting for a random dude to ask them to join a war? Where do they get their armor, weapons, training? The county it popped from is a province in finland with 2 holdings, maybe around 300-400 levies?
I would understand if they had ~8k. That's half of byzantine empire's army, mind you. But 20k, as well as the tyranny penalty for punishing people trying to oust you, is utterly ridiculous.
Oh, and no, mercenaries are not enough. Getting 10k of mercenaries would cost ~1500 gold (together with 2-3 months of monthly cost). I get 8 gold per month.
I said before that I loaded the save game in order to check out the numbers he would spawn with. I know what I'm doing. Like I said, I have never lost to an adventurer before... but allowing a 30k man army to just materialize in your capital is something that shouldn't happen by design. And you shouldn't have to be forced to land traitors just to end their ambitions because arresting them is a -40 tyranny penalty. It just seems like a really bad idea to be scheming against someone from within their court. And it's bizarre that he can somehow find room for the accomodation of 30k troops right in the capital city.
Some fixes that they need is that they cannot scheme if within your court, they will be moved to another nearby court that isn't too far to interact with if they do want to begin an adventure. Adventurers outside your political range should not be able to start up invasions against you either. That would at least adress some of the grievances expressed in this thread.
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He is your brother if he replaces you, you play as him. If he only takes the kingdom and one county, you become his vassal hence not game over.
Game rules are if you try to imprison someone without good reason it is considered tyrannical. Failing to assassinate and being found out about is considered dishonourable. -50 to vassal opinion, now you get 50% of max levies - assuming max before - rising your actual risable levies to almost 10k (assuming you could actually rise everything), plus your retinues giving you 15k troops. Which can easily defeat 20-25k troops with proper use of generals.
So not a broken mechanic, you lost the war before it began. But still not game over, more like rage quit and complain on the forums.
Also I only play Ironman, only play standard to do testing. I never savescum and it is the same with others, this is not in any way related to ironman.
Game rules are if you try to imprison someone without good reason it is considered tyrannical. Failing to assassinate and being found out about is considered dishonourable. -50 to vassal opinion, now you get 50% of max levies - assuming max before - rising your actual risable levies to almost 10k (assuming you could actually rise everything), plus your retinues giving you 15k troops. Which can easily defeat 20-25k troops with proper use of generals.
So not a broken mechanic, you lost the war before it began. But still not game over, more like rage quit and complain on the forums.
Also I only play Ironman, only play standard to do testing. I never savescum and it is the same with others, this is not in any way related to ironman.
Unless you are a count, none of these myriad of scenarios mean "game over."
They either mean some loss of land and/or a title, or you becoming a vassal.
Also stop it with this bullshit argument of "magically appearing." Things appear out of thin air all the time in this game, I can fly in thousands of mercenaries from England in one click to Venice, magically fly in women, nobles, holy men, holy orders, levies, and so on. Nearly everything in this game magically appears out of thin air, it is a needed abstraction that also takes place when it comes to adventurer hosts.
I seriously have the feeling that some people want to play a game where it is impossible to lose anything ever. This game has already become laughable easy since they caved in to people whining about levies, and now I spend a whole game not having one single faction revolt, the faction system basically does not exist anymore, nobody plots, and this is somehow exciting for people?
They either mean some loss of land and/or a title, or you becoming a vassal.
Also stop it with this bullshit argument of "magically appearing." Things appear out of thin air all the time in this game, I can fly in thousands of mercenaries from England in one click to Venice, magically fly in women, nobles, holy men, holy orders, levies, and so on. Nearly everything in this game magically appears out of thin air, it is a needed abstraction that also takes place when it comes to adventurer hosts.
I seriously have the feeling that some people want to play a game where it is impossible to lose anything ever. This game has already become laughable easy since they caved in to people whining about levies, and now I spend a whole game not having one single faction revolt, the faction system basically does not exist anymore, nobody plots, and this is somehow exciting for people?
Yeah, no. Sorry, but being attacked by more troops that you'll ever be able to raise as a count and without warning is not a challenge, it's a game-ender and no amount of skill is gonna save you. THAT is why people complain about adventurers. Unless you're a king or an emperor there's often no chance at all to beat them. Is a person who spent several hours on a save, managing his domain only to be roflstomped by a "lulz I haz thousands of troopz, jajajajaja" moneyless beggar out of nowhere really an idiot if they rage?
The system is good in theory.
But it's implemented badly thus not fun.
You are a King of a single (small or moderate) Kingdom and it's only <200 years since game start?
- Scam the jews -> save -> assasinate the adventurer and reload until it works ... or straight-out reload an autosave before the adventurer event.
You are playing ironman?
- Bad Luck. Try playing a different nation. Byzantine Empire for example. See, it's realy easy now to handle adventurers, that was not so hard, was it? The game is not broken at all.
"But this is not fun!"
- Listen to the fanboys who call you a whiner. Stop complaining!! IS IT FUN NOW??? START HAVING FUN YOU WHINER!!!!
Edit: For your information, I do not play ironman mode. I like playing guys that, for a certain period of the game, could be game-overed by adventurers, if I am unlucky. I am not afraid to use saves to simulate being lucky in those situations.
But it's implemented badly thus not fun.
You are a King of a single (small or moderate) Kingdom and it's only <200 years since game start?
- Scam the jews -> save -> assasinate the adventurer and reload until it works ... or straight-out reload an autosave before the adventurer event.
You are playing ironman?
- Bad Luck. Try playing a different nation. Byzantine Empire for example. See, it's realy easy now to handle adventurers, that was not so hard, was it? The game is not broken at all.
"But this is not fun!"
- Listen to the fanboys who call you a whiner. Stop complaining!! IS IT FUN NOW??? START HAVING FUN YOU WHINER!!!!
Edit: For your information, I do not play ironman mode. I like playing guys that, for a certain period of the game, could be game-overed by adventurers, if I am unlucky. I am not afraid to use saves to simulate being lucky in those situations.
This.
It is in no way tied to your total troop strength, or anyone's total troop strength. It's just an arbitrary large number of troops that the game pulls out of its ass without regard to either realism or balance
If you compare it to say a Norse prepared invasion... the hosts get literally 10x the troops sometimes, because rather than getting a certain size contingent every so often and that adding up to a realistic troop total, the game deals with adventurers by just saying "hm how about a 20k stack here"
where the hell is this guy with no land and no money, living in the middle of nowhere, getting the largest army and navy in the world? How is he paying them? What are they eating?
Makes zero sense and anyone defending it is just being dense
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In my current Hungary game, (1066 start as Duke of Transylvania. So still an Arpad) I have my vassals joining factions all the time, I even get factions with 100% strength that never fire. WHY? I have a 1000 gold rainy day fund and a Retinue. I got an Adventurer Host to attack me BEFORE I was ready. It spawned in Scotland and had no ships thus never made it to Hungary and died of starvation/attrition after ten years.
I routinely have rulers known as the Cruel or the Wicked. I banish uppity vassals get the Tyrant malus yet no one revolts.
How this is tied to Adventurer hosts I don't know, but Adventurer hosts are only problems in the 867 start when levies and gold are in short supply and Adventurer's are plentiful.
If they cut maximum Host's by 50% they would have a more believable numbers and still be able to beat most realms before 1000 AD. And some players would still complain about it.
It isn't like I haven't ragequit before or even whined on the forum..........its just that it is actually counterproductive......the developers seem to have deaf ears to most complaints.
I routinely have rulers known as the Cruel or the Wicked. I banish uppity vassals get the Tyrant malus yet no one revolts.
How this is tied to Adventurer hosts I don't know, but Adventurer hosts are only problems in the 867 start when levies and gold are in short supply and Adventurer's are plentiful.
If they cut maximum Host's by 50% they would have a more believable numbers and still be able to beat most realms before 1000 AD. And some players would still complain about it.
It isn't like I haven't ragequit before or even whined on the forum..........its just that it is actually counterproductive......the developers seem to have deaf ears to most complaints.
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Your counter argument completely misses the point.
I play on very hard and yes, this game is easy as it currently is... but trying to make it more difficult by randomly throwing 30k stacks at you is bad gameplay design. I've had 6 adventurers thrown at me in less than 120 years... they're not a challenge, they're just tedious and boring. I haven't lost to them but I wish the challenge came from better implemented and fun designs than this. If other AI kingdoms weren't such pushovers we wouldn't need adventurers.
And so you your saying that you vehemently want to keep adventurers because nobody plots? Can't you see that you're just as annoyed about badly designed game aspects as other people? If they made the revolt system more lethal and managing vassals a lot harder, then the need to rely on adventurer's to provide challenge would decrease.
1) Someone trying to overthrow me is not a good enough reason to imprison?
2) My max levies were 6k, not 10k. For your reference, I had norway and sweden, and 2 provinces in finland, nothing else. So no, there's absolutely nothing I can do.
3) I'd be willing to accept losing titles if I made a mistake, or if the way I lost a war made sense. But when I lose because a game mechanic is broken, I'd rather do something else.
If you cannot see that 20k is utterly ridiculous, and that trying to imprison someone who's trying to openly overthrow you in your court is tyrannical, than there's nothing left to discuss.
The imprisonment tyranny malus is broken IMO, it often makes no sense at all. Invade england with William and imprison and banish an anglo-saxon lord to take his titles and give them to a norman? well that norman will hate you because of "tyranny"
absolutely ridiculous