Lifespan of Generals

[Zaphod]

Do Generals and Admirals age and die of natural causes, just like monarchs and advisors? Does it make any difference if they remain unassigned to a unit? In storage so to speak until you may need them?

 

[Dr. Zoidberg]

They do, not sure about the last bit.

 

[Mrdie]

Everyone in the game dies. Bishops, the Pope, Kings, Queens, Admirals, Generals, Advisers, etc. No matter what.

The only thing that is eternal are units. Well, until you kill them, that is.

 

[Strager]

I am Eternal! So is Johan and MrT - Everyone else dies though.

Doesn't matter if they are in storage-make use of them when you gottem

 

[unmerged(503)]

from what ive seen in the demo I see some issues here right off, one, military tradition is darn hard to gain, and it degrades too quick. I hate to say this but you need to adjust this right off. skills learned on the battlefield in a period of "peak" activity are not so easily forgotten, it bleeds off wayyy too quickly for my liking, remember that in essence top tier commanders were the rock stars of thier day, and people corrosponded, shared ideas, or published thier works, de saxe etc...

next!!! lol...leaders DIE WAY TOO SOON...ive had a hard fought war got to 20 military tradition, figured that was all I was going to milk out of that war, got a ho hum :} leader 2 shock 1 manuever, as I recall, and he died 3 months later :}!!!! LOL NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! so I had to use my monarch...and he died in battle. seriously though, change the survival percentages here.

but all this aside, im very much so enjoying the demo. ive purchased 6 games in the past month and im playing this demo BUWHAHHAHA! gj paradox.

 

[Jernau Gurgeh]

I too have had generals die a short time after I created them. Funnily enough, I got them in wartime and they died shortly after peace was made. Maybe they just retire?

 

[von Rosen]

I think military tradition should be both slower to accrue and slower to dissipate, but if it had been so in the demo we would never have seen it work within the timespan. If it was only made more lasting it woth accumulate to much and most player nations would rise to 100% in a century.

 

[unmerged(6777)]

I know it's natural to want to be able to get to 100% tradition quickly and then stay there so you can recruit the best possible generals, but that's rather problematic since then you're saying that you want the uber-leaders (the ones that in EU2 are a once-in-a-lifetime general like Napoleon) to be a dime a dozen.

Part of this may be due to a misconceived comparison between EU2 and EU3 generals (same is true of admirals, etc). When you see a EU3 general you need to remember that a 0/0/0/0 EU3 general is roughly the same as a 2/2/2/0 EU2 general. That's because the EU3 general's stats are added to the unit stats, whereas in EU2 it replaced the unit stats. BIG difference.

The idea with tradition is that it should be hard to get, and hard to keep. There is a national idea (battlefield commissions) that reduces the rate of erosion, and there's the war college (expensive province improvement for your capital province) that further reduces the rate or erosion. With these two things you can eliminate the tradition loss during war, and have fairly slow erosion during peace -- but it's "expensive" to get this (as it should be).

Otherwise, to maintain a high tradition you will need to be involved in very bloody, prolonged conflicts which will eventually give you enough tradition to get that uber-leader we all dream of having. There's also a very tiny chance of an uberleader popping up when you recruit a general at lower tradition (essentially even a 6/6/6/6 general is possible at 0 tradition but the chances of getting one are incredibly tiny) which simulates the once-in-a-century-or-two miilitary genius that seems to appear out of nowhere.

Now...if you really don't like the balance that Paradox feels is appropriate for the game, open the \common\defines.txt file and look for these lines:

military = {
	<snip>
	0.3	# Tradition gain base value from combats.  
	0.2	# Tradition cost in percentage to recruit a leader.
}

Increase the tradition gain value more towards 1.0 to get more tradition from battle. Change the cost value to something tiny (0.001 or whatever) so hiring a general won't cause you to lose 20% of your current tradition value.

Now open the \common\static_modifiers.txt file and look for this section:

war = {
	diplomats = 1				#1 diplomat yearly if at war.
	max_war_exhaustion = 10			#base max at war.
	war_exhaustion = 0.041			#about 1/24 increase each month
	army_tradition = -0.02			#lost 2% yearly at war.
	navy_tradition = -0.02			#lost 2% yearly at war.
	
	prestige_decay = 0.05			#lose 5% prestige each year at war.
	merchants = -1				#1 less merchant if at war.
}

peace = {
	max_war_exhaustion = 10			#base max at peace.
	war_exhaustion = -0.083			#about 1/12 decrease each month
	army_tradition = -0.03			#lost 2% yearly at peace.
	navy_tradition = -0.03			#lost 2% yearly at peace.
	prestige_decay = 0.05			#lose 5% prestige each year at peace.
}

Change the values for army_tradition and navy_tradition to whatever pleases you (if you're really dedicated to free ubergenerals then give them positive values which will actually increase your tradition for free every month without you doing anything).

The game will then become incredibly unbalance because every country in the world will be constantly fielding armies led by 6/6/6/6 generals, but if that's what you want you can certainly do it.

 

[Jernau Gurgeh]

There's also a very tiny chance of an uberleader popping up when you recruit a general at lower tradition (essentially even a 6/6/6/6 general is possible at 0 tradition but the chances of getting one are incredibly tiny) which simulates the once-in-a-century-or-two miilitary genius that seems to appear out of nowhere.

That's very good to know. Hope the AI knows when to use such a brilliant leader to go on a war spree ala Napoleon. Now, if a general's stats were uncertain until you actually fought a battle, that would make things even more interesting

 

[Daunus]

I think military tradition should be both slower to accrue and slower to dissipate, but if it had been so in the demo we would never have seen it work within the timespan. If it was only made more lasting it woth accumulate to much and most player nations would rise to 100% in a century.

agreed