Strat is not very user friendly

[Dehitay]

If it makes you feel any better, even well experienced players don't have a damn idea what to do with trading since nobody bothered explaining how it's supposed to work after implementing it.

[Oberyn]

Well chadz said that it works based on distance. So I'm guessing a good's worth grows exponentially the farther away you are from the place they were bought. Ideally a really profitable caravan would make a constant complete round trip around the map in a circle buying/selling goods at opposite points on the diameter of that circle. This would have to be modified according to geography, trade deals, enemy territory, etc.. but the basic idea would be the same.

[The_danish_lost_viking]

I think its very hard to get in to a town, i think i need to make it more easy

[Teeth]

I think the only way too properly participate in Strategus as of now is by joining a clan. They know what you have to do and basically that is what this is all about, wars between factions. Which is the main focus point so far. As development progresses they will implement more things for the clanless player, but they arent that far down the line yet.

Trading has been implemented, very basic now but that could be interesting for a clanless player like you. Sadly we barely have any idea how it works yet, but we will find out. Clanless players can play a huge part in that, cause most clans are rushing for the troops and gold and can't afford to waste time or money at this point.

Strategus is very tied to this forum, partly because it is a beta, and a lot of problems will show up. Also diplomacy and messing with the enemy largely goes on this forum.

Strategus so far is mostly enjoyable when your in a clan, I recommend joining one, cause Strategus can be very awesome.

[Tristan]

Well besides trading there ain't much to do but fighting.

Join a clan. Seriously. It is strat 101. Join a clan.

I'll just repeat myself. Join a clan.

And just another advice:

(click to show/hide)

Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.
Join a clan.

Get the point?

[Fyre]

I mentioned before, I have a clan that may try to make a move over to strat if we can figure it out.

[RandomDude]

I mentioned before, I have a clan that may try to make a move over to strat if we can figure it out.

The fundamentals are pretty basic.

Earn money by playing crpg and by working in settlements.

Recruit troops from settlements.

Spend your gold on equipment for those troops. Save some money for upkeep/costs/paying wages to people who fight in your battles.

If you have enough troops, attack a village (best done by pooling all your armies together)

A battle will appear on the c-rpg.net website, strating roughly 24 hrs from when you attacked.

Anyone can apply to fight for the battle.

Any member of your faction with a ranking of 5-10 can edit the roster.

You have to manually pay your fighters after a battle, win or lose.

If you win the battle, the fief is yours. You can change the taxes and I believe the fief owner is able to recruit a bit faster than everyone else.

Thats pretty much it apart from trading. I just wrote a small guide for that (http://forum.c-rpg.net/index.php/topic,18061.0.html) so id rather not type it all again here.

[Fyre]

I appreciate all the advice you guys are giving, though I have managed to figure most of it out. My real complaint is that it was overly difficult to do certain things due to poor interface design.

[Tot.]

More newbs is what we need here blah blah blah

Sorry about him, Fyre, someone left the troll cage open again. 

[Phazey]

Most of us don't really know how strategus works though and we're just guessing / trying / bothering the devs on irc with questions...

But Fyre is right, a guide and some documentation would be nice.

This is what i gathered you can do as a clanless player in strategus: gather some gold in strategus by playing regular crpg with your main character (only the main earns gold atm in strategus  ).

Then enter a fief by moving close to it, clicking the "You are in the vicinity of xxx" link and clicking 'Enter xxx'. You might have to wait a few minutes depending on how close you are to the 'center' of the fief.

Inside you can recruit some troops (you don't play upkeep for up to 60 troops?) and you can buy some trade goods (if there are any available).

Then you travel to the other side of the map and sell those trade goods in another fief for profit and hope you don't get attacked on the way.

You can also try to sell your strategus earnings for crpg gold, i guess.

Or recruit troops and try and raid other traiders, steal their trade goods and sell those. 

Look into the eye candy grease monkey script, it improves the look of the strategus website quite a bit: http://forum.c-rpg.net/index.php/topic,11210.0.html

The more troops you have, the more goods you can buy.
Obviously you want to buy low and sell high.

There is a distance multiplier involved too, so the further you travel before you sell, the more you get.
I tested it only a few times myself so I dont know the optimal location to sell - perhaps 1/2 the map is the max distance bonus u get i think.

There's only "trade goods" so dont worry about that.
Transaction tax goes to the fief when you buy or sell trade goods.

http://forum.c-rpg.net/index.php/topic,18061.0.html -> Strategus trading guide faq by RandomDude


Let's compile some basic strategus newbie advice (besides 'join a clan!') and see if someone is willing to compile it into a guide.

[RandomDude]

(click to show/hide)

Most of us don't really know how strategus works though and we're just guessing / trying / bothering the devs on irc with questions...

But Fyre is right, a guide and some documentation would be nice.

This is what i gathered you can do as a clanless player in strategus: gather some gold in strategus by playing regular crpg with your main character (only the main earns gold atm in strategus  ).

Then enter a fief by moving close to it, clicking the "You are in the vicinity of xxx" link and clicking 'Enter xxx'. You might have to wait a few minutes depending on how close you are to the 'center' of the fief.

Inside you can recruit some troops (you don't play upkeep for up to 60 troops?) and you can buy some trade goods (if there are any available).

Then you travel to the other side of the map and sell those trade goods in another fief for profit and hope you don't get attacked on the way.

You can also try to sell your strategus earnings for crpg gold, i guess.

Or recruit troops and try and raid other traiders, steal their trade goods and sell those. 

Look into the eye candy grease monkey script, it improves the look of the strategus website quite a bit: http://forum.c-rpg.net/index.php/topic,11210.0.html

http://forum.c-rpg.net/index.php/topic,18061.0.html -> Strategus trading guide faq by RandomDude


Let's compile some basic strategus newbie advice (besides 'join a clan!') and see if someone is willing to compile it into a guide.

i msg'd shik about putting it in his FAQ or updating it himself

It makes sense to have everything there imo.

[Espu]

The UI is being transferred (by Harald mostly) to the same engine as the cRPG site. Once that is done, it is possible for mere mortals like me to join in and make the UI easier to use. Atm it's messy and difficult to use for both users and developers.

As for instructions / tutorials, the forum is certainly the major source of information. Occasionally some motivated person or a group writes a more refined set of instructions but due to the evolving nature of Strat things sometimes change fast and with little published information. There is basically "enough" info around, but it's often scattered in forum posts and irc logs and some effort is required to form sufficient understanding of the underlying mechanics.

Most developers find documentation the most boring part of any software project and few are willing to spend the little time they have to spare on documentation instead of implementing new cool stuff.

Anyone is free to help in any way - well written forum threads are usually made quite visible and wiki is freely editable to anyone (even though a lot of info is missing and lot more is outdated). Currently the best source of information are the sticky threads in Strategus General Discussion, feel free to contribute to them.

[Jarlek]

-snip
Anyone is free to help in any way - well written forum threads are usually made quite visible and wiki is freely editable to anyone (even though a lot of info is missing and lot more is outdated). Currently the best source of information are the sticky threads in Strategus General Discussion, feel free to contribute to them.

People really should write more stuff in the wiki. Right now it's just sad to look at.

[Dehitay]

Anyone is free to help in any way

Ooh ooh! Give me some development rights. I've always wanted to code in a function on the marketplace to allow offers of gold for items. Also, I could easily make the Strat site more user friendly by just adding some instructions. In addition to being an awesome programmer, I'm also capable of project planning and documenting.

And best of all, I can use my development powers to tell everybody that I'm better than they are!

People really should write more stuff in the wiki. Right now it's just sad to look at.

I completely forgot that thing exists. There really should be a link to it on the main website if that's where we're going to be storing instructions

[KaMiKaZe_JoE]

I really thing we should nerf cav.