How to prepare for strategus fights

[kinngrimm]

reworked the second post, still not finished.

[Ronin]

Great guide kinngrimm! I used most of the tips you posted here, and I think they did aid me greatly!

Is there a thread or something that lists all of the strategus features? I want to know more of the strategus and I am a complete detailist, so I won't feel like a mastermind until I know all the factors in it.

Besides, what would be your advices to newcomers like me?

[kinngrimm]

...

Besides, what would be your advices to newcomers like me?

get a small crew running 5-10 peopel, regularly playing cRPg so you also produce strategus tickets which can be converted into troops or gold.

Depending on play style and objectives.

Get trade going , there are lots of Free Trade Areas, you need to check the forums for that or ask specific factions.
Or rip of other traders or steal S&D if you feel risky ;), this but will earn you some enemies from the start ^^
Collect fief data about what is loomed where with which discounts, thereby you will know where to buy what to get nice gear and perhaps also a bit cheaper.

When you have spotted someone who's fief you want, get in contact with his enemies, perhaps there are already claims on some of those fiefs and you don't want to attack something only to loose it directly afterwards, you can also that way get partners and coordinate attacks on a certain faction. This but may be a longer process, as you will need to get the factions trust you want to work with. Over time you will make more friends and more enemies

[Ronin]

Thank you kinngrimm. I have some questions:

-What does quick march do or how it works?
-How does troop recruitment work? I see you have some tickets and you can convert them to troops over time. But how do you get more tickets?
-What effects marching speed? I see caravans are running around with some horses in their inventory and with as few troops as possible.
-They say you'll have to pay gold to your men when you have a large army. How does troop payment work?
-What do fiefs do exactly other than being outposts? Villages, castles etc.

[kinngrimm]

Thank you kinngrimm. I have some questions:

-What does quick march do or how it works?
Quickmarch increases the movement speed of your party for 300 minutes,
afterwards there is a cooldown within the speed is reduced for around 900 minutes.
The cooldown but is highly depending on troop size and there are some balancing issues what we have found out sofar and i think/hope the devs are aware of them and will correct the formular at one point.

Basicly you can use quickmarch to either intercept, hunt enemy parties or for the last km to get sooner to your target and not be intercepted on the way there yourself. F.e. locking down a fief while enemies don't catch you in for front or you can use it to get away in the safty of a fief so that the enemies loose track of your movement.

-How does troop recruitment work? I see you have some tickets and you can convert them to troops over time. But how do you get more tickets?
In the Info Tab on the strategus website, there is Troop Cap defined, you can choose it freely with a minimum value of 1 and i am not aware of a maximum value.

At a time you reach the troop cap, the tickets will be converted into gold, if you are below the troop cap you have setted, your strategus tickets would be converted into troops 1 for each hour, so that you can recruit 24 troops a day(anyone please confirm this, this is more a rough observation of me then a controlled test case information)

-What effects marching speed? I see caravans are running around with some horses in their inventory and with as few troops as possible.
Every troop can carry a set of gear, f.e. Body, Head, Foot, Hand Armor and weapon.
When you would have more of that then tickets, it would be packed into crates.
Every troop can carry also additionally goods as can horses.
Those goods or equipment who are not directly carried on a horse or on a trooper are shown as crates. The more crates you have the slower your party moves. Having goods from different types has a positiv effect on your movement speed, f.e. having 10k crates of one goods type makes you slower then having 4*2.5k crates of different goods types.
The formular are in one of the other strategus FAQ you can look up or i will link/copy them later.

-They say you'll have to pay gold to your men when you have a large army. How does troop payment work?
In the OP i posted a link for troop upkeep, basicly the more troops you have the more upkeep you pay. If you carry them on yourself, there is a steep curve which makes your upkeep a real problem. Upto 250 men could be provide only with strategus tickets and those converted into strat gold when you set your troop cap to 250. Everything above you need to provide your party with an additional income. When you station your troops inside of a fief, garrison them, then the curve is much flatter and you can support a crapload more of troops that way. So stationed/garisoned troops are much cheaper then those on a party. Also statioend troops are costing nothing till around 90/91 troops. Then additionally you can convert garrisoned troops into population, depending on fief you can convert different amount of troops into population. Population doesn't cost upkeep, but you are then immobile you can't take those troops out anymore and go attack anything else. Attack armies with 1.6k can be rather costly therefor when you
form those and give them gold, you have a target and you don't hesitate with your attacks otherwise they die of because of missing gold and then you don't only loose your tickets but the gear too over time.

-What do fiefs do exactly other than being outposts? Villages, castles etc.
* give you a better defendable position then open field battles
* Production Points which can be used for increasing prosperity which adds to the overall S&D available, in/decrease taxes, in/decrease goods prizes, loom&discount gear
* the means for trade, S&D used for buying or selling goods
* a gathering point to form armies, where you can stash gear, goods, gold(don't put more in your fief then for upkeep required), troops
* a title which is shown when you join the official servers
* your color/banner/faction is seen on the map when you hold a fief

[Ronin]

Thank you kinngrimm. I have a much better idea of what is going and what is going not based on your answers and my observations during this time.

I have however 1 more question:
-How does supply and demand work? Let's say 2 neighbour villages tosdhar and emirin have respectively 1000 and 9000 s&d values. So that means I'll do a better trade if I buy my goods from emirin?

[kinngrimm]

... How does supply and demand work?

default prize of a fief is 15 gold

daily increase of S&D is determined by Prosperity .

Prosperity can be increased through spending of Production Points.

Prizes and Taxes can be increased or decreased through spending of Production Points

Fiefs with less then 10 gold per goods, i would categorize "buying fiefs", locations where you buy goods.
Fiefs with more then 20 gold per goods, i would categorize "selling fiefs", locations where you can sell goods.

When you buy goods, the available S&D is reduced by the amounts of goods you bought.
When you sell goods,  the available S&D is reduced by the amounts of goods you sold.
This is independent to the prize, you can buy and sell either in "buying or selling fiefs", but well it may be not be economic but strategical depending how you interact with S&D.
If you buy/sell that many goods that the S&D would sink below the daily prosperity value, you got negativ effect on prize and i was also told on overall production, the later i can't quite confirm.

Best Case Trade Szenario:
Buy at a prize between 5 and 8 gold, in a way that the S&D is still above prosperity. Travel with those goods at least a distance of 55km to 60km  for selling them there or swapp the goods with a trade partner half way. Repeat indenfenetly. Have for this 4 fiefs included, 2 selling 2 buying fiefs on each end of the trade route one selling and one buying fief close to each other.

[Casimir]

You use two ticks per hour, you need 48 strat ticks to recruit for a whole day, this will get you 1 troop per hour.

[Kirbyy]

When you buy siege equipment, do they need to be +0 - +3 or can they just be -2 ladders, construction material, etc?

[Artyem]

Siege gear must be +0 in order to be bought.

edit: it also maxes out at +0 and can then only be discounted.

[kinngrimm]

When you respec a fief, take in consideration the fiefs close around you, what they already produce in terms of gear.

Not sure if i mentioned it already,
having 30% discount is cost effectiv, if you go for 40% it takes a shitload of Production Points, if you want first to get more gear with discounts aim for 20-30% discount rates and later you can still specialise.
The loomlevels is more a question of taste i guess. I myself always hated it to ahve 5 different stacks of one gear in an army, but well you use what you got, nevertheless the sooner you get to loomlevel 3, the sooner you can aim for perfect geared armies.

edit: i was of for 8 months, any major changes in game mechanics in that time?