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The Guild II - Thread is Out of Sync!
Xaviar
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
So, I enjoy this game, but I'm having a hard time getting the hang of it. So I want some discussion.
I know people have been talking about it a reasonable amount in the Steam forum, but I figured it deserved its own thread, especially considering how many people have picked it up in that last sale.
Currently available by heating water until it boils for $14.99USD. Also in a pack with the expansion for $24.99.
I have the expansion, but I've been trying to get the hang of the original first.
UPDATE - Apparently the expansion is standalone and also $14.99. It includes everything the original has. It is also what we are playing online. So there's no reason to buy anything else, I guess..
Stolen from the (poorly written)wikipedia article:
The Guild 2 is a role-playing middle-age life simulation video game and the sequel to Europa 1400. It was developed by 4HEAD Studios and published by JoWooD Entertainment on September 29, 2006. The game uses the most popular gamebryo engine, the same engine popularized by the role playing games Oblivion and Fallout 3.
The Guild 2 takes place in a medieval world in which the players begins his own story, to create an up to the distant days existing family empire to rest many years later, and to indulge in the wealth. The game features the ability to run a dynasty to compete against the computer or other online players. The game is the successor of the medieval life simulator Europa 1400. It was also thought of multiplayer games, because the game includes a multiplayer mode.
The object of the game is to become rich, famous and powerful through bargaining, diplomacy, and sinister actions. In addition to german cities around Augsburg and Heidelberg, the backdrop for this complex mix of economic and life simulation with a dash of role-playing, but also other european areas like the mountains around Lyon in France or the Sherwood Forest. A total of seven players and locations to choose from instead of individual cities, there are small tracts of land complete with a few settlements and some wildlife. As a counterpart to the classic continuous game players will find the so-called dynasty mode, this is no concrete targets so long as, until his own dynasty is extinct.
The idea is that you are dropped in an area with a few towns or cities, and your job is to start a business, raise a family, and break into the political scene, slowly building your dynasty until you basically run the entire area.
There are several different classes, and each one has different paths. For example, if you start as a craftsman, you can start with a small smithy and make metal goods, or a carpenters shop, or a tailors shop. As you progress you can continue down each path, making a larger smithy capable of producing bigger things, or you can diversify into the other paths. Eventually you'll be able to secure resources for yourself as well, which will really increase your profits--if you own your own mine, you don't need to buy iron from the market.
Beyond Craftsman, there is also the Patron, who has farm and cooking-related paths, like ranches and bakeries, but also they can build and run the bars, inns, and the like. The Scholar, who runs the apothecaries, but also the churches. There are two religions represented, and if you go this route, you'll have to fight to convert your followers. The last class is the Rogue, who runs basically a criminal empire.
Once you get your business off the ground, you'll want what everyone wants -- more power.
Politics is your way to do this. By running for and holding office, you gain the privileges of rank. For instance, the judge has immunity, because, come on, are you going to find yourself guilty? But he can also set the severity of punishments. The captain of the guard can, quite obviously, command the city guard. The mayor can set the sales tax, and also embezzle money from the city. And so on.
But, what happens if you want to diversify? Can a craftsman only corner the production market? Nope. If you want to break into the bar trade, go seduce and marry a patron. Once they are in your dynasty, you gain access to them as another playable character, and all the benefits that includes. Yes, it is theoretically possible to have your family control the entire political landscape (though I have never been anywhere near successful enough to do so).
But, what happens when my wife and I die? Is it over? Was this all for naught? What about my legacy?
Fear not, I say!
You can have children, and they grow up and join your family as productive (or subversive) members of society! And they can have children of their own! So long as you make sure to keep at least one person of playable age (you can't play children) alive, you can continue. So when your first character dies of (hopefully) old age, his son can pick up the reigns, if he's old enough.
Also, you probably have figured it out by now, but it bears mentioning:
The economy is real and functioning, and everything you do impacts the prosperity of the area.
Screenshots!
Fighting. Not actually all that interesting, but there ya go.
City hall, where you go to purchase titles, apply for office, and do other politically-inclined things.
Pretty..
So.. That's pretty neat.
Discuss.
Multiplayer Guilding!
So you want to pit your mans against other peoples mans? On the interwebs?
Good luck. The first thing to realize is that the net-code is horribly buggy. Just fair warning. But that said..
So here are some tips to make it work, if you want to play with us.
Yeah having said how horrible the desyncing is we are still trying to organize multiplayer games. This game is ridiculous.
IMO the Fun : Borked ratio leans in favor of fun. It just means knowing that at some point... any point really our little pocket universe will implode on itself. I do see reports of people successfully having decently sized games go for many hours over many saves, before father time decides to get drunk
I think it says something positive about the game when I still want more and more multiplayer now, even though it flat out doesn't work
So here are some tips to make it work, if you want to play with us.
- Play the expansion, Pirates of the European Sea - This doesn't help with the sync issues, but it doesn't hurt either, and it's what we are playing. If you haven't purchased it yet, just get the expansion. It is stand-alone, and you don't need the original.
- Install the modpack, located here - Again, this is what we are playing. Reports are that it does not affect the sync issues, but does make the game more fun and playable in other ways.
- Install the hotfix, located here - What do you know, it fixes things! (note if you follow the instructions in the above step, this will already have been done)
- This spot reserved for the beggar fix. Presumably if we are doing this, they should all be fixed the same way? Someone let me know the consensus?
- Edit some configs!
- Navigate to your game directory. For steam: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\common\the guild ii - pirates of the european seas
- open config.ini in notepad or other text-editor of choice
- ctrl + f
- type in campaign = and press enter
- change the value to "_Network"
- Get Hamachi
- Network name: patheguild
- password: wang
- Start with a fresh startup. If you've been previously playing, quit, and load it up again.
- Run the test at www.speedtest.net
- The person with the fastest upload should host
- Pick a smaller map - the more stuff going on, the greater the chance of losing sync
- Set Normal to be the maximum speed. If you go faster, you'll probably lose sync.
- If possible, fewer AI dynasties seems to be better.
- Slow the game down when saving and loading to give everyone a chance to catch up.
- Save every day.
- Disable autosaving. Do it by hand, the autosave messes with your junk.
- Reports indicate quicksaving is also bad. Go to the menu to save, kids.
- Don't just get thugs and beat everyone else up. That's lame, and you are lame for doing it.
Xaviar on
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The expansion pack is standalone, in case anyone doesn't know, and it includes all of the content from the base game. So if anyone is interested in getting The Guild II, just purchase The Guild II - Pirates of the European Seas. It also shouldn't overwhelm you with new features that would make you feel like you have to try the base game first. It essentially adds two new professions to the game, including various buildings related to them. There are also new maps, goods, and artifacts.
This mod pack is also worth checking out for the standalone addon:
http://forum.jowood.de/showthread.php?t=169283
It fixes a lot of bugs and adds in a ton of new features. It consists of work from basically the entire modding community, including two previous large and popular releases (Back to the Roots and Sovereign Edition).
One other thing that should be known about the game in general is that it has multiplayer. Multiplayer appears to be the massive single-player mode but with other people online. You can all create your own dynasties, fight for political office, engage in espionage and sabotage, and compete for goods and profit together. The mod above also works with multiplayer, too, with some features geared toward that mode specifically.
Out of sync issues are still present even after years of patches.
Too bad considering just how awesome The guild 2 is. It basically has everything anyone could want out of a living city in the 1400s.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTYXhqwGPTU
Also, I read that there's a 2.1 or 2.2 patch out for the original, but that all of the expansions are broken in some way or another... and there's a third(?) expansion on the way...
It looks very interesting, but unfortunately I have no time for this right now.
Steam Profile
3DS: 3454-0268-5595 Battle.net: SteelAngel#1772
What the NPC priests are doing is actually converting people to their faith, with the added benefit of saying "And the church I work at is way better than the other one, so you should pray at it instead."
Anyway, the moneymaking of church work is from giving sermons, which is a 10-hour global cooldown, meaning you can't just be constantly giving sermons while rotating which priest is doing it. If it's not on automatic, try to keep an eye out for when you see people leaving their homes with the "Attending Church" action.
You get a little money for each attendee, but you get more if you offer Host. Just make a few stacks, and then put it in the Sales Stock section in the inventory, and it'll be sold automatically during sermons. The real money, though, is when you make poems, books, and letters for sale in market or through the church itself if applicable.
Once you're able to convert people to your flavor of religion, try to regularly have a priest in high-traffic areas throughout the day. The marketplaces, bridges within a city, and sometimes even the city gates see a good amount of people. This requires a level 2 church, and a specific upgrade, as I recall.
Also, try to keep an eye out for other churches in the same town. If you go Protestant and there's only a single Catholic church in the town, you can compete pretty safely, but if it's instead both a Catholic and Protestant cathedral, you should probably consider being an alchemist instead.
Unless you're fine with burning down churches.
I have yet to test it, but you may be able to just forgive your own sins through the high-end items, so oddly, Scholar may be a better choice for playing dirty than Rogue.
Has anyone done this? I hope (and kind of assume based on the depth I've seen so far) that such an obvious crime would lead to me being strung up or at the very least being hauled in as a suspect in a trial.
Technically I'll just be brutally murdering the opposing families that own those churches and burning their houses.
I'll have to look into automating the churches. I'm trying a rogue and scholar marriage to see what kind of shenanigans that enables.
Uh, I wasn't running for the office at the time (I eventually did have a daughter fill the vacancy) but I HAVE murdered the Inquisitor in a town since he was in a convenient place and had been getting on my nerves. The family head was the chief magistrate though so he had immunity to prosecution.
I HAVE taken advantage of the torturer/jailer's ability to haul people in for interrogation to remove a rival for a seat from the election meeting though.
Steam Profile
3DS: 3454-0268-5595 Battle.net: SteelAngel#1772
This will be here until I receive an apology or Weedlordvegeta get any consequences for being a bully
And Disney World is nowhere in sight.
Buy some titles, have an employee from your house shadow them or ask around for evidence.
For me, it comes down to having enough money to bribe them, or enough evidence to make them cower and give in.
Maybe start by waiting until the last possible moment for a town meeting, then apply for a vacant seat.
Let the bribing and blackmailing commence!
And Disney World is nowhere in sight.
Bribing doesn't count against you in any way. It's pretty much expected in the game.
But man, I love this game. I was playing the Modpack Dashui linked, but it still has some bugs and the guy making it won't be available for a couple of months, so I'm taking a break.
I still haven't gotten the espionage parts of the game down, though. I usually play fairly honest and just try to make a living and get elected, but since the Modpack really ups the AI aggressiveness, I need to learn the intricacies of removing rivals.
I wouldn't waste your time with the base game or the latest expansion, Venice. Pirates of the European Seas is all you need and is the most supported version for mods. There was even an official patch that added the Venice map to PotES.
Finally, a game that lets me be a a stereotypical Jew. I think I will play as Shylock.
Joseph Curwen.
And Disney World is nowhere in sight.
PSN : Bolthorn
My complaint about the Craftsman profession is that it's kinda hard to have steady income. People don't buy your products near as much as stuff from the patron profession, so you're basically reliant on the markets, and once you saturate those income dries up. I haven't tried supplying raw materials with the stronger dynasties, though.
I haven't messed around with it as much as the other professions, but it does seem like it's much more reliant on supply and demand than patron or scholar goods.
When I had a woodcraft store selling torches in a small, poor town, they would fly off the shelves. This diminished as the town got richer. Having to switch up goods is hell on your storage space though.
Steam Profile
3DS: 3454-0268-5595 Battle.net: SteelAngel#1772
It helps if you're the inquisitor/bishop so you can get a boost as the plaintiff and have another dynasty member as the chief magistrate so you can always get at least one guilty vote and set the punishment for the town as harsh for extra leverage towards guilt. Which is still pretty corrupt, but at least in your favor.
Steam Profile
3DS: 3454-0268-5595 Battle.net: SteelAngel#1772
Did patches help? or was it just me that had issues
So far I'm loving the scale of economy that it is possible to run in this. My current family has something of a stranglehold on Dansig's taverns, not to mention the town council where we're pretty much a mafia. I purposefully don't apply for higher offices so I can retain voting rights for each position.
This meant I had to manually remove loot from my thugs' inventory and tell them to go back to the road every time they took a couple sacks of wheat from a passing cart.
Also how do I rotate building blueprints?
I can't join in but this sounds like fun, how long does a game usually last for?
This will be here until I receive an apology or Weedlordvegeta get any consequences for being a bully
Beggars are from one of the mods, aren't they? They're not in the base game for sure.
I think you rotate by holding down control.
Steam Profile
3DS: 3454-0268-5595 Battle.net: SteelAngel#1772
Its really fun so far, but is it possible to make a family member an "active member", set them in their workshop of choice, get it up and running like you want, automate it and then take them out of the active member group?
also there are some weird bugs in this game
AKA [PA]Ilovepandas
oh okay, thanks. And yeah I guess the beggars are fan made but it really pissed me off because there was no way to get those invincible hobos away from my hideout besides razing it to the ground and then waiting until they wander off toward the city.
Just like single player. FOREVER.
I would. How is multiplayer?