Total War: MEDIEVAL II - Definitive Edition MEDIEVAL II Total War traits & Triggers guide

What Are Traits & Triggers

MEDIEVAL II Total War traits & Triggers guide image 1

Traits are characteristics, that affect your family members.

These effects can be positive or negative.

These traits are generated by triggers. You can influence some of these triggers. With this knowledge it is possible for you to collect good traits and avoid bad traits

As an example:

If your family member stays in a settlement with the building trigger brothel, there is a risk that he will develop the trait "drinker".

Traits affect the character abilities like command, chivalry, loyalty, authority and piety. There are also additional characteristics through the trait such as more income from trade.

I recommend choosing family members based on their abilities (traits) and specializing between generals on the battlefield and governors in settlements.

Command improves the morale of troops in battle

Chivilliary improves the population growth and morale of your soldiers

Dread improves public order and reduces the morale of enemy troops

Authority is only visible by the king. It determines how often rebels arise and how easily family members with little loyalty desert. The general with the highest authority is always the faction heir

Loyalty determines how easily family members can rebel or be bribed

Piety improves the economy in the settlement and protects against denunciation by the Inquisition. It also increases public unrest caused by other religions in the settlement

Traits 4 Good Generals

These traits mainly improve the morale and combat effectiveness of the troops. In addition, piety and authority can be improved.

Basically, defeats create bad traits. avoid that

Be successful in battles, ambushes and sieges. Your general will then get corresponding good traits. Like "good commander" or "good at sieges".

Conquer settlements to get the "Victor" trait.

Always kill enemies with your general during an battle. This creates "brave" and "battle scared". At the same time, you avoid "coward" or "Haemophobic"

for good infantry general, achieve crushing victories with an army consisting of over 80% infantry

for good cavalry general, achieve crushing victories with an army consisting of over 40% cavalry

Avoid retreating before or during a battle, this generates "coward" and "indecisive"

Traits 4 Piety

Traits for Higher Piety are allways useful and often also improve Authority, Law, and Loyalty

- Always have at least one religious building in the settlement (like a small church) that generates the extremely useful "Public Fate" trait. At the same time, you reduce the harmful “Public Atheist” trait.

- Build religious buildings or recruit priests, this gives "Religiously Active"

- Join Crusades! It gets even better when you win the Crusade!

- Complete papal missions, this gives you "adored by the pope"

Traits 4 Dread Or Chivilliary

Dread

Traits that give dread are often good for law and authority, but bad for loyalty, piety and public order.

- Always kill more than 70% of the enemy army during battle and always kill every captured solider. Never accept an ransoming offer of your own captured men. Newly conquered settlements have to be exterminated. All of this gives “BattleDread”

- Always keep taxes as high as possible and have at least 10k florins in the treasury, this gives "strategy dread"

- Complete town hall or better buildings and get "harsh judge"

- Use assassins and spies

Chivilliary

Traits that improve it are often also good for piety, loyalty and public order but bad for law and authority

- crusades, joining and winning them.

- Always kill less than 70% of an enemy army during battle and always release everyone captured. Always accept ransom of own capturedmen. Newly captured Settlements have only to be occupied. This gives “BattleChivillary”

- Always keep taxes low or build churches. This gives “Strategy Chivilliary”

- Complete town hall or better buildings and get "Just"

- Obtain "Tourney Knight" through staying in a settlement with a djousting place

Traits 4 Authority And Loyalty

Authority

-It's best to leave the fighting and conquering to your king and the general you want as your prince. This increases the authority at best. Crusades in particular are a good source of authority. Win battles and destroy other factions. That gives “winners” and “factions killers”

- During an battle, Kill enemies with your general and create "brave" or "Battle scared"

- Always have at least one level 1 religious building in the settlement. This gives Prim, good for Authoritarian & Law.

- Build town halls or better gouvernment buildings.

- Be in settlements with a horse race or a djousting place

- Use diplomats for negotiations and bribery and thus create "Political skill & Deciver"

loyalty

- Always have at least one level 1 religious building in the settlement your general is in. This creates “Upright”. "Upright" is extremely useful because it also blocks bad traits like Corrupt!

- Winning battles or staying in settlements or fortresses with stone walls is good for loyalty. This gives “Content General”

- Losing battles or staying in distant settlements or castles without stone walls is bad for loyalty. This gives “Discountend general”

- loyalty will increase, if your Faction leader and the general have both at least 3 Chivilliary. However, it decreases loyality if the faction leader has 3 dread and the general has 3 chivilliary. Loyalty is also reduced when a Chivilliarous general kills prisoners or exterminates a settlement

- an excommunicated king destroys the loyalty of family members with high piety

- Marriage to a princess gives +3 loyalty

Economic Traits

Traits 4 taxes & Law

- Always keep taxes as high as possible. This will generate “Good Administrator”

Low taxes and high public order on the other hand produce “bad administrators.” So taxes should always be as high as possible.

- If the taxes are at the highest level possible, the public order is at "blue face" and a building is completed there is a 75% chance of getting the "Good Taxemen" trait

- If your treasury is negative, you have a 4% chance of getting the useful traits like "Cheapskate & Miserly"

- Uprisings and rebellions in settlements have a 50% chance of traits like "Rabbleroucer, Disciplinarian, harsh justice & Authoritarian". These give law and authority. But be careful, your governor can be killed during an uprising!

Traits through building and owning buildings

- If your governor completes a building of the trade, farming or mining series with full movement points, corresponding good traits such as good farmer or good trader are created. Specialize your governors in building the 3 types of structures.

- Always have at least one town hall and one grain exchange in cities. This is how you prevent bad traits like “bad trader”, "ignorant" or “unjust”

- Alchemist labs, universities and libraries give very good traits for economics and trade such as "Mathematician or Intelligent" Build them whenever possible!

- Through the drill square, siege works or the military academy, useful traits such as "Strategic skill, Tactical skill, Academy trained or Good engineer" are created. These are good for command.

- The Birmastan or baths produce the useful "Hale and Hearthy" trait. This improves health and the chances of having offsprings.

- Theater, Artist Studio and Icon Studios give good traits like "Epicureean" or "cultured" and useful artist retinues. But be careful, these buildings also create the “expensive taste” trait. This is bad for tax revenue.

Bad Traits And How To Avoid Them

- Never be in a settlement with a building of the brothel chain. This creates bad traits like "Drink", "Arse", "gambler" & "girls"

- There is also an extremely low chance of these negative traits if your family member is idle in settlements or at a sea Voyage. However, the probability is less than 1% and the risk has to be accepted.

-Never have more than 50k in the treasury and avoid settlements with a bank or the merchant quarter. This creates “corrupt” or “expensive taste”

- avoid adoptions. As a result, biological children become jealous and develop negative traits.

- Assassination attempts create "paranoia". avoid enemy assassins.

- Witches can curse you. Avoid that.

-Some bad traits arise spontaneously at birth and are inherited. That's why you should get rid of family members with "ugly", "barren", "perverted", "insane" or "inbred" as quickly as possible!

- Good traits can also be inherited. Good family members should therefore have as many children as possible. Bad family members only clog up the family tree and should therefore be eliminated

Traits 4 Agents

Agents have a high chance of getting good traits when they are created. Especially if there are corresponding guilds on site of creation. Recruit lots of agents and use the best ones!

Traits are created through actions. Like assassinations, negotiations, traiding or denunciations

Merchants and diplomats benefit if the settlement in which they are created has less than 70% of your religion and/or is far from the capital away.

Merchants benefit from monopolies. this is when in a province with at least two of the same resources, all of these resources are occupied by your merchants.

Priests particularly benefit from a high rate of religious conversion to your religion in a province. To get this, gather many priests and bring them all at once to a country with a foreign religion or high heresy

Princesses are influenced by their father's traits. Make sure that only good family members have children in order to pass on good traits to princesses. Princesses also benefit from a low treasury when comming of age, this gives "natural beauty"

Source: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3306941242

MEDIEVAL II Total War traits & Triggers guide