Medieval II Total War: Traits & Retinue

My guide for traits and retinue in medieval 2 total war, the best game to date by CA/SEGA.

Sources/attribution:

The game manual for Medieval II total war

In-game music & cutscenes

[thesavagekitti]

Here are timestamps, as I cannot add chapters yet:

Introduction: 0:00 - 1:35
Retinue: 1:35 - 5:05
Traits: 5:06 - 10:25
The player's influence: 10:26 - 13:50
5 Amusing Retinue: 13:51 - 14:58
5 Amusing Traits: 14:59 - 16:18

[JereyStonearm]

I find it incredible that a game that came out in 2006 still has such a high number of players so that youtubers are still making video's to explain mechanics

[patmcgroin]

I'm always finding new traits. Like..."Hates Bandits". Sent a family member out to clear a rebel stack of 2 crossbow militia, autoresolved it, and he lost. Got the trait. "This man never stops talking about how awful bandits are. No positive or negative effects." To the best of my memory.

Also, I usually try to marry off my princesses early, but recently used some high charm ladies for diplomacy until they were almost old maids. One high charm Portuguese lady picked up a nasty one, something like "obsessed suitor", ie a stalker. Minus to charm and chances of marriage I believe... But all ended well when she found herself a dysfunctional English boy half her age, who became king of Portugal eventually, as his cougar wife was quite the lady and offset his nuttiness so as to make him not the worst faction leader after all. They had 4 children too, who took after their mom, thank goodness, lol...

[Avatar]

I know you are only covering the base game, but the epithets became absolutely hilarious in the old Lord Of The Rings mod.

Gandalf the Bloody.
Aragorn the Profane.
Grishnakh the Saint.

Also I love how the tavern traits are a Father Ted tribute, being Drink, Girls, Arse, Feck.

[zombies]

This in depth information in conjunction with little to no filler is why I subscribe to this channel.

Another video idea would be to expand on the corruption system. Late game, I have issues with bad, lazy, and evil generals that have low loyalty. Would be great to see something on how this system works and how I can avoid these.

[HyperboreanAnchovy]

Had Absoutly no idea retinues were transferable that’s awsome

[Peronizador]

Seeing you moving the retinues from one character to another blew my mind, i never even thought of doing that

[computer__eyez]

Excellent breakdowns. Thank you. Commenting for the algorithm 👊

[petros-vw]

Great video!! We need more of these guides for Medieval 2! Like campaign tips, how to start and advance, what to build etc. Manual was lacking information on many things (like for example sack, occupy or exterminate? etc.) What an amazing game it was!

[Lowco]

Proving quite insightful, as always. I'll have to write down some of this.

[hardywatkins]

I recently went though my export_descr_ancilliaries file making them all transferable, as well as augmenting some of them.

[NaCk]

another good one: when the pope has the trait "secretly female"

[oisheokay]

More guides please.! Can you show us how to make a nation a vassal ?

[memegenerator]

I really like this feature, brings life to your agents. however some of them have such specific needs, especially the americas dlc ones. good video.

[benjaminloyd]

My favorite Retinue is the Ark of the Covenant, which you can just acquire while on crusade.

Moving your character every turn to 100% of his movement points, has high chance of giving him Energetic trait, increasing his movement speed.

[Digital-Scriptorium]

played this since it came out and had no idea retinue can be transferred! Also, I swear certain factions get the short end of the stick for good traits. The Byzantines I swear are cursed with a high chance of bad traits but maybe it's their buildings. Whereas Italian factions IMO get super traits but again fancy buildings...

[addochandra]

What bothers me about retinue in M2TW is at a glance you don't know which one is transferable to other character or not. At least give a sign in the retinue detail...

[LazyererSoda]

I can tell you from multiple campaigns that characters who gain a special named title like The Crusader can be replaced with a newer title when they gain the max tier of a different trait. It was very common for my Generals who were on Crusade and gained the title Crusader and I would often preform noble actions with them like not killing civilians or building religious buildings would often gain them the titles like Honorable or Chivalrous.

[googlesu]

0:22

Can't wait to see this video!