Seems there is still a bit of controversy in the game.

Stronghold 2 is a Castle building Castle Simulator. As a Castle Simulator, the creators made a game that simulated life in the medieval period and just gives the player the tools to build it. Of course, since its just a game, its not going to be majorly accurate, but it really gets the job done.

Sure there is a little micro management, but thats what a Castle building game should do! They didn't market Stronghold 2 as the best medieval war game out there, the Total War series takes the cake when it comes to battles. But Stronghold 2 was amazing and unique in that you are able to control large amounts of individual units to fight someone elses simulated castle. If they didn't manage it well, you'd win. If they did, you'd have to step up your castle in order to produce something to beat him.

So to simulate the game as real as possible, they added Crime, Gong and rats, all huge parts in the medieval period. Without these features, SH2 becomes much easier and solely about fighting and less about getting a stronger well managed economy in order to defeat your opponent.

So yes, it makes it harder, but nobody said the game was going to be easy! It adds liveliness to the game and it separates the true masters from the regular players. This is long, but I hope I get my point across that whether you like it or not, its there for a reason.

Gong:
I agree that in reality there is lots of 'waste' to dispose of, but I would not expect my workers to just **** wherever they please like outside the castle kitchen door or in front of the armory. I usually take it out when I map. It might help if we had little outhouses to place for the folks but had gongmen to clean them out every so often before diseases spread.

Rats:
Rats make sense as it would be a real problem that must be dealt with.
Should be a few cats around too.

Crime:
That's real life problem too. BUT if I am handing out extra rations and low or no taxes I don't expect to have any petty thievery going on.
Although a much larger assortment of crimes would have been more interesting. Like: Hi-jacking of supply wagons. Stores getting robbed. An occasional murder.

Gong:
Ever read about the middle ages? They used to just take there waste and dump it in the roads. Medieval life was very unsanitary. They didn't really have much else they could do; when they realized dumping it in there drinking water killed them they couldn't do much else. Eventually, gong farmers game about and just collected all the **** and put it in a big hole. Eventually, sanitation came about, and over time life became clean again.

Rats:
Yes

Crime:
Back then, and even today, not everybody is perfect. Some people are very greedy and will still be criminals. I mean hey; if someone is giving you gold and food but you have the opportunity to get more food, wouldn't you? I mean, who knows how long this lord will hand out food....

QUOTE:
whether you like it or not, its there for a reason

There is no reason for them, a game is made for you to like so naturally if you dislike something you voice your opinion and hope for change

I have no idea how anyone can justify gong as it was in SH2, it made no sense at all. A gongfermor was incharge of removing excrement from outhouses, might be a shock to some but humans still had brains in the middle ages and did not pull their pants down in the streets (for the most part). A gongfermor was only permitted to live in certain areas of a town and was only allowed to do his trade during the night to prevent all sorts of troubles.
Contrary to popular beleif it was a service people took for granted because they did not see gong farmers work, much like today as we just flush and forget.
Again, I don't get it.

Rats, I can't really argue with that. I would prefer to just see tiny rats running around randomly in your village, the number growing as you expand. I really don't want to control the problem, they existed but i'm not entirly sure they were hunted as such. It was left to each person to care for their house and workplace. They had traps and poisons in the SH timeframe to deal with this issue, they did not rely on birds. If we move on a little further and talk about the Black death then it is Cats that did the work for most poor families.

Crime, has always existed and will never go away. I liked the way SH1 delt with public torture, icreasing such structures made the workers more effective but lowered popularity. I'm not saying crime should not be added to SH3 but I want it simplified quite a bit because towns with public forms of Torture generally had little crime.

Im a SH/SHC fan so naturally I want SH3 to be based on that winning formula, I don't want the SH series to stray from what made it my favorite game.

I personally love having to manage rats, gong, and criminals. It really adds to the feel of a castle sim. Sometimes it is annoying when all of a sudden all your farmers and lumberers just disappear because there is too much gong and rats. I do think maybe there could be a little less rats, gong, and criminals but when you're in a big castle, I guess that's bound to happen.

I hope we get this again in sh3 but not so much bugging like it was in sh2 too.

But yeah it was really a good point for a castel sim game and is a big must have.

I usually only enable gong, rats and criminals when i need it for one my missions (as a quest), but it just gets annoying for me.

I always place my guard posts at the granary, and everything else thats needed as close as possible (which is hard when everything close to the granary is food production).

If I place a gong pit, I'll put a falconneers post as close to it as possible. Spread it out along the map and you'll be fine.

Maybe a tweak would fix it ...or something.

Oh I loved the crime!
I guess I'm a bit of a masochist, because I really enjoyed watching the torturers going about their work.
Their writing was too funny!
"I've caused more pain than you this week!" "Nah, I think you'll find I've caused more pain than you!"
"Oi mate, do you smell burning?" LOL! I love it

Rats and gong really are annoying but also make it more realistic in my eyes. I love the crime system and torturing and/or executing the criminals.