Medieval 2: Total War

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Oh I'm not saying that I managed to beat the Mongols when they attacked - they have taken both of the settlements they have attacked so far - but they have been very inefficient about doing so.

They could have send two-three armies to attack each settlement but instead they send them all to a single settlement at a time and let most of their troops just sit there doing nothing productive. Even when they attack they seem to leave most of their troops just standing there trading arrows with my towers instead of sweeping into the settlement through the smashed gates. I have never seen such stupidity in an enemy.

As a result I have been able to inflict massive casualties using two settlements that I had just taken over and not had a chance to build up the defences. The whole lot of them are now heading towards Jerusalem which I literally just captured and have left a single unit of milita to guard. Now the whole lot of them will waste at least three turns getting there and conducting the siege. Meanwhile my assassin will be attempting to pick off the last couple generals and troops from my better developed settlements are besieging the first settlement that the Mongols attacked (Damascus).

 

Same for me, I tend to have at least one faction suffering his Holiness' disapproval, generally with a second getting close.

OTOH, it is rarely the Scots. For me they are quite a mild, pious faction who rarely bother other countries.

Odd, I found them very powerful, but beatable (just) and that was with a mere two settlements anywhere near them (I was France). This was even in the open field, where I beat them once and the second time (although I was defeated) I hurt 'em so badly that there were only a few survivors left to return to their closest city.

They worked well for you? For me they were very disappointing- they killed very few and tended to take large casulties in return. On paper they looked great, but it was as if the computer just woudn't let them attack. Odd.

Anyway, enjoy the French, Aldeth and bear in mind that the Scots Guard are most definitely your friends.

 

One thing that perplexes me about the Scots, it says their commanders prefer to fight on foot. Im pressuming that only affects the army when you have no general in it?

 

I think I have seen Scottish generals where they and their bodyguards are infantry instead of cavalry.

 

They worked well if you use them reasonably. Their one weakness is that they only have light armor, meaning they have a problem with missile fire. So no, they aren't going to do well if you charge them head long into a group of 5 pavise crossbow units. They'll take casaulties, and then the crossbowmen will simply run away when they get close, only to resume firing once the distance increases again.

What they work well for is the way I conduct battles - I usually prefer to circle my cavalry around and drive the opposing infantry towards my missile units. That isn't bad if they just go towards the missile units, but sometimes they get to the missile units, which is very bad. Having groups of chivalric knights to protect missile and bombard equipment is great. They are also decently good in defense of cities. Basically, they work great if the enemy comes to you, not so great if you have to pursue the enemy.

Yes, their generals do have bodyguard units on horseback if that's what you mean.

Even more curious. In the lone settlement they took - as my previous post implied, it wasn't even a good fight. I doubt I gave more casaulties than I took.

 

Started to play online, and it's great fun. A few tips for other newbies like me:

1. Don't use any artillery except the rocket launchers. People will ask you to get artillery, but if you're not playing siege, it's better spent somewhere else. Elephant Artillery is also okay, but it's kinda expensive.

2. If you play as Tirumids to use the Elephants, which are great fun against factions with lesser cavalry, prepare that people who still have not learned to fight them will flame you.

3. Do NOT go all on one type unless it's support units such as missile infantry. People don't like being the sole provider of cover while you have fun in the front lines, and unless you are like me and like to build the attack from the root instead of fight from the frontlines, don't stack up on one kind of unit.

The exception of this is the Aztecs, because they really got no other choice.

4. People are much more forgiving in this game than in most other RTSes, but that doesn't mean you can mess around in a serious game. Keep your eyes sharp and mind fresh and don't take fifteen years just to buy your army and you should be fine.

5. Don't play Mongols. They are unbalanced, everyone knows it. Seriously. Play the Tirumids instead. Same effectiveness but higher prices to balance it out.

 

You assume correctly. I had recently acquired Marrakesh from the Moors, and the spanish seemed adamant to take it from me again. As I mentioned earlier, they did eventually get excommunicated, and even stayed excommunicated when I killed their king in the crusade to Leon. They did get reconciled once I killed their new king when he laid siege to Leon, but managed to get excommunicated again for attacking Cordoba, which they seem very persistent in wanting to besiege even with only three unit armies. Granted, my garrison consisted of only three units itself (1 spear militia, 1 muslim archer and 1 mortar unit), but they have proven very effective in halving the attackers in sallies with just ranged attacks.

Other factions do get excommunicated from time to time, but there seemed to be a rather long period of non-excommunication for any catholic faction in my current game. The french did manage to get themselves excommunicated at one point, and as I sent out an army to take advantage of this, they got reconciled again. By that time my forward spy had noticed that Paris had become a rebel settlement again, so I just sent my army that way and conquered it. It's kind of fun to have a single settlement that is surrounded on all sides by the french, english and the HRE.

You seem to have had bad luck with the Mongols then. Three times they attacked me in my current game, and three times they got their armies decimated by my cannon towers. Even the times they actually did bring their artillery to bear, they got quickly wiped off the playing field. Trebuchets, rocket launchers, they were no match for the almost randomly fired cannon balls of my towers. In fact, once I saw a trebuchet lying in pieces at almost twice the normal maximum firing distance of my towers. Guess it was one of those freak missed shots that actually managed to hit something.

I did get some message to the effect of: "Ur c0mput3r just got pwnzered by teh reinforcements, so they r delayed." Meaning that my computer wasn't powerful enough to display the 6000 units of invading armies and the roughly 1000 of my own army at the same time, so the reinforcements only showed up on the battle map once the current army was down to a certain percentage (roughly 50%, I believe). And then they usually tended to sit on the edge of the map for a while before nicely positioning themselves in front of my walls. Though the last army to reinforce them usually just remained sulking at the very edge of the map.

I've noticed something similar in the few occassions I actually met them on the open battlefield. I had a unit of Hospitaler Knights charge a unit of their heavy cavalry missile units, and even so they simply got owned and were down to half their numbers, while their missile(!) cavalry unit had only suffered 1/4 losses. Given the fact that my Hospitaler Knights had full armor upgrade I would have expected them to make mince-meat out of them in hand-to-hand combat, but it was actually the other way around. I guess that when they say the Mongols have the best cavalry available, they aren't kidding.

I've had similar experiences with Sicily's dismounted broken lances (though they have a defense rating of 20+, not an attack rating of 20+, so it might be different). They simply kick ass in taking settlements. For an invading army, I usually mix 2 units of broken lances with 2 units of sword and buckler men and have them take the brunt of the attack (which they can usually easily take), while my cavalry circles around and attacks the opponent in the back, preferably at a critical time as to cause a quick rout.

As for having them run out to the opponent, I only do that when I think my cavalry can't do it alone, for instance when the enemy has a lot of spear men. And when I do, the combination of a cavalry charge from the back and flanks, along with the headlong rush of my infantry causes a rout fairly quickly in most cases.

/edit
The expansion of my Sicilian kingdom is going well. The most recent addition to my kingdom was Toledo, which was a well developed citadel sporting a fancy Swordmaster's Guild Headquarters. More upgrades for my favorite units, and a good place to retrain my armies, which had been diminished quite a bit in the conquering of the Iberian peninsula. And with this acquirement of Toledo, the existence of the spanish on the Iberian peninsula seems doomed.

As I was besieging Toledo, it struck me as a shame that it was so poorly defended. It would have been a truly formidable task to have taken it with a decent garrison defending the place. And without the moronic AI sallying forth while they would have been better served sitting tight. I would have had to bust two more gates, had not an enemy unit sat right outside their gates, and opened it for me when routing.

Another thought was that it would have greatly benefitted from ballista towers or the like. It was kind of a surprise when I had captured Toledo and found that it did have ballista towers. Only my assassin had sabotaged them. I love my assassins and spies.

Further to the south, the Moors are still confined to Timbuktu, and even though they've got plenty of troops, they seem reluctant to take over the village to the west of Timbuktu. A turn or two more, and my assassin will have eliminated the last of their family members, though, and all I will have to do is to send down an army to take over a couple of rebel settlements.

In the middle east, the Turks are about to be reduced to a single settlement as well, as I'm about to take Tblisi. I wonder if the Venetians will attack me if I destroy either the Moors or the Turks, keeping in line with the 'max 5 enemies at a time'-theory. It would be convenient, as I could then finally conquer all of northern Italy. Though actually a little redundant, as I'm already at 37 settlements at this point, and with Timbuktu and its neighbouring town, the last two turkish settlements and the remaining settlements on the Iberian peninsula I should be getting pretty close to the 45 required settlements.

Actually, I just remembered I had sent an army south from Durazzo to take over some Byzantine settlement, but had completely forgotten about. There's another two to three settlements to conquer. Four or five if I decide to totally wipe out the Byzantine empire.

[ February 21, 2007, 01:09: Message edited by: henkie ]

 

I decided to try my luck on-line, but i have a couple of problems. First i can never see many games, max about 4, and most of them are in progress. The 2nd is that when i did get into a game, created my army and stuff, and when we got to the fighting, i found out the guy who was Tirmuids had only bought Elephant Artillery, which my Musketeers couldnt damage, and charging cavalry against them was a slaughter. Kind of a gay tactic if you ask me.

 

Ermm, Dalveen, you didn't meet someone named Rutkowski did you? <.<

However, if someone play Tirumids, they play it for the elephants. Prepare for it. Try to get the elephants to rout and suddenly the dude have lost half if not his entire army.

Also, if you can't see more games, then maybe you haven't gotten the 1.1 patch?

 

How do i rout them tho if i have no flame arrows?

 

Maybe the key is to have cannon towers. You see, of the three ass-kickings delivered by the Mongols, only one of them involved a settlement with cannon towers. Also, that one settlement was a city, not a castle, and I think I would have been much better off with multiple layers of defense. Question: When you get ballista/cannon towers, do the interior towers of a fortress or citadel also fire ballista shots/cannon balls?

Or perhaps the issue is you always sally forth when under seige, at which point the AI just stands there for some reason, doing nothing. I imagine it would be quite fun to spend an hour or so lobbing cannon balls at stationary Mongols. I think that's kind of cheesy, so I let them put up the seige and then attack. I only sally forth if I'm actually going to sally forth, and not hide behind walls.

I don't play online, and I've only fought the Timurids once, so I don't remember much about them. However, it seems to me that if musketeers are incapable of damaging the elephants, then you probably won't have any more luck with arrows.

OK, now that's something I've yet to see - a Guild Headquarters - and I mean a Headquarters of any type of guild. I have received the first level guild for Assassins, Thieves, Merchants, Explorers, Knights of St. John, and the Theologians. However, the second level guild (master guild) I have only received an offer for a Master Thief guild. I have never been offered to build a Headquarters (third level guild), nor have I ever conquered a settlement that possessed one.

 

Gunpowder units and short-range multi-fire siege weapons. Fear is the key, and those are the best to inspire that.

It's either that or send horse archers at them. It takes time, but they'll rout eventually.

 

my Musketeers werent even damaging the elephants. And he destroyed my monster ribaults

 

Ribaults are not what I'm thinking of. Use the Rocket Launchers and the siege engine used to defend other siege engines.

Also, the gunpowder units are not ment to kill the elephants, merely rout them. After they have panicked, send light cavalry after them to finish them off.

And with panic, I mean rout. NOT rampaging. If they do that, you are forced to go with your exposed units far away from it and pray that it doesn't follow.

The elephants are really effective, but also really expensive. Abuse that. Wipe out the rabble he have gathered that's not elephants and he'll loose when the elephants rout.

 

I don't care much for ribaults actually. I've never purchased a monster ribault, but I imagine it is a slightly improved version of the same rubbish. I'd rather have another missile unit instead.

 

I don't know for sure, but I suspect they are. As every tower normally changes from normal arrows to ballista on an upgrade, I see no reason why this would be different with interior towers. I can't be too sure though, as I've yet to attack or defend a citadel fully equiped with ballista/cannon towers.

I suspect it was the sallying forth that won the day. You're right about it being cheesy, but I don't really care. I much prefer to see their units get massacred than to see my own units get massacred.

I've been lucky in my game with the Sicilians. Not only did I acquire the Swordmaster's HQ from Spain, I also got the Thieves Guild HQ in Naples, the Assassin HQ in Damascus and the St. John's HQ in Acre. Especially the Assassin HQ is useful. Not only does it give a 10% bonus to law, it makes every assassin I build, anywhere, a journeyman, meaning that I have at least 3 stars on every single new assassin, usually even 4.

I've also noticed that different guilds are usually bound to different places. Castles in Northern Africa and the Middle East are prone to get a St. John's order in it (though this may require previous participation in a crusade, I'm not sure), whereas towns in the same region have a high probability of getting an Assassin Guild in it.

Castles on the Iberian peninsula seem almost exclusive in receiving a Swordmaster Guild, and most of the european cities get a generic Thieves' Guild. Some european cities seem more prone to receive another guild, such as the Explorer's Guild or the Merchant's Guild.

 

Holy crap! I've never got past a Master's Guild, and you've received 4 HQs in the same game!?! I have another question - Some of those HQ you said you have got through conquest. However, I'm assuming that at least the St. John's HQ must have been offered to you, as that's normally a rebel/Muslim settlement, and thus would not have received that guild. Did you do anything unusual in this game to receive the initial offer for the guild, and then to get offered to upgrade it twice all the way to the HQs? Perhaps the successful completion of numerous crusades? I can only assume that there is something different about our playing styles that prevents me from getting HQs offered to me.

As I previously noted, if not a crusade, at the very least, conquest would be required, as Muslim settlements are ineligible for these guilds.

Actually, the only swordmaster guilds I have received (level 1 offered, and a conquered level 2) were in Central Europe. I've been offered to build the first level guild while playing HRE, Poland and Denmark, and the conquered level 2 guild was from Hungary. As far as I can tell, you can get offered theif guilds anywhere. So long as you produce theives (and who doesn't?) you get offered the guilds. I typically have about a dozen level 1 guilds in my kingdom and a level 2 somewhere. I have received the explorers guild while playing Spain, Portugal, and Denmark. The only time I received a merchant's guild was playing Denmark, and the only time I received a theologian's guild was playing Poland.

Now, there seems to be some pretty obvious things you can do to get guilds, but it doesn't work that way in game. For example, if you conquer large areas of Africa, and convert them into Christian settlements, you'd think that would help you in getting a Theologians Guild. However, when I was Spain and I conquered and converted essentially all of Africa, I never got offered a Theologians guild. Similarly, in the games where I've had a ton of high level merchants working those out of the way settlements in Africa, I didn't get offered a Merchant's Guild. To me, the whole guild process seems quite random. There are times I get guilds that I was in no way working towards, and other times I don't get guilds that I'm actively trying to recruit.

 

I've only conquered the Swordmaster's Guild, the rest I just received.

Come to think of it, I think some traits of your king might influence the selection of guild HQs. All my kings so far have had the Master of Spies and Master of Assassins traits. In fact, I think at least one of my kings had the Master of Assassins as both a trait and something in his retinue (they're both a little different in terms of bonuses, but named the same). And of course, having successfully participated in two crusades may have been responsible for the offer of the St. John's HQ. I can't even remember having to upgrade it twice, actually, just the first offer for a St. John's Guild and then the offer for the HQ. Not too sure about that, though, I usually just accept any offer for a guild house without paying much attention.

Aside from these guilds, though, I've not been offered a single Merchant's, Explorer's or Theologian's guild in this game, though I've been offered at least the first two in a game as England.

 

I get guild's all the time. I'm guaranteed a merchants guild within the first 30 turns, and a Master Merchants in the next 60. With Milan, I had a Merchants HQ in Milan, Sword smith HQ in Palmero cos its was my main Citadel. A St. Johns HQ in Acre Templar one in Addana, also had an Explorers HQ in Cagliari. I always end up with thief guild dotted about, and seeing as I hardly use assassins I have only had the level 1 guild for them.

I've only had a Theologians guild twice, one as France and one as Portugal.

One thing I've never had is the Horse Breeder guild. Anyone had it yet?

 

I have the Thieves Guild HQ in my current game plus a couple of Master guilds but amusingly I don't have any assassin's guilds despite my assassins totally creating havok across the old world. I have eliminated the HRE, Spain and Portugal via assassination and I have taken out a ton of French and Mongol generals and family members.

I have never seen a Horse Breeder's guild (but I am only on my second game).