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frogbeastegg
11-13-2006, 21:15
Venice is playable right from the start, without the need to unlock it or edit any files.

Amon_Zeth
11-15-2006, 06:25
Watch out for Emperor Alexius of the Byzantines, to the east. He's got about eight stars or so, and I think he usually has a full stack of troops with him. Scary.

Lusted
11-15-2006, 19:23
Overview

Venice are in an interesting position. At the start they border Milan, HRE and Hungary, and soon will border Byzantium and Sicily as well. It has good trade and a good mix of units, especially some useful militia units to protect its cities. It's unique infantry units(Venetian Heavy Infatry, Venetian Archers) do not take long to get, and are good quality troops.

Starting Position

As mentioned above, your borders are nearly surrounded by other factions at the beginning. There are 3 rebel provinces near by that you should try and get as soon as you can. Zagreb or Durazzo you wil be assinged to take by the Council of Nobles, and i go for both of them. Also try and get Florence if you can. Also try and build up good relations with the other factions in Italy, as well as Hungary as you do not want them to backstab you if you play Venice like i do.

The Pope

Do everything you can to make yourself the best loved faction fo the Pope. This greatly helps you out with wars against other catholic factions. Milan are likely to back stab you at some point, but maintain good garrisons in you settlements and let the ai attack them. This wa you beat up their army, they are the agressors, and will 9/10 times accept a ceasfire the next turn.

Byzantium

Once i've got myself quite secure in Italy, i go after the Byzantines. They field quite archer heavy armies, which can be a pain as Venice, but if you bring armoured sergeants, mailed kngihts, and your own archers along their armies should be no trouble. I plan my war against Byzantium in 2 parts.

1. Take Thessalonica, Corinth and Constantionple. Then build up my forces before
2. Taking the rest of their settlements, as well as Rhodes.

Once Byzantium is destroyed you should have enough provinces to be raking in the cash.

The Holy Land

What i like to do next, is use Constantionple, Cyprus and Rhodes as launch pads for Crusades to the Holy Land. This further extends your empire into provinces which can bring in a lot of cash, and also provides you with large armies for when the Mongols come.

Italy

All this time you will more than likely have been attacked in Italy. At first just beat them when they attack your cities then make peace. Later on try and capture a province from the factions that attack you every now and then. Then rebuild your standing with the Pope. This way you can slowly conquer Italy, whilst not getting ex-communicated.

The Mongols and Timurids

These 2 can be either a huge pain, or do nothing. Personally i plan based on the huge pain thing. Let them attack your cities, and beat them when they assault them. In open battles their horse archers and cavalry will beat you, even if you have got to Chivalric Knights and Menat arms by this point. Wear them down slowly using your fortresses.

End Game

You should already have quite a few of the 45 provinces needed for victory, and now you can do several things, or a combination of them.

1. Conquer the rest of the middle east and Egypt
2. The New World
3. Beat up some other Catholic factions to get the required provinces.

I hope this is helpful, even if it is a bit short.

santelia
11-16-2006, 20:18
Venice is a wonderful italian choice, but to really boost it the right way the right beginning strategy is the key. So, to grow fast and to easily conquer territories you have to pay attention to a couple of not so visible elements:

1) you are compelled to control narrow long territories, such as the eastern Adriatic coast, and narrow territories mean both difficulty in mantaining a quick reinforcement chain and frequent attacks on long exposed borders. Magyars, HRE and Byz could become annoying reasons to waste unwanted money to face their attacks time after time.

2) in the beginning Milan can be a quite ally, but if you really choose to ally with them and to forget them for many turns, you are in the meantime letting them build a strong economy and very dangerous armies. You risk to pay a lot, later, for such a lazy choice.

So, that's what I did:

Destroyed buildings in Durazzo and disbanded troops down there, to get an initial boost of money. Didn't care of losing the town. It will be so easy to take it again when needed lately in the game...

Build up a little but hard army in Venice, sent it with 3 spies to Genoa to open the gates, conquered the town and made a ransack. Got lot of money and strong happyness. Raised taxes. Build a harbour. Made a new little strong army in Venice. Same tactic used to Bologna, that already has a harbour. Next turn got Florence from rebels the same way. In the meantime Pope asked me just to take Florence, that I was already taking, and got some free troops as prize. Funny. Same tactic again to get Milan. The Milan remaining armies (only 3 and not so strong) became rebels the next turn, and they sadly faced my towns being beated with easy.

End of Milan faction. Northern Italy is mine.

Now spent some turns to build up my economy and enforce my armies and garrisons.

After a short body-building time, sent spies to Naples, followed by a strong army, all along the Adriatic western coast. Faced Sicilian king's army in the south and beated it 2 times, then finally arrived to the gates of Naples (opened the usual way) and conquered it. Usual ransack and usual lot of money and happyness.

Pope asked to take Rhodes from rebels, so I build up an army in Crete, sailed to Rhodes, put it on siege, and taken it after 1 turn. Another price from Pope. Great!

Then used few more turns to enforce economy all over my territories and to build up a strong army in Naples. When ready, sent usual spies to Palermo and taken it with the new army. Ransack, money and happiness the usual way. Sicilian faction is out. I am the owner of all Italy, and only have a precious tenant in Rome (the Pope!).

Now, it's time for greek territories (Corinthus, Thessalonica and Byzantium, plus my former town Durazzo).
I did it my way :beam:

Next move: Asia.

But the key of success is to be found in the beginning attack strategy.
In my way, I have the strongest economy of the campaign, and the best manageable territories, in a very smart blitzkrieg.

See you soon, mates!

phoule
11-19-2006, 23:03
Possible bug? Or feature of playing the "Merchant" civ...on turn 1, you can send your diplomat to pay HRE a visit at Bologna. Say hi, make a deal to swap maps, trade deal and alliance and then to top it off with a merchant strat BUY Bologna off HRE for 1000 florins for 6 turns, when the city is yours from the sale you'll get 5 Merc Xbows which can move on Florence in the same turn, then reinforce Bologna with some units from Venice, essentially laying claim to Bologna and Florence on turn 1 in addition to laying claim to Zagreb...then assault Florence as your first move and because of your size from the first turn Milan will be happy to pay you 1000 for at least 4 turns in exchange for an alliance, so you essentially end up paying 2000 florins for Bologna. Considering it pulls in a hefty 1200+ a turn in taxes it pays for itself very quickly. This was in a very hard campaign map...

Bug or Feature?

TinCow
11-20-2006, 16:14
I have played two VH/VH campaigns as Venice now. I lost the first and am doing reasonably well on the second. I will describe my errors in the first, the change of strategy that allowed me to survive in the second, and general advice.

First campaign:
I grabbed Zagreb and Durazzo almost instantly, with Florence and Rhodes following shortly. I made alliances with everyone I could and was raking in money. Unfortunately, my military forces were relatively minimal, with the only sizable force capable of taking the field located near Venice. Hungary and Byzantium allied and both declared war and besieged Zagreb and Durazzo respectively on the same turn. Both stacks were massive and I had no chance of defeating the assaults. I sent my large army from Venice to try and help Zagreb. Both cities fell the next turn, before my relief army could arrive. With the main force diverted to the east, Milan (my allies) declared war and besieged Florence. Hungary also moved on Ragusa. I turned the army back around made for Florence, but it too fell before I could get down to help it. HRE then declared war, defeated my main stack and took Venice. I had managed to assemble a large force on Crete and could have attempted to invade Greece and survive that way, but instead I declared defeat and started over.

Second campaign:
Took Zagreb and did as one of the previous posters advised: took Durazzo for mission money and then abandoned it. I focused spending on military development in Ragusa and Venice, with the aim of being able to fight offensively in Northern Italy and defensively behind the walls of Ragusa. As before, Hungary and Byzantium declared war and attacked Zagreb and Durazzo. However, since Durazzo was rebel, I was not at war with Byzantium. Zagreb fell and I did not try to retake it.

Despite many alliances, I soon found myself at war with Milan, Sicily and HRE. I focused everything I had at military buildup around Venice/Florence while building defenses and archers for Ragusa. I stayed on the defense in Italy until Milan and Sicily got excommunicated for repeatedly attacking me. I then managed to grab Bologna (Sicily had taken it from HRE). With Venice, Bologna and Florence all controlled by me and close to one another, I was able to out-produce Milan and took Milan and Genoa after many battles of attrition. During this time Ragusa had been attacked several times by Hungary, but strong defenses and the ferrying of troops and generals across the water by boat helped preserve it.

When Northern Italy was secured, I built up a large force, including catapults, and took the war to the Sicilians. Following the capture of Palermo, I then took Corsica and Sardinia, making all of Italy my own. By this point, I was no longer in danger of imminent destruction. I then focused on economic development and border defense for a long time.


General Comments:

Territories - You start with very widely dispersed territories. Your cities will all have to be self-reliant at the beginning of the game. This may mean giving up Zagreb and Durazzo as I did. However, there are FIVE cities very close to one another in Norther Italy. This is a major power base and should be your first objective. I would even say you could lose all other provinces and still be ok, as long as you were able to expand in Northern Italy. Once you have those 5 in your pocket, you will be in good shape.

Militia units - Venices militia are very good. Italian Spear Militia and Pavise Crossbow Militia in particular are excellent. At higher development levels, you can get a militia cavalry unit as well. On top of that, the town hall line of buildings gives you a morale boosting unit that can also fight decently when things are desperate. With all of these units, and the ability to produce siege engines, you do not even need castles to become a military power. Given that all 5 Northern Italy settlements are cities (and you want to keep them as cities for trade), this is important. I highly urge fielding armies that are based on these units. You can go most of the early game with them just fine.

Use the Carrocio Standard! (or whatever the morale boosting city hall unit is called) The morale boost is noticable and will keep your Italian Spear Militia line holding significantly longer. While they are expensive to recruit (about 750 if I remember correctly), they have a very low maintinance (about 50 I think), so they will not cost you much in the long run. They are entirely decent fighters too, and can make the difference in a battle if it is hanging by a thread. Just tell them to drop the standard and attack like normal infantry. I always keep one of these in every city and in every major army.

If you lose Ragusa, perhaps consider converting one of the Northern Italy cities to a castle. Otherwise, I believe it is in your best long-term interests to keep them all as cities.

Castle units - After you control Italy, you will want to develop your castles though. Palermo, Ragusa, and either Corsica or Sardinia should be more than enough to keep you supplied with castle troops until you take a mainland castle from HRE. Once Italy is secured, I highly urge you to hold your borders and develop your cities. It takes a while to get decent units out of Venices castles, but when you get there it is worth it. Venetian Archers, Dismounted Men at Arms, and Venetian Heavy Infantry are excellent units. Venetian Archers may even have a run at Longbowmen for one of the best archer units. They are particularly excellent for siege defense, since they have long range arrows, good defense, and can fight off anything but heavy infantry in melee. This is an archer unit that you can place in front of in-coming ladders and siege towers. When they run out of arrows, use them as an additional infantry unit.

Crete/Rhodes - Crete is an excellent outpost territory. Use milita from there to take Rhodes, which you can develop either as a city or castle, depending on your desire. Crete and Rhodes will be constantly blockaded during wars, but I have not yet seen the AI attempt naval invasions of them. They are the perfect spots from which to launch Crusades, allowing you access to Asia Minor instantly by ship, or a direct landing in the Holy Land within 2 turns of sailing. If you start your Crusades from these islands, no one will ever beat you to the objective.

Venice Defense - Defend the bridge! Thats right... that huge bridge that is the only access to Venice. If you can hold there, great, do it. Even if you cannot, hold there for a little while, shooting them up with your crossbowmen as they come across, then withdraw into the city. It is technically a battle loss, but you will have inflicted large casualties by crossbow for the loss of a unit or two of spear militia. A worthwhile trade IMO.

Pope - Keep on the Popes good side. Let everyone else get excommunicated by attacking you. Always do what the Pope asks. When the Papacy is low on money, gift money to them, particularly in tribute. They will love you and you will probably be able to get an alliance with them. Since you will be fighting in Italy a lot, you can sometimes get Allied Papal forces to fight with you. This means auto-excommunication for your enemy!

Beren Son Of Barahi
11-21-2006, 07:23
I thought i would post my experience and lessons from my campaign with Venice. although reading the post above, a lot of what i have learn is there.

Venice is in a great location and ironicaly in between a rock and hard place. that being in between alot of cathlic factions and also on the cusp of the muslim world. The Trick is to get a solid base of operations first, using ities spears and crossbows, both units will hold you under pretty heavy attack if you can keep them focused on strong points. garrison well, and after the rebel land grabs pass, work on your getting 5 cities and the two island castles if you can to the south west. this should give you both the ways and the emans to make money and work on your armies.

it is most important to do things big with venice, if your going to get merchants get lots of them and make sure you don't let others in, same goes for spies, preist and assassin, i have an army of spies, preist and assassins roaming around esp. in front of my armies... this was something i didnt do very well for a while.


* tip Pavise Crossbow Militia work very well in open ground when stagged and skirmishing, if possible aim at the units at the back of the incoming units it causes a large numbers of kills. ities spears can hold any local factions inf at the start of the game.

*tip theres alot of rolling hills around, if you can attack from the hill tops.

rhodes and the other island are great for trading and for staging a naval base. i have one castle and one city, to allow for strong riads into turkey or the holy lands.

wait for the excummincations for milan and sicily , they will attack you and them take all the settlements you can in 2 or 3 moves, i wiped out mailan and sicily in 4 turns each...

after sicily you should have great castles ready to mass produce Venetian Archers, Dismounted Men at Arms, and Venetian Heavy Infantry, as they leave alot of the other units in the area lacking....

take your time with venice and you will prove to be a very strong faction...

santelia
11-21-2006, 16:51
One of the best features of venician troops is the killer pavise crossbow militia. Not at the top like the Genoese one (14 shot stat), but very effective (12) for the cost.

Always get at least 4 of them in your army, better if you can get 6.
Play battles instead of making them resolve automatically.

Put your pavise crossbows in the front position, let the enemy army come at your range, walk few steps forward and target the heaviest enemy troops you can find.
The AI rest bug let you shoot your deadly arrows as a killing machine while the enemy troops stay there and die man after man without attacking.
This way you can destroy the heaviest enemy units (heavy melee inf, heavy cav) and the general unit too, before your arrows end.
Enemy archers and crossbows, if any, in the meantime target your most forefront units, that in this case are just your pavise crossbows. Due to their pavise, your crossbows stay completely safe while reloading, and only have the risk to take minor losses when firing.
Bafore you suffer consistent losses (30-50%) with your pavise crossbow units, they will be able to reduce at 20% 1 enemy heavy unit each 1.2 units of your pavise crossbows. Take 6 of them and you'll be able of destroy 5 enemy heavy troops.

Pay attention that your pavise crossbows must always have free sight to the targeted enemy unit, just to be effective and deadly. If they don't have free sight to the target, they use a parabolic shot that results in quite no damages at all for the enemy. That's correct, since crossbow arrows are short and thick and are designed to be effective only with a straight fire.

R'as al Ghul
11-30-2006, 15:18
I'd like to contribute my own observations from my 3 Venice campaigns. They are the only faction I've played in campaign yet, but, as they weren't in MTW 1, I found them to be exceptionally interesting and challenging. I guess the same can be said for Milan but I've not played them yet.
My first two campaigns I had to abort due to mistakes on my side. When wrong diplomatic decisions, wars with neighbours and abysmal relations with the pope plus excommunication and the plague all came together at one time, I resigned. But I've learned playing the game and Venice that way. The third campaign is around turn 160 atm and I'm doing very well.

Where to expand?
As others have stated and becomes obvious when you look at your realm, you're surrounded. Even worse, most of your neighbours and soon to be enemies can reach your capital in one turn. Especially Milan and the HRE but also Sicily will eventually try to seize it. I've not had the initial conflicts with the Byzantines and Hungarians as others describe. I guess one reason is that I didn't take Zagreb. The Hungarians and Byzantines are very often Allies after turn 1 or 2. It seems that the Hungarians have the mission to take Zagreb (I've the theory that the AI also gets missions from the "Council of Nobles" like the player, this explains part of the AI's moves) and whether you or the rebels own that settlement makes little difference to them. Let them have it and instead of fighting the Hungarians negotiate trade rights asap. BTW, Zagreb isn't making much money anyway and is landlocked.
I did however take Durazzo (you can wait for the mission to get extra cash or units) and most importantly Florence. I'd try to get Florence on turn two before anybody else gets there. You'll need the income of that city and it provides a jumppoint to the isles of Corsica and Sardinia which you can take later on. Another easy expansion is Rhodes but again, you can wait for the mission, it takes time before others get interested. You can get to Rhodes from Iraklion in one turn and you need about 5-6 Militia units to capture it. I'd recommend thinking about making Rhodes a city as I've not build a single castle unit in that place for the whole 3 campaigns. Your future castle in that area will be Corinth which is always undergarrisoned. But try to wait till you enter a war with Byzanz, a couple of turns into the game and their attention will shift eastward. Try to negotiate for trade rights, too.
So, the initial turns should be devoted to get Florence, Durazzo and Rhodes. Corsica and Sardinia are next and I'd make them cities, too. (The plan for later is to have these castles: Ragusa, Corinth, Palermo and Innsbruck.)
You should now consider how it is feasible to seize the other Italian cities Genoa & Milan, Bologna and Naples & Palermo. Chances are that Sicily will try to claim Florence (the mission thing again). Let them lay siege and wait for the Pope's reaction. If they attack you can esily repel them with your militia force. If the Sicilians get excommunicated - attack and try to destroy them by taking their two cities. The same strategy is recommended with the other neighbours. Milan is very aggressive and the HRE always short of being excommunicated. If you play it wise you can do the pope a favour by expanding to their territory. Be careful, though, it may take longer than you expect.
If you manage to take Italy except Rome you're bound to become filthy rich but you need to make sure that you've trading partners. France has been my ally for 150 turns or more, as have the Papal states. The Hungarians are undecided between war and alliance but have been trading partners for quite some time.
Further conquest depends on the situation but Byzant's greek possessions are yours for the taking once you can muster an army that's not needed to defend your Italian provinces.
If the HRE gets into trouble or is excommunicated take their castles of Innsbruck and Bern.

Economy
North Italy is a powerhouse of trade. See to it that you build the structures to support the economy and get the most out of it. You'll have trouble to upgrade your cities all at a time but make sure that public order is taken care off by building the barracks line and the mayor's buildings. Siege workshops etc. aren't that important and can be delayed.

Diplomacy
This is the most important part of the game I've come to realise. It's a major difference to the previous titles and I really enjoy it. Keeping good relations with the pope is the most important thing, after all he's your neighbour. Also you can't get rid of him in any way, he'll haunt you from exile if you take Rome and you most probably won't be able to repair the damaged relations. I've even had my King die and wasn't reconciled.
To be on the Pope's good side you need to know what makes him happy.
First of all, I offered him Trade rights and an alliance very early. He accepted and we're allies for 160 turns or more now. That's a good start but won't help you through the game. The difficult task is to keep it that way. I've made it a a habit to drop by every other turn and offer him my map info (if I have something new) as a gift. Sometimes he'll decline and even insist to pay you for it. :smile: Additionally he'll keep track of your doings and if he thinks that you're not a good catholic your pope-o-meter value will fall. So, don't attack your christian brothers before they do, defend yourself and wait for them to be excommunicated. Train a lot of Priests and send them to the Byzantine Orthodox region, to North Africa and to the borders between Moors and Spain. By converting and fighting Heretics you'll quickly gain Piety points and have your Priests promoted to Cardinals and finally to the College of Cardinals. try to have at least three Cardinals in the College to influence the Papal votings which can happen very suddenly even if the Pope is still young. Be prepared. It's absolute legitimate to send assassins to the other Cardinals to make room in the College for your own. Select the enemy Cardinals on the College scroll to learn their position on the map.
Apart from the dealings with the Pope you need to stay in touch with your allies and trade partners. Make them small gifts to maintain good relations. Seize opportunities to fight together with them. A good way is to attack a fleet when the Pope's fleet is near it and you're allied with him.
All your neighbours will sooner or later send a bunch of Assassins and Spies to your cities, even if they're neutral. Keep a spy in each of your towns and train your assassins on the never stopping flow of foreign agents. Escpecially the Hungarians and the HRE have swarmed me with agents.


Military
Military wise, as was already said, you can pretty much rely on your city troops. I've fought for at least fifty turns with nothing else but Militia. Italian Spear Militia and Pavise XBow Militia. Later you can add Cavalry Militia, Broken Lances etc....The castle units are excellent once you get them, but after taking Palermo or Corinth that won't be a problem. Shipping troops over from Ragusa to Venice is very quick. BTW, it is absolutely necessary to build a strong fleet. Try to tech up to War galleys asap and build stacks of three. Make use of the chokepoints at Durazzo and Palermo to keep enemy fleets out of your territory. Iraklion should be able to build at least war galleys if you want to survive the naval battle with the Byz empire which will come eventually.

I hope I've inspired the one or other to try this faction. It's really fun if you add some roleplay elements to it and try to stay on the good side of the Pope. Right now most of my Generals have lots of vices and very low piety but my pope-o-meter just maxed out after building the second cathedral. :grin:

Sharpy
12-01-2006, 17:22
First campaign:
I grabbed Zagreb and Durazzo almost instantly, with Florence and Rhodes following shortly. I made alliances with everyone I could and was raking in money. Unfortunately, my military forces were relatively minimal, with the only sizable force capable of taking the field located near Venice. Hungary and Byzantium allied and both declared war and besieged Zagreb and Durazzo respectively on the same turn. Both stacks were massive and I had no chance of defeating the assaults. I sent my large army from Venice to try and help Zagreb. Both cities fell the next turn, before my relief army could arrive. With the main force diverted to the east, Milan (my allies) declared war and besieged Florence. Hungary also moved on Ragusa. I turned the army back around made for Florence, but it too fell before I could get down to help it. HRE then declared war, defeated my main stack and took Venice. I had managed to assemble a large force on Crete and could have attempted to invade Greece and survive that way, but instead I declared defeat and started over.


I lost my first campaign in very similar circumstances. To avoid a repeat, I did two things; Firstly, I reigned in my conquest of Rhodes till later in the game, concentrating on consolidating the Adriatic first (the Hungarians WILL attack if you look weak). I also converted Duosso into a castle to stop it revolting and to free up units.

Second, I took out Milan immediately. It took about 10 turns and allowed me to focus on Bologna, Florence and Sicily without having to worry about Milanese armies. From that point, winning the game was a foregone conclusion.

frogbeastegg
12-02-2006, 17:33
This is not the place to talk about bugs. Do that in the Citadel.

Alexander: The hellenic empire
12-02-2006, 19:41
I am currently playing a the Venicians and I am having a lot of trouble with the Mongols who are blasting down through Europe. I have been successful in defending my castles with archery but cannot match their missile cavalry in field battles. Does anyone have any advice for defeating the Mongols.

Thanks,

I have also found out that getting hold of the new continent is not as easy as it seems. Any advice for this would be great.

I hope I'm not asking for too much.

I also hope you are having as much fun as me while playing, most probably, the best game ever.

:2thumbsup:

Il Duce
12-02-2006, 20:31
Here's my strategy (or what I have been doing for the last 50 turns):

1)Establish a strong trade economy with your neighbors quickly--especially with your Italian buddies...establish alliances with them to keep a period of peace on the peninsula; while you're at it, send out diplomats to secure your relationship with the more powerful nations like Byzantium...this will ensure that you will have at least 30 or so turns before you start getting harassed by them

2)Take over the rebel provinces--in the order of: Florence, Durazzo, Zagreb, Rhodes...Florence and Durazzo are the most important ones.

3)Send out several merchants to monopolize the resources in your peninsula.

4)Once you have a sizeable income, start building your army with more expensive units...also you should now have some cavalry units that you got as a gift from your council of nobles if you've taken some of the rebel states.

5)After building a sizeable army, take them over to Genova and kick some ass...in my case it was just some Milanese general there so it was easy...

6)Establish order in the new city, then march your guys over to Milan and burn that to the ground.

...that's as far as I've gotten...Milan has been pushed back further north and I have control over parts of the northern mediterranean and the alpine provinces...I plan to conquer the Sicilians and control the peninsula...after that, I don't know where I should go...the Byzantines and their cavalry archers are pesky to deal with (especially with a militia-heavy army) and HRE is still a bit too powerful for me to deal with...it'd be nice if i can monopolize the entire mediterranean...

Wizzie
12-03-2006, 22:46
Why Play Venice?

Venice is possibly one of the most interesting factions to play, not only for their fantastic militia armies, but also their ideal position near the seat of the holy see and the edge of the Christendom; within easy striking distance of the fabulously rich Asia Minor territories and their inhabiting infidels.
This gives you many options at the very start of your campaign. Should you take up the crusader's cross and bring the light of Christianity to the heathens across the adriatic? Set your economy on overdrive and become the trading hub of the mediterranean? Or, set your sights on Europe and crush the Christian Monarchs under your elegant velvet bootheel? Each is possible.

Short Term Goals - Early Game

Although it is tempting to band your militia armies together and ride off to sack Thesalonica and Constantinople right at the very beginning, your first priorities lie in securing you borders. Although the Council of Nobles will scream for you to annex Zagreb and Durazzo, neither is particularly wealthy or provide any significant advantages other than to over-expand your borders at a time when you are quite vulnerable. If the Council does offer a reward for the capture of either, it is worthwhile to send a token force to sack the settlements before abandoning them and leaving them to rebel. You will need all the troops you can get for the Peninsular war which will shortly be coming to a head.

The Nettle in the Bushes - Bologna

Bologna is the most pressing and tricky problem you will first have to deal with. Not only does it have a powerful Imperial Army, complete with an Emperor with an unhealthy hankering for Gondollas and Venetian girls, but it also lies between you and Florence. Although some think that Florence is a waste of time, I would strongly disagree. Not only does it expand your power base in sub-Alpine Italy, but also gives you access to the West coast of the peninsula. And this will be vital for creating various fleets, and for any military ambitions on the islands of the med, specifically Ajaccio and Cagliari.
So, one of your first orders of business should be to march your army of merchants and tradesmen over to Florence and force the resident duke to bow to the power of the Doge. However, to do this without dealing with Bologna will result in your various armies tramping all over the Emperor's lands. Understandably, soon enough he'll get annoyed at you and feel inclined to send his Germanic armies off to stick sharp things in your face.
You have three options:

Ignore him and induce the pointy things outcome.
Sack Bologna and start an early war with a powerful Empire.
Buy Bologna from the Imperials for 1000 florins for 6 turns.

Of the three, I would usually pick the third options. Not only does it remove one faction from the inevitably inter-Italian wars, but also gives you a few mercenary crossbow units for free and delivers the city of Bologna into your sweaty little palms.
However, if you do opt for the sack and pillage option, be prepared to suffer the Pope's displeasure and take on a powerful entity early on. Not really recommended for beginners.
In any case once you have Bologna you will be rated as quite a powerful faction, and it is worth trying to eek out every Florin of everybody when it comes to eary-game diplomacy. Giving away Map Information, trade rights or alliances; be a proper Venetian entreupener, sell anything you can for extortionate prices and buy anything you reckon you can flog on for a profit.

The Snake in the Grass - Milan

By now you should have Venice, Bologna, Florence, and the castle at Ragusa under your control, and you should be concentrating on building up ports, roads, farming and markets in each to maximise your income. If you are a person of a certain agressive and tyrannicaly nature, you can go for Milan straight away and try to throttle them before they become too much of a problem. However, I found it more leisurely and slightly more devious to churn out some heavy militia spearmen armies and wait for their inevitably attack on me.
While you wait, you should send some token forces to capture the island settlements of Ajaccio and Cagliari. Personally, I converted them to settlements as I thought they would turn into cash-cows later on (which they did), but I also see some merit in leaving one as a castle to support any military operations around Northern Italy, as Ragusa is quite far away. Alteratively, you can convert Florence to a castle to serve this function, but I think the islands are the better option (Florence will develop as a city quicker than the islands will). However, if you're confident enough you needn't bother turning any into castles, as Venice' militia armies are more than adequate to deal with any threats.
Once Milan attacks, repulse them with your militia armies and pounce on Genoa and Milan as soon as possible. At this early stage it is probably better to sack these settlements, as you could use the cash, but watch out for his Popeness. If Milan have expanded across the Alps, I would be reluctant to follow them. The tactic I would use is to capture Bern (as they usually will expand to Bern and then Dijon) and gift it to the Papal states, meaning you have a buffer between your little powerbase beneath the alps and your marauding enemies. Another plus to this tactic is that the Pope thinks you're the best thing since Jesus.

Fortress Italy

Now you have all of Northern Italy under you control, woohoo! :smash:
A major advantage that is often overlooked is that there are only around six to seven passes allowing access into this little money-printing region with it's big, wealthy cities. Since I wanted to move my conquests towards the Byzantine Empire at this stage, I created "Fortress Italy" by blocking all the passes with forts, garrisoned by a unit or two of cheap militia. Remember these forts arn't there to withstand any serious attacks, just to deter any wandering armies or to delay any would-be-invaders long enough for you to scrape a stack together. Once you have the money, it's worth creating a heavy espionage network with a spy in each of your Italian cities (they will be magnets to spies of the other Christian factions - and the less unrest in your cities the more you can tax them), and also spies in each neighbouring settlement on the other side of the alps. This way you can spot any invasions before it's too late.

The Mafia - Sicilians

By this stage Sicily will be hankering for some land and will probably attack you (if they havn't already). If you've been smart, you've been building up a nice, elite, small army in Ragusa. If you havn't, well you should have. Ship this castle army over to mainland Italy to take on whatever mob the Sicilians have sent against you, and hiring some mercenaries/getting some reinforcements from nearby settlements, march on Naples. Don't pause for too long in this conquest, as Sicily can be quite tenacious and have a good early-game unit roster. It's best to hit them early and fast with units like armoured spearmen that can withstand their Norman Knights/Muslim Archers combo. After a quick jaunt across to Sicily to storm Palermo (Note: the conquest of the Sicilians was a prolonged affair in my campaign because I didn't plan for it and I induced Papal interference. However, that's no reason for yours to go the same way. Know and plan for this war from the first few turns) you should be sitting sweet.

Now what?

Now you have several options. You can sally across the Alps and storm Europe, or head off and conquer the Byzantines (this is a lucrative prospect). Alternatively, you can use Palermo as a staging post for conquering North Africa, and move towards either the Iberian Peninsula or towards the Holy Lands. The advantage of starting with Crete and being within striking distance of Rhodes is that you have the perfect launch pad for Crusades - and you should exploit this. Not only do Crusades gain you favour, but turns your characters into Gods among men and make you very, very rich.

In any case, by this case you campaign will have panned out in it's own unique way and the way forward is really up to you, so happy conquering ~:)

TevashSzat
12-05-2006, 02:13
This is a blitz strategy that I have found to be very effective. I play as vh/vh.

First turn, use faction heir's army to take Zagreb. Leave one unit in it and send the rest of the army towards Durazzo. Build up three cavalry from Ragusa. Send faction leader in Venic with all garrison except for one peasent archer right next to Bologna as far as you can go. The army should be at 9 o'clock from the city if you did it right. Recruit militia in Venice.

Second turn, use everything in Ragusa except for one unit of peasent archers and go towards Durazzo. What will happen with HRE is that they will send an army right in front of your faction leader as if they are trying to block your passage through that mountain pass. Don't try to get to Florence another way but attack the army that came out. The fight is not that hard since they have lots of peasant archers. Key thing is to fight the army that is the smallest first whether it is reinforcements or the artmy that you attacked. If you do things correctly and kill a routers, sack Bologna. Leave one of your weakest units in there are move the rest to siege Florence. Hire all of the mercenaries you can at Florence.

Third turn, take Durazzo with army from Ragusa. Take Florence and sack it too. Turn it into a castle. This is very important later on. Leave one unit in Florence and go for Genoa. Siege it. Hire more cavalry in Ragussa.

Fourth turn, you might have to fight a battle with your faction leader against any army that attacks you, but Milan usually sends an army up towards Bern so there shouldn't be any heavy resistance. Sack Genoa too. Warning around this time Pope should be asking you to stop fighting Milan or get excommunicated, but continue. You can easily get reconciled later with your huge amounts of money. Meld heir army, cavalry from Ragusa, and the army that took Durazzo togeather and move towards Thessaloinca. Leave one unit in Durazzo. Remember to keep on building units in Venice to garrison the cities you conquered.

Fifth turn, stay put in Italy and build up your army. Milan might besiege Venice or Genoa, but you should be able to hold it easily. Get your general and two spear militia from Crete, hire mercs, and send it towards Corinth by boat.

Sixth turn, your faction heir army should besiege Thessaloinca and the army from Crete, Corinth. Set up for an attack on Milan.

Seventh turn, sack Thessaloinca and Corinth and besiege Milan. Turn Corinth into a city since you won’t get attacked there with this strategy. Move everything you can in Corinth up towards Thessaloinca.

Eighth turn, sack Milan. The Milan faction should be destroyed.

After this, use your army in Thessaloinca and head for Constantinople. It should be at least a half a stack and hire any mercenaries you can while fighting. There will be at least two stacks of Byzantine you have to fight, but they are not really tough fights since you should have three generals in your army as well as lots of other cavalry units. Remember to gang up on the horse archers with all of your cavalry first. Once they are out, rest of battle is easy as you can just charge the enemy infantry from behind. It is very likely that the army there becomes too weak to fight anymore at that point I suggest you head north and take Sofia which the Byzantines should have. Use that to retrain troops and build an army for Constantinople. In Italy, take the two island cities and then aim for Sicily. At the same time, try to get reconciled with the pope by giving him money. I had to give him 8000 for reconciliation, but I had like 25000 money already so I wasn’t really worried.

One important note is that try to get a ceasefire with HRE. If you don’t fast enough, they will get an alliance with Byzantine Empire at that time which its incredibly hard to get peace and then they will try to drag other factions into the fight. At one point in my campaign, I was against a five faction alliance against me. They were HRE, France, Sicily, Hungary, and Byzantine Empire. If you cannot get peace with HRE, it is important to take Innsbruck just north of Italy since if you don’t it will keep on pumping troops out for the HRE to attack you in Italy. Hungary will probably show up in front of Zagreb with a full stack, but you can hold the city by having around five or six militia units in it. All you do is position them around the gate and when they break the gate down, the whole army will rush in the gate which you will have surrounded. They enemy will be easy to defeat from there . I have defeated a full stack with around 1000 troops with only about 350 militia with this strategy. It is highly effective. Sicily will go for Bologna with a full stack if they declare war on you so put a decent sized garrison in it, but defence strategy would still be the same as Zagreb.

Nepereta
12-11-2006, 15:04
Starting Moves

Roleplaying: Crusader

Diplomacy:

1) Visit Bologna with diplomat buy Bologna off germans + offer maps + trade and allaince. Best way to buy is a perhaps around 2500 for 2 turns or so. (It varies please experiment)

2)Send diplomat to secure allainces with Pope ( offer Military access + Maps + trade + alliance) Offer each gift seperately for more bonus should get perfect rating.

3) Send diplomat to secure allaince + trade with sicily and milan.

4) Send diplomat to ally +trade with every single catholic faction.

5) Always keep your word. Make sure that allainces are broken by others and don't communicate at all with those you intend to fight early on. I got a reliable diplomatic rating for this and it makes it a lot easier in the game if people always trust your word.

Aggression:

1)

send faction leader with the x-bows to take florence.
take the two rebel territories to the east using your other generals.
Take the small rebel island to the north east of your island.

2)

Trigger crusade versus Tunis. Pope standing should be high enough.
Send faction leader + x-bows from bologna + enough mercs to trigger minimum crusade army on florence coast.
Hire cheap crusader boats on the coast
go straight to tunis and take it.
on the way back try to take out the two small rebel islands between tunis and florence.

Bring your faction leader back to venice and sit pretty with the huge pop(chiv) bonus in your homelands.

Now take a breather from fighting and build up for war:

The target is byzantium
To remain diplomatically reliable never enter or agree to talks with them

I used the following bases:
X-Bow Militia + It Milita in venice
Ballista then catapults in Bologna
Armoured Sargeants + Peasants in Raguza.
I built priests in a variety of locations and stacked them together in a horde which I nickname the god squad.
And I built lots of boats everywhere.

Attacking byzantium:


Its harder fighting them outside due to the huge numbers of horse archers they seem to tote. I would advise taking a castle or city at one end of their empire and then attacking the other using marine attacks.

I went for south greece castle first and watched their stacks approach it. Then I attacked nicae and constantinople.

Its important to bring your own artillery as it will save you a turn.( I started build ballista workshop on turn 1)

Once you have byzantium the world is your oyster. Remember to trickle a giant and growing god squad(preist horde) through your territories rapid conversion is the second phase of a true crusader.

I took another breather until rome asked for an antioch crusade.

NB rebel held antioch yields the holy lance (spear of destiny)

Ended up fighting the egyptians. Milan just got xcommed thinking about starting to fight them but we share many allainces unfortunately.

RtkBedivere
12-13-2006, 16:31
Has anybody on the venice campain tried to completely ignore the papalcy. I started out caring then kinda slipped of. I have priests in my estern territories so that i dont riot as offten but i just dont see much use for it. Now i can also expan much more easliy in europe as i dont have the pope on my back.

im just wondering if I will get destroyed in a couple turns...

Nepereta
12-13-2006, 17:48
ignoring the incredibly nearby papacy as any Italian faction is rough, you'll get slapped around by inquistors quickly and easily they rarely snipe a good friends priests and generals. Best bet imo is play the pope and manipulate him as best you can and obey when you can't manipulate. Every italian has a great shot at crusading from the get go.

However if you want RP some catholic bashing I'd suggest cleaning the italian penisula including the pope. IF you can stop the inquistor spawn point you'll be safer.

Snoil The Mighty
12-13-2006, 21:45
Long time player of the series and visitor to this site, but first post. My experience playing Venice was that ignoring the Pope proved to be a bigger pain in the keister than just keeping him happy with (initially) allaince&trade rights. Then give maps and frequest free updates. Eventually giving him military access boosted me two when I was low on the popescale. Tithe him some florins here and there. Also, anytime you are about to attack rebels or a faction the pope is war with, have your Dip give a free 'offer to attack". Those go over great with his Popeliness as well so use it. First run was on h/h and I ignored the Pontiff which seemed ok for a short while. Then the happiness levels dipped getting excommed and those Inquisitive Pyromaniacs found much fuel amongst my family tree for frequent burnings. Makes you a target of cursades too which very-not-fun and costs you not only blood and treasure but alliances and (worst of all) trade agreements throughout Christendom. But, when he really likes you, you can pretty much name a crusade of your choosing every time they are available and with him on your borders, he's a way better friend than enemy. Every 2-3 cathedrals I build now, he chips in 1k in florins when they are complete, I own the college of cardinals and the Pope has been Venetian for 1.5 centuries now. My popescale readings have been consistently 8-10 essentially from day 1 and this campaign is going smoother than the silk I sell to the rest of the world....at a nice markup.....

Snoil The Mighty
12-14-2006, 01:27
Ok, can't edit-didn't catch that so sorry 'bout the repost but to be clearer than previously-

Ignoring the Pope might not be quite suicidal as Venice, but it seemed that it hurt worse than the other scenarios I have tried. As England and Scotland it didn't hurt nearly as much to be on the Pope's naughty list as when I was Venice. As Venice it seemed to affect my citizen's happiness more, though that could have been a function of Venice's proximity to the Papal States. Also, with a central location, any crusade called on you will get Hungary, HRE, Milan, and Sicily (assuming said factions are extant) in on the first call, and likely Spain France and Denmark too. Losing alliances and even worse, trade agreements, was crippling for me. The warfare was non-stop, sea and land. And I couldn't keep more than 4 generals alive once the Inquisition got going. I usually had 3. Then once the Byzantines ally with even one of the factions crusading on you, they are at your throats too. Not saying it can't be done if you don't prepare for it, in fact I may retry it at some point, but it's by far easier to make him your Popely Pal which is very easy to do...

As with most, I started with Trade Agreement, then alliance, then map. I gave Alliance before map because I also gave free "offer to attack" each time I attacked rebels, and I believe (correct me if I am found wrong) that those offers won't gain as much interest if not allied. (If the Pope ever is at war with anyone else, I also make sure to offer to attack for free on them too if I actually have such plans. Might as well get my Pope Points!) Then I gave map and have continued to give free and frequent updates, eventually gave military access which took up two notches without adding any florins to the gift. When in doubt, tithing some florins every few turns works nicely-his Holiness has a great fondness for florins. I have gone deep enough into the game where I am on my fourth diplo who's only assignment has been keeping the Pope in my pocket. No Inquisition, very little heresy, a Cardinal College full of Venetian priests and bishops, and a long lineage of Venetian Pope's has been the result. I have completed 7 crusades, 3 where I took cities from Catholic factions. And of the 7, six were locations I asked for specifically. Hope that's clearer and that my typing was better.

RtkBedivere
12-14-2006, 15:34
Well as this point in time its probably a little to late to go back. I hadent thought about clearing italy as i was just thinking that would make the situation worse. Ill try that and if it doesnt work ill start scraping up relationships with the pope.

Von Nanega
12-15-2006, 09:51
Because of your proximity to Rome and European factions, kthe Popes pleasure is important to court. Milan was getting nosey and camping all around my border. I built two good miliia armies, and stood next to their two cities in Italy. They promptly attacked Bologna since I had moved away. I ignored their seige, and besieged the Milan and the other one an the coast. Several bloody field battles later the Milanese army was destroyed and I took the cities. Time to regroup adn charge them dearly for a cease fire. The Pope is still my little freind and Milan is crippled. :smoking: :rifle:

Nepereta
12-15-2006, 13:53
Because of your proximity to Rome and European factions, kthe Popes pleasure is important to court. Milan was getting nosey and camping all around my border. I built two good miliia armies, and stood next to their two cities in Italy. They promptly attacked Bologna since I had moved away. I ignored their seige, and besieged the Milan and the other one an the coast. Several bloody field battles later the Milanese army was destroyed and I took the cities. Time to regroup adn charge them dearly for a cease fire. The Pope is still my little freind and Milan is crippled. :smoking: :rifle:

concur same thing happened to me. Milan got excommed and then tried to attack bologna. I end up taking milan and venice before reconcilation took place with papacy.
winning gambit I think is pope friendly and focus the early wars on the heathens

benefits in short are:
1) Chivalry +piety benefits for crusaders the pop explosion benfit is great!
2) papal kick backs in terms of cash and troop experience.
3) No need for focused heavy cav build because you'll get chapter houses quickly.
4) no excoms and few inquisitions v you. ( I lost 1 priest and 1 diplomat in all the time I have been playing.)
5) the catholics that do attack you usually get xcommed.
6) you'll own the papal college and be a pope maker for years.
Problems are:
1) uniting the italian penisula takes far lot longer since you are waiting for other italian factions to attack you.
2) moslems hate me ( all bar the moors have war decced me)

Skott
12-16-2006, 05:05
I started up a Venice Campaign today (H/H) because reading about it got my interest going. First thing I did was buy Bologna from the HRE for 6800 Florin. Then I got the noble mission to take Florence which I did. During this time I allied with Milan, Papal States, and Sicily to buy me some time. After selling Bologna the HRE immediately took Zagreb. So neither Hungary nor Byzantium got it. I then sailed some troops down to Durazzo after getting the mission and took it.

I built up for a bit and then the Pope calls for a crusade to Jerusalem. I was building a army to invade Sardinia and Corsica so sent this army with my King south along the Dalmatia coast and picked up some nice units on the way. My fleet met them south of Durazzo and then ferried them to Jerusalem. The Egyptians were taken offguard. They only had two units in the city and I easily took it on the second turn of the siege. I left this army in Jerusalem to defend the Holy Land and take more territory.

Things are going really good at this point. I start to build another force to invade Corsica and Sardinia and then Byzantium attacks. At first its only naval blockades so I dont worry and ignore their ships. Next turn both Milan and Sicily attack me. At first Milan sends a small army of four units at Venice and the Sicilians blockade my ports. No problem I keep my guys inside the city and let them siege me thinking the Pope will excommunicate them. They assualt and I beat them back. Two turns later a full stack of Milanese troops attack Venice. I was trying to rebuild my troops so I waited unable to to do much. They assault and I barely survive it. Still the Pope doesnt do anything. On the next turn after beating them back two more, full stack, Milanese armies approach and I see a Sicilian army coming north. Also a small Byzantine army shows up at Durazzo. Still no excommunication from the Pope. And he's my ally and I got great prestige with him. I ask for help but he refuses to attack anyone. The money I been giving as gifts isnt doing much other than keeping my relations with him high.

One Milanese army goes for Venice again and the other goes for Florence. I beat back the Byzantine army at Durazzo. Venice falls to Milan as does Florence. On the following turn the Scilian army lays siege to Bologna. Another Byzantine army, this time a full stack, attacks Durazzo. On the following turns the Sicilians take Bologna and the Byzantines take Durazzo. Now the Pope finally excommunicates Milan and Sicily. Too late! LOL

After this Raguso falls to The HRE after I refuse to give them money. They wanted 8200 Florin and I didnt have it so said, "No". This left me just Jerusalem and Crete so I declared defeat and quit the campaign. The Milan faction built up very fast in my campaign and matched my troops unit for unit in quality but produced like four times as fast. The Sicilians had even better troops but only one army. Dismounted Knights and so forth. The HRE also had better troops but nothing I could do about them once they attacked. The Byzantines had two full stacks at Durazzo idling about when I finally quit. The Egyptians seemed kinda pansied about things. They didnt know what to do once I took Jerusalem.

I'm gonna restart the campaign again later and see how it goes. The AI in this game is alot like in RTW where it has nearby factions gang up on you. Just how its programmed I guess. The Venitian merchants seem to be better than other factions I have played. They seem better able to take over other merchants without losing. The assassins still suck IMO. Havent played a faction yet that the assassins could kill anything. The spies still suck as well. Neither the assassins nor the spies perform anything near as good as they did in RTW. I actually did get a good crusade this time. First time one actually worked for me. In past factions they always deserted before getting to the Holy Land.

This game has so much potential and yet so many flaws. :furious3:

katank
12-16-2006, 17:34
Nope, you played your opening wrong. You need to recognize the threat of Milan to you. Take out Milan ASAP and declare war first. Papal excomm isn't a life saver. Just pay off the pope to let you kill Milan in peace. If you look strong, Sicily will simply have their big stack near the border to Bologna hesitating to attack. Then simply amphibiously land two halfstacks near Naples and Palermo simultaneously to take them. Their big stack can't relieve their cities in time. Palermo is often a citadel early on which can let you pump out Venetian archers (awesome units).

You should also not be beaten to Zagreb by the HRE. You have an army in range of it on first turn.

Your forces in Crete can land right next to Corinth on the first turn and siege it on the second. Key is to attack instead of waiting to be attacked.

Skott
12-16-2006, 18:35
I restarted the campaign and this time I went more agressive and took Milan out early. Things going much better now. I'll give a write up a little later.

btw, whats these Carrocccio Standard units? I got one for taking Jerusalem and I thought it was like some little unit that gives bonus to an army. Now I got like 8 of them (no cost to me) for completed missions and I'm not sure what to do with them all. Anyone got a strategy tip for them?~:confused:

katank
12-16-2006, 20:13
Carracio Standards boost morale of troops around them, working like a general. This is very useful for militia heavy armies of Venice.

They can also be capable heavy infantry should you find a need to tell them to drop the standard to fight. They are one of the very few units capable of taking a Mongol charge. They have a hefty (+8) bonus against cav.

afrit
12-16-2006, 20:34
Hmm. I had a bit of a different experience with vh/vh. I think deterrence in the west may work. Here's my campaign summary (now around turn 45 or so):

I took Zagreb and Durazzo and Rhodes very early (i.e before being asked as a mission), then I read the posts here, and I got worried that Milan and Sicily will attack me in Venice. So I kept a full stack in the city at all times. That seemed to deter Milan (they would move an army every few turns into Venice territory and then leave a couple of turns later). Hungary also seemed to send a stack into Croatia once in a while, but in the end they attacked the HRE and left me alone for a long time. I think keeping a half-full stack in Zagreb helped.

When I noted the Byz moving a large army towards Durazzo, I attacked them first. I got lucky in that I sunk their fleet in the first battle (I massed all my ships in a single stack). This allowed me to use a marine opportunistic strategy with them. When their main army attcked Durazzo, I sailed around and took Corinth (spies helped). WHen they went for Corinth (leaving Durazzo alone!), I took Thessalonice, and seeing that I could not hold it, gave it to the Pope (so the Byz could not get it back). Then I hopped the same army across the sea and took Smyrna (also poorly defended). When their prince headed to Smyrna, I took the same army, had it join a crusade (to Jerusalem), and then took advantage of the extra movements to take Constantinople and Nicaea before the Byz stack from Smyrna could return. I am now having trouble garrisoning the 2 cities because of crusade desertions, but at least the Byz have been severely weakened.

While at war with Byz, Sicily attacked, but I defeated them outside the walls of Venice with my Doge. Despite them being excommed, I did not go on the offensive except to blockade their adriatic sea ports. A few turns later, Milan attacked, but I pushed them back and captured their capital. Pope did not complain. Now France declared war and Hungary is sending a stack towards Zagreb, but I am ready for them (I think)

Needless to say, maintaining large armies for deterrence early on was costly, and I depended a lot on sacks of Byz cities to remain afloat. I had several turns in the red. But now with Constantinople and Nicaea (and the free crusading army), I am in the black.

Skott
12-16-2006, 22:57
Okay, I started a new Venice campaign (H/H) and doing much better this time around. The trick does seem to be that Milan needs to be taken out ASAP. Once again I bought out Bologna from the HRE. I sent my eastern army to take Zagreb. Then I sent my Venetian army to take Florence. Last time I had Bologna and Florence as cities and this time I turned them into castles. I couldnt get Durazzo. The Byzantines got it before I could get there. Which i think is a good thing considering the Byzantines are leaving me alone this time. I did make alliances with Milan, HRE, Papal States, and Sicily. I later added Hungary to the alliance.

I built up as quick as I could and took on Milan. I waited for the Milanese troops to be over off my western visual range before attacking. I was hoping I could get a extra turn before they came running back. Unfortunately They got a stack back to Milan right after I laid siege to it. Bologna however was only guarded by two units. On my turn after starting the siege Bologna fell easily to my army there. The Milan fight however wasnt as easy. The Milanese had a full stack next to Milan when I started my assault with my full stack. After a long hard fight I beat both the Milanese relief army and the city troops. Milan fell. Luckily for me that also took them out of the game. I had feared they had taken a western territory but apparently they failed. I was also lucky that Milan hadnt made an alliance with anyone else. So no angry friends to come after me.

Right after this the Pope called for a crusade against Jerusalem. I sent a army there and captured the town. Only Poland answered the crusade call as well. I sent my King down from the Venice port via ship. Jerusalem only had two Egyptian units defending it so it was a easy take. Two turns after that the Egyptians asked for peace and trade which I politely accepted.

Now I was in excellent relations with the Pope. I then attacked and captured Corsica and Sardinia. I turned the Corsican castle into a city to increase profits but the Sardinia castle I left as is for any future attacks against Sicily and the Moors if needed. Next I took Rhodes and the fortress northwest of Milan. Forget its name but it was a rebel fortress and I got to it before the HRE did. Bern I think it may be called. I'm at work so cant check.

The Pope died just before I took Rhodes and the Northwest Fortress (Bern?) and after buying some votes I managed to get my Cardinal elected Pope. I then managed to take Acre after that. And thats how things stand now.

I'm allied with Papal States, HRE, Hungary, Denmark, and Sicily. I'm neutral and got trade agreements with everyone else including the Byzantines. There hasnt been much European warfare. Just Portugal against the Moors. Its like everyone is waiting for someone to attack or break alliances and start the wars going. England, Spain, and France all asked for an alliance at one point but I turned them down because I felt sure they would be the first to start a European war but so far they havent. Kinda odd because usually by now two of those three are at war with one of each other.

I have a army almost to rebel held Antioch. The Egyptians tried to take it but after a lengthy siege they were forced to withdraw. I figure I'll take it and then Adana since its still rebel. I currently got a mission to annex Gaza and I started to build another army to take it but a 3/4 stack of Egyptians showed up nearby so not sure what to do about that yet. I wanted to get Antioch and Adana first before fighting the Egyptians just to avoid fighting in the northern MiddleEast and southern MiddleEast.

I been watching the Scilians but they just been hanging out south of Rome with a full stack. They seem peaceful enough. They probably dont know what to do and got no inkling to invade anyone. Even their navy is behaving itself. Just sailing around the Mediterranean. I think they are killing rebel fleets because I havent seen many this time around and thats kinda unusual.

I dont want to be the one that breaks up the Alliance so I think after I take Antioch I'll either Attack Egypt or Byzantium. No one cares about Egypt and the only alliance Byzantium has is with Poland and Poland isnt in alliance with anyone I'm allied with. Besides Hungary is at war with Byzantium and Hungary is in my alliance group so that'll probably keep people happy if I go killing them. I been teching up the Zagreb and Ragusso fortresses all this time so I can build a pretty powerful army given time. Right now I have small garrisons at Zagreb and Ragusso but can quickly build up if need be.

I do have to watch France though. They got spies and assassins camped outside of Milan and Genoa. I think its a matter of time before they get brave and/or greedy. My assassins are useless agianst their assassins. Best chance I can get is 25% and so far every attempt has failed. I go through this with every campaign I have played with this game. Once again I'm fustrated how useless assassins are in this game. The AI however doesnt seem to have this problem. A definete flaw in the design IMO. So, anyway, I got spies and assassins at all my Italian Castles/Cities to keep the AI's assassins and spies from succeeding. So far thats working but who knows for how long.

I had to go to work so I stopped there. The year is 1180. I'll pick it up again later tonight or tomorrow when I get the chance. :yes:



Edited For Spelling & Grammar

Von Nanega
12-18-2006, 09:07
Not only must ally with the Pope, give the Papacy military access. The Pope will wander around your lands a bit with weak stacks. Since I was allied, I would wait for the stack to be next to an enemy, and attack! The pope forces would be drawn in, I would make sure they impacted the enemy line first, then I would attack. Since (in this case Mila) the enemy force would be fighting the Pope, they would get ecommed. :laugh4: Muhahahahahaha

Quillan
12-18-2006, 16:58
You can do the same thing with navies. The Papal States usually has one navy roaming around the western Med, and if you catch it next to an enemy fleet you can drag them into the war and cause your opponent to be excommunicated at the same time.

Me, I allied with the Papal States, HRE, and Byzantine Empire at the start, and made a hard choice to keep my global reputation up by not exterminating or sacking any cities and releasing all prisoners without asking for ransom. My relations with all 3 have been solid. Milan was treacherous as usual, and I had to take down their Italian cities (they had taken Dijon in my game) and Sicily jumped in at a later time. I just waited for the inevitable war between the Byzantine Empire and Hungary to break out, got myself dragged into it on the Byzantine side, then took Constantinople from Hungary after they took it from the Byzantines. This might prove to be a trigger for war with my ally, though. The turn I took it, during the end turn cycle, I was attacked by a Byzantine army. The game crashed a few seconds later and I haven't gone back to it yet to see if it will repeat.

Skott
12-18-2006, 23:25
I've learned 'sacking' a city, any city, is fine. What you dont want to do is 'exterminate' a city. Thats what gets you into trouble with the Pope and other countries. There are exceptions to this rule.

You can exterminate the town if its:
1)A rebel held town.

2)You can exterminate if its faction has been excommunicated by the Pope. He's never held it against me yet nor has anyone else except maybe the faction I'm at war with.

3)And you can exterminate the town if its a muslim faction and you are playing a Catholic faction. No Catholics care if you kill muslims.

With the exception of those three you can sack everything else and not incur anyone's wrath, including the Pope.

Ransoming survivors is kinda weird in this game. I always try to ransom just to get more cash but more often than not the faction in most cases refuses to pay and the survivors automatically get killed. The AI seems to be pretty harsh about ransoming IMO. It doesnt seem to matter if the amount is small or large. It doesnt like to buy back the lives of its own men. Not that it bothers me any.:laugh4:

Lobosolitario
12-24-2006, 06:17
I found the Papal states to be of great use in this campaign (as with any catholic faction). When playing catholics I tend to get an alliance and military access both ways with the Papal states ASAP. It's fairly easy to keep in the Pope's good books after this, by building churches and priests whenever possible, which is good for morale as well, and self-reinforcing, as it improves your chances to control the Papal elections (so far in every game I've played, every Pope after the first one has been from my faction) thus keeping Popes favorable to you in power. Step two of makes you even more popular with the Pope.

When I find myself in a difficult region, with multiple factions bordering me, leading to strained relations and possible military engagements I'd rather avoid, I use the Papal states to create a buffer state. The Pope has always been a great neighbour, with the aforementioned treaties I've never had to worry about Papal armies in the slightest, indeed they've helped me out more than once. This also makes living with the other factions a lot easier, as they're happy to ally and trade with you as long as there are no border clashes, and they're loath to attack the Papal states regions, or to send troops across them. And if they're not catholic, or are sufficiently angry at the Pope to attack, then you have an excuse to launch a crusade against them, restoring the buffer state, and knocking them down a few pegs in the process. If the buffer zone becomes more of a hinderance than a shield, just send troops through to attack the regions on the other side of it with relative impunity. I have Papal states regions dotted throughout my empire, with no problems at all. The only downside is having to follow the basic Papal mandates, so you may not always be able to attack the catholic regions you'd like to. Still, you can generally manoeuvre other rulers into getting themselves excommunicated, take their provinces through diplomacy, or wait for them to otherwise make a mistake. Failing this, spies and a good army mean you can take a city faster than you can be excommunicated, as many people have already pointed out on the forums.

On to Venice.

With Venice, pretexts to fight other catholic rulers aren't much of an issue outside of the Italian peninsula. I decided to focus on the Mediterranean, and develop as a naval and trade power. My main early goal was to expand along the coast to Constantinople, thus ensuring that my main enemies were orthodox or rebels. I also grabbed Florence, sending an army through the Empire territories to do so, in order to keep a favorable power balance in Italy.
To the north of Greece, Zagreb and Sofia can be gifted to the Papal states in order to create a massive buffer zone protecting you from interference by Hungary and the Empire in all of the region. I held onto Zagreb, as it's my only castle in the area, not wanting to sacrifice any of the coastal provinces for this task. This caused a lot of headaches with both the Empire and Hungary, eventually leading to a short vicious war which could probably have been avoided, and has benefitted me very little, as I still haven't had much use from the Zagreb troops. I engaged in extensive diplomacy in the opening turns in Italy, gaining alliances with all the local factions bar the Empire, although only the Papal states had a full military access agreement with me. A possible early move would be to buy Bologna (from memory, may actually be a different region, the region directly south of Venice) from the Empire before it is built up too much, as this would save a lot of friction. I didn't manage this either, another cause of the later war. Still, intensive diplomacy managed to keep northern Italy in an uneasy peace until I had conquered Constantinople, reduced the Byzantine empire to a handful of far flung colonies and gifted Nicaea to the Pope, giving me a buffer from the Turks.
Around this time, Milan betrayed our alliance, and started a pointless blockade on Florence. Their land armies didn't press the advantage, and I was able to snatch both Genoa and Milan (with the help of a good spy) from them in one turn, placing them firmly on the back foot. I consolidated this advantage by quickly pushing forward to Marseille, which became my western Papal states buffer, keeping Milan, France and Spain out of my affairs. Now separated from me by this new buffer state, the Milanese were quick to agree to a ceasefire, which lasted until I had a force in place to take over their island holdings, reducing them to a land power. This damaged my standing a fair bit with the other factions, and noone trusts me any more, but since I'm ranked first across the board, it's not much of an issue.
With east and west secured for the time being, I turned my attention north. Abysmal relations with the Empire (which now had both Milan and Hungary as vassals, thus taking up 100% of my northern border) had deteriorated into open war after the Milan crisis, a few clumsy bribe attempts on Bologna and finally, a failed assassination attempt on an Imperial family member (who was sitting a few miles from Milan with a decent sized army). I took advantage of the opening turns to smash Bologna with three armies from Florence, Genoa and Venice, and then sat back to defend my northern border. Not long after, the Emperor had been excommunicated, and I was able to call a crusade on a city deep in the middle of Imperial territory. In this short but nasty war the Empire lost around three-four stacks of troops, and the regions of Innsbruck, Vienna, Budapest (the last remaining Hungarian region), and I lost two stacks of my own. When the dust settled, however, I had a solid Papal border consisting of Marseille-Innsbruck-Vienna-Budapest-Sofia cutting me off from the whole of catholic Europe. The two Imperial territories I took beyond this buffer I gifted to Scotland and Spain, improving relations with them dramatically, as well as making northern Europe even more chaotic.
Since that war, the only catholic opponent I have had has been Sicily, who I have methodically ousted from Italy, Sicily and northern Africa as I attempt to dominate the mediterranean. Progress is slow, as the Pope doesn't approve, but city by city the Sicilians are being wiped out, and Papal relations are good due to all the huge cathedrals being built with the mediterranean riches.
Now my attention has been drawn back to the east, with the turks warring on the Pope in Nicaea, I went to his rescue, and met the Mongols coming the other way. Currently I am bogged down in a massive war of attrition in Turkey as I wear down the Mongols and their damned full silver chevron starting armies. One full stack of my troops can just about defeat one of theirs in the open (medium difficulty), which seems a good deal, as mine are raw recruits, and therefore limitless, and theirs are elites, and therefore limited. So far this is the only serious military opposition I've faced in the campaign, and I'm enjoying it, or at least I was up until, after a long and arduous siege battle where I managed to fight off a full stack of Mongols with a half stack of mercenaries and cavalry militia, the game promptly crashed as they tried to withdraw through a mountain :/

Future targets are to gain the upper hand against the Mongols, and spread along the eastern and southern Mediterranean. After that Russia is a good source of non-catholic provinces, or I hope to opportunistically pick Europe apart with crusades as various faction leaders fall out with the Pope, in order to complete my region quota. Or perhaps a few ships from Venice can set sail to America, once it becomes available.

Militarily I haven't got much advice to give. I'm still working out the ins-and-outs of the Venetian units, which are quite specialised. Pike militia have performed well, holding Mongol full silver chevron units far longer than my other units (my cavalry invariably vanishes under a pile of light horse, and dies to a man). Musketeers have shown promise in the first battle I fought with them. The army was decimated, but the muskets caused some serious damage before it happened, and I look forward to seeing them defending castle walls. Venetian heavy infantry give a good account of themselves, and work well with the pike militia, although I preferred dismounted knights for the flanks, due to their morale bonuses. The heavy infantry performed much better against cavalry though, the knights tend to get massacred if caught out by cavalry units. A half hexagon in a wooded area, with pikes on the front, supported by heavy infantry, knights and a carroccio, and with decent ranged and cavalry support (so far my default army is 5 pike, 2 heavy, 2 knights, 1 carroccio, 5 ranged, 5 cavalry) performs pretty well against the mongols. I tend to lose a lot of the ranged support and cavalry, the first because I prefer to sacrifice them rather than risk the integrity of the pike wall, and the second because I hit any weak spot I can see with the cavalry until the enemy routs or the cavalry are all dead (and since the mongols are so damned tough, even archers can absorb a charge, and give back a fair bit of punishment, so the cavalry tends to get steadily chewed up). Still, at the end of the battle, the mongols have taken heavier and more valuable losses. On hard/very hard this will probably not be possible though, as it's a pretty close battle on medium.

-Lobo

Congratulations on maintaining such a great forum by the way, the Org has been my first stop for TW information since Rome, and I wish I'd known about it when I had Shogun. I've never got round to posting before, but I figured it was about time I gave something back ;)

XiahouPing
01-16-2007, 14:28
I've noticed in my 2 campaigns as Venice, as soon as one faction attacks you, another 2 or 3 will jump on the bandwagon next turn, even if you have had alliances with them and whatnot. Make sure you have enough power to push the enemies back. Just thought I would point it out to the people who are thinking of playing Venice. :)

Owen Glyndwr
01-16-2007, 15:20
idk if ythis is a little off-topic or anything, but how do you make the merchants better. Even with a master merchant's guild, my merchants get wiped out 2 or 3 turns after i make them. It's really frustrating to me.

oz_wwjd
01-19-2007, 15:10
yeah I've just about given up using them cause there's a swarm of HRE and Milan merchants roaming around,and as soon as I produce a merchant they follow it until they catch up with it and exterminate it,so any help on how to aviod this would be appreciated.On another point is having a castle neccesary? So far I've defended my cities nicely with Italian Mitilia and Italian Pavise crossbowmen mitilia,with a few calvary units thrown in for good measure

Nepereta
01-19-2007, 17:47
the venetian archers and infantry are very respectable units. Well worth producing the infantry at least. For cavalry my suggestion is go on the crusades and get a chapter house.

rvg
01-23-2007, 22:21
When playing Venice I find that securing Northern Italy for yourself is the best way to ensure total economic domination. I do take Durazzo to prevent the Byzantines from having a port in the Adriatic, but other than that, my cities of interest are Bologna, Florence, Milan and Genoa.

Buying Bologna from the Germans is a must, as is the immediate attack on Florence. Milan and Genoa can wait until after the imminent sneak attack from the Milanese. In the meantime, send your best diplomat on a naval world tour and get trade agreements with EVERYBODY. As far as defense goes, I set up a couple of forts in the mountain passes near Durazzo; this usually makes the Byzantines completely lose interest in waging war on me. They become a reliable trading partner + training grounds for my priests.

Some light expansion onto mediterranean islands is okay, but not overall crucial. Ragusa is the only castle you'll ever need, so dont forget to convert those island castles into something more useful.

Some forts in the mountains North of Venice and (eventually) around Milan will completely secure your money pit. Now settle down and build-build-build.
I tend to ignore crusades, as they accomplish little other than disrupting my trade, just remember to buy the Pope's affection as necessary. Chivalry points are nice and all, but my army of assassins that I employ on a regular basis means that the Doge slips back into dread within a few turns, and I dont really *need* the Crusading Orders anyway. Yes, they are cool, but overall unnecessary. Not to mention that keeping an outremer city happy and productive is a royal pain, and not worth the lost trade revenue in the long run.

Anyhow, from this point on the Venetian faction will be making so much money that victory will be a 100% certainty, so I tend to take it easy and enjoy the game without the need for a mad expansion in all directions...

From here on I start to quietly kill the weak (Sicilians, whatever remains of the Milanese) without attracting too much attention from the Pope.

oz_wwjd
01-24-2007, 07:55
I must say Everyone being at war once one person attacks in pretty spot on.First the Byzantines attacked to try and take Ragusa,and promptly got their butts kicked,then the next turn The Polish attacked Zagreb,and the HRE and Hungarians decided to set up a naval blockade of all my ports.I wasn't able to get them to agree to sell Bologna to me early on so now the HRE are being a pain and using it as there base,and I'm having a hard time scraping together the cash for the units to take it,and fight off 2 naval blockades and the Polsih at the same time. I control Venice,Florence,Zagreb,Iraklion, and Sofia,Rhodes, Antioch,and Aleppo.Any tips about how to fight out of the 3-sided war?Rhodes is my only castle as I thought I'd make a good base for my conquest of the Bzyantine Empire eventually.

PseRamesses
02-07-2007, 10:18
Hmm, there´s a lot of blitz-strategies in this thread so here´s a different approach:
1. Ally with all neighbours. I tend to go with "pay me 100f/turn for X turns-alliances"
2. Take Rhodos, convert to town.
3. Take Durazzo. Will act as bait for the Byzantines later and I´d rather have Cyprus than Durazzo, he he!
4. Buy Bologna from the HRE. A 500f/ turn for 10 turns or 1000 for 5 will do it.
5. Launch a crusade on Tunis and on the way there take Florence, Ajaccio, Cagliari. (After taking Tunis I usually let it rebel)

I play RD´s Iron mod so taking Zagreb is not an option since the Magyars has a stack there and will take it on turn 1 or 2. The starting strategy with Venice is weather to take Italy or Byzantium. Personally I don´t like destroying factions so I tend to go with making Milan and Sicily my vassals and later removing the Byzantines from the Balkans and Greece. In all my camp´s as Venice I´ve only used one castle - Ragusa. Venetian HI and archers are really good units but the bulk of my army the first 100 turns are the excellent militia units reinforced with some knights from Ragusa castle.

6. I keep the pope busy with crusades against x-coms. I´d like to arrive in the Holy Lands late to fight stronger muslim forces. The muslims in M2 are redicilously weak. One of the largest flaws in the game IMHO. The RD-mod however allows homelands to bolster besieged settlements with additional troops which really makes it hard to take them. Jerusalem is one of thoose.
7. The crusades. Most of the time I just settle for Antioch, Aleppo, Damascus, Acre and Jerusalem converting all castles to towns since Acre is more useful economically as a settlement. If I must have a castle in this region my choice will always be Aleppo.

Venice is all about trade and naval domination. The faction specific buildings doesn´t directly hurt those ambitions.

xseabrookx
02-08-2007, 06:30
Just completed a long campaign with Venice. As said before, move your whole army out with your faction leader from Venice and siege Bologna right away on the first turn. You should have two units merc spearmen to hire and one unit of merc crossbow? On the 2nd turn I auto calc the battle and I won on VH/VH. Once I got excom. on turn two but I restarted and the Pope didn't excom me. After that HRE asked me for peace. Taking Bologna really helped.
After you take Bologna on turn two, move your army out again to take Florence.

My mistake was letting Milan stayed around for too long. They kept attacking me in Florence and Bologna.

The town Duranzo has only a 400 starting population and I had to wait a very long time for it to be of any use. For some reason I can't find its name in desc_strat.txt. The AI seems to have population + bonus on harder difficulties. You can use this small village as bait for the Byzantines. They'll send armies to Duzano. If they do send armies, send some militia units on ships your island city and take Corith in two turns.

Quillan
02-08-2007, 22:36
It's Durazzo. The files may spell it differently than it shows on the map, not sure.

PseRamesses
02-08-2007, 23:15
I did a search today, after xseabrookx´s post, but didn´t find it either.

Gingivitis
02-09-2007, 00:25
And now I had to go try and find it. No luck. Searched by population and not name and there wasn't anything in the file with a starting population of 400. Saw Durazzo in other files, but not in the strat one, weird.

Didz
03-20-2007, 15:15
Having read this thread I am now really worried about the future of my current Venetian campaign. I have succeeded in making just about every mistake this thread warns against.

I have taken Zagreb, and I have also taken Durazzo and Rhodes in accordance with council requests.

I have also allied with the Milanese, the HRE, Hungary and Byzantium.

So, basically, if this thread is correct I have set myself up for a crushing defeat. However, at the moment I seem to be doing ok…the Byzantines especially seem to be ignoring me completely. Nevertheless I am worried.

What I have done, which might save my hide later is build a number of watchtowers along my Eastern and Northern borders which allow me to monitor foriegn troops movements well into their own territory. So, for example, I was able to watch the Byzantines muster a huge army just outside Thessalonica and was able to watch with relief as it marched off to the East instead of towards me.

The other precaution I have taken is to post a diplomat permanently outside Rome ready to rush into an audience with his Holiness at the first sign of serious trouble and hand him any of my doomed cities as a personal gift.

So, my strategy, such as it is, is to milk Durazzo and Rhodes for as long as I can, but if it looks like they are going to be taken to sell up and give the empty shell to the Pope. Hopefully, that will either dissuade the invasion force from attacking and earn me some final brownie points with his Holiness or better still instigate a Holy War between the Pope and the aggressors which I can exploit to my advantage.

What I am actually more worried about is the fact that I have left the Milanese and HRE alone for too long. The HRE still rule Bologna and have a massive army in it which keeps dithering in and out of the city as though the Emperor would like to do something with it but can’t make up his mind what. I assume he is thinking about taking Florence which is still rebel, and also happens to be my next likely target too.

I suspect that war with the HRE is going to be inevitable, but is going to place enormous strain on my armed forces particularly as my main arsenal is based in Ragusa. Ragusa is a long march from Venice, let alone Florence and the only sensible option is to retain naval dominance in the Adriatic Sea so that my armies can be ferried rapidly back and forth as demands require. So, far that has just involved dealing with the odd pirate fleet, but sooner or later my 'allies' are bound to start sending fleets in there and a naval arms race is going to kick-off.

Its all a bit dodgy and ‘defeat is a distinct possibility’.:help:

Quillan
03-20-2007, 18:15
Not necessarily, Didz. In my Venetian campaign, I took Zagreb, Durazzo and Rhodes as well. I was betrayed and attacked by Milan in the early going, and Hungary made a few threatening moves, but my alliances with the Byzantines and Holy Roman Empire were rock solid for a century and a half. Of course, I deliberately released all prisoners and never sacked or exterminated a city in order to keep my reputation up, and gifted those two factions with money a lot to keep our relationships up as well. Venice is a potent faction with good troops. Just make sure you take Florence, and get Genoa when the inevitable war with Milan breaks out. Genoa/Florence can make an obscene amount of money, especially if you own Ajaccio and Cagliari as well.

Didz
03-21-2007, 14:31
Well I bottled out on my original strategy and decided to take the general advice given above and attack the Milanese.

To be honest they were asking for it as both Milan and Genoa were hardly garrissoned and their armies were out of sight campaigning somewhere in France. I took Milan in a rush assault, at which point Hungary and the HRE immediately cancelled their alliances, but did nothing else.

The Milanese threw everything they could muster at a counter-assault on Milan which only acheived a further weakening on Genoa which I walked into and took the next turn after an epic field battle outside its walls.

With my army now split between garrisons in Milan and Genoa the Milanese attempted another counter strike at Milan with an army marched in from France. This resulted in a pretty close fought battle in the streets of the city in which the 'arse-kicking' incident I mentioned in the 'Hooked on Detail' thread occurred.

The Pope had already issued his 'stop killing christians' warning and so having fought off this assault I stopped all further aggressive action and satisfied myself with bolstering my garrissons in my new acquisitions.

In the meantime, the Byzantines have been getting more aggressive. They actually landed a small army of 2 units on Rhodes and it still sits there, although the fleet that dropped it off scarpered when my own galleys appeared on the horizon.

Elsewhere, I watched the appearance of a full stack Byzantine army near Thessalonica which closed steadily on Durazzo. However, I had plenty of time to prepare my contingency plans and when it was only one turn away I simple sold all the buildings in the city, loaded my garrison onto my waiting fleet, sailed away to Venice before handing over Durazzo to the Pope as a personal gift.

At this point the Byzantines did a rapid U-Turn and marched back the way they came.

So, I've lost Durazzo but gained Milan and Genoa, next stop Florence and then perhaps those germans in Bologna will need some attention. Also Hungary just got ex-commed but at the moment I don't have the troops to expliot it.

pockettank
03-25-2007, 06:49
i played a sort campgain w/ Venice to unlock all factions quite fast:

1.build up armies conquer Milan ASAP while slowly taking greece
2.if milan didnt have it try to beat france/germany to dijon and bern
3.after taking all of greece let constantinople fall to rebels -to expensive to hold up- then conquer all of asia minor
4. -Victory-

PS) i never got ventian heavy inf but i did have a 9* general who conquered asia minor :balloon2:

Unorthodox
03-25-2007, 11:44
I usually leave Durazzo alone (or if you want to take it for a Council of Nobles mission, that's fine, but after that you should sack it and let it rebel). The Byzantines want to take it and you really don't need to be in a war with them early on, when you've got the rest of Italy to deal with. The direction the Byzantines are coming from means they'll be attacking Ragusa, which is your strongest point to defend anyway. Initially you should focus on Milan and Sicily. Milan will attack you and eventually get excommunicated, which makes it easy to take their cities (you can even call Crusades on them, which is a nice boost). Buying Bologna from the HRE is also useful, since it means you don't have to get them involved in the Italian war. Once you've got all of Italy (Sicily will eventually attack you too), Cagliari and Ajaccio, then I think is the ideal time to turn on the Byzantines.

You should have a very strong economy, and as such, can afford a very wide and crippling attack on the Byzantines. Your first moves should be to take Rhodes (if you haven't already done so) from the Rebels and Nicosia from the Byzantines. Assemble powerful armies at the following locations: Ragusa, Iraklion, Rhodes, and Nicosia. Then, all in one go, march/sail your armies like so:
Ragusa -> Durazzo OR Sofia
Iraklion -> Corinth
Rhodes -> Thessalonica OR Smyrna
Nicosia -> Smyrna OR Iconium

If they've taken Iconium, then use your Nicosia army to take that, and then move your army from Rhodes to Smyrna. This means you don't attack Thessalonica yet, but it'll be easy pickings after you gain control of both Corinth and Sofia/Durazzo. This means that in the matter of a few turns, you'll have control of the Byzantines' coast on the Mediterranean, which takes away a huge number of their settlements and cripples their economy. The large scale of the attack also makes it hard for them to respond - they may be able to reinforce or counter-attack into one region, but either way, you'll still take at least 3 of their settlements. Then, from Durazzo/Corinth/Thessalonica, you can march on Constantinople or Sofia (if you left it alone - if you didn't, then you can easily take Durazzo, which should be isolated in the middle of your provinces anyway), and use the armies in Smyrna/Iconium (if you took it) to take Nicaea.

Didz
03-25-2007, 11:59
Another option is to capture Durazzo and then gift it to the Pope, that gets you extra POM points (I'm current his most loved follower with 8/10) and leaves Durazzo as a buffer zone between you and the Byzantines with Papal protection. I did this just before a large Byzantine Army descended upon it and they did a very rapid U-Turn and dissapeared back over the border sharpish.

However, I'm playing the short campaign so I have no real interest in starting a global war. I've eliminated the Milanese faction and so all I need to do is eliminate the Byzantines to win.

I tired buying Bolgona but the Emperor wouldn't sell so at the moment I am allied with them and won't bother them unless they bother me. Venice, Milan, Genoa, Florence, Zagreb, Ragusa and most recently Bern are all I own atm but I am getitng decent revenue and so far I am the strongest faction. I am just building up my ecomony and technology before striking eastwards to win the game.

Unorthodox
03-25-2007, 14:53
As far as I know, the HRE will always sell Bologna (at least in the early game, where keeping it doesn't seem to be in their interests - understandably so, because I've never seen them hold on to it for longer than 10-15 turns), as long as the price is right. Some people have gotten it for something like 500/turn for 10 turns, but for me it always cost over 10,000 florins. However, in all my games, they've ended up selling to me, even if I was at war with them.

Didz
03-26-2007, 10:55
Hmm! well I tried right at the start of my latest campaign and they wouldn't sell it. Perhaps I just didn't have enough money at the time.

The situation there is rather weird atm, as I am allied with them and the city was just put under seige by an amphibious assualt force from the Byzantine. I thought I'd let it fall and then liberate it as I need to start a war with the Byzantines anyway as I have to eliminate their faction. But on the second turn of the seige they suddenly agreed terms and ordered a ceasefire, so atm I have a massive HRE Army and a massive Byz army both camping in Bologna.

Quillan
03-26-2007, 15:00
At the start of my Venice campaign, it cost me 1000 per turn for 7 turns to buy Bologna, but I didn't bring up the subject until after I'd secured an alliance with them (paying them for it as well), so that might have influenced the cost. You have to play around a bit with the figures to see what they'll accept.

KyodaiSteeleye
03-28-2007, 13:14
Well, I'm just at the start of (my third attempt) at a VH/VH venetian campaign, and I have some advice on how NOT to start. I've decided to play this campaign with the aim of securing the whole Mediterranean - anyway, the first two campaigns I did my usual of leaving factions alone unless they attack me first, and went after Durazzo. Unfortunately, the Byzantines seem to always be after this too, so will attack you at the first opportunity. The Sicilians also seem to be scripted to land a full stack outside of Ragusa and attack it in about turn 6. Then you just have to deal with a follow up attack from Milan on Venice, and if you have taken Florence, and amphibious assault by the Moors (the Moors? what the hell do the Moors want with Florence?).

Anyway, both campaigns ended with me having my arse handed to me. Unfortunately, at this level, it seems the only way to survive is to buy Bologna, which comes a bit into 'cheesy' tactics in my book, but hey..
So, in my third attempt I now have a small power base of Venice/Bologna and Florence. I didn't go after Durazzo this time, but left the Byzantines to get it - they're now gunning for Ragusa, but at least I had time to build up some forces there. The Sicilians didn't send all their armies to Ragusa this time, which is a relief, except they've just sent them up to Bologna instead. The Moors have just started seiging Florence again. I'm in a better position as I have a good stack in northern Italy to take these two armies out, I'm just hoping that Milan doesn't join the party, or i'll be stuffed again.

This is by far the hardest faction i've played so far, at least in the early game (experience of England/Poland/Egypt).

Didz
03-28-2007, 15:49
....the first two campaigns I did my usual of leaving factions alone unless they attack me first, and went after Durazzo.
I did that also, but I waited until the Council offerred me 2,500 florins for doing it. Its quite easy to take and so worth doing just for the cash, the trick is not to keep it too long.

What I do is capture it and milk it for as much tax revenue as I can for as long as possible. By building a watch tower at the head of the pass to the East you can easily monitor Byzantine activity as far away as Thesselonica and when it becomes apparent that the Byz are coming to get you, wait till the last moment and then sell all your buildings except the Church, load your garrison onto your waiting fleet and then sell, or more realistically gift, Durazzo to the Pope.

This will earn you several brownie points on the Pope-o-Meter, send the Byzantines scurrying back to thesselonic with their tails between their legs and set Durazzo up as a buffer zone between you for a hell of a long time.

I use the same strategy with any cities I capture during crusades. I am not interested in liberating The Holy Land, particularly with the Mongols and Timurid's on the horizon, and so for me the crusades are just money making ventures. Any cities I capture are milked for as much revenue as I can squeeze out of them, then stripped of their assets, and handed to the Pope. Consequently, his Hattiness likes Venice a lot.


....The Sicilians also seem to be scripted to land a full stack outside of Ragusa and attack it in about turn 6.
That's never happened to me, certainly not on turn 6, perhaps it depends on the difficulty level you have chosen to play. In my game the Sicilians have been 'pussy cats' and no real trouble at all.


....Then you just have to deal with a follow up attack from Milan on Venice,
I have accepted the advice given elsewhere on this thread and concluded, that no matter how 'peaceful' one would like to be, leaving the Milanese Faction in the game too long will reap you a shed load of grief later.

For some reason the Milanese seem to be able to churn units out at a phenominal rate, I've literally seen slaughtered armies withdraw into Genoa restock completely in one turn and come right back at me the next.

Take 'em out as early as possible, is the only strategy that seems to make sense. They seem to be the Hojo's of MTW2.


....and if you have taken Florence, and amphibious assault by the Moors (the Moors? what the hell do the Moors want with Florence?).
Not seen this before either, but as a general observation, playing Venice and not having naval dominance in the Adriatic is dodgy at best. If nothing else, in the early game the benefits of being able to ferry units back and forth from Venice to Ragusa necessitates not giving pirates or rival factions the chance to interfere.

I usually have at least 2x5 vessel fleets on patrol in the Adriatic at all times and upgrade them to Wargalley's as soon as funds allow. This might be why I haven't witnessed these naval invasions you mention, which is even more reason for doing so.

Fleets are expensive to maintain, but I find them essential for Venice. Not just to ferry armies back and forth quickly, but also because I need strong fleets to get my Crusading Armies back after their trips to The Holy Land. The revenue from these trips more than pays for the galley's needed to bring my troops home and once they are safely in Venice, I disband the mercenary galleys and merge the best of the rest into my Adriatic patrols,

An obvious pre-requisite of this strategy is to keep a Diplomat on permanent duty outside Rome, ready to rush into the Papal Palace and give the Pope anything which it looks likely I am going to lose anyway. That Diplomat also manages to pay his own wages by constantly pestering the Pope with copies of new maps he has been sent by my Crusading Armies. They usually sell for around 200-400 Florin's each but he won't buy a new one every turn.

oz_wwjd
03-29-2007, 11:43
I have a question. If the byzantines start fielding large amount of their HA units specifally Vardariotai in their armies what's the best way to counter? I can whiddle them down with my crossbowmen but it takes a while and I seem to suffer more losses in the process....

Didz
03-29-2007, 13:20
I have a question. If the byzantines start fielding large amount of their HA units specifally Vardariotai in their armies what's the best way to counter? I can whiddle them down with my crossbowmen but it takes a while and I seem to suffer more losses in the process....
As I've said elsewhere HA's are probably the most frustrating units in the game to deal with. With the Mongol ones I dealt with them by letting the Mongols beseige my cities and shooting them down from my castle walls durnig sally battles.

In the open field I haven't really found any alternative that works consistently other than Mutaully Assured Destruction. Crossbowmen in open order can usually give as good as the get and at least kill them. Chasing them around with cavalry can sometimes corner them and drive them off the battlefield but they just come back next turn.

Very occassionally they get 'too cocky' and you can slip units behind them and sandwich them between several units so that they don't have anywhere to run but thats pretty rare and not very practical if they are part of an army. I even tried bringing back mercenary horse archers from the crusades but that's really just a more expensive version of the M.A.D. solution, its probably cheaper to use crossbowsmen and use your own HA's against a opponent that doesn't have any.

KyodaiSteeleye
03-29-2007, 13:35
Thanks Didz - interesting - I guess playing Venice means I have to change my playing strategy and be more agressive (which I don't like doing - I'm not an agressive person!). I have to say I've had to disband the starting fleets for Venice as in the early game they've been too expensive for me to maintain, whilst also fielding an adequate set of northern and eastern armies and some city/castle building. Granted, once I get better finances i'll be making sure my war galleys rule the waves.

Didz
03-29-2007, 15:41
I have to say I've had to disband the starting fleets for Venice as in the early game they've been too expensive for me to maintain,...
Well whilst I can't swear to it, it sounds like you have paid a heavy price for disbanding those fleets by encouraging the Moors and Sicilians to get aggressive. I don't know if the AI is sophisticated enough to recognise the concept of 'a fleet in being' but given that you have had these problems whilst I haven't it sounds like the AI is sensible enough not to risk naval transportation of its armies when his opponent has a strong naval presence.

I suggest in future that you keep at least a token naval force in the Adriatic. Enough to keep the pirates under control and to allow the transport of units to and from Ragusa Castle in safety.

It will be interesting to hear if you still get problems from enemy naval landings having done so.

Money problems for Venice is another issue. I never had much trouble with my economy playing Venice, certainly not as much as playing Russia. Venice is in a good position tradewise which suggests this is another area that needs attention.

Quillan
03-29-2007, 18:20
Byzantium in the AI hands never fielded the numbers of horse archers I did when I was playing Byzantium. My typical Byzantine army consisted of 4 Vards, 2 Skythikons and about a dozen Byzantine cavalry with one general and zero foot troops. However, if you do happen to face the predominately horse archer army, I'd recommend using Venetian Archers instead of the crossbow militia to counter, simply because of rate of fire. The archers also have the long range missiles and a higher rate of fire. Turn skirmish off so they don't move, start shooting before they can respond, and concentrate your fire.

Vladimir
05-05-2007, 23:51
Just playing around I came across what I call the Pentagram Opening. Forsaking everything else buy Bologna, launch simultaneous attacks on Milan and Genoa (after paying the Pope a visit), then Siege Florence. Your Dodge and faction heir should each lead an army which can easily take both cities, wiping the faction out. Then take the Dodge on a fort building spree, closing off passes and dropping a garrison unit there, while letting your heir await the Florentine sally.

During this phase you should be awarded with largest army, most wealthy, and most advanced civilization titles in the first 10 turns. After that just specialize/convert your cities as you see fit. No where else on the map, not even the Holy Land, is there such a great opportunity for such an amazing start. :2thumbsup:

Vladimir
05-14-2007, 13:29
Any advice on playing VH/VH? I’m attempting to play a game focusing on northern Italy and I want the Venetian heavy infantry more than the Genoese pavaise crossbowmen. Is the best way to secure the 5 cities in the north, turning one of them to a castle, and withdrawing all your troops to Italy? I’ve also found naval battle to be a pain. Venice was famed for their galley production but they don’t fare to well in combat.

trickydicky
05-29-2007, 00:12
Any advice on playing VH/VH? I’m attempting to play a game focusing on northern Italy and I want the Venetian heavy infantry more than the Genoese pavaise crossbowmen. Is the best way to secure the 5 cities in the north, turning one of them to a castle, and withdrawing all your troops to Italy? I’ve also found naval battle to be a pain. Venice was famed for their galley production but they don’t fare to well in combat.

I'm playing the same setup at the moment, I blitzed the northern provinces, and then turned Bologna into a castle. This then pretty quickly provides you with your Venetian Heavy Infantry :beam:

I also as you suggested pulled all of my troops back into Italy proper, and then took the war to the Sicilians. This then gives you another Venetian Heavy Infantry factory to the south (In Pamplona). Putting you in prime position to produce troops north and south. One for your conquest of Europe, and one for Africa.

On a side note Venetian Heavy Infantry rock!

:charge: :charge: :charge: :charge: :charge: :charge:

Jammer
07-04-2007, 08:08
In connection with Vladimir's Pentagram Opening, here's a few considerations;

Consolidating northern Italy means facing a choice. Do you want to get excommunicated or not? Many players don't care, some do. So these tips are for those that do NOT want to peeve the Pope.

Like others have said, BUY Bologna. First turn, ally with Germany and agree to 1000 florins per turn for 6 turns. Emperor Kraut-eater exits and leaves 6 units of merc xbows.

Use the mercenary crossbowmen to immediately seige Florence!

Then build to the point where you're ready to SIMULTANEOUSLY seige Milan and Genoa. Don't wait too long or those dirty Milanese will take Bern or something. The key is to eliminate them in one stroke and prevent any Papal warning. I seiged on turn 6 and finished the job on turn 7. Done and done.

As a side note, the small force at Iraklion is able to lightning strike Corinth right off the bat. This strategy combined with the No-Excom-Pentagram is perfect for a Venetian short campaign.

Happy killing!

Vladimir
07-06-2007, 13:24
In 1.2 the map is small enough that you can form an alliance with and gift the Pope enough that a simultaneous attack on Milan's two cities that you'll only get a warning. Being his ally AND the most powerful nation in Europe reigns in his displeasure. Teh blizt is easy but it's VH/VH right?

PuppetMaster
07-07-2007, 12:47
My last campaign as Venice turned out to be really good. I attacked Milan and defeated them very early on, then moved on Florence and Bologna. From there it was a cake walk, and a crusade on top of upgrades in markets and sea trade buildings had me ridiculously rich. From there I took Sicily, and it was into the Balkans from there.


Btw I took Zagreb next, and that city can be a cash cow if you build it up correctly.

Orb
07-24-2007, 11:52
Just managed a beautiful opportunistic stab at Sofia and Bucharest with Hungarian help early on. It helps immeasurably at preventing a war with Hungary and also adds a great position for attacking the Byzantines.

Edit: Well, 27 turns in I've wiped out the Byz. Hungary has just betrayed our alliance, which doesn't really concern me.

The_crusader
07-25-2007, 15:55
When I first played MTW2 I just had to try out Venice(maybe it was because I saw shakspears Merchant of Venice......anyway),I did 3 test campains with them and I noticed that there is always an inevitable attack from the Holy Roman Empire.they will also strick a deal with Milan to attack you,the best way to get Milan off your back would be to send a princess and have her get married,then build as much merchant cavilers at Venice (they should be available at this point of the game and there not that bad for a cheap price....at that point of the game of course),the Holy Roman Empire will attempt to besiege your capital,and if that fails they will cut off there hostilities against you so you may have the rest of the game nothing but smooth sailing and bloody conquering....:thinking:

Quillan
07-25-2007, 16:24
The unfortunate problem with that idea is the Venice begins the game with no princesses and the faction heir starts married, so there will be no early marriage alliances. Buying Bologna from the HRE seems to keep them off your back. If you make nice with the Pope, you'll reduce your probable hostile neighbors down to 3: Hungary, Milan, and Sicily. Hungary is nowhere near the threat Milan is, and Sicily isn't that hard to hold off, but Milan needs to go quickly, even if that causes problems in your papal relationships.

The_crusader
07-25-2007, 16:32
True,Milan should go early in the game ...as I recall they have France that is also against them(the ennemi of my ennemi is my friend).

Rhyfelwyr
08-07-2007, 23:14
Here's what's happened so far in my M/VH Venice campaign:

Stage 1:

Spent a few turns to build up the Venice province. After that, built a basic militia army and conquered Miland and Genoa. In my previous Scots campaign I found Milan a strong faction on the battlefield, so I wanted to get them away from my lands. I then built forts across all gaps in the Alps to seal off my lands from the north and west, safe from the HRE, Milan, and France. I then quickly grabbed Zagred and Durazzo before Hungary could make a move.

Stage 2:

For some reason there was no Crusade called to the Holy Land. So, I focused on securing my lands in Italy. The Pope had already grabbed Florence, which was pretty annoying, so I seized Florence and then Rome in a couple of turns, thinking the Papal States Faction would be destroyed. Meanwhile, I used spare troops from Zagred and Durazzo to wage war against the Byzantines, conquering Corith, Rhodes, Smyrna, and Nicaea.

Stage 3:

The Pope finally launched that eagerly awaited Crusade that lets Catholic factions make some easy gains. Unfortunately it was against me, and so I panicked and gathered all spare troops in Italy and joined them in an army based between Milan and Venice. The HRE, Spain, Denmark, Scotland, Sicily plus some others all soon joined the Crusade. A small navy was sent to complete a mission to blockade a Sicilian Port at Palermo. In the east, my troops take Byzantium just before a Turkish army on Jihad. In a great moment of luck, my fleet returning from Palermo spots a figure who looks like a Bishop cowering in a forest next to a Castle filled with Muslim Rebels at Caralis. This figure turned out to be the Pope, and so at a huge cost (totalling six figure amounts of florins) Venice is reconcilled and the Crusade is called of. Magdeburg becomes the new Papal land after I bartered it off the HRE in an earlier ceasefire agreement.

This is where my campaign is at right now. I'm economically crippled for the moment, but managing to hold onto my lands so far. My advice is that its best for Catholic factions not to attack the Pope...

Gaius Terentius Varro
08-07-2007, 23:31
True,Milan should go early in the game ...as I recall they have France that is also against them(the ennemi of my ennemi is my friend).
I am playing on VH campaign and Milan has been my trusted ally for 120 turns now I got 2 marriage alliances with them. I keep giving them little cash and map info and they stay loyal. They keep France England Spain at bay while i went east. You can actually stop the reputation slide on VH through intensive diplomacy it just takes a while. I got Egypt to ally with me after 3 crusades against them so hell anything is possible.

Hrafn
08-09-2007, 14:44
I have been trying to keep the Ventian bloodline clean by not accepting adoptions and man-of-the-hours (rather sad actualy to deny the hard fighting peasants a stab at nobility).

Its only around turn 25 and it seems that the bloodline detoriarate rapidly: my faction heir and his brothers get the "Dysfunctional" traits and the rest of the brood start showing up with "Aloof", "Deep pockets" and "Lazy"..

Ive tried very hard to use the guides to train up good generals/governors so most have various levels of good taxman, farmer and trader traits....

But im afarid that all my hard work to groom the venetian bloodline would end me up with some "Utterly insane", "Totaly Closed", "Embezzelers" inbreeds...

So should i try to opt for some adoption to get fresh blood into this nest of degenerates?

What have i done wrongly to get so appaling traits when the whelps come of age? I tought having a chivalourous grand crusader as father and grandfather should set some kind of example? The heir married a spanish princess, maybe thats where the problem lies?

Out
08-09-2007, 15:47
I have been trying to keep the Ventian bloodline clean by not accepting adoptions and man-of-the-hours (rather sad actualy to deny the hard fighting peasants a stab at nobility).

Its only around turn 25 and it seems that the bloodline detoriarate rapidly: my faction heir and his brothers get the "Dysfunctional" traits and the rest of the brood start showing up with "Aloof", "Deep pockets" and "Lazy"..

Ive tried very hard to use the guides to train up good generals/governors so most have various levels of good taxman, farmer and trader traits....

But im afarid that all my hard work to groom the venetian bloodline would end me up with some "Utterly insane", "Totaly Closed", "Embezzelers" inbreeds...

So should i try to opt for some adoption to get fresh blood into this nest of degenerates?

What have i done wrongly to get so appaling traits when the whelps come of age? I tought having a chivalourous grand crusader as father and grandfather should set some kind of example? The heir married a spanish princess, maybe thats where the problem lies?

No, you see, you are playing as Venice. In effect, you are now the Father of Capitalism. You just have America syndrome. No known cure.

In seriousness though, I don't think it's *all* your fault, sometimes you get some bad luck, even with hardcoded events. At least, I prefer to look at it that way.

Hrafn
08-10-2007, 12:05
Hehehe..

Ive resorted to "cheating" and saves/reloads the game until i get a heir with traits i could use...seems like changing varaibles (like the happiness in the coming of age town, whats building, what garrison and so on influences on the born traits).

After working on the "perfect" venetian strategy and restarting the game a multitude of times ive concluded with the following (plays on H/M):

- Take Durazzo and convert it to a castle and utilize enough troops to hold against Byzantine attacks until you can go on the offensive against Byzants. Wait for the mission and get 2500 florins before attacking! Dont give it away, as a castle its perfectly defendable and if you upgrade yo could turn it into a large town after you have pacified Thessalonica.

- Attack Zagreb first turn with faction heir. Build spears in Venice and hit Bologna in turn 2 or 3. You get no Papal interference so early and the HRE are happy to offer ceasfire few turns after you have taken it (seems like tha Kaisar residing in Bologna wasnt to popular guy with the HRE). Its a complete waste to fork out 6-7000 florins for a town you can take for free and sack as wel.

- Build a Ballista factory in Venice first turn and get 2 units of ballistas.

- Hit Florence and take it as well, then build up two armies both with one ballista each and attack both Milan towns. You are able to siege them same turn with a ballista in the army.

Around turn 10 or so you should have Venice, Bologna, Zagreb, Durrazzo, Florence, Milan and Genoa (and Crete). Thats a perfect base for heavy ecconomic and technical boosting of your faction.

Now you have some options: get a crusade going towards Tunis and capture the islands or get a crusade going against Antioch and hit the Byzantines hard on the way.

Im on turn 23 now and own the above mentioned cities together with Antioch (+ a small town besides Antioch), Rhodos, Corinth and Thessalonica. Had a lot of fighting with Byzants on the island outside Antioch but my returning crusaders will crush it on their way home. I got a council mission for damascus so thats next on the hit list.

Didnt go for the Islands since i used some turns to capture Bern Castle (still rebels) and Sicily had already taken Tunis.

The next 10 turns i will focus on building up the diplomatic realtions with HRE/Hungary (hope to get the heir married into thos dynasties) and keep the Pope happy, while i destroy the Byzantines. Allied to Portugal and Spain so its possible i try for a crusade against the moors in Cordoba so im able to boost those alliances as well :)

Got a really good game going now with excellent ecconomy, since i using the militia spear and crossbow 90% of the time and only supplement with crusader heavy forces when available.

Some more generic do's:
- Build a grain exchange first thing in every place a familymember will reside so as to avoid the badtrader trait.
- Build a smal church/chapel next so as to avoid the astrologer ancillary.
- Keep taxes on very high when building with a governor, to get good admin skills...

ixidor
08-17-2007, 15:29
Personally i thinkVenice a bit overpowered. They have a great economy, tons of land to expand and one of the deadliests armies i had ever seen. Pavise crossbowmen just kick ass, just put them on your front line and they clean the house, and with their shields on their back the casualties from enemy fire are close to none. Then bring Venetian Heavy Infantry, who just wipe out everything on their path. To finish, use that incredible stradiots, who seem more like some very fast mailed knights to me, to chase rooters, generals or even attack unwanted missile units (like arquebusiers).

seari
08-25-2007, 11:21
When I play Venice, I always crusade with my army from Iraklion to antioch after allying with the Pope (and after having done the usual stuff buying bologna,taking florence).
When Antioch falls,I sack it but more important I get a 6+ piety general.
With the general in Iraklion and training a lot of priests and sending them to the holy lands, I always get a theologians HQ there when I've upgraded it to huge city.
That HQ combined with a Cathedral gives me priests who become almost always cardinals 1 turn later. That's fairly handy for pope-control

part_time_player
11-20-2007, 17:01
I have installed LTC and begun a new campaign as Venice because I liked the army composition. I started the Campaign on VH/VH and for my own enjoyment am sticking to a number of house rules;

1) Create a somewhat-realistic "story" and stick to it (ie. role-playing but on a faction level rather than individual characters)

2) never/ever save/reload. If I make a mistake that costs me a city, its tough, otherwise it encourages a lot of unrealistic play as you know you can try it a different way if it goes wrong, but in reality, a king never got the chance to turn back time.

3) Be the Pope's poster boy (fits with the story, also means never ally with muslim factions)

4) All armies, with the exception of troops moving around within my own borders MUST be led by a general.

For this campaign I decided that the doge of Venice would have his sights set on creating a trade network to try and rival Constantipople as the gateway to trade with the East. Having already taken Ragusa to protect ships in the Adriatic and setup a staging post to harbour & re-supply ships at Iraklion, there was already a safe shipping route all the way to Africa and the Middle East. I decided therefore that the first objective would be to take the Castle at Sofia and build a port whilst also taking Zagreb and thus creating a road from venice to the Black Sea which I would control. Taking Zagreb would also mean Venice was protected from the East. In Italy I bought Bologna from the HRE and Allied with them as well. I also took Florence which then represented my own league of city states.

I sent the Heir to Zagreb and both of the remaining sons to Sofia. I sieged Sofia for five turns until it gave in. Hungary almost beat me to it but I allied with them and got there one turn before them. There army has sat there on the border ever since and done nothing else (I think its confused because it wants to take Sofia but its allied with me and our relations are "outstanding").

After a few turns building up my conquests the Byzantines decided to take offense at my plans for breaking their trade monopoly and layed siege to Sofia. I fought them off but was too weak to strike back. Shortly after Sicily attacked Bologna and Iraklion, then the Moors landed and attacked Florence. It seemed like a case of if you have something worth taking, someones going to want to take it!

Next the Pope deciced to call a crusade on Jerusalem. It was bad timing as I was already over-stretched but I cmae up with a plan to turn it to my favour. The Doge was defending Italy and the two youngest sons were stuck in Sofia. This left the heir in Zagreb, until now safe from harm. I decided to gather every spare man I could beneath the heirs banner and march to Jerusalem -- right through Constantiniople. Reinforced by the garrison at Sofia the crusaders smashed a large Byzantine army and then took their Capital before continuing on their way. They succesfully sacked and secured Jerusalem and the heirs own son took the castle at Acre.

Back in Greece, the second eldest son was returning to Italy to assist his ageing father whilst the third son was to rule the newly conquered Constantinople. Of the Doges grandsons one was governing Bologna, one took charge of the garrison at Sofia and the other was to command the army assigned to putting an end to Byzantine aggression.

Just as things looked like they were getting back on track, the Doge died and the byzantines emerged from sourthern greece with an enormous army. Ragusa was lost, and Sofia and Constantinople both fought off difficult sieges. The general in Bologna died in battle leaving only one man to govern Italy which was now also under attack from the Milanese. I had another general come of age at Sofia and I managed to gather enough troops to make a half-stack for re-taking Ragusa. This new-kid has so far done a great job of fighting his way through to the castle and securing it. The general at Sofia marched south with about 1/3 of a stack to help break yet another siege at Constaninople and was caught by a full stack of byzantine spearmen and archers. After fighting a heroic victory, the survivors at constantinople have joined up with them to create an almost-full stack with both generals in just north of thessalonica. The general at Ragusa is going to join them soon with another half stack to try and finish the Byzantines in europe once and for all, although they will still be outnumbered.

Meantime, back in italy, the new Doges brother in Venice has just had another son come of age and immediately despatched him with a full stack of militia to take milan after the pope just excommunicated them. he then managed to get himself killed in his first battle (although the battle was won) so the Doges brother has joined the army from venice to finish the siege.

While all thats been happening, my 3 enemies, Sicily, Milan and the Byzantine Empire have all allied with the HRE to create my very own axis of evil. The HRE has not turned on me just yet but it did just ask for 150 florins in return for not attacking me which doesn't look good. At this point they are the largest and strongest faction in the game. the second largest is france who I will also have a border with soon. I am the the third largest overall though there are 3 0r 4 factions of near equal size.

My plan now is as follows. Finish off milan and genoa and then reinforce northern italy like crazy before the HRE and maybe even france turn up. Build them up into some money making machines while i'm at it. Finish off the Byzantines and then get all the spare troops from that region onto a boat to take Sicily and Cagliari and unite Italy under my rule (with the blessing of the Pope of course). If I can achieve that, I might look to go crusading again, ultimately I want to take on the turks and link up all the way to Jerusalem.

All in all, this has so far been an excellent campaign, I've lost battles, lost regions, lost generals, I'm not the biggest or strongest, I'm not rolling in cash but I'm not broke either, I haven't got the best troops but I'm not stuck using clone armies of militia, all this and I still feel I can win! I just hope the late game is going to be as good. I think I would have been a lot more powerful now if I had blitzed northern and then Southern Italy at the beginning before turning towards Greece but I doubt it would have made quite such a challenging mid-game as what I have now.

Captain Poppy
11-22-2007, 16:34
Greetings dear friends and servants of the Queen of the Adriatic.

I've just finished one VH/VH long campaign as Venice.

My advice for a good start would be:

1) Buy Bologna at turn 1 (costs around 5000/6000fl)
2) Send a diplomat to the Pope right away to get an alliance and give the Pope-o-Meter a boost any time you have the means to (Florins and/or map info and/or settlements you can't afford to keep atm).
3) Prepare 2 stacks of armies to siege Milan and Genoa in a short campaign, in order to minimize the rep hit with the Papal state.
Wiping out Milan faction should be your the first objective, letting them live makes them become every turn a bigger threat.
4) Grab with your remaining forces all rebel settlements you can, listed by order of importance: Florence, Ajaccio, Cagliari, Durazzo.
5) Give Durrazzo to the Pope if the Byzantines show up in the area with a stack of armies. (This will prevent early war with them and allow you to be able to defend against HRE in the meantime).
6) Try to secure an alliance with Hungary.
7) Take care of Sicily the same way you did with Milan (1 stack per settlement, blitz style).
8) Be prepared to defend Zagreb from heavy HRE assaults.

You should then now own all Italy and have a quite nice Florins income allowing you from this point to continue on the campaign in whatever direction you fancy.

My advice for continuing the game would be:

1) Take every Mediterranean island if possible.
3) Don't seek to expand to the East too far for Mongols and later on Timurids will show up and will turn your investments in a loss. Using the same strategy than the one to defend Zagreb should be used in Constantinople that should be considered as a "Frontier city" filled with full stack or armies).
2) Build up solid and consistent fleets. (Each fleet has a max range/per turn then each of your fleets should touch the max range of the next to it in order to be able to intercept every single enemy fleet that dares enter your waters).
3) Seek to "Envelop" the Mediterranean see to create new trade routes between your settlements and boost even more your income. Coastal settlements all around the see should be of interest for you (Exception made for Middle East).
5) Don't try to keep and hold inland settlements unless necessary, they will cost you more to defend than what they will reward you. For example create safe borders to the North by creating "buffer zones" by seizing inland settlements and handing them to the Pope.
6) When you'll be invading the Iberian Peninsula, use the blitz method. The settlements are far away from each other. Beginning the invasion without sufficient backup will make the campaign last much longer than it should.
7) Try to obtain an University asap for the "World is round" event is triggered by the construction of the first one. This will allow you to send and expedition early on and able you to use Venice famous merchants at their best (one experimented merchant on Tobacco or Cocoa resources will reward you thousands of Florins each turn).
8) Have fun.

TheLastPrivate
11-24-2007, 03:04
I have been trying to keep the Ventian bloodline clean by not accepting adoptions and man-of-the-hours (rather sad actualy to deny the hard fighting peasants a stab at nobility).

Its only around turn 25 and it seems that the bloodline detoriarate rapidly: my faction heir and his brothers get the "Dysfunctional" traits and the rest of the brood start showing up with "Aloof", "Deep pockets" and "Lazy"..

Ive tried very hard to use the guides to train up good generals/governors so most have various levels of good taxman, farmer and trader traits....

But im afarid that all my hard work to groom the venetian bloodline would end me up with some "Utterly insane", "Totaly Closed", "Embezzelers" inbreeds...

So should i try to opt for some adoption to get fresh blood into this nest of degenerates?

What have i done wrongly to get so appaling traits when the whelps come of age? I tought having a chivalourous grand crusader as father and grandfather should set some kind of example? The heir married a spanish princess, maybe thats where the problem lies?

Spanish and Hungarian blood tends to have the "rage" trait so its good to marry them and bring their blood in. You get bad genetic compositions once in a while and I just charge them into rebel spearmen in a narrow column.

Niterider613
11-30-2007, 01:45
I am having a blast playing as Venice. I hope to be able to take all of Italy without pissing the pope off to much:laugh4:

Trithemius
12-11-2007, 11:33
Anyone try to upset the Pope?

In my current game I tried very hard to keep him on-side, but he allied with the HRE (the ahistorical goon! :)) and then betrayed our alliance when war broke out!

My elderly heroic Doge received the Holy Lance from the general bearing it, and lead an army against Rome, displacing the unholy despot.

I've managed to reconcile with the Papacy (bribed them with the loot from Rome), and gave them Sardinia as a new home.

The Papacy still supports the HRE however, so I don't think this is the last I will have heard of the Pope...

Quintus.JC
01-09-2008, 18:51
Venice has a superior militia and also a very good army. I tried to unify Italy right from the start but that got me excommunated with the pope. after a while i was reconsilated again and had been the pope's favourite ever since, never made aggression with a Catholic nation (though they did to me), build churches and joined crusades. after Italian unification i want west into Byzantium, after conquering them i waited for the mongol invasion the lauched a large scale invasion into Asia.

mikalcarbine257
02-15-2008, 01:52
Some good information here, makes me want to replay venice

seari
03-08-2008, 20:33
There is a Pope-trick in 1.2 or 1.3. just capture Ajaccio and give it to the Pope. Almost everyone wants it, and thus, gets excommunicated.
Free killing for Venice!

jester
03-13-2008, 08:30
lots people suggest buying Bologna as the first move. I just trade ikronka, map and trade rights for bologna, then turn around and seige Ikronka, and kill the HRE emperor(it would be a nice payday if HRE had the 15k for the kings ransom, but they never do). then it's alliance with the pope and wack that snake in the grass(milan). kiss up to pope, call a crusade, send all your generals beside king and heir(since they gonna cultivate dread anyway). sell your cruade target to someone who have no hope of holding it(spain, portugal, england etc). consolidate a bit, then strike the byzantines.

Unknown Soldier
03-26-2008, 14:10
Ha the pope attacked florence after excommunicating me for taking Milan.

He died in the siege battle.

I lost the the city though - inflicting 90% casualties on the papal army.

Then we elected a sicilian in as pope, but I assulted rome and sacked it in the very next turn, - Pope 2 dies by the hand of Venice.

Then we elected a spaniard to be pontif.

I gifted Rome back to him after destroying all the buildings.

I own all northern Italy - milan has gone and the HRE in bologne was taken by assult in the first few turns.

Wild! I now have three Cardinals!

Mek Simmur al Ragaski
03-26-2008, 22:32
This is what i reckon somebody playing Venice should do

Expansion
Exterminate the people of Zagreb and Durazzo, and consider taking Flourence and Rhodes. I would not suggest attack the Byzantines as they are actually a decent ally, and wont stab you in the back like Milan regularly do. Your next goal should be to eliminate Milan as early as possible, so they are not a pain later on. I also suggest taking Ajjacio and Cagliari, both south of Genoa on the two islands, as the AI never attacks them and they are good for trade as they are right in the middle of the sea.

Trade and diplomatic stances
Seens as though you are places crash bang in the middle of italy, many diplomats will come down for alliance, trade rights and map info, the trade rights will gain you much money. If you have taken Florence, gift it to he pope, as many factions will attack florence, and it is a waste of money. This will also put your papal favour near the top, so its a good thing to do.

Navy
Venice has possibly the largest navy in the game, you should exploit this by blockading enemy ports, destroying their navies, porting units to their countries. Or you could simply dispand it to lower your upkeep, although i dont suggest this.

Units
I cant think of any, but people say they have some very good unique soldiers

Well, thats what i think you should do whilst playing Venice

kitbogha
07-17-2008, 16:17
My Plan:-
1)Trade money for Bologna, a good investment as once you take Florence too, you hold the keys to the peninsula and have options to expand east or west. Ally with everyone (ask for money to do so-they will usually pay for the priviledge). You can manipulate the Pope far easier if he is your ally, and if Milan (for instance, the treacherous snakes!!) decide to attack you and break your alliance the Pope seems to take this more seriously and it makes the whole Crusading for gain thing much easier.
2)Take Zagreb, before too long it expands to a nice little earner and also links up with Ragusa, somewhat unifying your empire.
3)Take Ajaccio. Keep it as a castle as it a) is handy for building troops for your expansion into Iberia and North Africa, b) It is tougher for when other factions (Milan again?) decide they want to risk your wrath and attack it. It is a great way station for expansion south and west. You can also take Cagliari (unless as in my campaign Sicily got there first-I am still being freinds with everyone but the Muslims and the Rebels).
4) Get some priests over to southern Iberia and North Africa to smooth your way with the locals and boost their credibility for when Pope Electing time comes.
5) Being the most popular faction with the Pope you can now commission a Crusade against Cordoba and get a toehold on the peninsula.
This is as far as I have got (turn 28) but I am nicely set up for a nice little war against the Moors.
More Later.

Later-
Turn 68 and the Moors are no more. Their empire fell with surprising ease (thanks to 2 handy crusades) and I now have substantial holdoings in Iberia and North Africa, including the king of all moneymakers Timbuktu. As planned the Pope is now Venetian. Milan, as expected betrayed our alliance, so I had to relieve them of 3 provinces. I was casting around for a legitamate enemy and Lo and behold Spain backstabbed me, so now the war is on, Spain have been excommed and I am rushing over to Rome with my diplomat to gift the Pope some florins and a map to push my love just that little notch higher to allow my planned crusade against Toledo (although the most popular of the Catholic Church's son's my faction is marginally short of the level to activate that particular crusade).
Once I have dispatched them (or maybe at the same time!) I aim to take out those Byzantines who have been raiding my Easternmost provinces...
It is good having a widely spread empire, allowing opportunities for action in several directions at once.

CrusadeAgainstYourEnemies
07-24-2008, 02:18
I started out very peacefully with Venice on VH/VH.

Traded Iraklion, Map Info and an Alliance to the Holy Roman Empire for Bologna.

Secured an Alliance with the Pope.

Did not move on Zagreb or Durazzo.

My only military move in the first 25 or so turns was to take Florence.

In the mean time I spent my time by teching up the economies of Florence, Bologna and Venice through farms/roads/markets/ports while supplying each with the means to defend itself through militia spears and crossbows.

I built cavalry in Ragusa. Brought the administrator to Venice and the Iraklion family member to Ragusa.

I allied with the French knowing full well I would eventually square off with the Milanese.

But the first act of war was the Sicilians. They were eliminated with relative ease as they were excommunicated and destroyed without a Crusade but with no Papal intervention either.

Next the Milanese decided to strike. I crusaded against Milan and quickly relieved the people of that nation of their two Italian cities. Now Venice resides over all of Italy, minus Rome, and Ragusa on the Greek coast.

My next move, where I'm in the middle of now, was an invasion of Greece. The goal for my initial half of the strategy is to secure Constantinople to Genoa whilst avoiding war in the West, setting up my economy and maintaining Papal favor.

The way I approach this game, as a Catholic faction on VH/VH, is always to appease then manipulate the Papacy.

I just took Thessalonica and Corinth, the next stop is Constantinople to control the trade of the entire map.

Once that is achieved, I will likely look to Hungary/Poland/Germany to further expand.

Don't get trapped into the idea that Venice needs to be played with the same ruthlessness and aggressiveness as the AI. It is possible and very effective to use your early military strength to stay at peace and develop a core of Venice, Bologna and Florence as the heart of your future Imperial economic structure.

angie1313
07-24-2008, 19:45
I started out very peacefully with Venice on VH/VH.

Traded Iraklion, Map Info and an Alliance to the Holy Roman Empire for Bologna.

Secured an Alliance with the Pope.

Did not move on Zagreb or Durazzo.

My only military move in the first 25 or so turns was to take Florence.

In the mean time I spent my time by teching up the economies of Florence, Bologna and Venice through farms/roads/markets/ports while supplying each with the means to defend itself through militia spears and crossbows.

I built cavalry in Ragusa. Brought the administrator to Venice and the Iraklion family member to Ragusa.

I allied with the French knowing full well I would eventually square off with the Milanese.

But the first act of war was the Sicilians. They were eliminated with relative ease as they were excommunicated and destroyed without a Crusade but with no Papal intervention either.

Next the Milanese decided to strike. I crusaded against Milan and quickly relieved the people of that nation of their two Italian cities. Now Venice resides over all of Italy, minus Rome, and Ragusa on the Greek coast.

My next move, where I'm in the middle of now, was an invasion of Greece. The goal for my initial half of the strategy is to secure Constantinople to Genoa whilst avoiding war in the West, setting up my economy and maintaining Papal favor.

The way I approach this game, as a Catholic faction on VH/VH, is always to appease then manipulate the Papacy.

I just took Thessalonica and Corinth, the next stop is Constantinople to control the trade of the entire map.

Once that is achieved, I will likely look to Hungary/Poland/Germany to further expand.

Don't get trapped into the idea that Venice needs to be played with the same ruthlessness and aggressiveness as the AI. It is possible and very effective to use your early military strength to stay at peace and develop a core of Venice, Bologna and Florence as the heart of your future Imperial economic structure.


Thats great advice to anyone who is listening. I made a few of those mistakes a number of times before I realized what I was doing wrong. Your thoughts on not being too aggressive is spot on.

CrusadeAgainstYourEnemies
07-24-2008, 20:51
Another thing:

The Byzantines were very strong in my game. Their generals are all 4+ Command Stars, with their family members usually around 6+ Command stars. They rolled with large, archer/heavy cavalry type armies.

I teched to Venetian archers too late as I was hell bent on getting a barracks in Ragusa/Palermo/Corinth for Venetian Heavy Infantry. If I could go back I would've mixed in the archery ranges as well to get the Venetian Archers, great units.

Bring lots of Priests to Byzantium. I got many Cardinals from spreading the faith not to mention only one family member ended up with a Pagan Magician in his entourage. Furthermore, Priests help with assimilation of conquered cities with different religions as most of you already know.

One question for any of you Venetian Veterans: Why is the blood-line of Venice so screwed up? I keep getting horrible traits for my coming of age Generals. I've killed off at least 5 neophyte Generals because their traits were horrible.

Fisherking
11-02-2008, 11:40
I have a different approach to playing Venice.

It has arguably the best balance of units in the game.

Her best archers are good as infantry so turn off the skirmish mode in most battles and stand fast. Back them with a few spears to rout cavalry and us Venicetion infantry for their infantry. You can make lancers in cities and they are good enough.

As to enemies, you don’t need to worry about too many of them. Buy Bologna from the Germans and pounce on Florence in the first turn. Buy cities from any faction that has more than three provinces in your early expansion. Tech up your castles for archers and infantry. Use diplomacy to buy provinces and do offer military access both ways to your allies. They attack less frequently when you have it. When you attack any city don’t sack if you can help it. Work toward that Immaculate reputation. Going to war is something to avoid. It will happen but don’t do it your self.

Use spies, assassins and priests to make Constantinople rebel and take it.

Seamus Fermanagh
11-03-2008, 21:17
Interesting, Fisher'.

Quite similar to how I play Venice, though I sack more (virtually never exterminate).

As you rightly note, your city unit mix is nearly as good as Milan's, so I take your approach (I do tend to use foot knights until I can get VHI production lines up and running and I prefer Knights to Lancers -- though only by a bit). Castle troops are a nice supplement, but not a requirement at all. A quick grab of Bologna and Florence really does give you a lot to work with. Once Milan attacks and you can take the other two members of the Quintet, you really have a great base.

I actually convert quite a few conquered castles to cities with Venice or Milan. I find one Castle in a large region (Italia, Gallia, Iberia, Dalmatia, Asia...) to be more than sufficient with those city troops. And yes, I generally leave as a castle that property which I know will be the enemies "focus" so that I can use it as a bleed-em-white spot.

Emperorwho
11-07-2008, 20:50
I probly plat as the British empire

floydsvoid123
11-29-2008, 03:29
Playing M/M 1.0 Long Campaign

Venice is one of my favorite factions to play (after Sicily, Denmark, Portugal, and England). I love the Italian militia units, I love the super cash cow in the Italian north, I just love the Italians in general, but Venice is definitely my second favorite of all of them. Milan is pretty fun to play too, but its complete independence from castle units (you can even train your heavy cavalry from cities...seriously, something's a bit off here.) can make gameplay a little redundant. Venice is also probably the most challenging Italian faction to play. While Sicily does have an economic disadvantage early on, it can overcome that easily and in the meantime doesn't have five factions or so to fight at once. Sicily can pretty much ignore European politics outside of Italy - Venice can't. Its starting position gives it incredible opportunities - control the Italian trade monster, attack the heathen Byzantines, use Iraklion to generate a huge and unstoppable navy - but it also means the wrong first moves will get you into deep trouble with too many factions to contend with, two of them (the HRE and the Byzantines) being the most militarily powerful and advanced in the world and Milan having the scariest militia army ever created, bar maybe the Moors with their urban militia (and even they don't get the pavise crossbows).

Key settlements are Bologna, Florence, Milan, Genoa, Durazzo, and Corinth.

Build a city barracks in Venice, you're going to want the Pavise Crossbow Militia.

The HRE must have something against keeping Bologna. Buy it for about 6000 florins total. Your diplomat begins with two pillars, you may want to bring it up by negotiating for a turn before going for the sale. You will receive a large number of mercenaries (most of the time it is crossbows, but once as Sicily later in the early game I got Frankish Knights instead). These crossbows are essential to your conquest, and you essentially just bought them for maybe 150-200 more than their normal cost. I believe there are 6 when you buy Bologna, so you can think of it as buying a city for 1200 florins.

Quickly take Florence. Use those crossbows, and use them well. They'll be part of your army for a long time from now.

My next target was Milan. Don't ever waste a single turn maintaining a siege against them. Instead, build spies by the dozen and send them into both of their cities. You may have trouble keeping your money up for the moment, as you're still paying tribute for Bologna. But both cities for some reason tend to be lightly defended. Keep two armies within walking distance of both cities, and attack when you have enough spies, taking both cities in one fell swoop. Preferably this would eliminate Milan from the game; if not, there is no real problem, as while they will be sending full stacks to take Milan back, Milan is an excellently developed city that will quickly develop advanced militia units and maybe a ballista tower. You can watch as they dash themselves to no effect against your towering walls.

Meanwhile, toward the east, you have Ragusa and Iraklion. For the moment it's hard to spare money for troops in this region. Take Durazzo for the council reward, it's important for your early game. Take Corinth, preferably after it reaches Fortress, with troops from Iraklion (you don't want to waste 4800 upgrading it yourself). Corinth will be the base of operations in your Byzantine war. Once things settle down in Italy, begin pumping troops from Ragusa (which you should upgrade to produce armored sergeants), Durazzo (get those Italian spear militias, or better yet, get ballistae to make sieges easier), and Corinth (Feudal Knights might be a good Idea). Using the troops you have already in Greece (probably a few mailed knights, mounted sergeants, and spear militia) as one stack and the new troops as a second, you can take Thessalonica and Sofia (Sofia is another excellent Fortress to pump knights from).

In Italy, the Sicilians will begin acting up. They have the usual militia plus dismounted Norman Knights. A head-on confrontation may be costly, though they have few to no crossbows usually. You can either defeat their invasion head on with a good stack of mercenaries (use all of those mercenary x-bows from Bologna) and spear militia, or you can hold them off with a stack and use spies and boats to take Naples and Palermo at once. Or just take Naples - the Pope will likely excommunicate Sicily a turn or so later, and then you can go for Palermo. Palermo is an excellent fortress that can probably upgrade to Citadel if it hasn't already, and I got a swordsmith's guild the turn I repaired the walls. So now I can have nearly invincible dismounted feudals and men at arms, plus I get a bonus to heavy cavalry at higher levels.

Take the island settlements now if you haven't already. As cities they are major trade centers and boost all of your Italian trade.

This is the point I am at now. Gregory died a few turns ago, and I had 3 cardinals and used allliances to vote me in as Pope. Always be wary of Papal standing - keep it at good or higher. I have 2 cardinals so far and am sending priests from Milan to make more; as always in my games, Milan is my theologian's guild city. With the capture of Thessalonica and Sofia, Durazzo is safe. The HRE took Bern and Zagreb before I could unfortunately. Bern is an underupgraded Castle anyway - if the HRE ever goes to war with me, I'll use Ragusa (its only real purpose in the game after the initial game) to take the mines of Zagreb and Vienna, and my superior militia to take Bern and Innsbruck, which will have upgraded far better now. Without these castles, the HRE's only resort will be Staufen, which quite frankly is a terrible castle compared to Innsbruck or Hamburg. I could probably convert Innsbruck to a city and keep Bern as my defense against Milan and the HRE.

France seems a bit hostile with me - I didn't ally with them when I could, and now I can't ally with them at all. They've been threatening to attack when I try to talk with them. Undoubtedly they will have Toulouse as the Spanish and the Portuguese don't seem to be doing so good yet, so my targets if I ever war against France will be Toulouse and Marseille for the Knights and the trade boost. After those two, France is likely crippled in the south and will be too busy fighting the surrounding factions.

Hungary, I hear, will attack eventually. I'll take Constantinople, use my navy to block the land bridges, and consolidate my power in Greece. If they ever attack, their first castle and city will be my targets. Without them the Magyars are toast.

I rarely expand further north in Italian games than Vienna, so in the South I have the Moors. For me the Moors are just a relaxation game more than anything else. Tunis and Algiers will likely be enough to contain them, but of course I could just oust the Moors from Africa and establish merchants in Timbuktu and Arquin (finding Arquin especially is entertaining).

A final few tips:
You have the best possible location to secure the Papacy. Send priests initially into the Byzantines. Eventually, once opportunities run out there, send them to Africa. As my Sicilian game proves, Africa is essential to the Papacy - I had 10 or 11 Cardinals once because of it. Use Milan to train better priests - get a theologian's guild, build a cathedral (don't build a huge one, it disables bishops). With a cathedral and a guild HQ, Milan can generate bishops (+1) with orthodox instruction (+1) and guild journeyman (+2), (+1) for blessed. That's a 5 cross bishop right there, more than enough to gain a Cardinal, not counting higher bonuses (Divine Connection +2, Chosen One +3), ancillaries, and missionary training.
Use your navy! Venice begins with the strongest navy in the world, 4 experienced galleys near Iraklion and 4 more near Venice. Use pirates to gain command stars. Often missions that give you best unit rewards will give you war galleys in the beginning, so don't worry about losing them (but do retrain). One thing I might try against the Mongols is use the navy to block the land bridge to Constantinople. It will protect against jihads and Byzantine/Turkish war as well. Venice will end up with one of the strongest navies in the late game (Portugal and Spain get the best ships but are unlikely to be able to finance them).

Spies, spies, spies. Make 6 or 7 early on, make more to root out enemy spies and reduce unrest. A thieve's guild is unlikely to be necessary, however.

And finally, upgrade city barracks regularly. You get excellent troops and excellent defense as well as happiness.

Kiron Drayga
12-18-2008, 06:56
I play Venice a little weird, in that I almost always convert Milan into a castle. I find that Milan's my least profitable province (probably has something to do with the lack of ports), and I usually capture Milan at a point where its population allows a relatively painless conversion to a Citadel. Genoa, Venice, Florence and Bologna are subsequently left cities, and they produce my extravagant income.

(Exception: One time with Venice, Sicily declared war on me early, so I converted Bologna into a castle and just kept it a castle after taking Milan and Genoa. Bologna's usually not quite as profitable as Venice, Florence or Genoa, either. Don't know why. It could just be how I develop the respective towns.)

While I respect the argument that every one of the five "Northern Italian bloc" cities should stay cities, I find that it's just so much easier to reinforce against HRE / French incursion when one of the five is a castle, as units from that castle are easily able to be sent to any of the cities in jeopardy. Also: as great as the militia units are, I have a soft spot for Feudal Knights and Venice Archers, with their superior range and defense, make better garrison units.

I usually find an early alliance offer and some degree of tribute to the Pope are sufficient to allow me to declare war on Milan without substantial consequences. I also benefit tremendously from the ol' "mass-recruit priests, send them on missionary work, build up their piety" strategy, which usually enables me to dominate with Cardinals. Often I'll play Venice by allying with everyone near me but Milan, bribing HRE for Bologna and grabbing Florence early, then going after Corsica and Sardinia, and then just staying put, until the current Pope dies and one of my priests inevitably replaces him. Sometimes I'll actually try to declare on Milan just before the Pope dies, as if my Cardinal is in great shape to be elected, he'll have a lower-then-average opinion of Milan going into the Papacy role.

Oh! I'll also give the Pope Irkalion. That's a pretty valuable part of my strategy. The island is very useless to me, so I've alternated in past games between giving Irkalion to the HRE (for Bologna, instead of a traditional florins bribe) or to the Pope (more useful if I've just suffered a slight blow to my status with the Papacy due to a war declaration on Milan.) I'll send my Irkalion units to Durazzo to win the prize, then leave the city torn apart for the Byzantines; then they'll march through to nothern Italy and end up assisting with Milan.

I like to take out Milan relatively early. Usually, if Milan's conquered Dijon, I feel I've given them too much time. I like to take Milan and Genoa out fast, and then rebuild my rep with the Pope after the damage has been done with Irkalion, bribes, and eventually cathedrals. (Venice is in great position to build one before other factions do.)

Once I've consolidated the five powerhouses of northern Italy, Corsica, and possibly Sardinia (Sicily occasionally beats me to the latter), I build up Milan (or Bologna) into a Citadel, the others into Huge Cities, and basically turtle for a while. If possible, I try to hit up north Africa (Moors territory) with crusades. It helps to have north African territory prior to declaring war on Sicily -- sometimes I even purposefully leave a northern African crusade target empty after conquering in a blatant attempt to convince Sicily to march from Tunisia and declare war so I don't suffer the bad karma.

Then it's Naples, Sicily and (if necessary) Sardinia, and now I have all of Italy outside of Rome under my control. I find it's really easy to subsequently keep the Pope on my good side -- he's almost always a Venesian pope, which helps, but I guess the fear of being surrounded by Venice keeps the Papal States in a subservient mindset.
I usually go for Iberia next and not Byzantium, but that's largely because the Mongols / Turks / Byzantines out there all frighten me, and expansion into Greece usually leads to Hungary and the Byzantines declaring war on me, and then I'll finally take Constantinople only to learn it's a favorite jihad target a turn or two later. (And even the Mongols join jihads! Never a good thing.)

Iberia is comparably safe. From a pure geographical standpoint it makes sense to move my capital to Sardinia, so I often do so. Start with the Moor territories -- Cordoba and Granada are usually still Moor-occupied at this time and the Papal States will be happy to see them eradicated. Crusades into these territories help immensely in terms of keeping troop levels high for low upkeep.

Usually in the early game I ally with one Iberian power and simply acquire trade rights with the other. Most recently, I allied with Portugal, then manipulated navy positioning so that Portugal would be forced into a war against Spain (with me.) Then I just take all the Spanish provinces, but I don't usually have to worry about Portugal double-crossing me. (Portugal has this irritating strategy in my Venice games of always taking Ireland, which makes eliminating the faction next to impossible. Spain is easier to eradicate outright.) Leaving a recent Spanish acquisition defenseless leads Portugal to declare war, they take the Pope popularity hit, and I consolidate Iberia, signing peace only after they've been restricted to Irish territory.

Next up has differed on my game: once I was hurting with Papal favor and the Polish took the Papacy, and despite being allies with Poland the Polish Pope didn't like me much. So I went across Africa on "crusades against the Holy Land" that never actually reached the Holy Land (or simply abandoned the holy cities after conquering them.) My real goal was Egypt proper, taken along the way. I find the Mongols usually don't mess with Alexandria, and I usually keep Gaza as a border. Eventually I end up dealing with Timurids, but never Mongols, from that position.

As a sidenote, I somehow convinced HRE to give me Bern for Antioch and tons of florins that game, but the poor HRE lost Antioch about a dozen turns later.

Another game, however, my relationship with the Papacy was better, and France made the mistake of blockading a port of mine, so I was able to go against France without risking excommunication. Started with Marsielles (from Genoa) and Toulouse (from Spain.)

After either Egypt or France, I always try for the New World when it opens up (really doesn't even matter which faction I'm playing!), but my final push is almost always for Byzantium -- in fact, I often prefer to leave Constantinople for my final conquer needed to win the game. Leaving Byzantine for post-gunpowder makes sense because you go from a huge tactical disadvantage to a huge tactical advantage against them (if they're even still around: one of the two times I played as Venice the Turks controlled Constantinople by the time I got there and Byzantium had been relegated to Rhodes.) I'll take all of Greece and even declare war on Hungary if necessary to acquire the settlements needed, though by that time, I'm such a clear powerhouse that half the world has declared war on me out of sheer desperation anyway. =)

To summarize: With Venice, turtling a while in North Italy during the "early-mid game" really helps: you'll build an immense amount of money and likely deal with few attackers. (I've never had HRE come down on me 'til much later in the game, assuming you've gotten the HRE to give up Bologna.) Like the Sicilians and Milan, Venice can go a little out of their way with sails to take on non-Catholic targets, namely the Moors, which helps tremendously with preventing any alienation from the Pope. Bologna, Venice, Florence, Milan and Genoa can all reinforce each other in a single turn with paved roads, so if any one of those is a castle, you can basically mass any unit you need to wherever you need it. Finally, it's all about taking Milan out early -- any way you can -- and you'll need an excuse to take Sicily out soon thereafter. If you succeed in consolidating Italy (minus Rome) as any one of the three Italian factions, and if you've done so without risking excommunication, you've basically won the game.

Random Generic
01-15-2009, 02:05
Finally, it's all about taking Milan out early -- any way you can -- and you'll need an excuse to take Sicily out soon thereafter. If you succeed in consolidating Italy (minus Rome) as any one of the three Italian factions, and if you've done so without risking excommunication, you've basically won the game.

You said a mouthful there, pardner.

To comment on what I have read on this thread:

I'm suprised that some people pay so much for Bolonga. I never pay more than 4000 florin (Alliance + Trade Rights + Map Info + 1000/turn X 4 turns). I occasionally get them to take the same deal as above but with 3600 (1200 X 3 turn)! It's insult to injury, though...the HRE will sell the same deal to Milan for 2800 cash! It's discrimination, I tell you...anyway, this price is usually good all the way to turn four, so I often wait while I take Zagreb and return the army to Italy.

In agreement with your quoted statement above, and to quell my natural aggressive instinct, I insist on taking out both Zagreb and Bologna without loses. It's fairly easy to siege those cities (as both have fairly minimal seige supplies) with sufficient force to make the populace surrender without sallying forth. No casualties taken, the Venice-Bologna-Florence triad in place with Zagreb starting to show as a true earner by turn 6 to 8. I find that having an intact and supplemented order of battle can really make the difference when push comes to shove, which happens right about...turn 7 or 8!

Iraklion is a royal pain. I have actually had good luck ceding it to the Pope and either taking Rhodes and Smyrna with the garrison or sending them home to help assure a timely annexation of the Nothern Italian Quintet. I have watched in horror as wave after wave of Sicilians and Byzentines wore the Garrison down and finally took it (I autoresolve all battles, no heroic gate defenses). It's positionally very attractive, but one CAN make do without it.

The funnest thing about Venice is that it's one of the few factions that can actually TAKE all the way to the advent of gunpowder and beyond to win. I can't think I ever made it past the bombard stage with Milan, even on VH.

Random

oz_wwjd
01-15-2009, 12:50
About the islands, I've found it best to leave them alone as in the past when I've taken them,Spain,Portugual,Sicily,France and england also decided that they wanted them and well,fighting what feels like,non-stop battles for them gets boring very quickly after a bit or that could be just me.

Prussian to the Iron
01-23-2009, 16:21
venice was actually my first faction playing m2 the first time around, and i continued on it until my comp. crashed and had to start over. i loved venice, mostly the balance of units, with the venetian heavy infnatry, the venetian archers, the cavalry, the exotic units, as well as the generic west european units(i use retrofit mod 1.0 with the grand unit addon mod on it now) i think venice is a very stable country to start with, being wealthy, in a good starting position, and with strong units all together.

with the islands, i usually turn them into huge cities with a small garrison of militia units, and secure trade rights with just about everyone around, making them trade centers in the eastern mediterranean. same with italian islands

Polemists
02-15-2009, 12:48
I think i'm going to have get fraps again once etw comes out, I forgot how fun it is to video tape your empire and battles.

Anyway,

I am playing venice at the moment, after a not so hot run with sicily and denmark (Go read Mtw2 general forums)

Venice is SHOCKINGLY easy for me thus far.

Early on I made a alliance with the pope and bribed him, and since I had a large navy and several ships I simply sailed south and took out sicliy. At this point the Byzatines attacked me and I struck back at them as well taking the small city on eastern greece. Usually when I kill leaders it dosn't help me but for whatever reason when I killed the leaders of both sicily and By somehow this made them enter a ceasefire.

I just launched a crusade against the turks, which I think is best as you want to keep the byzatines surrounded.

Right now the By's are taking the other turkish terrotories. My hope is to take The byzantine lands of west and let them fight the mongols later on.

The key for me has been sacking cities, these guys get a wide variety of good city troops, so not as much need for castles.

anweRU
02-16-2009, 15:46
I hadn't played METW2 for a while, but installed it on my new comp, along with the Kingdoms expansion. I'm currently playing the Grand Campaign with the retrofit mod I downloaded from the Total War site.

May be it is a peculiarity of the retrofit mod, but most of the dire warnings in this thread did not come to pass. I started out with allying with HRE & buying Bologna, then got the Florence mission. My Doge besieged Florence all by himself, and utterly vanquished the garrison when they sallied forth. I allied with the Pope, kept bribing him. In the mean time, the councillor captured Zagreb, left the garrison, and immediately returned to Venice, building watch towers along the mountain passes to the north.

I had started building the first level siege works in Venice the first turn, built a ballista as soon as I could, then a ballista. By turn 7 I captured Milan, which the Milanese had left with only a couple of units as they attacked a rebel stack to the west... It took me several turns to get into a position to capture Genoa. Again the Milanese Duce took the majority of his units out of Genoa, apparently to reinforce Dijon which he had captured. The Milanese were stuck in Dijon, with two full stacks, one in the city, and one outside. Then they went to war with the French as well, but didn't actually attack any French cities.

In the mean time, I captured Durazzo within the first 7 or 8 turns, and built two watchtowers (immediately to the east, and one close to Corinth) on the border with the Byzantines. They came asking for an alliance, which I accepted. I noticed them preparing a huge stack outside of Theselonika, but it turned rebel! It took the Byzantines a long time to finally get rid of it.

I noticed the same thing happen with a number of different armies with almost all the AI countries. They keep their stacks outside of the cities, and sooner or later those without generals rebel. The Turks had a 3/4 stack outside of Edessa, which just stood there for several turns. It then rebelled, and joined the Edessa garrison!

I called a crusade on Antioch (rebel), and sent two stacks to capture it, and then Acre. Acre was at ~ 4200 population, so I immediately started on the armourer and barracks series to get a swordsmiths guild. Later I had a mission to capture Damascus, captured Aleppo, and then called a second crusade on Jerusalem.

In the mean time, I sent a bunch of assassins and spies to Theselonika, along with three priests (one of them became a cardinal). The city rebelled, and a Venetian Crusader army captured it en-passent :laugh4:, and is now garrisoned there, as another Venetian Crusader army took Jerusalem the same turn.

The same crusade was instrumental in the final destruction of the Milanese, in the thirty-something turn. An army under the councillor had captured Bern, and after replenishing went to the north of Dijon, with a full stack. A second army, joining the Jerusalem Crusade just before I captured the city, approached the city from the south. I fought a major two stack vs two stack battle outside of Dijon. My second army (the mostly infantry army from Bern) had to go around a mountain, and my 3/4 stack valiantly martyred itself. The three Cavalry militia units, and the general made glorious charges (and got up to gold chevrons). Finally the second stack arrived and destroyed the second Milanese army (the lone Feudal knights unit went up to two gold chevrons in one battle!). Incidentally, the battle took over 40 minutes... I thought I had killed all three Milanese general units, and happily accepted the ransom - only to discover a Milanese Duce and a full stack of Italian militias & spear militias left in Dijon! I set up siege, and waited several turns to wear down the defenders (my armies were in no shape to fight the Milanese survivors until I could send reinforcements). Milan has finally been destroyed.

Sicily is left only with Tripoli, after foolishly betraying our alliance around the 10th or so turn, after I captured Ajjacio. This was just before the first crusade. I sent out a Crusader army from Milan & Venice, with a ballista, which made its way down to Naples. Ironically enough, it bypassed a Sicilian crusader army which got stranded in Bologna. After the crusade ended, my army found itself right in front of Naples, defended only by the Sicilian king and an Italian militia unit. Burn in heck, o foul Sicilian! Palermo was taken several turns later, and Tunis during the second crusade.

In the mean time, the Moors took Cagliari from the Sicilians. The Pope attacked Cagliari with two full stacks, while it was defended by a single Moor unit. Besieged the city, and .... did nothing! Several turns later he declared a cease-fire with the Moors. Repeated the same several turns later! Now there are two full stacks of the Papal army just hanging out, outside of Moorish Cagliari!

England and HRE have attacked France. On principle, I canceled my alliances with both aggressors, but somehow my reputation fell from Very Reliable to Reliable. France lost Rheims to the HRE. My assassins and spies are working on inciting a revolt, along with their French counterparts.

I have a Master Assassins guild in Bologna, a Master Thieves guild in Milan, a Master Merchants guld in Venice, a Master Explorers guild in Antioch, and an inherited Master Masons guild in Naples. I have two Templar's Guilds (Iraklion and Tunis), and just got a Swordsmith Guild in Ragussa, which I plan to upgrade to a Master S.G. soon.

The funny thing is, the rebel-held Antioch has an Explorers Guild! :inquisitive: (which I upgraded later).

At the moment I am allied with most factions, and at war only with Sicily, which has only Tripoli left. My original Doge died just a couple of turns ago, in his late sixties, so did Pope Gregory just this last turn. One of my cardinals was elected Pope this morning, before I left for work...

Overall, I've enjoyed the campaign so far. Most of the other factions (except for Russia!) have had stunted growth, due to rebelling armies. I'm at a lost to explain why! I don't remember such issues in METW2 1.1, which is what I played before.

anweRU
02-16-2009, 16:14
Sorry for the double post. Can't we edit our own posts?

I forgot to mention that I was playing on H/H. I've flooded the map with emissaries, spies & assassins, and Damascus has been my priest factory. I've been hunting other Catholic factions' priests & killing them. Unfortunately, England has three cardinals, all in England, and I can't get there yet - my navy is concentrated in the Central and Eastern Med, and I don't have a settlement on the Atlantic coast yet.

Gaius Terentius Varro
02-20-2009, 18:15
I hadn't played METW2 for a while, but installed it on my new comp, along with the Kingdoms expansion. I'm currently playing the Grand Campaign with the retrofit mod I downloaded from the Total War site.
May be it is a peculiarity of the retrofit mod, but most of the dire warnings in this thread did not come to pass. I.

A well know "feature" of the retrofit mod is a passive campaign AI: it virtually just stands there hardly attacking anything. Fire up a vanilla VH/VH campaign and enjoy the fireworks instread.
VHI is bugged it should have same weapon stats (incl animation speed) as dismounted boyar sons/dhruzhna or dism huscarls (other one handed armor piercing axe units). Instead it has the stats of a 2 handed axe unit AND a shield. Look up retrofits rebalance of VHI if you don't believe me...

Agent Miles
03-16-2009, 15:12
I took a slightly different blitz path (VH/VH) in my campaign. On the first turn I started construction of the first level siege building in Ragusa along with a knight and two sergeants. I sent the units there on a long trip to Thessalonica bypassing the worthless Durazzo. The fleet near Iraklion took all of my forces there to land near Corinth and was then disbanded. I sent the King and all of the other military units in the north to Naples. I sent the spy to Thessalonica/Constantinople and the priest was sent as a scout to Naples/Sicily.
I then laid siege to and on the very next turn sacked Corinth after hiring some mercs. The cavalry and the other units from Ragusa met up with this force at Thessalonica, which was also sacked after a quick siege. Without HA’s from Corinth, the rest of the Byzantine armies were no match for my cavalry. I bulled my way through them and siege/sacked Constantinople.
While this was going on, my King’s army used the ballista from Ragusa and sacked Naples without a siege, while the Sicilian navy was unsuccessfully trying to get an army past my fleet into the Adriatic. I then waited out the Pope’s ban on attacking Sicily before eradicating that faction.
By turn 14 Sicily is gone and the Byzantines have only two weakly garrisoned settlements. My faction is largest and numero uno in everything except finance (where 15k florins in the bank earns me only second place). I can now take all the rebel settlements that I ignored and then spank little Milan.

P.S. On turn 37 I completed the elimination of the Byz and Milan factions (and took Antioch to complete the crusade). That's it for the short campaign. I don't think that I will continue, as this was a slam dunk.

coalition
12-28-2009, 16:16
Amazing faction. Richest in the game and the only one to get the powerful Monster Ribault (Besides Spain).

Also can field Musketeers....Mhmmm :yes:

Great Militia units to defeat enemies in the beginning, easy empire in 30 turns :)

Richest faction in the game IMO.

Michael333
01-01-2010, 23:26
When I use Venice, I always focus on invading east and fight Hungarian and Byzantine troops quickly and as soon as possible. I think that Venice and Milan are really similar. They have the classic Italian militia/spearmen the only differences are the venetian archers and heavy infantry. I usually don't start to prepare an invasion of Italy and never attack the HRE early.

dzidek
05-13-2010, 14:51
Somebody stated above that he makes Milan a castle to pump his defense. I wonder why? A venetian city has all the defense it needs alone from itself... And reducing a 3k city income to 1k castle income is someting i would not do when not necessary.

Taking the italina peninsula first is a good plan and i follow it almost everytime. But i do take Zagreb early and make it a castle, Ragusa then becomes a city. I skip Durazzo if i don't get a mission for it that pays good value for my efforts.
From Iraklion i take usually Corinth, but only after i've united Italy.
I seem to grow impatient so i destroy Milan in the first 20 turns with a quick double attack with catapults or spies. Leaves me with some rebel generals to deal later. Sicily is more tricky as it quickly gets hold of some African terrain and other islands, i can't kill them off quickly. So i wait or a excom. that they usually get or until they have at least little Pope protection (four or less crosses). Then i seize quickly their italina posession. I make Sicily a town.
After i have the whole Italy i turn towards the Byzantines (i forgot to add that my priest did their work here from the start of the game).
I tend to make a front line with castles at Zagreb, Sofia and military oriented city in Milan. The south central castle of Corinth deploys the rest of the troops. Constantinopole is secured by navy.
All the islands i take are made cities. This way i controll 19 regions at the time of my current campaign. I have about 300k gold and the best army in the world.

The Army... it's great... it has to be... you will face Turks at some time so you have to match them at least.
The city units do their job really well. You will never need to suport your cities with castle units unless you are cought off guard. You have spears, crossbows, muskets, cavalry, cannons...
The castle units however are better for late period war making. The best infantry in game, very good archers, muskets (thay are from city but you really need them later), a large variety of artillery, great naval units, one of the best light cavalry in game (yest i do mean Stradiots). You really just lack top notch heavy cavalry, but the ones you have will make the job done if you use them wisely.

Myth
07-02-2010, 11:49
My advice is to never ever sit with 300k in your treasury. In my last England game i bought cities from the pope for 30-40k every turn just to sit under 50k. Get above 50k and your generals start getting those bad corruption traits.

I started a new game with Venice last night - playing lategame with "show AI movement" enabled means waiting for 1 minute for each faction to move it's 20 useless diplomats around... Not somthing I'll do again. Venice seems nice, and their starting position is superb. What i did so far:

Take my spy and both stacks over at Milan. Ignore the rebel settlement in Italy for now. On turn 1 i sell map info only to the Milanese for 500 florins. The guy in the village on the Peloponese peninsula goes to take the rebel settlement up north. The guy on the island next to the holy lands just waits and builds the city up. I disband both large navies Venice starts with. Sure 12 or so Galeons are very strong but you don't need them early on, and that gold is better spent on mercs and town development.

Early Italian castles are useless, so all three towns are focused on development.

On turn 2 i reach both Milanese towns with my two stacks, buy the merks and siege them. I sell map info + trade rights to the HRE for 600 gold and move down towards the pope.

Turn 3 - I take both Milanese towns and wipe their faction off the map. The world briethes a sigh of relief as this treacherous scourge of the Catholic world is no more. The Pope was too slow to react so I got away scott free! And since I didn't have trade rights or alliances with them, my rep stayed constant. I now plan to spraed some Catholic love around with my diplomats, getting the Pope on my side, then launching a Crusade at Jerusalem or even Bhagdad. Maybe I'll take Constantinople on the way, sack it and give it to the Pope, to ensure I can launch crusades later vs Byzantium.

where's yur troosers
08-24-2011, 22:37
Is there any way to avoid war with the Byzantines as Venice? I see some here have had them come asking for an alliance, but I cannot get one for love nor money (well I suppose they MIGHT agree if I gave them 4 cities and every penny I had). I have played and won as Venice and wanted to try again without fighting quite as much. In particular I wanted to try to make nice with Byzantium, but they just wont have it. I gifted them Durazzo and let Irakion go rebel so that we would not cross swords over that. We exchanged map info and trade rights (and I didn't ask for anything for that either!) and my relations are Very Bad and they laugh in my face when I offer an alliance (well I like to think they are laughing inside the computer).

It is early in the game (turn 29ish) I have the usual 5 northern cities, Zagreb, Ragusa, Bern and Antioch so am in no way powerful enough to make the AI want to hate me. I have alliances with 3 other nations and am not at war with anybody (although my crusading army is about to expand my empire at Egypt's expense)

Vladimir
08-25-2011, 12:53
There's a way to avoid war with anyone, but there's a cost. Byzantium is Venice's natural enemy. Secure modern day Greece and Big C and you'll be fine.

The_Adm0n
09-16-2012, 00:53
------------------------------------------------------------------------
How to put Italy under your boot in 5 turns: (VH/VH)
------------------------------------------------------------------------

Turn 1:

• Take Cristiano Selvo and the garrison at Iraklion and get them on the ships neighbouring the island. Destroy all buildings you can at Iraklion for some extra cash, and set the ships destination to drop the troops off at Palermo on Sicily (on my first attempt with Venice, Sicily attacked Iraklion by about turn 9 or so - so it’s worth getting rid of. As an extra point, you can destroy some of the ships to get rid of some upkeep costs in following turns).

• Next take your diplomat outside of Venice and strike up a conversation with Bologna. Agree to an alliance and trade rights as well as exchanging Iraklion for Bologna. The HRE should “barely accept”. (You can buy Bologna from the HRE in the alliance for 3850 florins instead of exchanging it for Iraklion, but by keeping Iraklion you will come to blows with the Byzantine Empire sooner rather than later and also you won’t be able to take your full garrison out of Iraklion either to take Palermo - so the choice is yours). Leave the diplomat where he is.

• Move your ships near Venice next to the third island along the coast of the Ragusa region, leaving them by the coast. Take Alessandro Selvo and the two units of spear milita in Ragusa and stick them on the ships, leaving one unit of peasant archers to garrison Ragusa and keep the peace (might not be necessary, but it never hurts). Destroy all buildings at Ragusa you can, and take your spy on that coast and also set him to board the ships.

• Take Councillor Bartolomeo and take Zagreb. Make as many units whole as possible and leave the weakest to garrison Zagreb to keep the peace, then with the rest of you army make for the same boat you stuck Alessandro on.

•Take four of the five mercenary crossbowmen from Bologna and siege Florence, building a battering ram.

• Take Doge Domenico and a unit of peasant archers and make a fort at the space in the Alps north of Venice. Leave the archers and then set Doge to rendezvous with the mercenary crossbowmen outside of Florence the following turn.

•Recruit a unit each of Italian spear militia and Italian militia at Venice, and build whatever buildings you want to at Bologna and Venice. Take your merchant and go for whatever resource you think is best (the silk outside Constantinople trades for a lot, but it takes a while to reach).


Turn 2:

• Complete your move with Domenico, take Florence, leave as small a garrison as you can there and make for Genoa.

• Recruit a unit of Italian militia at Venice.

• Complete Councillor Bartolomeo and his army’s move from the previous turn, as well as the spy’s, and set ship to dock your army at the western side of the Naples region.

• Move closer to Palmero with your ships containing Cristiano.

• With your diplomat gift the HRE with 250 florins per turn for 200 turns, ensuring their alliance. The fort you created in the first turn should have trapped their army so you will still be able to reach them with your diplomat. If you attempt this in the first turn, they will refuse, saying that they don’t feel comfortable accepting whilst giving nothing in return - which is why you needed to leave your diplomat in place last turn. Ordinarily by turn five Milan and the HRE will have an alliance, and any moves you make against Milan will cause your and the HRE’s alliance to break - making it vitally important to deal with Milan as soon as possible. Sometimes the HRE will refuse your gift again, if so then try again the next turn, if things went okay make for France with your diplomat (or whoever you want).


Turn 3:

• Dock your troops on the western coast of the Naples region, and make for the city.

• Advance further to Genoa with Domenico, recruiting all the mercs you can.

• Take your entire garrison out of Venice and make for Milan, you’ll reach the city but not be able to lay siege yet - so war is held at bay for another turn.

• Move Cristiano closer to Palermo.

•#The Papal States should send a diplomat to Bologna during their turn (making the acquisition of Bologna vital). Offer them an alliance, trade rights, Ragusa, Zagreb and exchange military access (you may have to run troops through Rome and they’ll definitely have to run troops through your lands to reach Ragusa and Zagreb). Then gift them 250 florins per turn for 200 turns. This makes the perfect buffer against Hungary, and to some extent with the Byzantine Empire though they usually will send boats to Naples with armies anyway as they seem determined to make war with you for whatever reason.


Turn 4:

• Dock Cristiano at Palermo, and with every army engage the required city. It helps to build two battering rams instead of one where possible on the off-chance one goes up in flames during a siege. Sometimes an army waits outside Naples, if this is the case you can take Naples this turn. You’ll notice that Palermo has one general unit garrisoned only, the rest are laying siege to Tunis.

• Remember to disband the troops you used to garrison Ragusa and Zagreb so you don’t have to pay their upkeep.


Turn 5:

• Conquer. Milan is a tough fight but all the rest are very easy, and you’ll kill off both Milan and Sicily in one fell swoop - giving you the entirety of Apennine Peninsula apart from Rome. If the Pope and asks you to cease hostilities - don’t; your reputation won’t suffer greatly and will bounce back to “outstanding” within a turn or two due to your tribute. I would recommend sending Cristiano with a small force to siege Cagliari in the same turn, and deploy Domenico to start blocking up the Alps with forts.

ConjurerDragon
05-01-2019, 10:15
My advice is to never ever sit with 300k in your treasury. In my last England game i bought cities from the pope for 30-40k every turn just to sit under 50k. Get above 50k and your generals start getting those bad corruption traits.

And I wondered why my venetian governours all turned into corrupt, embezzling Aesthetics with expensive tastes. One even becoming an Arse. Next campaign I will keep my treasury lower.



I started a new game with Venice last night - playing lategame with "show AI movement" enabled means waiting for 1 minute for each faction to move it's 20 useless diplomats around... Not somthing I'll do again.

When the AI moves their units and they are in your sightrange they will slowly walk along their coloured lines. Simply press the left mouse button and they will walk much faster.

karenmane
09-07-2021, 11:24
Guidance needed guys.

karenmane
09-07-2021, 11:25
i am kind of stuck in one place can anyone assist me?