Scottish troop mix

[where's yur troosers]

Whilst they have some cracking infantry the Scots lack in almost every other department. Their "best" archer is the noble variety and whilst they are handy, especially on the walls, they do not compare with anybody else's top missile unit. Their cities do not even produce archer militia.

Border Horse and Feudal Knights are OK, but again no top drawer cavalry. You have to hope for a crusading order. No bonus from tourney fields either.

No missile cavalry, no hand gunners etc and I find pikes hard to use - they draw swords on impact and die too qucikly.

My solution has been to hire mercenary missile units and keep more csettlements as astles than I would usually to supply archers for city defense.

Their infantry are fine at tearing through a line of armoured spearmen or flanking say DFK to great effect, but against a standard mongol (or even polish or Hungarian) stack what is the solution?

Don't get me wrong I enjoy the challenge, but would welcome some tips on tactics rather than strategy.

[Myth]

Some poster here (in the England thread i think) argued that Scottish Noble Archers are better then Retinue Longbowmen. Maybe he can come and defend his position? Also, "hoping" for a crusading order is no problem, you virtually can't play without getting them.

[where's yur troosers]

Noble Archers are CLEARLY better. Retinue Archers are dross what with the long range, armour piercing arrows, high attack and defense and those utterly useless stakes.

I have an Order HQ in my current game, but its at Antioch. I have disposed of the Turks and Egyptians. The Mongols have tootled off to Kiev. The only other powers nearby are the Papacy (I gifted them a settlement to make up for one or two ever so minor transgressions) and Byzantium and I have been and plan on remaining thier loyal ally throughout the campaign. So my best knights are years away from any kind of serious action.

[Myth]

There is a guide on Guilds you can read up on. In my current England game I got the Hospitalier HQ in Cordoba, but have also been offered it at several other towns and castles. Basically joining Crusades and having high Chiv generals, and recruiting the knights themselves will help you get them in other provinces. I just got offered to build the Hospitalier chapter house in the middle of Catholic Europe so don't worry. here is the link where this guy is arguing that Scott Guards are better: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?72050-England/page9

[Rahwana]

pikemen should be used rather defensively, yes, it was a hard trick, but it really worth to order your men with pikes move a bit, stop, lower their pike and bait the enemy into attacking you with some kerns or peasant archers

[Old Geezer]

Do not underestimate Border Horse. Recruit a lot of them and use them to charge archers esp and to chase down routers. By the year 1200 you should have at least a full army of all cav level 9 chevron Border Horse. Once you get ugrades of armor and weapons the Border Horse can do damage to Mailed Knights and even Mongols, because nothing is any faster. One important thing is that they disengage fast. Couple them with Mailed knights and then Hospitallers. The Border Horse can run down fast archer cavalry and pin them until the Hospitallers or Knights show up to obliterate them. Crank out Highland Nobles fast and get a Citadel asap and you'll have the swordsmith HQ soon. Pikemen suck. Unless you remove their secondary weapons by modding or play SS you are stuck. Some people say they can micromanage pikemen, but I have had no patience and less success. They were clearly designed, developed, and tested by an English malcontent or a person who has never seen or heard of pikes, except the fish.

[where's yur troosers]

I love the idea of using fish on the end of sticks to ward off a cavalry charge. It would probably be more effective than the pikes as the appear in the game.

I am not going to try to mod them. My 6 year olds know more about computers than I do. I could not even follow the step by step guide to have the Kingdoms units introduced to the main game which is a shame as I would like to use flamethrowers as Byzantium.

What do you do in seiges with a poor selection of archers? I have taken to keeping a couple of seige engines in each settlement an sallying.

[Bilgediver]

How can anyone claim Retinue longbowmen worse than Noble Archers for the Scots? The Noble Archers are not long ranged! The Scots (like the Danes) are one of the unfortunate factions never to get a long-ranged missle unit!

[Old Geezer]

It does seem rather silly, even to one such as I who is very partial to the Scots. I think that the Noble Archers could hold a wall better than the Retinue Longbowmen.