my first islamic campaign

[desdichado]

After a bunch of catholic campaigns I thought i'd give Egypt a go (on expert) - sick of bothering with excomm

I am doing OK with only a couple of ignomious defeats however I seem to suffer casualties on at least equal terms with AI and sometimes even worse although I am at least winning most battles. One battle I had left a total of 50 men in 8 units (out of 1,800)and they were all exhausted. I cut that one pretty fine.

My experience with catholic spearmen is they hold up too cavalry quite well but my Nubian & saracen spearmen are having trouble. When I faced saracen infantry before I thouth they performed adequately but were no match for chiv sarges.

My ghazi infantry are good but I can't get any high valour units cause they keep dying. Sure they smash the enemy but they don't last. I can now get Abyssinian guards so willl give them a try but they seem to be very similar but without any armour (arrows anyone???).

My tactics are fairly similar to catholic armise with spearmen in front and shock on flanks however I generally have a weak centre so I can pile as many units on the flank as possible. This never used to be a problem cause My spearmen took forever to die. I now am reinforcing my saracens with a could of units of Nubians so at least the centre holds for longer but my flank attacks then lack power.

Am I doing something wrong or is this par for the course on islamic campaign???

[rasoforos]

remember that mobility is your ally as an islamic faction , not brute power. try to harrass your enemy , make him exhausted , flank and do not attack directly. normally in the south no knight will be in good fightinh condition after a bit of running around so use that to your benefits.

[desdichado]

Rasoforos,

sorry I should have made myself clearer. i have only been fighting against Turks & Almohads so far - no crusade has made it too me yet.

So I am fighting against roughly similar troops - its just that every fight seems to end up with us both suffering horribly. I used to be able to (mostly) smash other catholic armies while keeping my losses acceptable.

Don't get me wrong I like the challenge but i just wanted to hear some other ideas cause so far none of mine have worked http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/confused.gif

[Basileus]

The turks are quite annoying with all the hybrid units and horse archers but still when fighting in the desert you got the upper hand, against the almos you should use saracens against their spear men and AUM and especialy try flanking the AUM..remember that the desert, speed are your friends so try to come up with a new tactic that suits your needs http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

[andrewt]

The Egyptians really don't have anything that match up well against AUMs. Except for Saracen infantry, most of their units are high attack low defense units. They are also very vulnerable against arrows by Turkey's hybrid units.

If you use ghazi infantry, your casualties will be really high. Against other nations, ghazi can easily rout units with a charge but many Islamic units tend to have higher morale. Muwahid foot can also be used as flankers but they aren't as good at killing as ghazi though they suffer a lot less casualties. I used Egyptians like Oda in Shogun or the Zerg in Starcraft. Build lots of saracen, ghazi and muwahid, add some cavalry and just use brute force of numbers. You have very rich lands and can start researching armor upgrades immediately after swordsmith and spearmakers' workshop.

[Leet Eriksson]

use Nizaries,they are the UU for the egyptians very good overall infantry and can actually defeat a unit if chivalric spearmen if used properly.

[Lord Romulous]

dont forget missile troops.
4 units of missile troops if used properly take around 300 -400 troops per battle.

that is a huge number considering the units themselves are not taking losses.

try and decimate your enemies heavy hitters like knights etc with missiles. surviving a charge by 3 full units of chiv knights is hard for your saracens but if the knights have been depleted by 1/2 if makes life easier.

my general stat for muslims are the following.

do not attack unless you have atleast comparable numbers to the enemy in quantity and only a bit lower in quality.

dont go up against foot knights, knights and chiv sergants with roughly the same amount of saracens, gazis and gulams you will lose on attack.

on defence you can go better usually i handle 2-1 odds ok with my muslim troops.

i follow the same general strat as u guys. with my battles.

spears in front, missiles behind, melle troops on side but slightly back. cav on the sides behind or next to mellee.

make sure the enemy cav does not flank you or it can be curtins. if a enemy cav unit tries and there are not any other enemy units to close then charge it with your closest saracen. the knights will abandon their attempt to flank and charge into your spears. then use your nearby melle or cav to hit them in the flanks. make sure you order the saracen to halt after if charges. the spears always fight better in formation.

if you have a long line of spears and you find one or two are feeling the brunt of the enemy watch that the unit does not start to turn left or right thus breaking your line. the ai is smart enough post patch to charge their now exposed flanks. if they start to turn then reposition them back to line again. they seem to turn their back to the enemy when they repostion but if you look closly their are a few saracens holding back the enemy while the rest of the troops repostion. so in all they tend to repostion back to the line with only a few losses if any.

but if allow them to get side on to the line then u can pretty much say good by to that unit and possibly a great chunk of your army too.

most of the above applies if you are fighting in southern and eastern europe. for the desert i can say as others have said that harrasing the heavy armour aum with cammels and horses archers is good. when you have a line of spears put javlin troops behind them and get them to throw at the enemy. javlins are very devasting close missiles.

sorry this so disorganised was just typing without thinking of structure.

[Kraxis]

The Muslims aren't as strong as the Catholics, they simply haven't got those strong versatile units. And since they haven't got such an important part of the army you can't play them as you would the Catholics. You must adapt.
As Muslim you have to be more patient in positioning and using your ranged units. When melee is commited you have to wait more as your Ghazi simply can't stand up to an enemy head on (they might win but losses will be very high and they are out of the fight). Also any non-Ghulam cavalry needs to be further out on the flanks as it can't pay off to have them locked in melee right away.

It takes time, but eventually you will find the way. But even when you have found your own way you must expect to lose many more units than what you did as Catholic (but your troops are also cheaper for the most part).

BTW Saracens are exactly the same as Chivalric Sergeants.

[Exile]

hehe, I turned to the forum for help when I was the Egyptians too. Once you have high-late era knights, CMAA and chiv sargeants, it's a real eye-opener. I received some very good advice which helped me in my campaign, maybe some of it will be useful to you:

http://www.totalwar.org/cgi-bin....l=exile (http://www.totalwar.org/cgi-bin/forum/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=7;t=4248;hl=exile)

[desdichado]

Quote[/b] (Kraxis @ Jan. 13 2003,02:27)]BTW Saracens are exactly the same as Chivalric Sergeants.
Kraxis,

yeah I checked the stats for saracens after I posted and noticed they were identical to chiv sarges. Bit surprised by this as they never could stand up as well when I fought them. I don't remember having a much better general than ai and was playing on expert so ai got extra bonuses. Must have been something I was doing but for life of me I don't know what.

Thanks everybody else for ideas - I'll see if they work but at least this my toughest campaign yet and am enjoying immensely - especially when enemy cuts off my northern invasions leaving them stranded in Sweden facing a huge rebellion and no reinforcements on horizon http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/frown.gif I am wondering if I should try and march them through Europe back to my homeland - would be fun to try I think).

[andrewt]

CA listed the Egyptians as easy in early and high, possibly the same in late. I think you were meant to rush with them, and with the Almohads as well. You can make a decent army with only a keep and start churning out quality troops from newly conquered territories almost immediately. Of course, it was easier pre-patch because of the spearmaker bug (+2 valor from workshop, none afterwards).

[Kraxis]

desdichado, at Hard the AI gets a small benefit at Expert the AI gets a substantial benefit as well as +4 Morale to all troops. So if your troops were identical then the AI ones would win any time (not counting generals) head on.

[A.Saturnus]

Against Almohad you should use heavy cav. Their only good cav are bodyguards. And they only have Muwahid, no Saracen, so Ghulam cav, AHC and later Persian (Kwarazmiam) cav can used pretty effective on them. But beware camels BTW, when you manage to get Lesser Armenia, upgrade and build Ghulam cav instead of AHC, with the valour bonus, they are better.
Remember that you can build arbs, the others not. Mamluk Archer are very good horse archers, far better than Turcoman Horse. Any Turkish inf except Janissary has trouble against Nizari. And of course, Saracen inf should be the backbone of your army.