clovenhoof
03-18-2003, 17:34
Hello, I am new and am pretty geeked about the last battle I fought. I am playing as the Germans and have recently taken Constaninople. The Byz. are throwing everything they have to get me out, but to no avail.
The last battle, my army was approximately 1200 strong, and contained some pretty powerfull units with high valor. The army was roughly 2 chivalric maa, 2 feudal maa, 5 catipults, 2 chivalric seargants and 2 swiss haliberders, 2 crossbow, and a unit of royal knights.
Facing me was an axis of a 2000 strong Byz. army and a 2000 strong egyptian army. I chose the highest ground, putting my chiv. seargants in a v formation with the point twords the enemy, and my crossbow units also in the v, right behind the seargants. At the ends of the V, the flanks, I put a unit each of swiss hal. fuedal maa. and chiv maa in close formation 5 deep, and staggered the units. On top of the hill, inside the V I put the 5 catipults.
Each army tried to flank, but I simply moved the whole thing back, keeping the same formation- I had left plenty of room for the stationary catapults. The Byz put 2 full Kataphraktoi units ahead of everyone else and it was on these that I focused the fire of all 5 catipults. By the time they were within charging distance, both units were down from 50 to less than 20 men and their King was dead. After that, I simply focused all the catipults, alternately into the middle of the enemy hordes and id some horrible damage.
My army was totaly overwhelmed and the V broke within minutes of full engagements. The catapults were overun and I evacuated them, one of the chiv. deargent units routed, but the rest of my army fought on. After a good while of some desperate tactical manuevering, the enemy ranks were severely thinned down, and suddenly I out numbered them.
The field was littered with pile after pile of purple and yellow garbed bodies. The enemy that remained on the field fled. My army was at about a quarter of its former stregnth, about 400 men. As the enemy routed, I took the high ground again and got my defense set up for the next attack.
The next wave came, some fairly strong units but mostly spearmen and archers. Their number was halved and they were routed. It seemed like I rebuffed several such waves. I was wondering if they were ever going to quit coming.
The coolest thing I had ever seen in this game occured during one of these last waves. My generals unit, feudal men at arms was down to about 30 men. Here comes an enemy unit of peasants, at full stregnth. I stretched my CMA unit out in one long single straight row and sent them in. What happened was pretty amazing and almost worth the price of the game alone. That single thin string simple mowed straight across the peasants in what seemed like a few seconds. The thrashing , flailing peasants in front of the FMA were reduced to lifeless bodies behind them as they moved through the unit. With about 50 peasants left, the enemy routed.
And so in the end, my force of 1200 men defended succesfully against an enemy army 4000 strong.
Somethings I have learned:
Always try to kill the enemy general as soon as possible
Always keep your own general close to the fight
Use all your artilery and as they run out, simply withdraw them and replace them with melee units
On defense, put your army as close to the point where reinforcements emerge as possible- you get them sooner and it forces the enemy to move all the way across the battle field. If this farthest point also happens to be a nice hill, with a nice veiw, you can start picking off the enemy with artilery long before they reach you.
Catipults work best for me. Artilery that can't turn tend to make the enemy stay out of its line of fire. But catipults can fire anywhere. Three such units focusing fire in the very center of a large approaching force can wreak some serious damage as each boulder launched with definitely kill several enemy soldiers and help to degrade their morale.
With the right artilery and ranged units (archers, crossbow, arbelester etc) you can often route an enemy before it even reaches your lines, especially if you focus everything on the enemy generals unit first and kill him.
well thats it, anyone who made it all the way through this post- thanks, and feel free to comment.
The last battle, my army was approximately 1200 strong, and contained some pretty powerfull units with high valor. The army was roughly 2 chivalric maa, 2 feudal maa, 5 catipults, 2 chivalric seargants and 2 swiss haliberders, 2 crossbow, and a unit of royal knights.
Facing me was an axis of a 2000 strong Byz. army and a 2000 strong egyptian army. I chose the highest ground, putting my chiv. seargants in a v formation with the point twords the enemy, and my crossbow units also in the v, right behind the seargants. At the ends of the V, the flanks, I put a unit each of swiss hal. fuedal maa. and chiv maa in close formation 5 deep, and staggered the units. On top of the hill, inside the V I put the 5 catipults.
Each army tried to flank, but I simply moved the whole thing back, keeping the same formation- I had left plenty of room for the stationary catapults. The Byz put 2 full Kataphraktoi units ahead of everyone else and it was on these that I focused the fire of all 5 catipults. By the time they were within charging distance, both units were down from 50 to less than 20 men and their King was dead. After that, I simply focused all the catipults, alternately into the middle of the enemy hordes and id some horrible damage.
My army was totaly overwhelmed and the V broke within minutes of full engagements. The catapults were overun and I evacuated them, one of the chiv. deargent units routed, but the rest of my army fought on. After a good while of some desperate tactical manuevering, the enemy ranks were severely thinned down, and suddenly I out numbered them.
The field was littered with pile after pile of purple and yellow garbed bodies. The enemy that remained on the field fled. My army was at about a quarter of its former stregnth, about 400 men. As the enemy routed, I took the high ground again and got my defense set up for the next attack.
The next wave came, some fairly strong units but mostly spearmen and archers. Their number was halved and they were routed. It seemed like I rebuffed several such waves. I was wondering if they were ever going to quit coming.
The coolest thing I had ever seen in this game occured during one of these last waves. My generals unit, feudal men at arms was down to about 30 men. Here comes an enemy unit of peasants, at full stregnth. I stretched my CMA unit out in one long single straight row and sent them in. What happened was pretty amazing and almost worth the price of the game alone. That single thin string simple mowed straight across the peasants in what seemed like a few seconds. The thrashing , flailing peasants in front of the FMA were reduced to lifeless bodies behind them as they moved through the unit. With about 50 peasants left, the enemy routed.
And so in the end, my force of 1200 men defended succesfully against an enemy army 4000 strong.
Somethings I have learned:
Always try to kill the enemy general as soon as possible
Always keep your own general close to the fight
Use all your artilery and as they run out, simply withdraw them and replace them with melee units
On defense, put your army as close to the point where reinforcements emerge as possible- you get them sooner and it forces the enemy to move all the way across the battle field. If this farthest point also happens to be a nice hill, with a nice veiw, you can start picking off the enemy with artilery long before they reach you.
Catipults work best for me. Artilery that can't turn tend to make the enemy stay out of its line of fire. But catipults can fire anywhere. Three such units focusing fire in the very center of a large approaching force can wreak some serious damage as each boulder launched with definitely kill several enemy soldiers and help to degrade their morale.
With the right artilery and ranged units (archers, crossbow, arbelester etc) you can often route an enemy before it even reaches your lines, especially if you focus everything on the enemy generals unit first and kill him.
well thats it, anyone who made it all the way through this post- thanks, and feel free to comment.