Turks: Strategy help needed [Archive]

invalidopcode

01-20-2003, 05:09

After conquering the world in expert mode/early age as the Danes, Spanish, Polish, Almohads and Egyptians, I decided to give the Turks a whirl. What a pleasant suprise to actually have my butt handed to me a couple of games.

My problem is, if I go after egypt, the byzantines come after me. If I go after the byzantines, eqypt breaks the truce and comes after me. Throw in the crusades and it is WWF battle royale every year And, to top it all off, all of this fighting eventually wears down my feeble economy until I cannot support advanced troops and inevitably I lose... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/angry.gif

Can anybody offer any strategy (and/or some battle tactics) that they have found useful with the Turks?

solypsist

01-20-2003, 07:15

it is for just this reason I've avoided playing the SP as the Turks. I assume you're playing an Early game. Parhaps try a later period with them, see if you can do it, then go back and do an Early game if you feel so inclined.

ShadesWolf

01-20-2003, 07:16

First a couple of questions

What level are you playing on ?

What Era are you playing on ?

Generally dont attack either, capture all the rebel provinces first, then send an emissary out and capture a few more. What for the AI to make a mistake as the Byzantines and then attack. If you can manage to attack constantinople and destroy all the buildings, then they will be no danger to you.

Make sure you build Inns, they are a cheap and easy way yo create a army.

Cooperman

01-20-2003, 08:00

In the early period patience is the key to playing as the turks.
You need to wait for the byzantines to commit their forces to conquering in the balkans or russia then try and grab a few of their provinces in turkey. They wont have the military to fight a war on 2 fronts and it should be relatively simple to defeat them.
As the turks mobility is the key the byzantines have slow heavily armoured units so try and use horse archers to wear them down use saracen infantry to hold the center and some ghazi infantry to tear them apart from the flanks.
You need to watch out for the Egyptians though, the first sign of weakness on your border with them and they will attack so keep a strong force on that border to deter them.

Efrem Da King

01-20-2003, 08:10

You can always cheat http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif .

Tyrac

01-20-2003, 08:29

Do you auto resolve battles or do you command them personally? With personal battles you should be able to win unless the odds are just horrendously against you. My very first game was Turks Expert. I did not expect to win... But I did I do nto really remember the tactics I used other then I hit hard and fast and used my Sultan in battle alot. Not much can stop those body guards at the start of early. Get a few wins for the Sultan vs rebles etc and it just snowballs from there.

Xicote

01-20-2003, 08:50

Quote[/b] ]the byzantines have slow heavily armoured units so try and use horse archers to wear them down

Yes. Always ALWAYS use Horse Archers. If you go against Egypt they are great against Nubian Spearmen. Up against Byzantines, use Skirmish tactics against their Byz Infantry.
Horse archers are the key to success with the Turks In my Opinion.

ShadesWolf

01-20-2003, 09:04

This tactic will only work against a SP gamer....

You try this against somebody online and they will wipe the floor with you......

Byzan's are the most powerful unit in early, as long as they are used correctly

Basileus

01-20-2003, 09:56

Speed i sthe key, use turcoman horse, turco man foot soldiers and armenien cavalary and spear men and your set in the early era..hit fast on byz and use mercs if your able to take constantinople on the 3-5th turn then your set..defend and go after antioch and tripoli grab the money making provinces of egypt..

Sainika

01-20-2003, 11:18

I play now as Turkey (early, Expert). By the 1320 I have the half of the map, exceptional armies and 700 000 florins cash (even after 150 years of permanent wars). As it was said before, patience is the key to win.
My strategy was to get an alliance with Egyptians and after several years of training and building go to war with Byzantine. The main reason - reach Nicea. I waited until Byzantine moved its armies to Europe (Serbia, Croatia) and conqered Trebizond, then - Anatolia and Nicea. Then I stopped to defend my new lands and to make peace with Byzantine. And so on.
Try not to begin war with Egyptians as they are much more dangerous than Byz.
My typical winning turkish army (in early) consists of 4-6 units of saracen inf., 2-3 units of Horse archers, 2 units of ghazi, muwahids and Armenian Heavy Cavalry. Almost all battles I played without autoresolves.
After that I begin to build income-giving buildings and farm upgrades. And only after this preparing I began to war with Egyptians. Next steps of conquest were easy to make and turkish empire prospers.

Lord of the Isles

01-20-2003, 15:55

I've been trying a different strategy with Turkey in Early than that discussed above. It's sort of a mirror version of the "Byzantine Blitz", where the Byzantine player attacks Turkey early on in an effort to take and pillage their main troop producing province in Rum. I've two successes with it, but three other games where I gave up after 20 years with awful positions. All games played on Expert.

The first success was unfortunately carried out early one morning under the influence of too much beer, and I can no longer remember how I managed it. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/rolleyes.gif The most recent one is still in my memory however, as are the losses.

The losses persuaded me that the major problem with this plan was allowing the Byzantine to retreat away from attacks on Georgia, Trebizond, Lesser Armenia and perhaps Anatolia. This gets the Turk lots of provinces but by this time Byzantium has two big armies in Nicea and Constantinople. He counterattacks with at least 1000 men including say 2 Kataphraktoi, 3 Byz Infantry and the Varangian Guard and you are mincemeat if you don't retreat yourself. Spearmen and Horse Archers are no match for them (unless you outnumber them at least 2 or better 3-1). You have to give back your provinces and Egypt is still sitting there ready to pounce on you soon.

The trick to making this early attack work is to split Byzantine forces and make them fight you often enough that their total number is reduced. In the first year Syria got a garrison of two peasants and Edessa got a spearman unit and one Horse Archers. Everything else gets moved to Rum and Armenia. Meanwhile Rum built Towers while the rest start a 20% farming improvement. It might have been better to start Rum on getting the spear building for Saracens/Muwahids but the plan was to reach Constantinople before they are available. Rum builds spearmen (and for many years to come, with a few Horse Archers when time allows). The Emissary goes to Lesser Armenia and then to get an alliance with the Egyptian Sultan in Antioch.

In year two I invaded Trebizond. The small army there retreated to Georgia: success Next year I attack Georgia with two units each of Horse Archers, Spearmen, Desert Archers and Camels. The Byz have five units: 1 Kataphraktoi, 1 Byz Inf, 2 Trebizond Archers and one Alain Merc Cav. I lost quite a few dead but the Kats held back on a hill to begin with, allowing me to rout the rest, before they charged. Camels and spears did for them.

That was a key loss for the Byzantine Empire, for it meant the next big battle (in Nicea I think) saw them with fewer quality units and Turkish numbers carried the day. I was able to take Constantinople and build up its garrison before any Crusades arrived and before Egypt decided to break the Alliance (which it *will* do sometime but not perhaps as soon as it should). By the time the wars with Crusaders and Egypt arrived, I was producing Saracens in Rum, Desert Archers in Syria and Armenian Heavy Cavalry in Armenia.

None of this would work against humans of course. The Byz AI retreats sometimes when it should fight, then attacks the next year, allowing you to be the defender. And a human Egypt would break the alliance earlier than I've seen the AI doing. But it works (sometimes) for me.

Alrowan

01-20-2003, 16:08

north is the key... bribe armies in khazzar and vrimea, expand up there, and remain peaceful with egypt and byz

Putchuco

01-20-2003, 18:56

Hm, interesting...

and I was complaining to myself how easy the Turks are

I started Turks on Expert/Early (no cheating),
stayed at peace with the Byz (they actually scared me...),
attacked the Egypt right away and never gave them time to recover (constant attacks&#33http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif
Horse Archer and later Turcoman Horse helped a lot, hehe.
Can't count the number of attacks where I chased egyptian
(and later Byz) armies with no defense to my horse archers.

It's now 1140 and I captured:
- All of North Africa
- everything south east of Serbia through the Balkan up to Volga-Bulgaria (or so)
- all islands in the eastern med sea
- destroyed Egypts (~1100), Byz(~1125), Hungarians (~1135)
- defended one (really) weak German crusade
(a second by Spain is on it's way...)

Might sound cocky, but this game is actually very easy,
I'm guessing now because of the rather successful way I'm
using the Horse Archers:
- circle infantry and hail them with arrows
- run down separate archer infantry
- circle (slower) med-heavy cav's
(can't tell you how cruel a 'fight' with 3 units
of horse archers against 1 unit of Treb. Archer +
1 unit of Kataphr. (Byz) was, they never had the
slightest chance,
I lost three guys through friendly fire...)
- lure fast cav (saharan or steppe) into your own
spear units (I tried horse archers there too,
but got my posterior kicked...)
- (as mentioned in the other posts here)
get mercs as often as possible
I actually buy them right before a big campaign,
use (abuse...) them heavily and disband as soon
as I have to slow down to secure the conquered lands.

Leet Eriksson

01-20-2003, 19:54

Mobility is the key son,turks don't fare well head on cuzz of the bad armour.also i'd rely on most of the posts above.one last thing,there are alot of turk threads i bet if you did some searching in the forums you'll find em.

Cousin Zoidfarb

01-20-2003, 21:29

I use this trick with all factions. Don't overextend yourself. Sometimes razing a captured province and leaving it to rebel gives you income and acts as a buffer and if the enemy recaptures it they will have to reinvest into it and tax their resources.

Odyssey of War

01-20-2003, 22:25

Horse Archer strategy works well with one major flaw, it will work if you have unlimited ammo or have raised the unit ammo stats. For those people that play with limited ammo, this strategy is very hard to implement in my opinion. Try using horse archers to inflict damage until they run out of ammo, then retreat them and bring in infantry and some lightly armored knights to take on the egyptians. If you do go to war with Egypt, I agree with above in that you should keep hitting them, otherwise they recover too quickly. Going north to novogrod is a very good strategy and keeps you out of the way of the byzantines early on. Eventually you will have to attack them. Try taking their islands and destroy their ships, the byzantines actually have some very good unit building provinces on their islands which they use for support.

Putchuco

01-20-2003, 22:50

Odyssey of War:
I don't necessarily agree on the unlimited ammo issue,
because I do play w/ limited ammo and the horse archers
are still kicking b*tt.
Fairly good archers, fast on the horses,
can evade everybody and tire them on 'fire&retreat'.
The Turcoman Horse are even better, because they
have some Melee strength and can actually attack
unguarded enemy archers, or even other units
if attacking from all sides...

I agree that the horse archers should be the first wave,
decimating the enemy, before you bring in the infantry
(I actually build some kind
of defense post with my infantry and let the horse archers
go to the enemy and hail them with arrows all the way
until they find my main army).
Sometimes the AI is so fed up and tired (I guess)
with my horse archers that its units just sit there
(exhausted?) and get mowed down...

invalidopcode

01-21-2003, 06:39

Thanks for all the great information. It has helped a lot.

The Eqyptians are no more. The Byzantines have been pushed out past Istanbul (not Constantinople&#33http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif. The Golden Horde have been held in check at the outskirts of the realm. I absorbed two Crusades - one by the French and one by the Spanish. There was much rejoicing...

Now it's time to recover the economy and get serious about a navy.

Bob the Insane

01-21-2003, 13:35

My final break through for getting the Turks started right (on early) is to get rid of either the Egyptians or the Byz, one has to go. But be aware, your islamic brothers in Egypt will attack you at some point, as you are clearly in a worse postion than the Almohads and are thus the logical direction for their expansion. The Byz will not automatically attack you (though they may).

Thus the pushing the Egyptians back to Egypt itself and leave them there. One bonus to this is that there will be no religious issues in your expansion. Now you have the cashflow required to start on the Byz. Three things to remember, keep an eye on the Egyptians, try and stay allied to the Almohads and remember that the Byz are the strongest and fastest expanding faction left in the game.

Oh, and keep your eyes peeled for the crusades..

Praylak

01-28-2003, 21:37

I’ve played the Turks many times, and I’m always impressed how different my games turn out. For the most part, I like to play as already suggested and I think it’s a great strategy. From the Early period, be patient and wait for the AI to make a mistake. You start with some potentially rich provinces so I build them up and get some of the better than basic troop production in action.

It depends on which of my two neighbors fairs the worst, but the crusades do to some extent keep Egypt busy. Byzantium is also busy conquering northward. So I tend to concentrate on getting my home provinces well developed.

I don’t agree with taking Kazar, because keep in my mind this province is one of a possible few that the Mongols will enter in 1230. I also make it priority to make at least a citadel in Armenia, because sometimes the Horde enters there. In my last game, I could not find a suitable opportunity to attack either until the Horde arrived. Yes, I spent the whole 120 years just building up. Still there was lots of fighting off crusades. By the time the horde arrived I had very developed provinces and good quality armies ready. I now had two ways to move. Egypt was fighting crusades from every direction, Spain, France and the Germans were sending them like greeting cards. Byzantium was now fighting both the Italians and the Horde. In just a few years, all neighboring border garrisons dwindled and all were ripe for attack.

The rest is elementary. I opened up two fronts and all fell before my armies. It was an unusual but very fun game.

Kristaps

01-28-2003, 23:25

To Praylak: and just how did you survive as Turkish 120 years just holding on to your existing Early provinces? None of those have sea access with significant trade income. This means you should have practically no army to defend in the case either Byzantines or Egytians attacked. Just wondering...

burma_mtw

01-29-2003, 07:51

Constantinople and Nicea can be picked up and held quickly in the Early Period. Constantinople has great trade and buildings. The Province on the South shore of the Black Sea (starts with "Tri") is a magnet for attacks so you may want to leave it alone for awhile.

Part of this technique is to move West to avoid dealing with the Mongels when they show up (AD 1230).

One of the first moves is to abandon Lessor Armenia (maybe it is a different Province) to trigger a revolt. The rebels act as a blocking force to keep the Egyptians off you back and reduce their forces.

Anyway, once you have Constantinople you are pretty much set. Build enough units to keep people off your back first. Next, get your trade going. Do you routes to the West first as the Egyptians will be your first target.

No need to attack the Egyptians until they come after you which is usually early anyway. Once they do, don't stop until they are eliminated. You shouldn't have to go any farther then Crynecia for the time being.

By the time the Mongels show up, you should control everything to the East of Constantinople with one possible exception. Georgia seems to fall whether you or the Byzies control it. Probably easier if you own it (you can retreat to the South and SW) but I like to see the Byzies get run over by 48-64 Units of Mongels.

While the Hoarde is doing its thing, you can head West to eat up whomever owns Spain. Constantinople (and maybe Greece) will keep anybody from bothering you from anywhere in Europe. With Spain in hand with all its Metalsmiths you can build up for awhile and start taking over the map about AD 1300. Blocking at Navarre and the country next to it, moving up the East side of the map, and then sweeping West works for me.

There are lots of ways to win, this is just one alternative. This Control the Seas, Turtle, semi-Turtle works for the Danes, English, Turks, Egyptians, Almohads, and Spanish. Maybe it works for others but I haven't tried. It is probably not as much fun as being territory agressive because you don't fight as many battles and they aren't that tough. It is just me being conservative. I like to have lots of money and big powerful armies.

For me, playing the Turks is the most fun because you get such great troops and more different types. With the Metalsmith upgrades and 7-8 Star Generals, nobody really has a chance. Jannisary Units are animals.

Forgot to mention two things. Sweeden (and Norway a little later) is good to pick up early. Bribe your way into Sweeden but put enough troops there to discourage the Danes who get a little miffed with you in their territory and they have lots of Royal Knights. Sweeden is a gold mine. Lastly, using this approach, bribe a lot but only rebels until later in the game. Your massive trade routes generate lots of money. If Italy or the Byzzies get lookj to be getting too powerful, cut their trade routes. The sudden loss of income will usually trigger a Civil war. The AI's don't tend to build large war chests.

Just my opinions...I could be wrong.

RJV

01-29-2004, 13:33

Hi,

I asked a similar question in a 'Turkish Delight' thread some time back and got lots of help. What worked best for me when I distilled it all down was:

Storm after the Egyptians straight away. You can fight their Sultan immediately and ransom him back. Pursue down towards Egypt itself and you should be able to ransom him back at least once more. Finally you finish them off in Arabia (I think), killing off their many-star general in a fairly straightforward battle.

Build inns everywhere immediately. The war with Egypt brings all sorts of nice Mercs flocking to that part of the world, and the provinces you capture are flowing with cash, so paying for them isn't a problem.

Develop provinces to specialise in Armenian Heavy Cav, Ghazi and Saracens (don't forget to build some archers too).
Then take on the Byz a province at a time, again topping up your forces with mercs.

Getting rid of the Egyptians is quite an elegant strategy, but by the time you move onto the Byz it's more of a steamroller type thing.

Once you have Constantinople you've broken the back of them really and I tend to leave them with a single province just to avoid a pesky re-emergence when I least expect it

Oh, and you need to start down the path for ships if possible, as the Byz treat the eastern med as their own private lake and if you're slow to start the war against them (or it goes badly) then this can add to the pressure on you.

Now, if only I could learn to use horse archers properly I'd be laughing...

Cheers.

Brutal DLX

01-30-2004, 10:50

Quote[/b] (Kristaps @ Jan. 28 2003,22:25)]To Praylak: and just how did you survive as Turkish 120 years just holding on to your existing Early provinces? None of those have sea access with significant trade income. This means you should have practically no army to defend in the case either Byzantines or Egytians attacked. Just wondering...
This is easily possible if you aren't agressive. You don't need trade to have an army, 80% farm upgrades with a good governour in your rich provinces is all you need. Never become too dependent on trade in your development strategy. I've also use the defensive strategy often, not only with the Turks.

The point is that you are little threat to the other empires as long as they have room to expand or other borders than with only you. That is the case for the Egyptians and the Byzantines. If you don't provoke them, it is very unlikely that they will ally with each other and attack you, rather one of them will almost always ally with you, this usually scares the singled out faction off of attacking you. Of course you take some risk and have less troops, but you can easily afford a well balanced central army for both Rum and Syria and still make a surplus from which to upgrade your provinces. Your Armenian cavalry is the best there is in early, if you get Saracens, archers and horse archers and possible some ghazis, you have a cheap but strong army, that should also be more advanced than both the early Egyptian and Bazantine stacks.

In case of a war, you can also hire mercenaries to carry the war into their territory and keep them from invading your provinces. I remember when I had a few skirmishes with the Byzantines, I quickly took Trebizond and Georgia and then was able to negotiate a ceasefire. But even if there would have been no ceasefire, I could have easily advanced further, as they had spread their forces all across the Black sea coastal provinces and into the Russian steppes.
With the Egyptians, it's the same, but make sure you don't rob them of their border with the Byzantines, eliminate them if you want, or pillage the crusader provinces, but don't keep all of them unless you eliminate or restrict the Egyptians to Egypt.

andrewt

01-30-2004, 10:55

Khazar is really good unless you take too much time. When I played Egyptians and Byz, I had already mopped up everything before the Horde appeared so I was ok. During my Hungarian game, the Horde appeared there with around 12,000 troops and since I had armorer's guild, they all had +3 armor upgrades. Took around 4 hours to finish the damn battle. I lost around 2,500 troops, killed around 7,000 and captured around 2,500. The key was hiding in the forests all the time and trying as much as possible to fight his cavalry there with infantry, if I had some to spare. That and my general was rank 7.

PseRamesses

01-31-2004, 10:47

Playing Turks on early have put me in the "two-font-dilemma" too.
First time I waited and builded my provs and eventually got run over by both the BYZ and EGY.
The second time I attacked EGY instantly pushing them back to Egypt BUT I then retreated and let the provs rebel which really crippled the EGY and spare me the trubble of greeting all the crusades in ANT/ TRI/ PAL. I now turned my greedy little eyes on BYZ and drove a wedge into Trebizond threatening Constantinopel which divided the BYZ into two parts which my two other armies easily could decimate. Eventually I ended up with all of Asia Minor, which was my goal for the game.
My third game I did the opposite and attacked BYZ first and when marching vicorious through AM the darn EGY hits me in Rum, Edessa and Syria and BYZ had pulled troops back from the Russian steppes and other fronts so I got squashed in the middle - game over
So my conclusion, although only played 3 games, is that "hit the Egyptians first" works best. Anyone else has a different opinion?

Daevyll

01-31-2004, 11:21

Quote[/b] (PseRamesses @ Jan. 31 2004,03:47)]Playing Turks on early have put me in the "two-font-dilemma" too.
First time I waited and builded my provs and eventually got run over by both the BYZ and EGY.
The second time I attacked EGY instantly pushing them back to Egypt BUT I then retreated and let the provs rebel which really crippled the EGY and spare me the trubble of greeting all the crusades in ANT/ TRI/ PAL. I now turned my greedy little eyes on BYZ and drove a wedge into Trebizond threatening Constantinopel which divided the BYZ into two parts which my two other armies easily could decimate. Eventually I ended up with all of Asia Minor, which was my goal for the game.
My third game I did the opposite and attacked BYZ first and when marching vicorious through AM the darn EGY hits me in Rum, Edessa and Syria and BYZ had pulled troops back from the Russian steppes and other fronts so I got squashed in the middle - game over
So my conclusion, although only played 3 games, is that "hit the Egyptians first" works best. Anyone else has a different opinion?
I do actually. I prefer to take Constantinople as early as possible (the Byzantines always make the mistake of leaving it too lightly defended), then I hold it against all counters from the Byzantines.
With only 1 province to defend at that chokepoint (with a Citadel on it), I go after the Egyptians.

Once you take egypt, you have a nice big slice of the map, with only three provinces needing to be defended (Constantinople, Eqypt, Georgia).

By that point, the game is effectively over, which is the biggest downside to playing the Turks, it's too easy once you blitz past the first 50 years or so.

PseRamesses

01-31-2004, 13:36

Quote[/b] (Daevyll @ Jan. 31 2004,04:21)]I do actually. I prefer to take Constantinople as early as possible (the Byzantines always make the mistake of leaving it too lightly defended), then I hold it against all counters from the Byzantines.
With only 1 province to defend at that chokepoint (with a Citadel on it), I go after the Egyptians.

Once you take egypt, you have a nice big slice of the map, with only three provinces needing to be defended (Constantinople, Eqypt, Georgia).

By that point, the game is effectively over, which is the biggest downside to playing the Turks, it's too easy once you blitz past the first 50 years or so.
I´m gonna try this out right now Thanks http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-2thumbsup.gif

insolent1

01-31-2004, 14:16

Turks on early is very easy compared to the other eras. I always go after the Egyptians first. Once I hold Sinai & have them trapped in Egypt, I attack teh byzantines who will have been busy expanding in the north. Go straight for Constantinople through Trebizond as this will cripple them. Then take Georgia & push upn in to Khazar. I generally don't build much here just money making buildings & tech up for Fortress asap. I then use Kiev to build a master horse breeder & that is where I will make my primary stand against the mongols. If you build a master horse breeder in Khazar destroy it before the mongols come as they will benifit from it.
Try Turks on late for more of a challenge & go straight for constantinople. I'm sure the byzantines will leave it undefended. Also try to take Anatolia before the Egyptians do. The Egyptians will attack you soon & so will the horde.

PseRamesses

02-01-2004, 11:04

Daevyll,
Your strategy worked fine I played a game last night with your startegy.
Starting war on BYZ on first turn and invaded TRE and the next year besieged CON. Held of several sallies and my re-inforcements from RUM sweept away GEO, LES.ARM, ANA, NIC.
I then turned towards the EGY and trapped their sultan and three princes in ANT getting over 18.000 florins, he he

It´s now 1139 AD and I´m holding everything between three easily defendable provinces CON, GEO and EGY. Come and get me you knee-bending catholics

Daevyll

02-01-2004, 11:31

Quote[/b] (PseRamesses @ Feb. 01 2004,04:04)]Daevyll,
Your strategy worked fine I played a game last night with your startegy.
Starting war on BYZ on first turn and invaded TRE and the next year besieged CON. Held of several sallies and my re-inforcements from RUM sweept away GEO, LES.ARM, ANA, NIC.
I then turned towards the EGY and trapped their sultan and three princes in ANT getting over 18.000 florins, he he

It´s now 1139 AD and I´m holding everything between three easily defendable provinces CON, GEO and EGY. Come and get me you knee-bending catholics
Glad to hear it :)

R'as al Ghul

02-02-2004, 11:33

I would prefer the "hit the Egyptians first" variant.
This is mainly because of the Byz' generals. Only yesterday I started an xpert/early campaign. Trebizond and Anatolia and Georgia were taken in the first year. The Byz drew their forces together in Nicaa and west of Constantinopel. Constantinopel was taken in year three. What happened then was:
1. 800 stack army w/ 7 star heir attacks Trebizond. I withdraw.
2. army from Nicaa w/ 700 men + 6 star gen attacks Anatolia
. I withdraw two horsearchers + two spearmen.
3. Egypt attacks Edessa or Syria with more then 1000 peasants and a few good ones + a 6 star general.
Well concerning generals I only have a 3 star king, and 1 or two 2 star gens.
After reloading and trying again I lost the following battle: 2 Archer units, 2 Spear (1 2star gen, 1 AHC) against
1 Kataphractoi, 1 Treb Archers, 1 Byz Inf + 1 Spear.
He was attacking, I took position on a hill.
While he approached i decimated his byzinf from 100 to 36, his Treb-Archers from 60 to 18, his Kata from 20 to 13 and the spears from 100 to 75.
When he arrived my spears charged downhill, the AHC from behind....and then routed.... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-furious3.gif
From my perspective I was clearly in an advantageious position but due to his generals I lost.
This is why I'm going to try the Egypts first and conquer the Byz later when I have my heirs as competent generals.
So thats really my main problem: valour and generals.
I dreamed tonight of an Assassin Empire spreading from Syria....

PseRamesses

02-02-2004, 16:15

R'as al Ghul,
Either way works, BYZ first or EGY first, doesn´t matter. BUT blitzkrieg is crucial. On the first year pull all your troops together and attack in the 2nd year. Build miltary in your three original provinces and keep thoose archers and militia comming. Take all to Constatinopel or Sinai.
If you go for the BYZ I usually split them into two parts taking TRE then CON while letting my reinforcements take out GEO, LES.ARM, ANA, NIC. If you go for the EGY I do the same and take either TRI or PAL first. I don´t take EGY because elimination a faction is bad for you so I stop at SINAI.
Then build up your other border and attack a.s.a.p. Take your heirs to guard the first foes borderprovince/-s.
When your set with a 3-province-border: GEO, CON, SIN or EGY start building moneymaking upgrades - your´re set

R'as al Ghul

02-03-2004, 11:29

Quote[/b] ]I don´t take EGY because elimination a faction is bad for you so I stop at SINAI
Why is that?
I just wiped them out and went back to face the Byz via lesser Armenia, Anatolia, Nicaa with Geo, Con and Treb still Byz.
Till now all is running well: I'm filthy rich and train those Turkoman horses, Sar Inf, AHC etc. every turn. I also build those super-assassins....
I had two battles against the Byz yesterday. Challenging but successfull. But one thing still makes me mad:
One unit of Kataphraktoi managed to rout 1 sar.inf. in a situation where they were fighting uphill in the woods against 1 sar.inf. head on, 1 on each flank and one Muwahid charging several times in the back. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-furious3.gif
It took ages to defeat them with way too many casualties.
But in the meantime the other unit of Katas (Byz King) ran like a sheepdog around the map trying to get at my Turcoman horses. It was like a slapstick movie: While fighting in the woods they would from time to time pass by. Everytime some of them were missing....
Cheers

PseRamesses

02-03-2004, 11:57

Quote[/b] (R'as al Ghul @ Feb. 03 2004,04:29)]
Quote[/b] ]I don´t take EGY because elimination a faction is bad for you so I stop at SINAI
Why is that?
Can´t remember exactly but that was one of the first thing I learned on this forum that taking out another faction is bad for you. Maybee it only applies to catholic factions. I searched the forum for the topic but couldn´t find it at the moment. Anyway, since I always play GA-style, I never take out another faction unless I really have to. Leaving Egyptian´s with Egypt is no threat to you.

Thoose Katapraktoi are too powerful for an early game. Personally I think that either each faction should have their unique super-bodyguards or ALL should have the same unit.
Once I spooked an entire 16-unit foe of archers, spears and milita with only 2 units of Katapraktoi, he he that´s funny