What´s the best thing ever happened to you?

[PseRamesses]

Personally It must´a been the time I played England on early and had taken Brittany and Flanders from the French and Scotland/Wales/Ireland from the rebels, and talen Palestine, Tripoli and Antioch on my way to Edessa when I suddenly inherit a very strong and good developed Danish kingdom consisting of Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Livonia and Lithuania with som 3 stacks of huscarle-armies. This happened in around 1150-1160, I think.

What´s your best tale? A great victory, inheritance, a nice papal intervention - tell me

[NewJeffCT]

I had posted this a few weeks back, but as the Polish, I was slowly expanding, taking rebel territories like Prussia, Pomerania, Moldavia, Sweden & Norway and a few others... meanwhile, the Almos were super aggressive and wiped out the Spanish, Aragonese, French, English, HRE, the Danes, Italians, Sicilians and the Papacy. They were the richest, had the biggest armies and, because of all the aggressive conquest, seemed to be led by a horde of 8 and 9 star generals and Khalifs. Eventually, they started conquering Egypt, Byzantium and the Hungarians. Soon, the Byz were stuck with just Rhodes, the Novgos had 3 territories and I had my provinces - I managed to snag one iron province in the Almo conquest of the HRE, as well as Kiev & Crimea. So, basically, the Almos controlled 65% of the map, I had about 25%, the Byz their one province and the Novgos the rest...

Then, along comes the Golden Horde. Now, I have the Almos to the South and West, Novgos to the North and the Horde to my East. I start to think this is my first loss...

So, I decided to go out in a blaze of glory, hired some mercs to invade the Novgos (usually, I never hire mercs, except for defensive siege equipment) and I sent assassins after the Khan of the Horde. Both strategies worked - I wiped out the Novgos and the Horde Khan. I then bribed half the horde and used them to defeat the other half.

That left the board as 2/3 Almo, 1/3 me and the Byz in Rhodes...

Again, I decided that fortune favors the bold and figured I would attack the Almos quickly, even though I am not a good attacker and consider myself pretty good defensively. We both had ships in every sea province and I literally attacked them all, even though the Almos had a numerical superiority with ships as well. I then sent a bunch of metalsmith's workshop upgraded troop from Sweden into Denmark.

Well, I could not have asked for better results. As is usual, the attacker with ships is usually victorious and I won about 75%-80% of those sea battles. I also won Denmark and figured I would hold on when the big counterattack came. I could always fall back to Sweden, if I needed to...

But, the big counterattack did not come right away. The very next year, the Turks, HRE, Sicilians, Danes & the Pope all re-spawned at once. The Turks were loaded with JHI and Janissary Archers, while the Pope was wielding demi-cannons in the 1240s? And, the cut-off Almo provinces rebelled like mad. The whole of the English isles and most of Spain had huge uprisings as well and some provinces in central Europe as well.

The Almos still have better generals and more troops than me, but I had them on the ropes...

[PseRamesses]

Come on guys Are NewJeffCT and I the only ones with good tales to tell. Don´t be shy - you can tell us

[Basileus]

Well when you´ve played the game for over a year its preety hard to remember heh http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[Zone]

I've never had any really good luck... I just have to battle through my games :P

One amusing battle though was me defending a fortress. I had one knight so the French (I was the English in Wessex I believe) thought it would be an easy battle. they came in with just 2 catapults. they managed to knock one wall down but all the rest of their units were slaughtered while running round inbetween the outer wall and the next one in... Fools...

[rpasell]

I was playing as the Aragonese early/hard/ga, and as you know, it's tough for them to expand without pissing off a catholic faction. Anyway, I had Aragon, Valencia, and Navarre. I was also married to an English princess. Well the English got wiped out by the French, and I inhereted Wessex, Wales, Mercia, and Northumbria. That allowed me to build ships and get to Sweden quicker. Made for a much more successful campaign, and it's the only time I've ever inhereted land.

[Kulgan]

I playing as the egytians was facing a huge and very good Turkish Army, but after 1 hard battle where their general ran he got some nice vices and virtues, he got -9 morale and -6 command in total.
I could defend my province with a few spearmen and an archer as they immedialty ran away when I hit them with a few arrows when they attacked with their army.
They functionned as a nice buffer in a border province sitting there with a huge ( useless ) army scaring everyone away.

[PseRamesses]

Two nights ago I started a new Spanish game with Wes´ MedMod and tried to bribe El Cid in Valencia - he refused so I decide that the boy have to go.
Invading the provice I saw that the Almohads also invaded which startled me because the where neutral and I bearly had a force big enough to take on the Cid-dude.
Anyway, the Almohads stood still in one corner so I moved on towards Cid´s powerful army, engaged and got absolutely smashed. I pulled all my troops back and the rebs followed, spreading their ranks all over the map when suddely the Almohads charged right into them leaving me and my men to recouperate on a nice defendable hill.
We quietly stood there for about 10-15 minutes while El Cid and the Almohads where decemating their forces. Then the rebels starting to rout and the Almohads followed so I decided to hit the Almohads with a full force knife-in-the-back-assault which worked The Almohads routed, the rebs kept routing and my king killed both Cid and the king of the Almohads. Talk about fluke luck I won a battle that I had no chance of winning if the Almohads hadn´t been there.

[thrashaholic]

I was playing as HRE, Egypt were the most powerful faction, owning the entire East of the map, I had all of central Europe (as well as a few other provinces here and there) the English held the British Isles and the Spanish held Spain, North-West Africa and Western France, the Egytians were dominating everyone and were vastly superior in every way except financially where I was. Anyway the Spanish King died without an heir and left all his armies (which were quite big really) as rebels, this gave me an opportunity to bribe all of them and eventually destroy the Egyptians.

Thrashaholic

[avarin]

When the Pope charged a double-line of my Italian Handgunners, it was beautiful, felt sorry for the horses though.

[Random Ronin]

I was on a cooperative campaign with the Byzantines (Playign French, holding England, Germany, Denmark, the low countries, and a small section of Spain) when we ran into the most horrific Turkish army imaginable, at least at this stage of the game, and sure enough, he ripped my Byzantine Ally's armies to bits, crushing the Byzantines entire mainland holdings, and even psuhing into Hungaria and Austrian regions, where I was trapped with my king (My heir in waiting was still a year from ready) and 1600 battered soldiers, the only unit at full strength being my royalguards whom I did not have do any fighting previously, and so I braced for a vicious battle which surely would have lost me the game, but at least I could take some Turks with me, when out of the east came the Golden Horde, the glorious and beautiful Mongols, and wiped out the Turks before they could engage me, allowing me to slip through a hole in the lines (I did have to battle my way through Northern Italy, but Italians were either too drunk or too busy trying to hit on the local women to put up a fight for my battle-hardened French, who wooed the women just by passing by and enjoyed wine by the gallon, rendering them immune to drunkiness.~:D )and by the time I was free, I had a bumper crop to allow me to finance a mass bribing of the Horde, taking over 60% of them, leaving the rest to make the Polish say Uncleski.

So ironically, that which struck fear into the hearts of all men became my greatest saviour. THE GREAT HORDE RIDES http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-2thumbsup.gif

[TheSilverKnight]

A truly Roman blessing. I was outnumbered in Anatolia nearly 4 to 1 (a crapload of Turks against my little Byzantine army led by Prince Alexius Commenus). My men were wavering, and then one whole group of Turkish infantry routed and I chased them all off the field. Sounds like something Caesar would do? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[kiwitt]

Playing the Turks. Both the Byzantines and the Egyptians have rebellions and become leaderless. Wow http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/eek.gif

[PseRamesses]

When I started this thread I knew there was going to be a lot of good stories out there. And reading through all of theese amazing stories makes me really happy because this game has so many tweaks and turns and I´m shure we´re loving every minute of it. Keep´em coming guys

[Random Ronin]

I fought the biggest battle I have ever seen in campaign mode, with no less than 15,000 troops in total. On my side, 2,000 French/Papal volunteers (Bribed Pope troops) under my king's command, and for allies 1,500 Almohads, and 1,600 Egyptians. On the other side, 7,500 hostile Turks, and 2,500 neutral Byzantines, all in the Province of Anatolia.

For over 1 1/2 hours (I had turned off campaign timer for some reason), the battle raged, and by the 100th minute, I had just 230 men left, my entire Egyptian force gone (only about 100 survived and routed), and my Almohad ally duking it out with the Byzantines (both had about 100 exhausted troops, but they kept fighting, talk about stubborn) and I was all that was left to face the 2,000 assorted Turks that remained, or so I thought, but I decided to take em on anyway, might as well die in glory I was thinking, and so with my 40 battered knights, my 12 Royal guards and king, and 175 spear and swordsmen, I advanced towards their center. At about 100 meters, I let loose my knights and BAM they cut through the enemy SPEARS and crashed into their General, routing him and with just 200 guys, I was chasing 2000 Turks off the field, killing about 300 in the process. Victory was mine I hit the Byzantines in the back, slaughtering them, and expected the game to yield to me, but then 500 more Turks appeared, the last of their 7,500 and they were bad-ass Janissaries with pole arms, plus some archers, but despite their strength, the absolute exhaustion of my troops (Not to mention myself, 100 minutes of this is tiring) and yet I managed to kill most of them, sending the rest packing. The last enemy reinforcement came, a group of 40 cavalry, and I put them to the spear, slaughtering them with a Knight charge. The greatest thing was the scene of my king slaying the last enemy soldier, thus ending the battle finally. It was like something out of a dramatic movie, only much more unbelievable, and no nice looking princesses played by the latest actresses.

The result was the effective end of the Turks as a viable fighting force, for unknown to me during the battle, the Turkish ruler, his best heir, and 3 of his best generals all fell in the battle, as I was so busy trying to keep my rag-tag army intact, I missed the messages relating that info. The Turks were left with only one decent general and a weakling ruler took the throne, only to fall to a rebellion a few years later. Even better, the Almohads, despite the losses, rebounded quick and went on to kick the Byzantines ass for me, allowing a well timed assassination of the Almohad leadership to create a massive void of leaderless provinces all over the middle-east, which distracted my only major enemy, Spain, who was now intent on taking all of North Africa, rather than Southern France.

It was so great, my only regret being that I lost some of my favourite enemies to fight. But even then, I got a huge number of their troops (I was rolling in dough and could just about bribe anyone I pleased) and could relax in Paris, go to the Moulin Rouge, and wonder how a 19th century club could be around in 1300... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-inquisitive.gif

[PseRamesses]

Quote[/b] (Random Ronin @ Feb. 10 2004,02:38)]I fought the biggest battle I have ever seen in campaign mode, with no less than 15,000 troops in total. On my side, 2,000 French/Papal volunteers (Bribed Pope troops) under my king's command, and for allies 1,500 Almohads, and 1,600 Egyptians. On the other side, 7,500 hostile Turks, and 2,500 neutral Byzantines, all in the Province of Anatolia.

For over 1 1/2 hours (I had turned off campaign timer for some reason), the battle raged, and by the 100th minute, I had just 230 men left, my entire Egyptian force gone (only about 100 survived and routed), and my Almohad ally duking it out with the Byzantines (both had about 100 exhausted troops, but they kept fighting, talk about stubborn) and I was all that was left to face the 2,000 assorted Turks that remained, or so I thought, but I decided to take em on anyway, might as well die in glory I was thinking, and so with my 40 battered knights, my 12 Royal guards and king, and 175 spear and swordsmen, I advanced towards their center. At about 100 meters, I let loose my knights and BAM they cut through the enemy SPEARS and crashed into their General, routing him and with just 200 guys, I was chasing 2000 Turks off the field, killing about 300 in the process. Victory was mine I hit the Byzantines in the back, slaughtering them, and expected the game to yield to me, but then 500 more Turks appeared, the last of their 7,500 and they were bad-ass Janissaries with pole arms, plus some archers, but despite their strength, the absolute exhaustion of my troops (Not to mention myself, 100 minutes of this is tiring) and yet I managed to kill most of them, sending the rest packing. The last enemy reinforcement came, a group of 40 cavalry, and I put them to the spear, slaughtering them with a Knight charge. The greatest thing was the scene of my king slaying the last enemy soldier, thus ending the battle finally. It was like something out of a dramatic movie, only much more unbelievable, and no nice looking princesses played by the latest actresses.

The result was the effective end of the Turks as a viable fighting force, for unknown to me during the battle, the Turkish ruler, his best heir, and 3 of his best generals all fell in the battle, as I was so busy trying to keep my rag-tag army intact, I missed the messages relating that info. The Turks were left with only one decent general and a weakling ruler took the throne, only to fall to a rebellion a few years later. Even better, the Almohads, despite the losses, rebounded quick and went on to kick the Byzantines ass for me, allowing a well timed assassination of the Almohad leadership to create a massive void of leaderless provinces all over the middle-east, which distracted my only major enemy, Spain, who was now intent on taking all of North Africa, rather than Southern France.

It was so great, my only regret being that I lost some of my favourite enemies to fight. But even then, I got a huge number of their troops (I was rolling in dough and could just about bribe anyone I pleased) and could relax in Paris, go to the Moulin Rouge, and wonder how a 19th century club could be around in 1300... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-inquisitive.gif
You didn´t happen to record the game did you? I´d love to see that epic last scene after all that stuggle - salut http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/cheers.gif

[Random Ronin]

Sadly no, for I was so dug into the playing, I neglected. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/angry.gif
http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-furious3.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-argue.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-oops.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-wall.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-embarassed.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-anxious.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/mecry.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/frown.gif

[Servius]

English, Early, Hard. 2nd battle of the game the Frog King tried to attack me across a river. I killed him, with no heirs yet his faction disolved, England got it's French claims in about 7 years.