Need help with Muslim units

[kawligia]

So I've been poking around and noticing that the Muslims, particularly the Turks, don't have many units. The Saracen Infantry and the Armenian Heavy Cavalry are good, but the rest of the units are pretty redundant. Some of the units have higher build requirements, and may cost more money, but they don't seem be any better troops than the earlier ones.


For example: Ottoman Sipathi have higher building requiremets, but they do not appear to be nearly as good as Armenian Heavy Cavalry. Also I do not see any significant difference between many of the foot archer units such as: Ottoman Infantry, Jannisary bows, and Turcoman foot except for requirements and some very slight stat changes.

Futtuwas and Jannisary infantry seem to be better than the rest, but are still pretty much the same except for building requirements. (Also I can definately see how Sipathi of the Porte and Hashishin are distinguishable.)

But what about the rest? Am I missing something? Are the other bows much more accurate or something? Do the other Cavalry units have some sort of hidden quality that makes them worth the trouble when the cheaper more "low tech" units seem to be just as good?

[Fragony]

Ottoman sapihi are buildable in every province unlike Armenians. Makes it very easy to always have some heavy cav when you need it. They may not be that flashy in the battle, but they are invaluable for the strategic game. By the way, since you are allready teched up for jannisaries, build a master spearmaker, and see what you will get. Most of the people here will know what I mean ;) The jannisary archers are useless imho, and they look kinda spupid.

[fruitfly]

Janissary archers are a waste of a unit slot. If you're building janissary armies, then you should replace them with regular janissary infantry and use the space created for JHI.

Turkish cavalry is a bit too weak in the game in my opinion. Sipahis of the Porte are fun, but would benefit from being standard unit size like boyars. Ottoman Sipahi are let down by a weak charge bonus and stats otherwise no better than Ghulam cavalry, whilst Armenians are the only mounted unit that get a full charge bonus. Turcoman horse are a significant improvement on regular horse archers though, especially when trained in Tripoli with a master horse breeder. Their units do have strengths, but are generally best used in a different way tactically to the standard Catholic ones.

Futuwwas are a good hybrid unit, although they tend to suffer from impetuousness which makes holding a tight defensive formation tricky at times. Turcoman foot soldiers are excellent archers in early (and high until they get replaced by jannissary infantry), but best kept out of melee. Both of these archer units benefit from shields, and the Turcomans have a staggered formation which seems to make them harder to kill in an archery duel. Being able to train Turcomans at 2-valour (with the bonuses) helps a bunch too.

Ghazis (a more general Muslim unit) are basically high-morale Highland Clansmen, and make decent shock troops that will fight until there's either noone else to kill or their unit is destroyed.

In early, a good Turkish army would be either 50:50 AHC:Turcoman horse (trained in Armenia/Tripoli with master horse breeders for the valour bonuses), or a more standard Saracen infantry, futuwwa/Turcoman foot based defensive setup. Because futuwwas pack a punch in melee too, you can pack a lot more archer units into a Turkish army than a Catholic one, which means there's less actual melee fighting to worry about.

In high/late I'd be inclined to go with a mix of JHI and janissary infantry, plus maybe a unit or two of cavalry to chase down routers. The only drawback with that approach is that the bulk of your army can only be trained in one province (without being cheesy and destroying/rebuilding your grand mosque), so it helps to use the janissaries to conquer with and then draft in regular troops to conduct seiges and maintain loyalty etc.

[squippy]

I don't know what Fragony is referring to; admittedly I may not have built a master spearmaker in the same province that had the military academy, but I certainly had others.

I agree that the Turks appear to have a number of duplicate units, but found this is not quite the case. Frex, they can deploy one set of archers in the desert and another in mainland europe - the armoured ones. And, rather like arbalesters, the armoured ones (esp with province val bonus and master bowyer) can be left in the thick of it.

JHI kick copious buttock. The saracen inf are effective in any era.

[Fragony]

Quote[/b] (squippy @ Feb. 24 2004,08:35)]I don't know what Fragony is referring to; admittedly I may not have built a master spearmaker in the same province that had the military academy, but I certainly had others.

I agree that the Turks appear to have a number of duplicate units, but found this is not quite the case. Frex, they can deploy one set of archers in the desert and another in mainland europe - the armoured ones. And, rather like arbalesters, the armoured ones (esp with province val bonus and master bowyer) can be left in the thick of it.

JHI kick copious buttock. The saracen inf are effective in any era.

Well JHI is what you get when you add a master spearmaker ;)
I have to disagree on the cavalrypart of the other poster; Turks can build Kwazzies, they may not be knights but they do their job.

[katank]

kwarzies are great and are identical to kataphracts with 2 less charge.

also use ghazis as you get a discount for them. they are equal to gallows except with more morale. just don't expect em to come back alive though. taking constantinople and getting silver armor would really help with survival rate.

ottoman inf also get AP missile capability.

The futuwwas are better for regular shooting and then slice and dice while the turc foot are probly the best pure archers around.

[R'as al Ghul]

Hi kawligia
You're the first one to complain about the Turks http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif
Although I agree to some degree there are some points:

noticing that the Muslims, particularly the Turks, don't have many units

not true in my opinion, most of the players on the org say they have the finest unit roster and I agree with it

The Saracen Infantry and the Armenian Heavy Cavalry are good

of course, use AHC to flank, they're great

Ottoman Sipathi have higher building requiremets,
but they do not appear to be nearly as good as Armenian Heavy Cavalry

of course not, they're light cavalry;
chasing routers and killing archers and other light cavalry is their job

Also I do not see any significant difference between many of the foot archer units such as: Ottoman Infantry, Jannisary bows, and Turcoman foot except for requirements and some very slight stat changes.

OttoInf and TurcoFoot have Armour piercing attack, shoot them empty and flank those armoured christian infidels
JanBows are straight archers w/out combat abilities but afaik higher shooting frequency

Futtuwas and Jannisary infantry are still pretty much the same

JanInf is much stronger: 4 points better defence; 2points+ armour and elite, disciplined instead of uncontrolled

Also I can definately see how Sipathi of the Porte and Hashishin are distinguishable

Not sure what you mean. They are different. One is Cav and the other Inf with hiding ability

I do agree on the point that the Turkish units could be better implemented in the game. Being not content with the stats given I just changed values for some of them.
For example, the Archer evolution you refer to, concerning ottoman/turcoman now really makes sense because ottoman have better stats then Turcoman (in my Mod)
The JanArchers are now pure Archers as they should be, as I use the empty Ninja-slot from Projectiles.txt (modded) for them.
They shoot high frequent volleys of death but when looked
at, they die immediatly. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif
Turcoman Horse need morale=2 instead of -1 like vanilla Horse Archers and and and
But even unmodded their units are a lot of Fun. Completely different Tactics from the Catholics
are to be used but they rock.
If you want I could send you my Crusader_unit and the Projectiles files for testing. I haven't overpowered them but reduced the flaws you realized and modded the compound bow in.
There's a lot of info on the Turks on this board and it helped me to make the best out of the given units.
Cheers

[kawligia]

Ah but Ottoman Sipathi are not actually faster than AHC So they will not do any better for mopping up routers.

As far as hashishim and sipathi of the porte, I meant that they are obviously distinguishable from the other units in their respective classes.

[Praylak]

The Ottoman Sipahi can dismount as Turc/foot archers. Considering what you have to build to get Lithuanian Cavalry, this has to count as a plus for them. Depending on how you play, and tactics you use, this can be quite an advantage.