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TosaInu

04-04-2004, 19:43

THE BYZANTINES — EARLY

1. Opening moves
The Byzantines need to attack Turkey and then Egypt in a variation of katank’s patented “Ransom the Sultan” blitz for Turkey.

There is also the isolated province of Naples to consider. The best defense there is an attack.

Gather all available forces and attack Rum. This is the richest, most developed province for Turkey. Without it, the Turks are hurting. Keep pounding the Turks with your Byzantine infantry, Trebizond archers and Kataphracts.

After you have taken Syria, go on a “ransom blitz” against Egypt. Methods vary depending on difficulty and number of troops, but the idea is to take and hold Syria, Tripoli and Palestine before the Egyptian sultan leaves Antioch. Then seize Antioch and ransom the sultan.

Other chances to grab the sultan and extort ransom will arise. In one game, I ransomed the sultan three times for a total of about $28K.

Meanwhile, back in Italy …

Take the whole Naples garrison and invade Sicily on the first turn.

At worst, you will set the Sicilians back for years, inflict heavy casualties and be able to ransom back your Byzantine infantry. Rebuild the unit in Constantinople and send it to the real war in the Middle East.
At best, you will storm the keep, conquer Sicily, build a swordsmith there to rebuild your Byzantine infantry and triumphantly retake Naples.

Finally, do not forget the Balkans. Horse archers from Greece and Slav warriors from Bulgaria can take Serbia easily. Just get to it when you can afford it and before the Hungarians do. Use the horse archers to destroy as many of the rebel peasants and spears as possible before engaging with other troops.

Congratulations; you are now the proud owner of an empire stretching from Egypt to south Italy. Time to tech up, build a dominant navy and get ready for the Crusades that will come your way. So much for Christian solidarity.

One final note on the opening moves; the island provinces of Crete, Rhodes and Cyprus are a lot of trouble, but work to keep them. They can make good shipbuilding centers. Their loyalty will improve once they have a ship link to some other port in the Byzantine Empire.

2. Units and buildings.
Byzantine infantry from Constantinople, Trebizond archers from Trebizond and Kataprhacts from maturing heirs make all the army you will need for the opening blitz. Some Slav warriors for garrison duties and as governors plus some horse archers for killing rebels are supplementary.

People love Kataphracts, Pronoiai Allagion and Varangian Guards, but those high-powered units can wait. First get your trade routes established and your coasts covered with fleets, develop your farming economy, and build up good armies in your big border provinces: Greece, Bulgaria and Egypt. Byzantine lancers and cavalry in support of Byzantine infantry and Trebizond archers will handle anything in the Early Era. Get yourself squared away, and then you can afford those top-flight units and have the time to develop them.

EDITED: to include the summery compiled by Doug-Thompson

Cheetah

04-04-2004, 19:43

Guide High

TosaInu

04-04-2004, 19:43

Guide Late

Cheetah

04-04-2004, 19:43

Pragmatic

Mercenary

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Joined: Sep. 2002
Posted: Sep. 30 2002,20:09

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Okay, I'm about ready to try my first game without cheat mode. I'm not sure if I'm ready for battles, however, so I'm going to be playing on easy.

What would anyone suggest for strategy? I found a page on FourBelowZero.com that gave some intro strategies. It suggests pulling out of Georgia and Lesser Armenia, leaving Naples to its fate, and concentrating on Greece, Bulgaria (questionable), Constantinople, Nicaea, and Trebizond. (The islands, while well developed, are isolated, and not much can be done to reinforce them.)

Anyway, I can see building up Constantinople (Kataphraktoi) and Trebizond (Trebizond Archers). What else? Obviously, with the economics of the game, it's a case of specializing. Also, since you want to top out revenue, the farm upgrades and merchant upgrades (when available) are also nice.

I assume I'll want to have ships churned out on a regular basis, as well, to connect with multiple-commodity provinces.

Any advice? Who to ally with, who to shun, who to backstab? I don't want to conquer the world. I just want to conquer my corner of it. The provinces in the Balkans which start out Orthodox. Along the coast down to Egypt. (Especially Jerusalem and Egypt, though mainly for historical reasons. Any benefit to Jerusalem, aside from the impressive governorship?) I'd like to keep my three islands. I think I'll want to stay away from north of the Black Sea, especially if the Mongols come in. Let them wipe out Novgorod and the Poles, I say.

Anyway, if any of you can offer some general tips on how to play as Byzantium, I'd appreciate it. I'll even play that particular game without any cheats (aside from save/reload... gotta have a crutch ).
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Boromir0101

Mercenary

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i was lord of water i am no newbie Posted: Sep. 30 2002,20:40

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For being Byzantines (my fav faction, to if only they had kerns) but anyway some tips
1.Kataphractoi are devastating early game, some of best cav avialible until Chivilarc knights, but they can beat most turkish melee cav. they are WAY to slow to use against horse archers though (build inns for alan mercs and/or get Khazar province for steppe cav.
2.Build trade routes, and ally with catholics so they dont crusade against you
3. Trezibond archers and byzantine infantry are good combos, trezibond's are good archers byzantine inf maybe games best
4. Constantinople good rich farm province, build it up (if you get 1092 patch it starts better)
5.The islands aren't that great, low farm income, no trade, maybe use them as naval bases thats about it
6.take out turks as quick as possible they end up being much stronger late on
7.Naples is hard to hold, try to get a foothold early as possible

thats all i can think of
darn now i want to play a Byzantine game good luck

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Long has my father the steward of gondor kept the forces of mordor at bay, by the blood of our people are your lands kept safe Boromir

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Long has my father the steward of gondor kept the forces of mordor at bay, by the blood of our people are your lands kept safe Boromir
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DojoRat

Duke

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Posted: Sep. 30 2002,20:40

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Pragmatic

On easy you shouldn't have to pull out of any provinces.(my rule is never pull out, but then I've had a vasectomy) First, choose the best leaders to be the governor of each province. These are units that have a leader with high acumen (4+ feathers) and dread in that order. The provinces with the highest income should get the better leaders. You may want to wait a turn or two and check your new units if you can't seem to find any good ones. This will boost your income without raising taxes.
In Naples, lower the taxes all the way and build a fort to produce peasants. You might get a revolt any way but its worth a shot.
Go after Serbia, its nuetral and has gold, which is very good.
Build up your forces and use your generals to take out the Turks and Eygypt in that order.
Concentrate on spearman and esp Byz inf as well as the Treb archers. Your heavy Cav will take time to develope. Buy mercenaries just before your campaigns begin to give yourself an edge. You'll need inns for this put one in both the Balkans and Anatolia.
Well that's a start. I gotta go.

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Pragmatic

Mercenary

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Posted: Sep. 30 2002,20:54

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I have a feeling that me and Hungary won't be seeing eye-to-eye. They have Iron in at least two of their provinces, so I'll be wanting them for future upgrades. Long-term, however. (Maybe assassinate both their leaders, one after the other, until they go rebel. THEN snatch them up.)

I don't know if its possible to get Serbia without cheating. The Hungarians tend to take Moldavia (one of the provinces that I want). I'll have to see if they take Serbia, as well.

It looks like my main enemies are going to be the Hungarians, the Sicilians (hard to exterminate, those... but I think I know how to reach Malta, now), the Egyptians, and the Turks. What order should I take them on? Who should I ally with in the meantime?

Aside from maxing out the trade possibilites, what provinces are good for what? It's too expensive to build everything in every province....

Should I spread out things like Cathedral, Admiralty, and stuff like that?
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Yoko Kono

Count

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UK Posted: Sep. 30 2002,21:03

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as the byzantines i developed my islands to churn out ships, this way they can never be attacked (only bribed or revolts), use trebizond for archers, constantinople for kata and byz infantry, while i used greece for byz cav
this way i had a good steady suppy of my core army units, byz inf; byz cav; treb arch and kata as shock, and my trade empire expanded rapidly givng over 10K income from the capital alone
try to fight one enemy at a time to maximise trade revenue
in my game i had a strong defensive line to hold back the turks whom i allied with after they failed to defeat me in battle, and i kept the otrher muslims on board as i need their trade income
i would first fight off the hungarians or anyone else with little or no sea ports but first ally with another faction along their borders who may also take advantage of your was and this will lesson the chances of intervention
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RealWarSucks

Mercenary

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Long Beach, CA Posted: Sep. 30 2002,22:53

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Well, I played one game as the byz so I'm not really qualified to say...but that never stopped me before. It was on expert level.

I took on the Turks really quickly. It was a long war that involved a lot of trading territories but I was able to wipe them out. Around this time I got jumped by the Hungarians and the Egyptians. I was easily able to take out the hungarians all together but then the HRE and Italians got involved. Basically I had never started a war with anyone but everyone who started one with me lost all or most of their provinces. Everything was going pretty well, I had from Syria to Genoa, Tyrolia, Bohemia, Bavaria, etc. The trouble I had was that I was heart-set on getting profit out of trade but the catholics kept attacking me. Anyway, strange things occured out west beyond my sight and the spanish took over the Iberian penninsula, southern france, all of africa, and up to my borders on the east. There were no more muslim nations. The Spanish were out of control strong at this point. I gave up. They were gradually wiping out my turkish holdings and i tried in vain to get one of the muslim factions to pop back up and slow down the spaniards. I guess I could have probably survived taking losses all the way to Constantinople and then trying to destabalize the spanish but it seemed like it would take forever.

Out of the experience I can give you this advice;

Bribe for Kazhar. It didn't work so well for me, but it seems like a good tactic. A better way I guess would be to get a force in Georgia and then bribe the Khazar, when they join you move in your reinforcements. Without reinforcements I was attacked by rebels from all sides who took back the province. Being able to produce the steppe cav is nice, especially against all those stupid horse archers.

Other than that I'd say my biggest mistake was conquering too fast. I ended up taking so many provinces so quickly that I had to move all of my armies out to the borders to keep down rebellions. It was costly supporting those forces and I seldom had the cash to really develop my core provinces.

My thinking was that the best chance for the byz would be to become a trading empire until i had the cash to rule russia. But the key to that is not being at war (at least not with everyone). I guess in hindsight I should've kissed more catholic booty...I doubt it would have mattered though since without the almohad the spanish became the global hegemon.

good luck

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Grifman

Duke

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Posted: Oct. 01 2002,00:11

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Here is the Byzantine Blitz ™ strategy:

1) Hungary is your friend. Your enemy is Turkey. Do not foolishly antagonize Hungary or attack them - a decent frontier force will discourage them from any adventures - 6 unit army in Serbia (slowly increasing to a fulls stack) and one unit in Bulgaria is all you need on that front. You have bigger fish to fry. Forget about the iron - it's not crucial and it won't do you any good to have their iron if the Turks have Constantinople.

2) First two turns - send troops and take Serbia - nice mines and farm income. Wait any later and Hungary takes it.

3) Send emissary to Khazaria ASAP and bribe it. Nice farm, trade income but most important, Steppe Cavalry which will make mince meat of Turkish archers.

4) Pump out troops in the Big C and Khazaria, mainly Byzant infantry and Steppe cavalry.

5) Hire as many mercs as you can afford in Trebizond. You should now have two large stacks of armies.

6) Move everything into Rum. The Turks will retreat and now they are doomed. You have their main, if not their only troop producing province.

7) Garrison the Big C, and build up more troops there, hire more mercs if you can. Let the Turks take whatever they want other than the Big C and Khazaria and Rum - if they hold a province temporarily it doesn't matter - you can now outproduce them since you hold Rum, even if they try and rebuild elsewhere.

8) Eventually, you can build up enough troops in Khazaria (Steppe Cavalry), Trebizond (mercs), Rum (horsearchers) and the Big C (Byzant infantry), along with your Rum armies to manuever and force the Turks back. Shouldn't be too long before you take the last Turkish province.

9) Now take some time to consolidate your victory, but don't stop producing troops or take it easy. The Egyptians will soon attack - they never attack the Elmoheads when they can attack Christians. Just build up and be prepared.

10) I use the island as naval bases. They all get 20% agriculture, then build only enough to be able to produce ships - to be used against Egypt (see below).

11) You shouldn't have trouble beating the Egyptians as you can easily outproduce them. A good idea when the war comes is an amphibious invasion of Egypt. A one stack army can usually take it, as they never garrison it with enough troops. This deprives them of a major province, and also heads off the Spanish or Elmoheads taking it as you roll back the Egyptians from the north.

12) With the Turks and Egyptians yours, your future is assured. Just build up for the Mongol invasion, and prepare to retake Italy or anywhere else your fancy takes you You can even attack the Hungarians now if you want. The world is now your oyster.

Grifman

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Taohn

Man at Arms

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Toronto, Canada Posted: Oct. 01 2002,00:12

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If you're playing Early, I've gotten myself a good start this way. Kick the turks out of Rum and Armenia on the first turn. If you use the right combo of troops they may reteat from Rum without a fight. Rum is their home province so you'll have, for all intents and purposes, eliminated them. Don't kill them off totally though or you'll regret it.(rebellions) I like to leave them Syria. Raiding them often so they pose no threat. Also, Lower Naples' taxes to very low and start a fort. Attack Sicily on turn one with all troops in Naples. Try to kill all their soldiers on the battle map or you'll have to siege a keep with Naptha throwers and Byz infantry. Either way you'll end up with a free keep

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Like all Miyagi, Shimpo Sensei was fisherman.... Love fishing. Love sake. One day, strongo wind, strongo sun, strongo sake, but no fish. Shimpo Sensei fall asleep off coast of Okinawa, wake up off coast of China.

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Like all Miyagi, Shimpo Sensei was fisherman.... Love fishing. Love sake. One day, strongo wind, strongo sun, strongo sake, but no fish. Shimpo Sensei fall asleep off coast of Okinawa, wake up off coast of China.

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Grifman

Duke

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Posted: Oct. 01 2002,00:55

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I have no problems with any Turkish rebellions and its 1274 AD and I have every Turkish province and have had them for over 150 year. I suspect you are not doing a good job of managing happiness in your provinces . . .

Grifman

[This message has been edited by Grifman (edited 10-01-2002).]
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Rosacrux

wind of change

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No man's land Posted: Oct. 01 2002,07:01

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Good strategy Grifman, and on Expert, from my experience with it, it's the only working.

but the lad is playing on easy, so give him a way to enjoy the game from early on, not crush'em all and then spend the rest of the game warring one faction after another, with no peaceful times at all, until he steamrolls over all provinces.

On easy, you can concentrate on production/trade but wiping out the Turks is crucial: If you let them grow, they'll become a major pain in the arse. So, take them out the way Grifman describes (those mercenaries are a must-have for early warfare, the AI has nothing to match them). Once again: Take out the Turks in the beginning. If you can come up with a couple of alliances before invading Rum, all the better: You'll have an easier time later on.

As for building up, Constantinople should produce Byz-inf and Cataphracts and a dromon or two early on, while an island province (I usually pick Crete... for sentimental reasons) can grow to become your main shipyard and produce loads of Dromones. So after some crucial upgrades, Constantinople should build all the money-bringing buildings and later on the nifty ones (Chancellery, Cathedral, Uni and so on). Greece and Nicae produce decent money, so build those up too... quickly. In the beginning you'll want to build archer facilities in Trebizond, to get those fancy (and effective) archers with good valor.

But you should make Rum your main troop producing province, along with Khazar (take both ASAP, they are crucial for your welfare of the Byzantines). Steppe cavalry is very useful and you'll have those buggers around up until you get Pronoiai Allagion (the latter a very decent medium cavalry btw).

You have to know that as the Byzantines you shall have no free time, meaning every now and then (even on easy) a catholic faction shall jump on your throat. You have to play the diplomacy game with skill and cunning, use them spies and assasins and try to keep good relations with all you can, because trading is vital for you - you need BIG armies to defend your lands, not mentioning going on the offense (something you'll have to do sooner rather than later - at least against the Muslim factions. The Turks shall attack you no matter what, and the Egyptians shall follow, so be prepared).

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Pragmatic

Mercenary

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Posted: Oct. 01 2002,07:26

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Well, I tried it on Normal settings. Only minimal save/reloads. I was doing quite well, but decided to quit. I still need a few games on Easy. And I haven't a clue on how to use the tactical battles. (Thus, invading Sicily and Rum on the first turn are flat out.)

Also, I ran out of money early on, so I couldn't bribe the Khazari. (Just as well. There was a Spanish crusade headed for Khazar, and it had three stacks by the time it had reached eastern Hungary.)

I did figure out that there's several provinces that you want to keep, no matter what.

Constantinople: Kataphraktoi, already well developed, loyal as all get out.
Trebizond: Treb. Archers, starts with an inn, also loyal.
Nicaea: Pron. All. (no-one had mentioned that; I sat bolt upright when I read that in the province display...), also loyal.

So, next game on easy, and only Auto-calc battles that are overmatched. (I'm going to be creamed, but what the heck... Can someone point me to a thread where tactics are discussed? I know the basics: hold the center with your best infantry, archers behind to pepper oncoming troops, and cavalry is to be used on the flanks or for running down routed troops.)
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Rosacrux

wind of change

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No man's land Posted: Oct. 01 2002,07:32

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For one, Naples is doomed. don't try to even get it up and running, just concentrate on the vital provinces. But you shouldn't give away anything else, you want to cream the Turks not get creamed by them. Focus on Rum, then Khazar and if you can get away with it (have a couple of spare units) bribe away Serbia.

Another point: Don't build everything everywhere: Focus on some key provinces (those I have already mentioned) and forget about the others, until you have abound cash.

As for tactical battles, there are others more skilled than me to get advice from... check the index thread, there are quite a few topics about this.

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CHIEF HISTORIAN

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Grifman

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Posted: Oct. 01 2002,09:59

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Quote
Originally posted by Taohn:
If you're playing Early, I've gotten myself a good start this way. Kick the turks out of Rum and Armenia on the first turn. If you use the right combo of troops they may reteat from Rum without a fight. Rum is their home province so you'll have, for all intents and purposes, eliminated them. Don't kill them off totally though or you'll regret it.(rebellions) I like to leave them Syria. Raiding them often so they pose no threat. Also, Lower Naples' taxes to very low and start a fort. Attack Sicily on turn one with all troops in Naples. Try to kill all their soldiers on the battle map or you'll have to siege a keep with Naptha throwers and Byz infantry. Either way you'll end up with a free keep

You must be playing on Easy. Won't work on hard:

1) You can't easily take the keep on hard with what you have

2) Even if you take it, you almost always get a rebellion that outnumbers you

3) The keep will hold for 4-6 years, but you can't afford to build ships in Constantinople and send troops to Sicily and fend off the Turks at the same time.

Strategy just won't work on Hard.

Grifman

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Paladin

Count

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Posted: Oct. 01 2002,13:01

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Quote
Originally posted by Boromir0101:
4. Constantinople good rich farm province, build it up (if you get 1092 patch it starts better)

Absolutely. And it makes for more historically accurate and more fun since your back is up against the wall and if you don't make the right moves, you can easily be defeated by the Turks early on.

For anyone that wants to download a copy of it:

http://home.pacbell.net/jpaladin/1092Early.zip

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Transported to a surreal landscape, a young girl kills the first woman she meets and then teams up with three complete strangers to kill again. - Marin County newspaper's TV listing for The Wizard of Oz
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DojoRat

Duke

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Posted: Oct. 01 2002,13:07

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The Byzantines in the early period on normal have a lot of tactical advantages. Their generals are great and the early appearance of Byzantine inf is another plus. Here are some basic tactical tips.
1. Know your enemy. Build a watchtower in both the east and the west. They're cheap and it will let you know what you're facing.
2. Gain local superiority. Build/Gather your forces from nearby provinces but just watch your loyalty/tax ratio.
3. Use the terrain. If he is on a hill try to either lure him off with some skirmishers or at the least turn sidewways on it by setting up on his side. Keep your Cav out of the trees when attacking.
4. Hold and flank. Group your spearmen and militia in a line. Send them forward to engage their line. Place your Byz inf on the flank and send them on a short hook to flank the end of their line. If you have some Kataphraks send them on a longer hook around the other side to plunge into the back of their general who has turned to meet the threat of you Byz INF. Save the light cav (if you can) for mopping up or scattering archers.
Different opponents will require different tactics but holding the center and turning the flanks is a good start.

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MajorFreak

Knight

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Canada Posted: Oct. 04 2002,20:04

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I played on hard. I figured i'd leave the european theatre till much later, and concentrated on killing of the Ottoman's and Egyptians. (italians caused me no end of grief with both ship bugs - no compass/mobile blockading)
i attacked Rum first turn. lowered taxes to stave off revolts and just went full bore on ethnic cleansing. Not pretty, but it got me Rum. After that it was a steady march: Armenia, Edessa and then Tripoli and the one just to the north and south of tripoli were ripe for the taking after i wiped out the turks

Best tactical advice for dealing with the turks? cavalry get massive penalty in woods, plus arrows suck in woods. You'll be outnumbered, so good luck. It's so worth it when you destroy the cream of turkish military and it's downhill for them after.
discovered the joys of heavy armour and desert heat. icky (though i mourn the fact winter weather isn't available....actually i do hope they patch in random winter weather. rare, but it would be nice to have the odd snow blizzard fight.)

Graphic

05-04-2004, 02:27

I found a rather sneaky way to become very powerful within a mere several turns with the Byz.

Simply take your Emmisary and go around all of the many rebel provinces to the North and bribe away. Most of them have very little loyalty and are very cheap to bribe. Within 15 or so turns, you'll have as many provinces.

Notes:

- If you like, when your emissary is finished bribing the final rebel provinces around Muscovy, have him take a brief journy through Germany and Denmark to bribe Norway and Scandanavia (there's a good chance that your emissary will be assassinated when passing through those territories, though).

- There is not much fear of this causing you to go bankrupt, because as you bribe more and more provinces, you will be getting an income from all of them.

- This strategy is possible with the Turkish, also, but not advisable. The Turks would have to deal with a lot of revolts since they are Muslim. Most, if not all, of the provinces in question are Orthodox, as is The Byz.

https://img26.photobucket.com/albums/v77/ubersoldat/mtw.jpg

The_Emperor

05-04-2004, 20:28

My main strategy for the Byzantines in Early is to give up Naples and develop everything else. (with a good dose of bribery to take advantage of rebels near Hungary)

Naples is in all probability going to be lost sooner or later because the people are catholic and full of rebellious spirit... even if you manage to keep the people down, by the mass training of Peasants and Militia the Papacy and the Sicillians will move against you and you will lose without naval support.

I say let them have it, crank up the taxes let them rebel and ransom back your men. (if you want them that is)

Focus the bulk of your attention on Turkey and wipe them off the Map... and then you get to laugh as Egypt attacks you with massed hordes of peasants http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

katank

05-05-2004, 03:21

It's nice to blitz turks by hitting Rum, then Syria and whichever provunce sultan is for a possible ransom.

then, hit eggy with typical turkish blitz that I illustrated in my turk guide part.

there's actually a decent chance of trapping the sultan in antioch if you blitz turks right away

note: your emperor and lone naptha already take Rum on their own on the first turn.

I know it's an abuse of jedi generals but it works with nice wedge switch to 1 liner when wedge hits and then slam other units with naptha grenades.

this turns into full rout for the turks soon.

move in some more troops to maintain loyalty.

the Turks will be crippled by lack of troops production for the rest of the game (two or three turns from then).

BTW, you trebizond inn will also fill up (often with turcoman foot with whom to take down the sultan, ahhh the irony)

Doug-Thompson

05-12-2004, 18:15

Quote[/b] (The_Emperor @ May 04 2004,14:28)]My main strategy for the Byzantines in Early is to give up Naples and develop everything else. (with a good dose of bribery to take advantage of rebels near Hungary)

Naples is in all probability going to be lost sooner or later because the people are catholic and full of rebellious spirit... even if you manage to keep the people down, by the mass training of Peasants and Militia the Papacy and the Sicillians will move against you and you will lose without naval support.

I say let them have it, crank up the taxes let them rebel and ransom back your men. (if you want them that is)

Focus the bulk of your attention on Turkey and wipe them off the Map... and then you get to laugh as Egypt attacks you with massed hordes of peasants http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

Consider, also, a banzai charge into Sicily on the first turn with your entire Naples garrison.

Defending Naples usually gets you into a war with Sicily while you're stretched out into Egypt, and an expensive naval war at that.

So crank up the taxes, abandon Naples and attack the 100 spears and a keep in Sicily.

Storm the keep. Take it and delete all of Sicily's buildings before the Loyalist revolt kicks in. Fight the loyalists, pay the ransom for your troops, rebuild the Byz infantry unit and send it east to the real war.

You've now done the Sicilians serious hurt. Nobody's going to be building ships in Sicily for a very long time.

You've also broken all contact with the Sicilians, who will put one fleet in the Malta Channel and the other in Sicilian waters to renew contact with Sicily and re-take it. The war with Sicily is over.

Now you're free to finish off the Turks and Egyptians, and use horse archers from Greece and cheap Slav Warriors from Bulgaria to wipe out the rebels in Serbia and provide the necessary garrison. Build a fort and a port in Serbia. Meanwhile, build a ship in Constantinople and get it over to the Adriatic. Return to Naples in triumph, then take Sicily and keep it.

katank

05-12-2004, 22:17

I see no need to use bribery for the rebels as they are trash that cost money.

these lousy spears can be killed by HAs or if you spare a byz inf from the war with Turks/Eggy.

treb archers also kill spears like nothing.

Is it just me or does it seem like Const. should just churn out a byz inf every turn for the first decade or so?

Kristaps

05-14-2004, 17:22

Quote[/b] (Doug-Thompson @ May 12 2004,12:15)]Naples is in all probability going to be lost sooner or later because the people are catholic and full of rebellious spirit... even if you manage to keep the people down, by the mass training of Peasants and Militia the Papacy and the Sicillians will move against you and you will lose without naval support.
Hehehe, keeping Naples actually is my pride goal if playing Byzantines: I make sure I fight off all rebellions and siciallian incursions until my fleet is able to bring in reinforcements. A combinations of the initial infantry + some peasansts, then urban militia, then spears and locally trained rebizond archers can do wonders :)

A blitz into sicily and NOT DESTROYING IT, is another option. I keep Sicily, and then attack Napolese rebels with troops built in the more advanced island. If you lucky enough: you might even jump start ship building in Sicily.

Actually, tried it again last night :) The lone Napolese byzantine infantry general Cerularius should rather be called Figaro. One turn he was fighting in Sicily, the other: back in Naples fighting an uprising happy about his absence.

Here is how it went (GA, Hard):

AD 1087 - Lord Lascaris: a scary 4 dread general becomes the king of Naples; Cerularius (the byzantine general in Naples) accepts the honors to be the Duke of Trebizond (2 command stars); construction of guard towers is started in Naples; Lord Cerularius and the napolese garrison venture into Sicily.

AD 1088. - the Sicilian spear unit retreats into the keep;
Cerularius and and his naptha throwing buddies move back into Naples to quell a catholic uprising (if no old_rebels are used this is quite manageable); start building border towers in Naples.

AD 1089. - Lord Cerularius earns his 3rd command star slaughtering napolese catholics; As soon as the dust settles he sets the sail back to Sicily where their king has
abandoned the island garrison all alone (the Sicilan boats have taken off for somewhere...); note that the Sicilians were not able to build anything during year 1088 since the province oficially belonged to Byzantines and there were no unit building facilities at the time in Malta; on the orders of Cerularius, fort construction is started in Naples.

AD 1090. - to the amazement of Lord Cerularius, Don Duncan Corsini has ordered his Sicilian spear garrison to defend in the woods... they get slaughtered or captured to the last man. The Sicilan keep falls with no defenders left. Despite 99% loyalty, catholics rise up again in Naples. Lord Cerularius sets his sail back to Italy. Town watch construction starts in Sicily.

AD 1991. - on the sight of Lord Cerulariu's unit marching off the ship, the Napoles catholic rebels retreat screaming like women. Lord Cerularius earns his 4th star. however, his absence has not passed unnoticed by Sicilian loyalists who do not seem threatened by the freshly recruited peasant leutenant in the keep.

AD 1992. - Lord Cerularius kills 50 loyalists, capturing 47. This does not stop the islanders from rising up again.

AD 1993. - Lord Cerularius helped by freshly recruited Sicilian militia kills 70 loyalists, captures and executes 50 more. From this point on: the populations in both Italian colonies seem to be content.

P.S. I guess, it wouldn't have gone as smoothly if (1) the Sicilians arranged their fleets correctly and got their king join the fight in Sicily, (2) the Pople had realized Naples was undergarrisoned at times... (3) the Italians had realized the same thing... (4) Lord Cerularius got rebellions in both provinces at the same time (5) old_rebels switch was used :)

Doug-Thompson

05-15-2004, 18:51

Quote[/b] (Kristaps @ May 14 2004,11:22)]A blitz into sicily and NOT DESTROYING IT, is another option. I keep Sicily, and then attack Napolese rebels with troops built in the more advanced island. If you lucky enough: you might even jump start ship building in sicily.
Now that is intriguing. If the keep's not destroyed in the assault, you can get a swordsmith's workshop pretty soon and replace losses to the Byz infantry. You could hold off rebellions indefinitely.

katank

05-16-2004, 13:24

dammit.

that's so true.

didn't think of that.

I simply had him fighting off wave after wave of Naples rebels.

by 1092 now he's already a 5* with a huge list of skilled and risky v&vs.

he's now my best non heir general

keeping both may actually be doable now that I think about it.

hmmm.

fight the rebels both ways and the swordsmith can immediately start having more byz inf join him and replenish losses in his unit.

this way you could actually hold all both provinces.

this is assuming the Sicilians don't smarten up and send their king over from malta which would be horrible.

the AI is incapable of managing their only two fleets so well though and hence that wouldn't be an issue, I suppose.

Doug-Thompson

06-16-2004, 23:06

katank

06-17-2004, 01:02

hitting Sinai and forcing the Sultan to one side would be another ransom opportunity.

a cheap trick is to let Arabia or Egypt rebel and then hit the other side for the ransom.

this way, the Eggy gain some loyalist rebels but the cash that you gain from ransom will more than offset however much it cost to kill the rebels.

besides, if you provoke a rebellion, be sure to leavew the province empty and usually at most 3 units will pop up.

For the opening, I like to have all forces in Anatolia attack Rum and your katank emperor can take care of just about the entire enemy army there and the naptha can nuke the spear unit to prevent them from tying up your emperor and your spear is just for back up.

this deprives them of their unit production province right away.

pull all other units to trebizond and leave only 1 byz inf on the western front.

queue up all byz inf in Const.

give title to someone in Trebizond or Georgia and attack the next turn Armenia while reinforcing Rum so your assault goes through.

then, storm Edessa and Syria on the next turn.

Inn in trebizond should yield some nice mercs to use against the Eggy, often a unit of Druzhina. FFK is always nice even if it fries in the desert, it wil be enough to cut through a few nubians before they are useless.

I love it when I can hire some muslim mercs like turcoman foot or kwarzies. ahhh, the irony.

for the Naples Sicily part, you should attack Sicily the ver first turn and then turn back to crush the rebels in Naples.

then, invade Sicily again and the spear will actually stick around to fight.

bomb it with naptha a few times while maneuvering with Byz inf. feign charges with Byz inf to get them off the trail of the naptha so the naptha can use all their ammo.

when all ammo is up or they are close to routing, charge in melee from both sides and try to get all of them.

if you get all of them, you'll not have to assault the keep and a free keep with shipyard without needing to assault is nice.

you can try and keep naples by fighting rebels every turn but I personally try to just keep Sicily by first pumping peasants, spears, and finally Byz inf.

then, after Sicily stabilizes, take back Naples.

Taking Rome is a good idea as you are the true Romans and must restore the empire. Also, getting a Castle isn't bad and by use of some cav etc, you can ensure grabbing the castle without needing to assault.

Also, the Popesta is a lot quieter about calling ofr crusades against you yadeeyada when you are sitting next to his weakling army with a huge stack

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

Zortanius

06-23-2004, 20:00

What I love about the Byzantines is the fact that everyone in the game wants to hate you. Every faction covets Constantinople and the rich provinces in the Balkans and Asia Minor. Usually even if you ally with a few catholic factions, even if one catholic faction attacks you - they all switch to neutral. Some even to enemy. They all send crusades to various provinces of mine - Constantinople, Nicea, Anatolia et al.

So, within say 20 years of you not doing much except capture some rebel provinces, pretty much everyone is out for your bllod. Wave after wave of catholic crusades sweep in from the west. Meanwhile hordes of muslim warriors bombard your east. Needless to say - it's tonnes of fun after a while. Almost every Byzantine unit has good defence stats, many - like Kataphracts and ByzInf have better defence than attack. The latter, with a level or two (or three) of armour upgrades and valor bonuses are absolutely deadly. They can sut thru almost any muslim infantry - including saracen infantry and if they can catch and pin them, murabatin infantry. They kill camels as well, who have a combat penalty in non desert areas. Also your first King Alexius I, will have 7 sons, 3 of them will be absolutely deadly both as fighters and generals and 2 will be solid if not spectacular. Throw in the one unit of Varangian Guard which you start with - commanded by the emperor's cousin, and the 1 or 2 ByzInf generals you train at constantinople, you have a veritable inpenetrable collection of legions. Spend the first 20 years or so getting as much of the rebel balkans and steppe areas as possible. Thereafter get all the farming upgrades and build basic military installations at Lesser Armenia, Serbia, Anatolia and Nicea. Pump out spears from one, archers from another and BI from Constantinople. You may have to build 1 more ship though just to keep the italians away from your lands. Therafter settle in to fight lots of defensive battles against superior odds. THAT is the real fun of playing as the Byz.

One year (1133 iirc) I had to fight 4 different crusades (French, Italian, German and Aragonese - the nerve), fend off both the Turks and the Egyptians as well as repel the Russians who are very very sneaky. Always try and keep 2 or 3 units of steppe cavalry in your armies for rounding up prisoners and repelling HA.

Sometimes I will bribe rebels in some far of province - Sweden, Ireland or even something like Flanders after a rebellion - just to get in at the deep end.

You know you are going to win the game eventually - just make it more challenging and fun.

Cheers

ah_dut

06-26-2004, 15:13

bwa, byz inf and treb archers roll over all in early with the jedi's in tow

Mightypeon

06-26-2004, 17:00

Med mod 3.14 high

The starting situation is grim.
Byzantium is in the hands of the outremer scum, Kerte is captured by the Italians and the rest of the outremer surats hold on Zyprus. So what to do?
I usually build units in Treb and Greece, get some help from Niacäa and then retake constantinoples.
It try to make a lot of them run.
Assaulting Byzantium castle is extremly costly, I prefer sieging it out.
After this setback, the Eggys/Turks will kill of outremer.
Take Cyprus, once the outrmeer fleet is gone.
Now advacne agasint the Turks.
Try to hold and fortify Georgia, the hilly terrain is your main point of defense agasint the incoming horde.
Crimea should get some fortifications.
Design a specialized Castle defense force and wait for the horde.
Try to establish a Empire from Greece Bulgaria to Georgia to Egpyt.
If you did this the really hard part is over.
Now take over control of the med, and ready yourself for the next fights....

Paladin

09-05-2004, 20:08

The Viking version of the game must have improved the AI because I easily built up a nice empire emcompassing the balkans, Naples, Anatolia, mideast, and egypt. I had a huge annual income that let me build like crazy. But the Germans and the French sent Crusades to pester me.

Thinking that I was the master, I laid waste to their base in Hungary and took every Hungarian province in two turns.

Feeling pretty good, I took over the Papal States and proceeded to attack both the Germans and the French.

That's when a massive Golden Horde showed up. The next turn, the Papacy returned with a massive force. So I was fighting the French, Germans, Papacy, and the Golden Horde. After a few years of brutal war, my empire dissolved into two factions. Now, my empire looks like swiss cheese. There's nothing easy about this version. But I'm having a good time. ~:cheers:

katank

09-06-2004, 01:33

always be prepared for the GH with healthy pack of buffed varangs in the Khazar fortress for them to storm as well as more varangs and heavy spears forming a plug behind which mountains of arbs in Kiev can destroy em in Kiev.

1231 is the magic year so be prepared.

war with 4-5 factions isn't much.

play HRE and you'd be at war with 6-7 factions at a time if you prohibit yourself from rampant offensive wars that destroy factions (ie. can't wip em out).

Romaoi

11-14-2004, 13:58

Byzantine Ransom Blitz (Med Mod, Expert Early)
Turn 1. Prepare for Invasion.
A. Move Units into Constantinople: Byz Inf from Greece, Crete and Cyprus. Byz Inf, and Strat from Trebizond.
B. Move Dromon from Crete to Rhodes.
C. Build Watchtowers in Greece and Constantinople. Port in Bulgaria. Spear1 in Cyprus and Trebizond and start Keep in Rhodes.
D. Train 5 Treb Arch in Bulgaria and Constantinople; 5 Spear in Greece and Rhodes; and 5 Dromon in Crete.
E. Send Princess to Kiev and Emissary to Rum.

Turn. 2. Invade Moldova.
A. Move Imperial Army from Constantinople (1 Kat BG, 1 Strat, 1 VG, 2 Treb Arch and 5 Byz Inf) into Moldova; move 2 Treb Arch and 1 Byz Inf from Bulgaria into Moldova; and move 1 Byz Inf and 1 Spear from Rhodes into Moldova. Move 1 Spear from Greece into Bulgaria.
B. Build Spear2 in Constantinople and Armorer1 in Greece.
Results: Moldavian forces will usually retreat into fort without fight.

Turn 3. Invade Poland.
A. Move Imperial Army (1 Kat BG, 1 Strat, 1 VG, 4 Treb Arch, and 7 Byz Inf) into Poland. Move 1 spear from Greece and Rhodes into Bulgaria and 1 Treb Arch from Constantinople into Bulgaria. Leave Moldova to the Russians for now.
Results: Polish King will usually retreat into Silesia or Volynia, leaving his castle to fall immediately. Sometimes though, you may have to assault the castle on the next turn.

Turn 4. Collect first Polish ransom.
A. Destroy everything in Poland for cash except watchtowers/border forts.
B. Attack Polish King with your Imperial Army (leave a 100 men to garrison Poland). In Volynia you will usually capture him outright, in Silesia he may take refuge in the keep.
C. Collect the ransom usually around 8,0000 – 10,000 florins. If he retreats into the keep prepare to assault on the next turn.
D. Build armorer1 in Trebizond and Crete and start a Keep in Cyprus. Build Merc in Bulgaria.
E. Move 1 Spear from Rhodes and Greece and 1 Treb Arch from Constantinople into Bulgaria.
F. Train 5 spears in Trebizond and Cyprus.
Results: If you capture his Royal Highness he will pay you dearly. If not, get him on the next turn. Poland may rebel against your garrison, if so, smash them again.

Turn 5. Regroup the Army.
A. If you have ransomed the king, return the Imperial Army to Poland. If you have taken Volynia or Silesia outright, destroy everything for the cash. Otherwise you will have to assault the King in his Keep on the next turn.
B. Move 1 Spear from Greece and Rhodes and 1 Treb Arch from Constantinople into Bulgaria.
Results: The province you have just left will usually rebel for the Polish King on the next turn. If so, prepare to attack him again for another ransom.

Turn 6. The Big Invasion. Collect second Polish ransom and mug the Hungarians.
A. Attack the Polish King in Volynia or Silesia with half of the Imperial Army.
B. Attack the Hungarian King with your Heir and half of the Imperial Army in Poland and the Imperial Army in Bulgaria (7 Spears and 6 Treb Arch).
C. Build Trader1 in Bulgaria and Spearmaker2 in Greece.
D. Move Spear from Greece, Rhodes, and Cyprus into Bulgaria and a Treb Arch from Constantinople into Trebizond.
E. Train 5 Spear in Greece and Rhodes; 5 Kats in Constantinople and 5 Treb Arch in Bulgaria.
F. Hire any Mercs in Bulgaria.
Results: You give the Polish the once over again. The Hungarian King will usually retreat into Carpathia or Croatia leaving his nice Hungarian Castle to you outright. Sometimes you will have to assault the Hungarian Castle on the following turn. Either way it is a rich prize, so destroy everything for cash.
You mug the Hungarians the same way as you do the Polish. Chase them from Croatia and Carpathia for as long as the other factions will let you do so in peace. If the Hungarians have an ambitious King, they may have taken Wallachia or Serbia while you were mugging the Poles. If so, then you will have to build Kats earlier for a good leader and detail part of the Imperial Army in Bulgaria to drive the Serbs out to where they can be cornered.
But be careful of the Sicillians, Italians, the Turks and the Russians. They can swarm like sharks if they smell too much filthy lucre flowing into your coffers. I can usually hit the Poles three times and the Hungarians twice before somebody tries for Greece or Trebizond. This expedition usually nets me around 40,000 florins before I have to deflect an attack from a jealous rival.

If the Turks become embroiled with the Egyptians (something you should encourage), keep a look out for an advantage against the Russians. I once brought my Imperial Army back to Bulgaria, only to find the Russian Prince was in Moldavia, Kiev, Crimea, Pereyaslavl and Khazar. I drove him out of Moldova, Kiev and Khazar and mugged him in the Crimea, leaving him 10,000 florins poorer in Pereyaslavl. His fleet was very large and kicking my fleet’s ass so I finished him off there.

I can usually keep the Sicillians out of Greece with 4 Spears, 3 Treb Archs and a Kat Heir. But the Italians are another story, I do everything to keep them happy until I can make fire Galleys. Watch the Turks, because they usually come on like gang busters. Also don’t let them keep any ships around Cyprus!

The purpose of this mugging expedition is to fund Byzantine economic and military expansion. It also effectively eliminates Hungary and Poland as threats and can embroil HRE and Italy over Croatia and Hungary. I prefer to marry into HRE and ally with them as a check against Italy. The elimination of the Polish threat only strengthens HRE against Italians. The Turks I take care of when they come. We play a game, they hit Trebizond and I retreat into my Keep. I hit make a seaborne invasion of Anatolia on the next turn while the AI masses its Turkish Army in Trebizond for an attack on my capital. They divert their army into Anatolia while I strike into Rum, which the AI leaves with only a small garrison. The Turks get Anatolia back leaving Trebizond intact with its Byzantine Garrison still in the keep. Rum usually falls like a plum, castle and all, I raze all the military buildings (I don’t destroy the rest because I’ll be back soon to stay) and leave it to the Turks, who retake it with a huge Army. Now my main Army in is poised opposite in Trebizond. This usually invites the Egyptians to the party. They can’t resist an undefended Syria or Edessa. After that it is only a matter of time before I and the Egyptians dismember them.

I’ve done this about a dozen times now and after the dust settles, Byzantium occupies Constantinople, Nicea, Anatolia, Rum, Armenia, Georgia, Moldavia, Crimea, Kiev, Bulgaria, Greece, Crete, Rhodes and Cyprus. Khazar, Serbia, Hungary, Croatia, Wallachia, Carpathia, Volynia, and Silesia are in ruins and left to the jackals of war. My economy is humming and Egypt is still rich and ready for the plucking.

Remember, that I use the word usually a lot. It doesn’t always go down so easily, but have fun and give it a try.

Romaoi

11-14-2004, 15:31

MTW VI BYZ Early Normal:
Pull troops out of Georgia and Lesser Armenia. Very low taxes in Naples, Georgia and L armenia. Low taxes in the Islands and normal taxes elsewhere. Build W/t in every province first turn. Take Serbia first turn with Treb from Bulg and Byz Inf from Greece, to buffer Greece. Take Walachia and Moldavia sequentially with Constantinople garrison. Second turn build forts on Islands, Treb and Naples. Third turn start building farms and traders on Constantinople, Greece, Nicea and Bulgaria. Get to where you can produce spears and trebs in Naples, Trebs in Trebizond, Byz Inf in Constatinople. Ships on Islands. Build Anatolia towards spearmen. Don't bother with horsies, Byz Inf, Spearmen and Trebs can handle the neighbors with ease. Concentrate on economy and trading. Put good leader prospects in Bulgaria to use Serbian, Wallachian and Moldavian rebellions to raise stars and military skills. (I got a seven-star Master of Numbers Treb this way) Avoid conflict as long a possible until you get really powerful and rich, then kick ass. You may have to give of Georgia and L Armenia for a little while. I have seldom lost Naples by building in this order: Watchtower, fort (train 2 Peasents), town watch (train 2 UM) , spear 1 (train 4 spear), bowyer 1. Then just train lots of spears and trebs and wait for the Pope, Italians or Sicillians to call, and kick their butts when they do. Most importantly, experiment and have fun.

Lanemerkel1

11-17-2004, 02:22

People love Kataphracts, Pronoiai Allagion and Varangian Guards, but those high-powered units can wait. First get your trade routes established and your coasts covered with fleets, develop your farming economy, and build up good armies in your big border provinces: Greece, Bulgaria and Egypt. Byzantine lancers and cavalry in support of Byzantine infantry and Trebizond archers will handle anything in the Early Era. Get yourself squared away, and then you can afford those top-flight units and have the time to develop them.

I personally have found that the best army if you don't have VI is 4 units of PRONOIAI ALLIGON 2 units of BYZANTINE CALVALRY 1 unit of KATAPHRAKTOI as the general 4 units of BYZANTINE INFANTRY 3 units of TREBIZOND ARCHERS (1 of them being your starting one and the other 2 being newly trained out of trebizond or constaninople) once the BULGARIAN BRIGANDS come along replace the 2 units you of TREBIZONDS you trained with 2 units of BRIGANDS and 2 units of VARANGIAN GUARDS it works PERFECT and all these except for the BRIGANDS are exclusive to the byzantines so I just make it a byazantine exclusive army by not replacing the TREBIZONDS with BRIGANDS then its a byzantines exclusive ~:)

Lanemerkel1

11-17-2004, 02:48

oh yeah i can't find the EDIT button so this ell have to do you have to have the ptroop thing set on HUGE

Jamais Le Dimanche

11-20-2004, 11:13

I love playing Byzantines in Med Mod Early Expert. The problem is that their starting position in Med Mod is not as good as in Regular MTW VI. Nicea has no tradable goods and belongs to those pesky Seljuks. As does Anatolia. AND they have Ottoman Infantry, which if I recall my history, would not come available until the Ottomans (Osmanlis) come of age in the late thirteenth century. I found that if I tangle with the Turks, the Russians attack with a lot of ships and Boyars, or the Hungarians, Sicilians or Italians. This is especially true if I play my normally peaceful development plan.

So I am experimenting with early Blitz attacks, to cripple them until before they can get too strong. Today, I had a few hours free, so I tried this one several times with some interesting results.

On the first turn I move everything into Constantinople, except of course for the Vest (Byz Inf) stranded in Rhodes. I move the Dromon from Crete to Rhodes. And build Dromons in Crete, Kats in Constantinople, Trebs in Bulgaria and Spears in Greece and Rhodes. I also build for spearmen in Trebizond and Cyprus who will come available on turn Four.

On turn two in move the Rhodes units (Byz Inf & Spearmen) into Nicea. The Army in Constantinople I split in two. Army Number One (Kat BG, Kat, 2 Byz Inf, 1 Treb) joins Rhodian force in Nicea. Army Two (VG 2*, Byz L, 3 Byz Inf, 2 Treb) moves across the Cherno More (Black Sea) into Kiev. Reinforce Const from Bulg and Greece. Press turn button.

On turn three the Russians vacate Kiev leaving either Castle or Keep intact (as happened every time so far.) and go into the Crimea. The Turks in Nicea retreat into their Keep. Reinforce Nicea from Rhodes, Trebizond from Constan and Constan from Bulg and Greece.) Assault Keep in Nicea and destroy everything in Kiev and move into Crimea. Press turn button.

On turn four, Army #2 on auto always beats Russians, who leave with remnents for Khazar, leaving Crimea either intact or with a garrison that you must assault. Turks in Nicea fall to army #1 leaving either keep or fort intact. The Turks will often Invade Trebizond at this point with a small force. If they do pull your garrison into the keep. Build a watch tower in Nicea. Take your King Kat, everything in Constan, Bulg and Rhodes and move into Trebizond. Take your new Heir and the rest of Army #1 and head for Anatolia. Build spearmen in Cyprus (and Trebizond if Turks don't bite). Build some stuff and press button.

On turn five, Army #1 forces Turks into keep in Anatolia. Army#3 (remember Emperor in Treb?) forces Turks out of Treb. Army #3 either destroys remaining Crimea garrison or defeats Russians in Kiev and forces Russian Prince into Keep in Khazar. Russian Revolution breaks out in Kiev.

And so it goes. Russian rebels retake empty and devastated Kiev. Russian Prince ransomed in Khazar. Khazar is destroyed and small garrison is placed into Crimea. Remainder of Army #2 leaves Khazar via port (which is destroyed afterwards) a lands in Trebizond. Anatolia keep is assaulted, Army # 3 feints into Rum and everything that is avaliable reinforces Anatolia.

Most of the time so far, the Turks pull into Castle in Rum and I put both all three Armies into Rum to meet the counter attack. The AI seems to be slow to move troops from Edessa, Armenia and Syria to protect Rum. On the following turn there is a large battle in Rum, which has always been a Byz victory so far. Soon Rum falls and is laid waste, followed by Armenia (likewise wasted, my intention is to weaken, not destroy Turks and Russians). I then fall back to a three province border in the east Anatolia, Trebizond and Georgia.

If Egypt doesn't join the feeding frenzy, leave Lesser Armenia alone or they will attack too soon. Also weakening the Turks too much also invites a premature Egyptian attack, so stay out of Syria! The Egyptians have plenty of units and rich provinces, so I prefer to fight them in defensive battles where I can bleed them a bit, before I attack. Besides with this plan the Byz army will be spread out in the East and West. The key for the Byz at this stage is to crank out a lot of Spears from Greece, Rhodes, Trebizond and Cyprus, plus Trebs fro Bulgaria and Kats from Constan. This combination seems effective at this stage, before Byz Inf can come on line in any numbers. Train and reinforce like crazy. Keep a good stack in Constan for your second heir to use against Hungary if possible or to protect Greece from the Latin maritime powers.

In the most interesting game so far, I've have managed to rush west with my second heir and blitzed Hungary for two Royal ransoms, leaving me with Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece, Moldavia, Constantinople, Nicea, Trebizond, Georgia, Anatolia, Crete, Rhodes and Cyprus, protected by a buffer of devastated Croatia, Hungary, Carpathia, Wallachia, Kiev, Khazar, Armenia and Rum. All in all a fine empire to start with and with 40,000 florins or more for development. Most of the time, however, Egypt or Italy give me serious trouble before I can finish with Hungary. Sicily will also try to cause trouble (usually maritime attacks, but once in awhile a strike at Greece). I find that the Sicilians are the easiest to handle, but Italians seaborne invasions or an Egyptian breakout in the east is SERIOUS TROUBLE.

BE SURE TO BRING CYPRUS AND RHODES ONLINE AS SOON AS POSSIBLE AS SHIP BUILDERS. Dromons aren't very good potection, so you need a lot of them to protect your islands and keep your seaborne reinforcement routes open. Italy, Egypt and Sicily all seem to build a lot galleys and Dhows.

I am going to try Blitzing with the Hungarians next. Poland looks well situated for several royal ransoms.

_Aetius_

12-12-2004, 22:05

My strategy with byzantium on early is on expert mode, keep naples and develop it, start by building watch towers on my first go in every single province, then border forts in naples and other rebellious provinces on my 2nd go i build 20% farmlands in anatolia, constantinople, nicaea, and greece. Then forts in anatolia, bulgaria naples and georgia. Send everything i can spare east after 5 or 6 years invade rum and over the next five years crush the turks.

Easy.

Then avoid war with egypt, create a frontier, i have rum armenia, lesser armenia and edessa, egypt will probably take syria from the turks and they also have antioch. Maintain large garrisons on the frontier and replenish the garrison on the other forntier with hungary.

All the while creating a fleet take crimea which has no defence whatsoever, trade all the way upto venice, and to egypt. Develop all my provinces i start to pump out byzantine infantry in 3 or 4 provinces, varangian guards and heavy cavalry in constantinople, trade keeps money flowing in, if a war with egypt or sicily ruins this, build an army in naples to capture sicily defeat the sicilian fleet, with egypt let them invade your provinces there armies are poor and you should massacre them with the armies used in the earlier turkish campaign.

They will both sue for peace soon, but it doesnt matter if sicily doesnt because theyll be reduced to malta and your navy should be to powerful for theres. Dont take anymore land you have enough develop everything because the money form sicily, constantinople, bulgaria, greece, crimea, and nicaea will be massive.

Thats what i always do, and since ive conquered eevry province on the map by starting with this strategy to start off with it clearly works.

metatron

12-14-2004, 07:51

Kill the Turk quickly; I cannot stress this enough. He will become much stronger as you become weaker. Hire mercenaries, don't worry if they outnumber your own men.

After said Turks are all subjugated under the Imperial banner, consolidate your European front, as an Egyptian expedition would be costly and cause logistical problems (although, if you feel you can afford it, go for both).

Keep you fleets in a triangle between the Black Sea, the Adriatic, and the Nile Delta and all your feduciary problems should melt away.

After Egypt/the Balkans are secured, you may want to push to Spain/Russia. Both offer their share of riches. The African route offers your army security, and Russia does fall to the Khan eventually. However, establishing a presence there can mean a quick counterattack, or an initial decimation.

Finally, the last provices open to you should be the Italian/Iberian lands. The Spanish aren't nearly as rich, but they won't have the entire Catholic world at your throat either.

Above all else, do as the Emperors did since Augustus: manipulate your enemies, exploit divisions and weaknesses. Roma Victor!

ZlOpOgLeDjA

12-22-2004, 20:22

Greetings! Ladies & Knights ~;)
:charge: Romanii attack!!
an easy non stressful play fir byzantine experts from 1087 to ???

Buildings & Improvements
WT, BF, Fort+Motte+Bailey, Mine, +20%, Port, TP, TW,
Keep+Wall+Ballista, MineComplex, Me, +60%, Church, TG, Tavern
Castle+Wall+Catapult, MeG, +80%, Monastery, Brothel, Alehouse
Citadel+Barbican, MaMe, Reliquary, TM, Drinking Den, Stew

list of military provinces for continuous training:
Cavalry
Moldavia : Avar Nobles (sp-ar+hb)
Kiev : Steppe Heavy Cavalry (sp-ar+hbg)
Khazar : Steppe Cavalry (hf)
Siege Weapons
Constantinople : catapult (sew) * i prefer castle assaults
Foot Ranged
Trebizond : Trebizond Archers (bo) *
Infantry
Bulgaria : Spearmen, Slav Javelinmen (sp)
Nicaea : Byzantine Infantry (sp-sw)
Sweden : Viking Units (sp-sw+ar+RP)
Navy
Crete, Rhodes, Cyprus : Dromon (shipwright)

I. Short Term Objectives
1. Rum & Armenia (do not proceed towards Egypt, cause you will most likely
become a goal for crusades. this way you can provoke a inner crusade warfare!?)
line should be Lesser Armenia - Rum - Armenia
2. Moldavia (your prize province!) - Avar Nobles are similar to Kataphraktoi
but, quicker and cheeper & most of all you will be able to train them at Keep level!
3. Provide navy from islands : Crete, Rhodes & Cyprus (use navy to protect Greece)
4. From Moldavia to Kiev & Khazar to get basis for Steppe (Heavy) Cavalry.
* Naples?! if you can't have it, give it away! hopefully Pope will have it!
why? best scenario is when you capture Venice, is landing of Pope onto Sardinia, Corsica

II Long Term Objectives
5. War against Hungary, Poland & Russia to establish line
Croatia - Hungary - Poland - Prussia/Pomerania
6. War for the line from Venice to Flanders (cutting off britts)
7. Get Pope to desert Italy!
8. From now on you can attach middle east to your orthodox family
9. Childs play for France, Spain & Britannia
*destroy all military facilities with exception of your own...

you should rule the old world within 100years...

Kralizec

03-11-2005, 20:17

In my last Byzanthian game I tried to capture sicily whilst holding naples as it seemed a good idea. Sending both the Byz infantry and naptha over to sicily the first turn means that the Napelese rebels will be fewer in numbers.
I first gave the infantry general the Duke of Trebizond title, so that the army would have +1 valour because of the two stars granted by the title. Crushing the sicilian army wasn't difficult at all.

HOWEVER,

I never manage to catch all the routing troops! There are always a few spearmen or u.m. that manage to make it to the end of the map because my byz infantry isn't capable of intercepting them! This is hugely annoying because I have to return to naples to fight of the insurection and Sicily returns to the sicilians. Sicily is more valuable then naples because of the keep but assaulting it isn't much of an option I think because the low loyalty meanst that a huge revolt would happen instantly.

I eventually did manage to take sicily and keep Naples (the last battle was against my 100 man army against a single spearman. I autocalced because I feared that if I did it manually the spearman would just flee before I had a chance to attack him). So now I had both provinces, after a lot of years (don't remember how many, 7-9 I think) and a 6 star general.

THEN

The Italians invade Sicily with 10 units of Urban militia. Knowing that my sincle unit of byzanthine infantry is no match even with the 5 units of valour that it had, I retreat. I'm left over with Naples only.

Talon

04-05-2005, 22:51

Byzantium Early on Expert

The Byzantines are one of my favorite factions to play, possibly because everybody else in the game hates them and they are the "outlier" faction. Catholics have other Catholics and Muslims have other Muslims. You're on your own baby!

First, as many suggest- attack the Turks in Rum instantly-you can deprive them of their troop generator and cripple them early. Next, take Serbia and Wallachia. This is all you do on the Northern front for a long time. Use Serbia, Wallachia, and Bulgaria as your defense line against the waves of crusaders that are bound to come. Build up your troops armor factor in Constantinople. It is relatively easy to defeat the Turks. As for Naples- its gone- some say attack Sicily but I dont think that works on Expert. Just ransom your troops back- they are useful in finishing off the Turks.

Keep your islands, eventually you'll need all 3 as ship producers.

Once you have the Turks wiped out, build up some economically and get ready for the Egyptians. Pay careful attention not to become overly dependent on mercs. I always keep my florin flow on the positive side.

I looked to bribe Khazar as well but the generals loyalty was too high- his price was over 12,000 florins and not a good deal- although I missed the light cavalry.

Soon the Egyptians will attack you. Some talk about ransoming the Egyptian Sultan but he died when I cornered him. Proceed south methodically down into Gaza and Egypt. If the Egyptians have a huge troop buildup, then hire some mercs and throw them into the grinder the next turn- dont keep mercs around long.

You can wade through the Egyptians with good generalship and som patience- keep your units in formation and dont chase the wily buggers. It may take awhile to chew them up but it will happen. In my game the Spanish met me halfway across Africa as we both chewed up the Egyptians.
I consolidated, improved economically, started building ships and when the Spanish declared a crusade I smashed across Africa (which is a pure slugfest as you can only go one province to one province)

I fought one of my toughest battles in Tunisia. The Spaniards had four stacks of troops to my two (one Byzantine, one purely mercenary) I attacked with my mercenary stack anchored with two units of heavily armored Byz Inf. In a classic attack of him hitting my right flank while I hit his, it was the longevity of one of my Byz Inf units holding onto my right flank long enough for me to roll up his right flank. Still with the merc troops (a real mishmash) it was a tough battle but ultimately a satisfying one.

It was one battle of victory or facing a breakthrough all across Africa, but eventually I reached Morocco. The fact that the Byz have great generals helps! I built ships to protect my coastlines as all of my garrison troops were hordes of peasants. If I would have lost a battle I would have been in serious trouble.

Spain was a tough nut to crack, with several huge battles, one of which ended up in a surprising defeat. But in the end I was able to eliminate the Spanish and control Spain. I holed up in Aragon and Navarre- two easily defendible provinces while I recovered and built up.

In the meantime I had fought battles against basically all the Catholic factions in Serbia. The high quality of troops built in Big C plus all the experience gained by units in successive successful battles made Serbia a rock upon which the Crusaders smashed themselves. Troop capacity in the Big C, Trebizond, and a few secondary places was adequate to replace losses.

Once I had a string of ships across Notrh Africa and a heavy fleet built up I finally took out the wily Sicilians, who made a complete nuissance of themselves throughout the game. Note: You have to keep control of the sea areas around Greece and Serbia or the Sicilians will attack you there when youre least expecting.

ABout this time the Italians finally declaed a crusade and I smashed my way across the northern med to control almost all land around the Med. My fleet destroyed the Sicilians and Italians (over many years of fighting) and I retook Naples, Sicily and Malta.

At this point my economy was humming along almost unstoppable. I started using autobattle in some of my fights as I took out the French, then the English in Western Europe- always keeping the number of provinces I needed to defend at a minimum. Finally I took out the Germans which was easier than expected. It was with regret that I attacked the Hungarians and the Poles which heretofore had been the only factions NOT to attack me. By now I was using mostly autobattle and massing huge armies where the enemy retreated.

The last bastion was Eastern Europe, Scandanavia and the steppes of Russia. I was able to bribe quite a few territories and waded through all else. I almost conquered everything before the Mongol horde arrived but missed it by one year and one provence. Then the AI placed a full 8 stacks of Mongol archers, heavy cav, and warriors in Volga-Bulgaria. I traded provinces back and forth for a couple years until I could surround the Mongols with heavy troop formations. At this point I had ships in every sea and had capacity to creat a full two stacks of troops from coastal provinces. Eventually I was able to surround the Mongols with enough troops to pin them down and engage them. Four hard fought battles with 4000 troops per side ended up in Mongol decimation, and terrain covered with bodies. That was it- game over. Byzantium reins supreme!

BalkanTourist

04-06-2005, 04:16

Byzantium is the easiest faction to play with. I conquered 100% of the map in 1166. I kept Naples and took Sicily. I attacked the Turks and whipped them out in 4-5 years then immediatelly took the battle to the Egyptians. In the North I rushed all the rebel lands effectivelly cutting the Hungarians and the Poles from the steppes. It was so exciting to fight the Horse Archers of the steppes with my BIs and an unit of VGs. Upon my reaching of Prussia the unit was a 10 star general. Loyalty was a problem at first. From there it didn't take me long to move over to Scandinavia and finishing off the steppe rebels. I had an amazing roster of units, vikings from the north, Avar nobles from Moldavia, Steppe Heavies, but the best unit of them all - Byzantine Infantry!

Stormbringer

07-13-2005, 15:25

Hi everybody,

This is my first post. I've been playing the Byz on level hard. I've not been playing too aggresively. Not initiating any wars myself. Just taking over the old eastern roman empire. I have wiped out the Turks, the Hungarians and the Egyptians. I control all of the middle-east, asia minor, russia as far north as smolensk and as far west as austria and sicily and corsica.

Does anyone have advice as to how best to use the Byz armies later in the game? My infantry and cavalry are not as all conquering as they once were. My Treb archers are a lot less effective now that they are encountering more armoured troops. I'm also finding myself very vulnerable to heavy cavalry and heavy knights. The Mongols caused such heavy losses that i had to break up their armies with bribes. I've still not managed to get Kiev back from them.

I built up to county militia hoping for pikemen and i don't get them. :furious3: Arrgh. I very protective of my soldiers and losing 1200 of them to Mongolian rebels in a single battle makes me sad. Please help.

peacedude

07-16-2005, 15:22

Ya Byzantine troops get more and more obsolete as the years go along. You gotta conquer as quickly as safely possible and by the late period youll prbly be relying on mercs a significant amount :embarassed:

Advo-san

07-18-2005, 12:14

Indeed... But the inferior Byzantine arsenal is countermeasured by a huge General Command Value.
But, as it is said above, mercs must be your iron fist

EatYerGreens

08-24-2005, 11:01

Hi everybody,

Welcome to the forum!

This is my first post.

From your message count, this appears to be your only post! ~;)
Sorry, couldn't resist. I hope it's the first of many.

I built up to county militia hoping for pikemen and i don't get them.

You may have noticed, from the moment that you first upgraded from Town Watch to Town Guard that Militia Sergeants didn't come up as an option? That should have been a clue and pikemen are the far end of that tech tree.

I was also annoyed by this, since the tech tree chart which comes with the game doesn't clearly mark them out as unavailable to Orthodox factions.

In the buildings menu, you can preview what units can be trained, before you commit to a build. Luckily for me, I noticed that Town Guard came up blank for the Byz and saved my money.

Pikemen are a strongly defensive unit but I've no idea what they are like as attackers. If your empire is as big as you describe, you should be in a position to be on the offensive and can probably manage without pikes.

Well armoured spearmen for anti-cav should do as a substitute and Varangian Guards for meatgrinding position-holds in the forests are all the defensive units you'll need. Have a reinforcement stack of archers, to rotate in and out on long battles, or pavs for their longer lasting ammo and protection.

Use the trees to shelter your foot troops from Mongol arrows, let them run out of ammo and bring on reinforcements to their heart's content but, in general, *make* them come to you and fight amongst the trees where horses are weakest. When they've wasted most of their armies attacking your provinces, then you can start to attack theirs, using fast cavalry to chase off their HA's and Katanks/PronA and infantry to hit anything that holds its ground, as soon as risk of missile fire has been shoved into some irrelevant part of the battlefield.

The only major thing I can add to the excellent guides in this thread is to recommend that you build a church in every one of your principal troop producing provinces. Byz Inf benefit from this the most, because their default morale level is set to 'poor' and the +1 church boost cancels this out.

That should be enough, what with high-star generals about but, optionally soup them up some more with monastery, Reliquary and Cathedral, if you can stand the build times when you might prefer to go for trader builds first.

As my campaign followed the pattern of Turks, then Eggies, then up against Spain in the desert, I built the church ahead of the armourer, postponing the armourer until desert numbers were adequate. Early-built TAs went to the desert, later ones are armoured for Europe and armoured BIs can come from Treb when needed. Meanwhile, Connie is busy with silver Kats and VGs and it's the only place to get monastery and Reliquary so far. Cathedral under construction... look out world, monster Tanks and VGs coming your way!

Varangian Berserker

08-26-2005, 05:55

I'm just starting out, so I was wondering, does any one ever leave the Holy Land in the hands of Rebels, Egyptians, or Crusaders? When I start a new game, I'm tempted to just pillage Antioch and let the rebels re-take it since several countries go crusading after it in Glorious Achievement Mode. In my present game (Late, Glorious Achievement, EZ) I often just let the Crusaders Pass Through/Pillage since they soften up the Egyptians that are on my southern border.

BTW, has any one ever tried to send packs of Assassins after the Turks, Golden Horde, Hungarians, etc... in an attempt to make their Royal Lines collapse? Such a technique would be fitting of the "devious Greeks".

:rifle::sneaky::evil:

King of Atlantis

08-26-2005, 22:27

Well, i dont play gloriuos achievment, but i wouldnt recommend not taking antioch, and all of the levant. Those can be some rich provinces...

And yes assasinating bloodlines can be awesome, but takes patience, and an assasiination training program(train assasins to kill other assasins, gaining higher valour..)

Varangian Berserker

08-27-2005, 04:54

AntiochusIII

08-27-2005, 08:23

Training assassins to kill other assassins? How? I thought they were invisible to everyone except thier owners, Towers, and spies. And even then, you only found out about the assassin when the parchment came up saying that a spy, Tower, etc had detected, captured, or killed one. ~:confused:I think he means your own assassins, you know, produce ten so one can kill the other nine and become experienced in assassination proficiency. Since assassins are covert "agent" units I doubt there would be political repercussions as when you start killing your own generals in their sleep.

Oh, and The Levant is worth all the Crusades you'll fight. It's one of the richest places in the game; with Antioch, Tripoli, and Egypt. At the peak of trading one could make more than 10k+ money for each of these provinces. ~:cool:

Advo-san

08-31-2005, 12:14

I think he means your own assassins, you know, produce ten so one can kill the other nine and become experienced in assassination proficiency. Since assassins are covert "agent" units I doubt there would be political repercussions as when you start killing your own generals in their sleep.

What valour will you gain by killing 9 0valour assassins?

Kralizec

08-31-2005, 23:01

Why kill your own assasins? Generally the other factions will send more then enough bishops or alims to your territory, asking for it ~D

Deus ret.

09-14-2005, 12:19

Since assassins are covert "agent" units I doubt there would be political repercussions as when you start killing your own generals in their sleep.

Actually I've never succeeded in doing so. Playing HRE in High, my kings and all their heirs were a bunch of idiots, de-stabilizing the empire way more than any invasion, including the Mongols, could do....so I sent assassins, and not fresh ones, after them but they failed every single time, adding another horrible line of traits to the "victim". Oh why?? It was only a matter of time until the civil war broke out, in which I sided with the rebels and established a somewhat fitter line of kings; if only their empire would have been nearly as large...

Deus ret.

09-14-2005, 12:22

In my present game (Late, Glorious Achievement, EZ)
Do you have a good strat for late byz empire? At some point I inevitably can't help falling victim to one of the countless enemies one quickly has. Without Varangians, the game seems insurmountable. Any hints?

Varangian Berserker

09-25-2005, 23:05

Do you have a good strat for late byz empire? At some point I inevitably can't help falling victim to one of the countless enemies one quickly has. Without Varangians, the game seems insurmountable. Any hints?

No, even though I had survived until 1453, the game still said that I lost because I did'nt take over 60%+ of the map. Like I said, it was my first game ever. I'm doing a new one on early era.

Lanemerkel1

01-06-2006, 17:48

One final note on the opening moves; the island provinces of Crete, Rhodes and Cyprus are a lot of trouble, but work to keep them. They can make good shipbuilding centers. Their loyalty will improve once they have a ship link to some other port in the Byzantine Empire.

or in my case, as a last resort for your empire (16 crusade sized armies battering my empire, well I need a place to go, and since I have naval superiority in that area I can build up all the army I want as long as I can afford it)

anyway in another Byz campaign I have this is my unit roster:
Bulgarian Brigands
Trebizond Archers
Geonese Sailors
Slav Warriors
Slav Javlinmen
Lithuanian Cavalry
Steppe Cavalry
Pronoiai Allagion
Kataphraktoi
Varangian Guard
Byzantine Cavalry
Byzantine Infantry
Byzantine Lancers
Swiss Pikemen
Swiss Armoured Pikemen
Swiss Halberdiers
Highland Clansmen
Kerns
Gallowglasses
Woodsmen
Urban Militia
Peasants
Spearmen
Pavise Crossbows
Pavise Arbalesters
Crossbowmen
Arbalesters
Arquebusiers
Archers
Royal Knights
Horse Archers

I expanded all the way to Scotland, my only real enemy is the Elmoheads, besides them the pope is a minor thorn, and since he always comes back he's the last one I'm going to knock out

my weak infantry and Cavalry (Peasants, Archers, Searmen, Urban Militia, Horse Archers)
are all out of date so I just sent them to italy to keep the pope in order

most of the rest of my infantry are in the pyrennes war with mr. Elmohead and most cavalry is in the Nile war with the same person

dagiz

01-06-2006, 19:13

I adopted an early strike method of going after the North Africa and stopping at Morocco to hold off the Spanish with one stack and than another two behind it for reinforcements. Controlling all provinces around the Black Sea and as well as serbia. It worked and I was able to build up quite significantly and be able to hold off the Spanish and the GH (it took a bit to get Kiev and Crimea back) also I bribed quite a bit early on to save man power.

In battle, I always have at least three cav units off to the side and as hidden as possible to come up from behind - especially when the opposing army as Siege weapons -- I sneak around those and take them out and then charge down and pick that army out from behind, usually leading to a quick route.

If you're not picking about losing men (and I actually am) the Byz. Inf. due to their numbers are great for causing mass panic amoung higher tech units, especially the skirmishers. The Naptha throwers are great for bringing around from behind as well.

Whenever going against the GH, I tend to have more Cav than anything else to counter theirs.

I think the best I ever did was against the Spanish who sent 7000 to my 3000, I came away losing about 400 to their three thousand, also helped that they started out in a deep valley and a lucky shot from a trebuchet killed the general before they got close.

Lanemerkel1

01-07-2006, 03:41

Odin

02-02-2006, 19:37

I am playing a Byz campaign with the XL mod in the high period. I have recaptured Greece and Constantonople (SP?). I am only in maybe 6 turns I bribed those armies. I never got into the Byz before despite years of playing MTW.

Be intrested in advice on how and what to do from the high period on? My first goal is to begin building up the provinces I have economically while building some stack armies to go on the offensive in and around the black sea. I know the Horde is coming and I am pretty sure the defenses I build will hold, but I dont see much on the Byz starting from the high period.

Any tips ?

Sirron

02-03-2006, 00:56

Odin

02-03-2006, 03:06

I enjoy much playing Byz in high period.

After taking some pains killing Turks I allied myself with French against egypt and let the crusaders to take many attacks which weakened Eggies to the point where I attacked. I took them in few years blitz finished by marvellous bribe of Cairo and establishing nice empire with few borders.
This tactics however led to sad situation when Tripoli and Cyprus are in french hands. Fortunately, poor them got involved in mainland war against english and HRE at the same time. They will either lose their royal line in some far-away battle and then I will take their Outremer possesions by bribe, or I will simply attack them in the unlikely case they will turn the anglo-german tide.

I play quite conservative style, leaving my fellow christians alone and attacking the muslim solely. Now it will have to change soon, as Almos are steadily beaten by many crusades (Morocco owned by HRE now!). Hungarians are now most likely target as I have no trade with them.

However I have not tasted the european steel yet and I fear that the attack on Hungarians could force my italian allies to leave me/attack me and disrupt my trade. I am at the point where without trade my Romanoi would be poorest of poor...

The Horde somehow posed no threat at all, since in 5 years they were beaten by my fellow Russians. I did not have resources and time to move from Georgia to Khazar, but quite conveniently and historically I took Crimea.

Basically I performed so far following steps:

1. Unification
2. Seljuks elimination
3. Trip to Egypt
4. Expanding trade ad absurdum

Now I slowly prepare for Hungarians and/or Sicilians who foolishly angered my imperial pride by siding with egyptians.

Sorry for boring first post. :skull:

Not boring at all mate, welcome to the org.

I usually play conservative to only because blitzing is far to easy particularly with the Byz. High period is a bit of a challenge straight away though, but once you reestablish some sembelance of a base you can expand. when I play I usually stick to my religion, so christians be dammed (no pun intended) for my game.

My real concern is do I take on the turks now, or build up and see what the mongols do? I have been burnt in a russian game by not properly preparing for the mongols. I hoped they would go middle east, they didnt they went north.

I can handle the turks now, my units are superior at this point (as long as I dont spend years fighting in the desert), but nothing has really happened yet, no crusades no eggies invading italy nothing...its eeriely quite.

Sirron

02-03-2006, 11:00

I have only extremely limited experience with Mongols, so far. I have started all my serious campaigns on early, except this Byzantine one.

I looked forward for double challenge - defending against Horde going south and fighting Turk at the same time.

After reading all posts from mighty medieval total warriors regarding Mongol threat I decided to take Georgia, then I vacated it in order to support other attacks (except puny garrison of 1 horse archers and 1 peasant units). The turks invaded Georgia and I was happy to retreat to the fort (the early wooden structure) with surviving 9 HAs. They laid siege (expected to take 5 or more years). As I kicked them out of Rum (worthy exchange for G.) , I was quite happy and garrisoned Trebisond to prevent any further problems.

Without Rum Turks were in dire situation, and I thought that their armies in Armenia/Georgia would create nice buffer between me and the Horde.

But surprisingly (or not surprisingly at all!:2thumbsup: ) my loyal subjects in Georgia revolted against the Seljuks fielding two foot knights (?gothic/chivalric? - I dont remember exactly). I excitedly moved the archers fro Trebizond in and could not resist to wipe them out of Georgia for good. Then adding some cavalry from Rum I rolled into Armenia and Turks were reduced to Anatolia. Knights did marvellous meat-mincing job until they were wiped out later in apocalyptic battle (from my point of view with egyptians).

So with no buffer zone at all I trembled before the horde ARRIVAL. AND HERE THEY RODE FROM THE STEPPES! And only against Russians, who after repeated battles annihilated Mongols without any major effort.

I was not able to muster enough forces to HELP my Russian friend and occupy Khazaria, though.

At the same time, the Seljuks were put to - hopefully - eternal sleep after huge battle in Anatolia + short siege. RIP.

So, somehow fortunately I was able to get rid both of the Turks and Horde until circa 1235-6.

But to finally answer your notion my original plan vs. Horde and Turks was:

1. Get Turks between my Empire and Horde
2. Let them fight and slow the Horde
3. Wait and see and liberate Asia minor in the meantime
4. Ally with Horde if they would get too dangerous, and pursue my Middle
East policies while Horde would fight against others.

Thanks to the prayers of Patriarch of Constantinople and all his bishops and priests my Roman Empire (DID YOU KNOW THAT THE BYZANTINES DID NOT CALL THEMSELVES BYZANTINES AT ALL? They were Romanoi - Romans and referred to their empire as Roman until 1461 when the Trebizond empire, the last successor state of Byz fell to Osman Turks) unexpectedly and quickly became a serious Power.

Long post again. :skull:

Ludens

02-03-2006, 21:09

Long post again. :skull:
But an interesting one, though this forum is about general strategy and not campaign stories.

Thanks to the prayers of Patriarch of Constantinople and all his bishops and priests my Roman Empire (DID YOU KNOW THAT THE BYZANTINES DID NOT CALL THEMSELVES BYZANTINES AT ALL? They were Romanoi - Romans and referred to their empire as Roman until 1461 when the Trebizond empire, the last successor state of Byz fell to Osman Turks) unexpectedly and quickly became a serious Power.
Yes, I know that, though I don't think everyone on this forum does. Although there are a few references to the "Byzantine Empire" from early "Byzantines", the term did not become popular until somewhere in the eitheenth or ninetheenth century. Modern-day Greeks still use "Romaioi" (sp?) as a term for Greekness.

Welcome to the Org, ~:wave: .

metatron

02-03-2006, 22:22

Odin

02-04-2006, 20:55

The Mongols are probably the best source of mercenaries in the entire game. Just kill their Khan in the initial invasion and his armies default to rebel with almost zero loyalty. Cheap, loyal, and a boat load of 'em.

Onward, Christian soldier...

Indeed, a sound tactic for surviving the Horde. I got a chance to play a little mroe last night. The armenians (I am using XL Mod) have cleaned up turkey, I took antolia so the orthodox faith has restablished itsself which is a nice addendum to my game. The Cumans have secured the northen black sea provinces and are in a death match with Poland which I believe they are winning.

The Horde showed up last night and I had to save the game as I had stuff to do. They entered in Khazar and I am sending an emmissary up there to see if they move south, west or north. My concern is south, the armenians (a good ally that aided my assault in antolia) owns as far as Georgia and my fear is that they will be swallowed by the horde fast as the war with turkey exhausted thier resources.

As the Byz I have a few jedi leaders (playing on hard) 6 star heirs so I am have 2 full stack armies and I am slowing building a merc force comprised of arbelastors and mortar as a small response force should one of the christians get cute in the west. I am bordered by 2 other orthdox factions to my north (i forgot thier faction names) so overall my position is secure until I figure out what the mongols are going to do.

If I can ally with them, then we take out the Cumans, my overall mindset for the game is to play along religion lines, supporting the orthodox cause against the pagans and keeping the chirsitans at arms length.

Sirron

02-13-2006, 18:35

rvg

02-20-2006, 19:48

Dear generals, do you have any suggestions for archer use playing Byz after cca 1300 ?

1. Fighting catholics do you rely only on arbalesters/handgunners?

2. Do you prefer Trebizond archers or Genoese sailors if you can get them?

3. Is the archers rate of fire important to you, or do you use primarily armor
piercing units late in the game?

In my campaign I use 3 units of archers (trebizond, genoese and occasional mercenary longbow) and 3 units of arbalests in my attack armies and I have noticed that even royal/chivalric knights suffer some important losses when targeted solely by archer wing of missile units...

Thank you.

1. Arbs/Handgunners are the main damage dealers in my Byz armies. I also use the spear/naptha combo. Spear pins, naptha kills. Everything. Sure, your spears die, but who cares, you got more where those came from. As Byz in Late you must learn the meaning of the word SACRIFICE.

2. Neither. I actually prefer Bulgarian Brigands. Genose Sailors are only available in specific situations, while Treb archers have exorbitant maintenance costs. Bulgarian Brigands have good stats and are cheap to maintain. If given weapon/armor/morale upgrades, they also perform quite well in melee (in a pinch of course).

3. Both. Arbies in the front, with archers behind them. Even in Late, arrows do enough damage to make them worthwhile.

Hope that helped.

Sirron

02-22-2006, 21:10

_Aetius_

02-22-2006, 21:40

Thank you rvg, it helped a lot.

And here is another question, which would help me in my current campaign.

Do other Catholics tend to defend the Papacy if it gets attacked by so called infidels?

I mean, if I (as the Byz) would attack the Pope, will they attack me or at least some of them? Would it be different from the usual allied help, which sometimes occurs?

I am tempted to bring papacy down but I do not want to put my trade routes in danger.

If you attack the Papacy its likely most Catholic if not all Catholic factions will rally and unite against you.

Its always best to pick off the enemies of the Papacy (excommunicated factions are best) the power of the Pope isnt military, but influence, if it doesnt hold sway over the major Catholic factions or they have been destroyed then the Pope is defenceless. You need to be cautious, as Catholics factions look for any excuse to launch a load of crusades at you, its bad enough when they randomly decide to crusade against Byzantium but giving them all the excuse they need by attacking the Pope is a bad move. You'll lose most alliances and become totally isolated.

rvg

02-24-2006, 19:43

Just some of my miscellaneous Byzantine ramblings....mostly addressing the fun factor.

Kill the Turks. They breathe your air.

At some point I like to conquer a coastal province with Iron. Usually Aragon.

V2 Treb Archers with full armor/weapon upgrades are fearsome in melee.

Once you got Varangian assembly line going, you will hate your Byz Infantry units.

Byz Lancers are surprisingly good in the desert, provided that they have no extra armor.

Royalty will provide all the Katanks you'll ever need. I hardly ever build them, but I do repair/upgrade the ones I have.

Grab Khazar.

Byz Cavalry is a fine unit, especially for its purely Byzantine flavor, but Steppe Heavy Cav. is better. And cheaper.

Slav Warriors from Bulgaria are a great substitute for Peasant garrisons.

If you attack and conquer Egypt before 1110, the rest of the game will be far too easy and boring.

Vanilla spears aren't *that* bad. Good for desert warfare.

All Byzantine units speak fluent Russian.

Speaking of Russians/PoN, Orthodox or not, they'll still attack you if the opportunity presents itself.

A Fortress in Khazar loaded with Varangians will deplete Mongol assault force by a few thousand. And they ALWAYS assault the Khazar fortress.

Don't overextend your trade network, or you'll be bored silly with way too much money.

Sicilians are evil and must be destroyed.

Defensive war + a total naval blockade is fun.

Island provinces should be building boats as quickly as you can afford. The entire Mediterranean must be flooded with purple galleys.

Try to ally with the biggest Catholic faction and help them become a superpower. Leter on they'll provide a bit of challenge and fun in the game.

Don't stockpile too many Varangians, otherwise you'll get bored with easy combat.

V2 Pronoia from Nikea is far more useful than a V2 Katank from Constantinople. Purely because of the speed aspect.

Combine all of your highest valor units into one compact army of whoopass, led by a 9 star general.

Take on obscure unit (like Urban Militia) and try to valor it up to a near-Jedi status (w/ full upgrades and all). Valor 13 UM is no joke in combat.

Any artillery capable of turning is a boon to any bridge battle (offensive or defensive).

High quality gunpowder artillery is useful in *any* defensive battle, and some offensive ones as well.

See to it that the HRE is eliminated. There's only room for *one* Emperor on the map.

Kill the Pope. Take his lands. Assign a sizeable army to fight re-emergences.

And last, but not least, always play in GA mode. Having to conquer the entire map becomes a mindless task after the first couple of times.

idiotpariah

02-26-2006, 07:37

Couple of other things to note. Although Byzantium units do get somewhat obsolete earlier they are insanely powerful. Pronoai allagion (V2 from nicaea+MHB) will always kick major backside. V1 Varangians are available less than 20 years in if you prepare. Also the humble byzantine infantry, if trained in constantinople or another well built province can get the +1 valour for master swordsmith and insane armour. A morale boost from a church/cathedral means that even in late they kick some serious backside.

Bulgarian bridands are nice, and have a low upkeep (is money a problem by that time though?) But valour 2 trebizond archers well armoured are quite a force as well.

One thing I would recommend with the Byzantines is to specialise your provinces. I am always building in Constantinople and Nicea. Constantinople builds for +1 valour varangian guards, then towards kataphracts (with a couple of trade buildings thrown in). Nicaea goes for the guards then pronoi allagion. Trebizond goes for archery buildings are armour upgrades only. Greece for trade and anatolia farming. Islands build ships, strategic units and build for title buildings- chancellery etc. I tend to maintain a stable border to greece and not expand too much in Europe to try and keep the game interesting. Then I take a general, varangians and pronoi allagion and go on a round the world rebel killing crusade. If its rebel and has a port I'll be there. This improves your general, but more importantly nets you great valour for your varangians and pronoi. Then you have a truly elite army that will last forever.

The problem I find is that I love playing as Byzantium in early but its far too easy. I'm considering modding the Novgorodians or Italians to give them a much better start so they can do some real damage.

I would love to stop at the turkish provinces, but the Egyptians ALWAYS attack me (leading to their destruction a few turns later) I offer peace (with 8 influence) and they snub me every time.

Incidentally an early bribe to Khazar is a cool alternative to the mercenary blitzkrieg, if they agree to the first bribe they will have a lower upkeep cost and gain valour.

Seriously though, how much harder would this game be if the AI used mercenaries? I've had to stop using them since it means that any faction can gain an unassailable lead (even aragon- all of spain within 15-20 years)

rvg

03-13-2006, 18:51

Just a quick note on holding Naples in Early: Grab Serbia asap and build a port there. That will allow you to send reenforcements to Naples with just one galley.

You'll already have a bunch of UM, Spears and possibly Byz Inf there and Archers, so get some Cavalry + a high star general (they're a dime a dozen for the Byz), and your Naples colony will be absolutely secure.

General Dogsbody

04-05-2006, 14:22

I'm playing as Byzantine on early setting and easy difficulty.

I followed the suggestions set oout on here.
In my 1st turn invaded Sicilly.
sent my emmisary on a mission to kazar
and built forts almost everywhere.

My invasion of sicilly went very well, however, as my naptha throwers hit the enemy from the flank, the remnants of their army turned tails and ran away, into the safety of their keep.
Naples didnt revolt at all, they were on very low taxes and I think the loyalty never went below 103.
I managed to last another turn seiging the castle until a rather large uprising took place and I was forced to ransom these units. But - because Naples was still loyal - that was where they went.

Over in the east, my emmisary eached Khazar and managed to bribe a rather large cavalry force. The smaller force in the fort rebelled and were easily smashed by my all horse force. which was good as my general went up a rank.
I swiftly moved this force south towards the turkish borders.
As soon as they moved another large group of rebels arrived in Khazar, which I also bribed succesfuly (using most of my funds in the process)
My inn in Trebizond had produced a rather tidy mercenary force and by turn 6 my troops attacked the turks. they didnt even bother fighting my army and abandoned the province. The same happened on the next turn as I pushed further south. They are now in Syria, and my next turn will be to move against them. However, due to my war efforts, I am running on about 20-30 florins a turn now and obviously my war effort is going to bleed me dry.
Should I go straight for the Egyptions in Antioch after I have removed the Turks or disband all my mercenaries and build up my economy again and then move against them?:help:

_Aetius_

04-08-2006, 22:50

General Dogsbody

I think it'd be wise to consolidate what you already have and attempt to revive your economy, assuming you have enough strength after disbanding the most expensive mercenaries then I think consolidation is the way to go.

Bribery is a good tool for the Byzantines, but don't overuse it, Khazar is a good province to have, but I doubt certainly at the moment it was worth the cost to the treasury. Your main effort should be against the Turks, the Sicilians and the west in general can be an annoyance, but the Turks and then the Egyptians and much more important.

However it depends how strong the Egyptians are I don't know how many men they have or yourself so can't provide to much detailed advice, but if you have a substantial force capable of holding Antioch after its capture, they it may be well worth the effort. Antioch could cure your immediate financial difficulties and provide you with a straight strong linear frontier, Antioch to Armenia.

I personally, always trying to avoid overstretching my resources when I have a heavily burdened economy would go for consolidation and a period of say 8-10 years of recovery, before going back on the offensive. The Egyptian army is generally inferior anyway and won't have advanced to greatly, besides knowing the AI the Egyptians will probably launch a few silly attacks on your territory giving you easy opportunities to crush large armies of Egyptians. You could then counter-attack and swallow up Antioch and Tripoli without having cost you more than a few nominal casualties.

Aetius.

rvg

04-18-2006, 19:44

I'm playing as Byzantine on early setting and easy difficulty.
...
Should I go straight for the Egyptions in Antioch after I have removed the Turks or disband all my mercenaries and build up my economy again and then move against them?:help:

Well, if you Don't attack them Egyptians they most certainly will attack you. I don't remember a single game as Byz where Egypt would leave me alone. Ever.

Taking Antioch will give you an easily defendable 2 province border with Egypt. Keep the bulk of your forces in Syria + some in Antioch and you'll be secure. You can also take Tripoli and Palestine, but that is not really necessary.

darsalon

05-09-2006, 13:17

To be honest I would go for the Egyptians all the way to Egypt when you're ready for it. But that's because I'm a vicious swine. It's all a question of money I find and denying the egyptians a major source of money by taking provinces such as antioch and palestine really does disable them.

Probably a reiteration of what's been said before but my strategy for the Byz I've found is hit the middle east first and really establish money & trade there first. Got a very good trade network with antioch, palestine and egypt there. In the meantime build up reasonable garrison units in Europe and maybe do a grab of Serbia to build a border between there and Constantinople. I tend to just do a hold of Naples for the time being there partly out of enjoyments sake as the battles with the Sicilians can be quite fun at the early stage.

Once the middle east conquests are done then relations with Europe are likely to take a nose dive as you've reached critical mass stage. Therefore those border defences in Bulgaria and Serbia will come into play with crusades trying to pile into you most likely. Keep on building the navy up and really start dominating the med as well to build the trade up.

In the middle east I've tended to find the Spanish beat up the elmos more often than not. Therefore I tend to build Egypt as a major garrison point which the Spanish more often than not will batter against for a while. Another set of grinding battles often takes place here before I then do an amphib assault against somewhere like Tunisia to cut the Spanish armies off from reinforcement.

My style of play tends to be a little reactive so I tend to play quite attritional long term games but it seems to suit me fine playing with this lot. Borders with other places run only across one two provinces at a time with other factions so defence is easy I find.

Have finally got MTW working on my machine again so this has whetted my appetite for another go at them. One of my favourite factions as they have so many unique units.

finneys13

05-09-2006, 22:03

I have been playing Byzantines on hard/early, only my second game of MTW VI. The first game I had conquered the world with the English by 1270 on medium, this doing GA and taking it slowly.

I am in 1215, and have the starting provinces, all of the Turkish and Egyptian ones, Serbia, Sicily, Britain, Ireland, Sweden and Norway. I have large armies in Bulgaria, Serbia and Wessex to deter the Germans and Hungarians who don't like me.

My economy is booming, 27,000 per a turn. Have 750,000 in the bank with all provinces having top upgrades.

My main question is what to do with the Mongols when they come? I hear they sometimes appear in Georgia, so I have built a fortress there. The Byzantines have only spearmen to counter the Mongol horses, what is the best policy against them? In my only other game with the English (medium/early) they came with massive armies, over 10,000 I think.

NodachiSam

05-10-2006, 17:11

The mongols will come with a larger army if you have more men in the provinces in the area I think. They come in 1230 and the battle is in 1231. I guess you'll want to lighten the load on the area and give a strong searout towards Khazaar to send reinforcements. They will still come with 10 stacks or so. Varangian guards are very good against mongol calvary I hear. I hate huge battles though and usually out number and autocalc anything really big. Like over 2 stacks on each side. My computer chugs and those battles take an hour! Anyways... get some varangian guards for sure.

Vladimir

05-11-2006, 13:00

My cheezy advice is to take kazar early, max out the fortress, then stuff your stronghold with vanguards and your best general. Avoid horses in less it's your general and try to make sure he's an army of one.

rvg

05-15-2006, 19:03

Yeah, Varangs chop Mongol Heavies into pieces. Just make sure to bring along many-many-MANY Pavise Arbies, because there's nothing worse than losing your elite axe-wielding shock troops to a bunch of mongol archers/horse archers.

Vladimir

07-24-2006, 13:25

My army for Late Byzantium in XL: 5 Arquebusiers, 5 Armored Spearmen, 2 Kablizatory (whatever, the katanks with bows and AP), and 2 Porno Cav (why are Greek words so difficult to spell: hippopotamus), 1 General, and 1 elite unit behind him as a reserve.

You may want to increase the accuracy of the Arquebusiers by 5% to .25 or not. This army will do you well in Asia Minor where the hills aren’t too steep and weather is arid but not too hot. If you go into the desert don’t up-armor your spearmen and use Byzantine cavalry and a less armored heavy spear cav with irresistible charge (I think they get Mounted Sergeants in XL)

Starting in Late it’s pretty easy to assemble this army as you’re already pretty teched up. Afterwards you’ll find that it’s pretty easy to replace your losses as long as you’re careful with your horses. Make sure you take care to run your guns behind your spears if the enemy attacks and use your melee cav to bite the flank of any unit attacking your spears.

For more info on high tech armies refer to this thread:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=66695

and remember to invest in light cannons.

Ripken

08-18-2006, 10:39

:help:

I hope this is in the right thread/ forum - I get very confused by all the posting rules and where I can and can't post as a junior member! :laugh4:

Anyway, I'm playing as the Byz on my second campaign, and I seem to be running in to trouble. Having merrily crushed the Turks and the Egyptians beneath the iron hooves of my mercs and swept through the Balkans, I decided it would be a bit of a giggle to re-claim Rome for the Eastern empire and sweep on in to France (as every Englishman has a duty to do!). All went well at first, but I now find my army holding western France, while being simultaneously attack by the French, Spanish, Aragonese, Italians, Sicilians and the usual resurgent Papacy. I can take any of them if I concentrate my forces, but obviously that leaves me vulnerable elsewhere and I lose as many provinces as I gain.

At the same time I'm getting slammed by mass rebellions across the Balkans, Asia Minor and the Middle East, and even in Constantinople itself. I've cut the taxes back to very low in most of these provinces, but they still keep rebelling and as they include all my richest provinces I have lost so much tax revenue I am running in to financial trouble.

Apart from a scorched-earth retreat from France (which doesn't appeal - No Retreat!), I don't quite know what to do for the best...???:help:

_Aetius_

08-18-2006, 16:58

Well i'm going to go out on a limb here and say its entirely your own fault :laugh4:

What you have here is a classic example of imperial overstretch, remember what is important, your heartlands, forget France, its an irrelevance if you want to avoid your empire being ravaged by rebellion and invasion then you have to concentrate on consolidation back home. Retreat is your only viable option, you need your troops back east to crush rebellions and settle the provinces down and dissuade any eager enemies from invading.

If you don't retreat, you'll become bogged down in a meaningless fight over France, which by the time a victor appears will have been ravaged from north to south and make the country worthless. You'll lose thousands of men in the process and your empire will be crippled.

Withdraw from western France and consolidate, destroy everything you can to make some cash and fight your way home. You can still come out of this with territory in Italy, so you can live to fight another day. Of course a loss of territory can encourage civil war, but its risk you will have to take, if your economy is bankrupt, your armies pinned down fighting rebels and your empire spiralling into annihilation how can you win the game? Forget France and get your armies back to where it matters.

In future i'd recommend invading Spain from the south after mopping up all of north africa, atleast that way you can limit the number of enemies you have to fight at once and slowly absord one province at a time. Then you could move into France at a time of your choosing.

sbroadbent

08-19-2006, 10:47

:help:

At the same time I'm getting slammed by mass rebellions across the Balkans, Asia Minor and the Middle East, and even in Constantinople itself. I've cut the taxes back to very low in most of these provinces, but they still keep rebelling and as they include all my richest provinces I have lost so much tax revenue I am running in to financial trouble.

Apart from a scorched-earth retreat from France (which doesn't appeal - No Retreat!), I don't quite know what to do for the best...???:help:

Here's a few ideas. Keep your king near your important regions. If a province is cut off from the king you'll get huge drops in loyalty (I had a completly muslim province at 200% loyalty (with no troops in the province) drop to 0% just because it was an island province and I had enemy ships blockading my routes), so if the king is playing warlord in France, and if you don't have a way to trace a safe route back to Constantinople, and many of the rebelling provinces, then that will be your biggest problem.

Next is to spam as many high Valor Spies. By upgrading your brothels up to a Bawdy House, this will allow you to train V2 spies. Spies will boost the loyalty in your provinces by 40%+20%*Valor. In this case, your V2 spies will give the province they are in a 80% boost in loyalty.

Something which might help you as well is if you can sneak these into your opponent's provinces (Border Forts basically mean instant death), the bonus that they normally give will instead drop the loyalty of your enemies provinces. What will happen is if they go below 100%, they'll have to drop taxes. They will probably have to anyway as they usually set taxes to as high as they go and maintain loyalty.

These two things just might help you keep your empire together.

For the future, it is best to avoid war more opponents than you can handle ;) I'd focus on the enemy who has the weakest position, and try to get an auto ceasefire against the stronger one's.

Ripken

08-22-2006, 09:47

macsen rufus

08-22-2006, 12:29

For an auto-ceasefire you need to break all contact with the enemy faction - no common land borders, no ships in their coastal waters (I'm not too sure if you have to make sure there are no ships of theirs in your coastal waters, though...)

sbroadbent

08-22-2006, 19:27

Thanks for the tips folks ~:)

I have indeed ended up pulling out of western and northern France, while consolidating the overland link to Constantiople and slapping down the Pope and the Italians. The English re-emerged, which was helpful as it keeps the French weak and stops them coming after me. Once I've got all my armies straightened out I'll probably go after Spain instead.

Good tips about the spies too - I've not dabbled with them too much but I'll certainly give it a go now!

One question though - under what circumstances does one get an auto ceasefire?

Over in the Entrance Hall I have a thread called MTW: Subterfuge guide. AT the end of that thread I posted a pre-release pdf of the guide which covers assassins, spies, emissaries, and princess's, so that should hopefully provide useful.

MTW: Subterfuge Guide (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=54932)

As to the auto ceasefire, I'm not sure either if their ships in your sea zones will prevent you from getting a ceasefire.

Kenshin the vega bound

08-29-2006, 11:28

I think we need more guides focusing on the late, and high era. The early era is too easy.

roman10

08-30-2006, 13:30

I've read this in the GUIDE:

"The second most important thing you need to learn is infantry missile units kill mounted missiles with ease, therefore keep your missile cavalry out of range. Infantry missile units (normal bow, crossbow, arbalest and longbow. Not guns or javelins) have both superior range and superior accuracy when compared to the mounted versions. The mounted missile’s horse also provides a much larger target than a single man on foot. If you have to take out infantry missile units with missile cavalry then order them to draw their melee weapons and charge. Generally your cavalry will have the advantage in a melee – just make sure you aren’t charging particularly weak cavalry into one of the cavalry killing infantry units!"

I want to know how? You can order Horse Archers, Byzanzine Cav, Jinetes to put aside bows and use their swords, HOW? Is that possible?? I tried everything but I was unsuccesful...

And one more thing... How to retrain unit? I suppose my unit is damaged in battle, I have 67 of 100 possible Byzantine Infantry, can I have 100 again? Or I'm asking too much?:wall:

Geezer57

08-30-2006, 15:31

"Generally your cavalry will have the advantage in a melee – just make sure you aren’t charging particularly weak cavalry into one of the cavalry killing infantry units!"

I want to know how? You can order Horse Archers, Byzanzine Cav, Jinetes to put aside bows and use their swords, HOW? Is that possible?? I tried everything but I was unsuccesful...

Hold down the ALT key, their bow-&-arrow cursor will turn into a sword cursor. Left-click with that cursor active and they will melee attack.

And one more thing... How to retrain unit? I suppose my unit is damaged in battle, I have 67 of 100 possible Byzantine Infantry, can I have 100 again? Or I'm asking too much?:wall:
You can merge two depleted units of the same type together by dropping one on top of the other. For retraining, you have to be in a province that can build the unit type, open your unit buiding queue (make sure there's an empty slot), highlight the unit you want to retrain, pick up the unit symbol in the bottom info panel (not off the main map) and drop it in the open unit building slot. Next turn, the retrained unit will be available - note that any new recruits will be green (zero valor), unless there's a valor bonus for that province, and the retrained unit's valor will be a mix of the green and veteran troops' valor.

If you prefer a small elite army, then merging veteran units with high valor is superior. If you just need to refresh your troops, then retraining works OK.

Maloncanth

08-30-2006, 23:44

Byzantines, Late, GA
Since the historic fall of Constantinople marks the end of the Late period in MTW, the Byzantines rightly lack any unusual GA points to gain. I played on Hard and considered the game "settled" at 55 turns, and so far, there hasn't been anything besides Homeland points and Conquest at a 2 province:1 point ratio. This guide is mostly about the opening, defeating challenges specific to Late Byzantine' strategic situation, and then putting the game on track. Afterwards, it should be playable like any other conquest game.

The Byzantine Military in Late
Before we continue, I'll go over my opinion on the Byzantine unit roster in Late. Much doom and gloom is about them being obsolete and they're all you'll have now. I think everyone generally understands where they stand compared to other factions' units so I'll try to concentrate on how this specifically applies to the situation starting in Late. In general, many of the units that were once the beatsticks of the army, such as Kataphracts and Byzantine Infantry have become much more defensive.

-Available with only a bowyer, Trebizond archers are your friend; its strength is its low tech and many regional rivals (including the Hungarians) use large elements of unarmoured or lightly armoured forces. They melee reasonably with many regional enemies, including camels and non-Janissary Turkish hybrid infantry. Virtually any province can build them. They are expensive to maintain, but not especially so to replace.

-Bulgarian Brigands are more limited in availability than Trebizond archers but they are significantly better overall, being faster, tougher, and cheaper. They are excellent as they tolerate Egyptian deserts and compare well with Turkish hybrids. In defensive battles in the hilly Balkans, you will find that BI and Kataphracts will be your screen, with massed Bulgarians as your arm of decision.

-Byzantine Infantry are your only infantry now but while their quality is lacking, their price is not. At 200 florins for a hundred men, they are a steal and easily trained in many new provinces. Early on you will find swordsmiths to be a priority – you will need more of these guys because you have nothing else and take take casualties fast. All the morale enhancing tricks must be used to keep them on the field fighting for as long as possible because they will start break against modern heavy units.

-Byzantine Cavalry are fragile because many infantry can beat them head to head. However, their biggest weakness is tech requirements. Specifically, Nicaea will be too busy producing Kataphracts and Pronoiai to bother. If you need horse archers, it's strategically more viable to produce the vanilla model in a peripheral province.

-Kataphractoi are no longer the death machines they were in Early and have a much more limited role now. They are poorly suited for chasing skirmishers and Hungarians, Mongols, and Turks all use those heavily. They lack endurance in Egypt, and usually hold up quite poorly to the region's other heavy cavalries. However, because Byzantines lack spears, pikes, or polearms of any kind, Kataphracts will be your only surviveable answer to heavy cavalry. Like BI, they have turned into a more defensive tool; I keep them close to my main body to countercharge cavalry, where their lack of mobility is less an issue, and where their surviveability is more of an asset. In Early, they could just beat up everything for you, but in Late, you simply don't want those knights hitting anything else you have. Under normal unit sizes, they come in batches of forty. This number is affected by the unit size setting, unlike Royal Knight numbers which are not. With higher unit sizes, you gain a small advantage, though some of your neighbours share it.

-With Varangians unavailable, Pronoiai Allagion are your only real offensive weapon. They still will not hold up to Chivalric or Royal knights, the heaviest Islamic cavalry, Mongol Heavy Horse, or Boyars. Unlike Kataphracts, keep them out of harms way, and use them to attack strictly vulnerable targets.

-Steppe Cavalry and Steppe Heavy Cavalry are available after you hit Kiev and/or Khazar when you attack Russia. Occasionally the former can be found in the Crimea earlier if the Horde declines to hold it down. SC are an excellent complement to the heavier Byzantine cavalry types as they provide mobility and rout chasing. Steppe Heavies are often off the shelf or nearly so in Kiev and Khazar. They render Byzantine Cavalry entirely obsolete.

-If you must use Spearmen in numbers, your only answer are basic Spearmen. In practice though, they probably won't last as long against cavalry as even the 100-man BI units.

-Mercenaries are an option – look for high quality spears such as Chivvies, Saracens, or Italians, pikes, and heavy christian infantry such as halberds or CMAA to fill your most glaring gaps. However, they are often not as necessary as you may think and probably end up being more expensive for the result than simply sacrificing more BI and TA.

Overall, I would say the Byzantines are not too badly off in terms of troops. Their backbone units remain usable because the fanciest armours and weapons are not as predominant in their region except through Crusaders or Spain in North Africa and they are probably better off than the latter out in the desert anyway. The Hungarians do have access to heavy catholic armour but in general aren't as heavily armoured, and bring along less because they use lots of Jobaggies and mounted archery. And while they're less potent relatively than they were, Byzantine units haven't gotten any more expensive over the centuries either, and remain good on the defensive. However it does mean that I, (and possibly you) would go the extra mile to win on the offense without fighting and goad the enemy into costly defensive battles instead.

Early on, only Nicaea will be able to train heavy cavalry and cavalry is always expensive. This means the bulk of your army will probably consist of Crossbows, Trebizond Archers and Byzantine Infantry with +0 or +1 morale and +0 to +2 armour – not anyone's idea of top elite quality. I would keep Kataphracts as a shield (everything else will fold if heavy horse can get to them), use Pronoiai to attack, but with care because they are more fragile than anything in their weight class now, and try to bring superior numbers of BI and arrows to bear against the center. Later on, you will have more cavalry and be able to use them more freely. The qualitative superiority of enemy heavy cavalry will often not make up for you having significantly more of it, especially in the more cool and open terrain on the Steppes.

Defensively, I use Bulgarians or Trebizond archers in enormous numbers (8-12 archery units, think Hero), camp them somewhere tightly and coordinate mass volleys to send as many soft targets routing as possible and then try to overwhelm or beat off anything that gets through with the BI screen. Supporting with 2 arbalest units among their number on Fire At Will can enhance the effect since they won't waste as many arrows and can send smaller, returning groups away once more without you directing a volley. Try to shoot down the general. Many AI attacks, even involving overwhelming reinforcement numbers will break down once the general dies. Up against lots of armour (most commonly the Spanish in North Africa, rarely the Hungarians or Poles), it may be a race between you shooting their general and your screen of BI breaking and your Kataphractoi being utterly destroyed. Firepower warfare will be your key to defense in the Balkans and Asia minor after you've conquered the Turks and set your eyes on Russia.

Challenges
The Byzantines have two major challenges between them and a GA victory with points built from Homelands and their fairly favourable 2:1 Conquests ratio.

-The Turks are as inimical to your survival as you are to theirs. They should always be your first major enemy and you need to get rid of them as quickly as possible. Grant no quarter; none will be asked.

-The endboss of every Late GA game, the Russians are a threat to your victory as the Turks are to your existence. They may not be at war with you. They may not even border you, but if you don't stop them, nine times out of ten, they will beat you on points.

Opening
The Byzantines begin with Constantinople, Nicaea, and Rhodes, and each of them is critical. Nicaea turns out silver armoured troops and heavy cavalry while Constantinople naturally is your breadbasket. Rhodes can replace lost emissaries and is quickly developed to build cheap ships, TA, and BI.

Assassins are on the loose in the levant from the outset so be prepared to replace and expand your force of emissaries at any time using Rhodes. This also allows you to assign the acumen granting titles at Constantinople more liberally without later having to scraping for title-stripping emissaries to maximize profits.

Constantinople should begin by upgrading its shipyard to build Gungalleys. There will soon be Baggalas and Caravels in the med and I do not consider Wargalleys to be adequate against either. Baggala is the Arabic word for battlecruiser, and there's simply nothing in the Byzantine arsenal that can catch it and kill it reliably. The AI will willingly let you hit it with a single ship however, and if you do, it's safest if that ship is a Gungalley.

Rhodes should either get the bowyer or the shipyard. I would take the former, though the latter gives you a headstart in sea control.

Nicaea is more open-ended. The bow upgrade, the church, and the shipyard are all valid. The church is the safest with its +1 morale, while the shipyard or bow upgrade (for better crossbows) provides options if something goes wrong. While strategically attractive, the 60% farms at 1500 florins is probably not worth it during the opening rush.

Build peasants in Rhodes for peacekeeping duty and get the other provinces rolling out troops – BI and Pronoiai. Immediately move the existing troops on Rhodes to the mainland and prepare to acquire the surrounding areas

Nearby Territories and Opening Bribes
Although your enemy is in the east, start your acquisition in the west. Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria are all prime real estate. The former two are fine money provinces and the latter two form a nice 2-province line. If you're going to siege something, do it to Greece.

The Turks will soon appear for the first time probably in Anatolia, sieging the castle there but it will keep them occupied a safe five turns. A new band of rebels appears in Trebizond after turn 1 for unknown reasons. This makes a stack total about six, making it unattractive. This is a good thing – we'll get to that later.

The stack in Bulgaria is worth bribing if only to assure the intact transfer of Bulgaria's troop building facilities. The Master Bowyer there turns out Bulgarians. There is also a six star general in Serbia. If you can bribe him and take Serbia in the process, you will be a much happier emperor also. Serbia-Bulgaria will be your border with variously, the Poles, Hungarians, and the Horde.

Trebizond and the Turks
If you hit the Turks soon, Trebizond has a solid chance of remaining in nobody's hands for some time. This means you can attack from Nicaea into Anatolia, and then into Rum forming only a single line of illusionary 1-province borders. Build up troops, then attack as soon as you can. Pick the turn when the sultan is about done with the siege in Anatolia if possible, to check him out of the province and castle without a fight if he doesn't move ou t on the same turn. If he does move, then you can lay siege and then try to beat him decisively on a defensive battle. Either way, do not delay long. As soon as your western border is even faintly settled and certainly within the first few turns either way, attack. The Turks start off with very little construction capacity; less than half of yours initially. Attack before they can build up and rob them of their starting florins. Your target in addition to destroying the Turks, is Rum; take it and you have a second breadbasket and troop production center and you are well on your way.

Phase Two
Taking down the Turks early is crucial. Rush them, defeat them decisively. Their opening units consist of their royal bodyguard of 20 Sipahi

The Eastern Border
Your Eastern borders are three provinces, which is unfavourable, but unfortunately, unless you have everything from Georgia to Sinai, you're stuck with it, or stuck with worse. To that end, remember that the minimal 3-border line is Anatolia, Rum, and Trebizond. You are not obligated to attack lesser Armenia immediately if the Egyptians control it. At least not until you're ready for war with Egypt or if they hit you. Lesser Armenia is positionally attractive, but largely a superficial province because it is poorly developed at the start.

That said, let's move on to Trebizond. If Trebizond was taken by the Turks early, you will have attacked it before hitting Rum. Otherwise, unless you snatched it at some point, the Horde is probably about ready to take it themselves. A faction in Trebizond is in striking distance of both Nicaea and Constantinople. This is not acceptable. If the Mongols have it, attack immediately after you're done with the Turks. This is one thing you are obligated to do. However, once you have Trebizond, you can hole up in it and build up a little. The Horde starts as the most powerful militarily but the Russians usually take them apart and there's no point in helping the Russians more than you have to. In Late, Horde heavy horse are usually in relatively short supply, which is good. Oftentimes, the Egyptians will attack the Horde or vice versa, which is also good. If not, hole up nice and tight and concentrate on building up and trade expansion by sea.

Sea Control
Your Shipyard will finish soon at Constantinople, and thereafter, you should constantly be pumping out Gungalleys and smaller ships from as many minor shipyards as you can afford while keeping up a defense on your now fairly large and wealthy empire. Trade with the northern mediterranean coast and wall off your shores with heavy ships if you can afford to. Put at least one heavy square in every sea area behind the wall as well because Baggalas will go right through it.

Egypt
If (or perhaps 'when') the Egyptians aggress, you will be presented with a naval threat as well as one on land. Of your various neighbours, the Egyptians are probably the richest and eventually the most numerically powerful, supplanting the Horde in this position as its resources are whittled away by Russians. The Egyptians rarely war with the Almohads (who themselves are often slowly picked apart by the Spanish) so they're either hitting you or hitting the Horde. Sometimes, they feel safe enough to do both.

Egypt is a nice enemy for several reasons. While your borders tend not to be quite as defensible as Hungary's, their attacks are easier to stop because they load down with camels, peasants, and Nubians, which you can easily handle with just BI and TA. Their most dangerous units besides Ghulam Bodyguard are probably Mamluk and Ghulam Cavalry.

Resist the temptation to commit heavily to a war with Egypt. Your major foe lies North of you, past the Horde. While powerful and inconvenient, the Egyptians are ultimately not a threat to your victory and a powerful Egypt can help you stall Spain indefinitely. Spain is a less enjoyable enemy to fight by far – they have huge stacks and lots of all the things that can make mincemeat out of everything you own at brawling range.

My strategy is usually to engage in strictly limited war with the Egyptians. Drive them out of Antioch and Syria simultaneously. Syria is a critical province positionally and taking Antioch is a money province for you. Because it faces the Turkish coast, which you control and denying the income from it to the Egyptians is just enough to lighten the threat without turning the whole place into free turf for the advancing Spanish.

The Western Border
Serbia-Bulgaria will be your border with variously, the Poles, Hungarians, and the Horde. The Horde is quite weak in the area and may lose it permanently soon to Hungary. Poland is not usually a threat when AI controlled due to its small size keeping it on the defensive against more powerful neighbours but may attack later if Hungary and Germany go to war for example. Half the time if they do though, they're launching corpses across a bridge. If the Italians later take Croatia, make a note of it and bring in armour piercing bows if needed. This is a theoretical possibility, I've never really looked at Italian troop composition in Late campaigns. The Hungarians are the main threat on this border. Try to ally with them and stay out of the way of their allies where possible. However, the hilly terrain on that line is superbly defendable by even minimally supported archers. Keep a more than decent stack in Serbia. The first wave of the first attack will be the most difficult and will probably contain most of the armour that the Hungarians own. My preferred tactic is to sit firmly on a hill and Hero their king with a storm of arrows. This combined with the BI stalling their stuff until you get their monarch can break up the attack sufficiently to send most of the heavily committed Hungarian heavy forces on the field into a rout. If you defeat the first wave of the first attack, your troubles should be over permanently as the Hungarians have many concerns, including Germans, Italians, and the Poles, all of which will have double stacks facing Hungary. Losing the three provinces up to Constantinople are painful but ultimately acceptable also, giving you some strategic depth. I consider this border overall to be as safe as you can expect in MTW.

General Scrolls
Constantinople starts off with a slew of scrolls. The richest provinces are Constantinople and Rum, so give your +2 feather scrolls to the managers of those two provinces. You also have many +2 star scrolls if only a few of your good generals weren't also royals! If you bribed the star-eyed boy in Serbia, giving him a new hobby in naval management will shove him to eight. Nearby provinces such as Trebizond, Rum, and Bulgaria provide command bonuses also. If you get a 2-star Kataphractoi or Pronoiai, making him lord of Trebizond and manager of horses will put him to a healthy six. I usually keep my big generals on defensive borders to hold them with as few troops as possible while putting royals and lesser generals on the front lines of attack where they will in any case have overwhelming numbers on their side.

Crusaders
The Plague hits in 1348 or so but before then, Crusades remain a military threat. They will usually bypass you but may aim for provinces that you need. Leaving them alone on your eastern frontier is dangerous also since they can be successful ventures and leave stacks of dangerous units on your border. Early on, you may not have a choice in letting them through but the Egyptians will also be better equipped to handle them once they arrive. If one arrives aimed at Trebizond, Rum, or Anatolia, you are probably obligated to repel them or to destroy them the moment they arrive (generally securing an auto-ceasefire). The Plague sets the zeal of most provinces to 0, so this will hamper crusades.

Russia and the Horde
The Russians will be gaining points practically immediately. Invading Russia can be a daunting task if the Horde is still in the way. You will then have to fight both the Horde and the Russians and in any case you must finish knocking the Russians out of the game (either effectively or literally) before the third scoring session. Preferably before the second session. However, while they are probably far ahead on points, they aren't necessarily daunting militarily. Initially, I would look at the condition of Georgia. No matter who controls it, if the garrison is fairly weak, it should be safe to bypass it.

The Russians and the Horde have numerous critical provinces – Khazar, Kiev, Muscovy, Novgorod, Lithuania, and Chernigov.

Take Khazar and Kiev immediately if you can, attacking across the Black Sea. Concentrate firepower on Kiev during your first attack to get them out without a fight if possible. Beware however, if the Horde controls it and already has nowhere but Crimea to retreat to. If they buy your bluff, it will be a relatively unfavourable bridge battle. I generally don't do more than secure loyalty to Very Low initially. If the Poles attack Kiev and take it, fine, let them siege your 200 while you continue your advance.

Chernigov is an unimpressive province, but it can hit almost everything in the Steppes so you must control it (if only to prevent Russians from retreating to it) and at least one of the provinces it doesn't border. Sweep them out of it, whoever they are. Pereslavl can usually be bypassed. In the East, sweep them out of Volga Bulgaria (this usually results in a small force left behind to siege/assault the fort) and then lay siege to Muscovy. It doesn't matter if your hold onto it is fragile. Deny them the use of the troop facilities as much as possible. Ultimately, it is probably best to take out the Russians without being forced into a difficult offensive battle. Against the Horde this is not always true since sometimes their generals are their footsoldiers. If that's the case, just screen with kataphracts while you rush down their center.

Limiting the fighting to a few decisive defensive battles for you would be ideal.

Concentrate all your resources into reinforcing your fight with Russia and/or the Horde. Don't stop until you have a 2 or 3-province border. Livonia is not strictly necessary. Both times I've played, the Danes had it and I had no trouble with them. It can be used as a pot for the survivors, but if it goes rebel with either faction knocked out, you must take and hold it. Finland is not strictly necessary either. Again, if you knock the Russians out and it's rebel, you must take and hold it (Finland is very hard to hold) to prevent a recursion. You will have time afterwords to go after the provinces you skipped. Generally, if the garrisons are small, they are hesitant to attack and siege occupying forces so they are safe to bypass. These include Pereslavl, Smolensk, and Crimea.

Settling the excellent Kiev-Lithuania line is preferable, along with a smaller garrison at Novgorod if you swept the Russian or Horde remnants into Finland and/or Livonia. If you sweep in a large stack, organize a force that you know will lose and send it in, pressing autoresolve. Your target is not to wipe them out entirely (unless you absolutely NEED to reset the Russians to 0 points) but to bleed their army down to a manageable size from which they can't recover.

The Rest
Once this is done, you should be in good shape. Look at the scoreboard and see if any of the other comps have snowballed large enough to challenge you for points and go after them systematically if there are. The most common culprits are an opportunistic Hungary that has overcome either Germany or Poland, and a Spain that has conquered up to Egypt or Cyrenacea. With Asia Minor and the Steppes under your control however, it ought to be simple to beat your way to victory with them. Even if it's some other dark horse AI that you can't reach that's bothering you, conquering your way to Morocco will certainly assure your victory.

Kenshin the vega bound

09-01-2006, 22:04

Hey thats a good guide Maloncanth.

I tend to go for Trebizond just for the Trebizond archers valour bonus. Also I tend to train Trebizond archers Instead of Byzantine Infantry.

I mainly focus on troops that get valour bonuses.

I think the Byzantine army fights best eastern style instead of a catholic one.

rvg

09-02-2006, 02:14

I think the Byzantine army fights best eastern style instead of a catholic one.
Well, In Late they kinda have to. In earlier ages Varangians form a solid backbone making Byzantine army virtually unstoppable; without them, Byz army is simply incapable of fighting in a Western manner.

Maloncanth

09-02-2006, 05:20

Well if by Eastern way, you mean fighting by maneuver, it's hard to do that too, because nothing in their indigenous arsenal is particularly mobile either.

Vladimir

09-04-2006, 00:48

Well if by Eastern way, you mean fighting by maneuver, it's hard to do that too, because nothing in their indigenous arsenal is particularly mobile either.

I'm sorry, did you intend to post in the Byzantium thread? There one of the more cav diverse factions, even more so in XL.

Maloncanth

09-04-2006, 07:19

In Late VI to which I'm referring, they have three types of unique cavalry. One of them though heavy is 'Slow', another is a 'normal' speed but relatively heavily built mounted archer and the final one is a fairly generic one on the feudal knight level. Their unique infantry is also a unit of a hundred men. This means in general, more frontage and more turning radius.

They may have horse, but it is by no means a particularly maneuverable army. In particular, they lack superheavy horse archers: The Turks and Russians have Sipahis of the Porte and Boyars. They lack "Fast" indigenous units of any kind: Much less such great things as unique fast horse archers like the Turks or Mongols or at least fast rout-chasers like Steppe Cavalry without reaching out and acquiring it. Nor are they particularly suited for desert fighting where winning by maneuver is more an issue of being able to maneuver rather than speed. Both their heavy cavalry are out. Byzantine cavalry are okay but critically lack a charge bonus. BI and TA will do fine, but the former as I said, isn't particularly mobile (especially since it can't sit still nearly as solidly as any contemporary spearmen which Byzantines lack) and the latter are outmatched by Desert archers. And of course, they don't have camels at all.

Basically, Byzantine unique units tend to throw a bit of extra oomph or solidity about standard units. They have vanilla-class infantry which will last longer engaged due to greater numbers, they have an archer that will give an extra good account in melee, they have more solidly built but slower horse archers and heavy cavalry. They have extra options in terms of horse, sure, but they're strictly no more mobile than the average Catholic faction unless they outnumber the opposition in numbers of horse units and that is a matter of economics and production facilities rather than capability. In Late, the Byzantines start with no more provinces for building heavy cavalry (1) than any other faction and by this point, even the muslims have access to (albeit expensive) options to even better cavalry (Late Ghulam Bodyguards and Sipahi's of the Porte).

Kenshin the vega bound

09-05-2006, 15:26

I've done really well with all cavalry armys in the late era with the Byzantine's

I think Byzantine cavalry speed is fine, as normally I use them to run rings round infantry. Also they are still fast enough to distact catholic heavy cavarly. (They often catch up, and destroy my Byzantine cavarlry, but that is normally ok with me, becuase by the time they return to the fight the rest of there army is destoryed.)

I think its better to replace Byzantine infrantry with Trebizond archers. You often always win the missle arms race. I dont really care if the enemy infrantry is tougher at close range fighting, becuase they are going to be shot to bits.

SCRIBE

09-07-2006, 04:09

ah the Byzantines...great guys, but really terrible fighting conditions in the late game.
They OWN in the early period, still at fighting strength at the high period, but is a crippled warrior in the late period.
Im pretty sure the Byzantines had more interesting and effective troop types even up until their twilight days. (We'll see in MTW2)
To win against your enemies as the Eastern Roman Empire, get to the highest level of armour and metalsmith (if the province has it), then you have a fighting chance.
You must count your blessings as well, the Byzantine Infantry can still put up a fight with the Chivilric types, the Trebs got the missile range on lockdown, and as for the cavalry, their still quite fearsome, but sadly :no: .
Against the heavily barded types, you can only :furious3: at the sight of your enemies and hope that you hit them in the right place.

Ripken

09-07-2006, 14:47

Ref my question above, got the situation pretty much sorted - pulled back a bit, trashed Iberia and a re-emergent but weak English left neither them nor the French in a position to bother me. Beat the Horde surprisingly easily too, after the heirless Khan obligingly led the charge across the Kiev bridge and got a Varang's axe in his head. They do seem to lose their expansionist ambitions when they turn in to just another bunch of 'rebels'...

Not sure I fancy starting on late though - sounds way too hard! :inquisitive:

Maloncanth

09-07-2006, 14:58

Rebel Mongols are your signal to start bribing. Horde stacks start from 6,000 which is a real steal considering what they contain. :p

Ripken

09-07-2006, 15:05

Yup, I bought what I could, trashed the rest and have now hit the French with my shiny new MHCs! :laugh4:

_Aetius_

09-08-2006, 16:32

If anything the Byzantines in the late period have it to good, by 1320 the empires condition was pushing terminal, it had the chance to remain a small Greek empire around the Aegean, but that was pushing it with the number of enemies it had.

Anyway, the best i've ever done with the Byzantines in late was to reconquer all of Asia Minor, plus Rum with the exceptions of Georgia (Russians). The islands that had been lost were recovered as was the old western frontier Greece and along the Danube (Bulgaria, Croatia, Wallchia and Serbia) also i'd overran Hungary and the Crimea, my greatest achievement though was to re-establish a presence in Italy, taking Naples and Sicily and Rome fell on the last turn to my armies, just in time.

I'd had it very hard early on, there was a period when the Italians, Turks, Hungarians, Russians and Egyptians were all at war with me and I very barely held on. The real low point was when I was forced to sacrifice Nicaea, my last territory in Asia, to the Egyptians to ensure Constantinoples survival, after so many desperate defences of Nicaea it was hard to give it up. A couple of important battles in Bulgaria and in Serbia though and I was able to finally after 60 years of endless warfare in the west, knock the Hungarians out of the war. At that same time I dealt the Russians 3 successive defeats during my defence of Crimea which I refused to surrender and was guarded by mostly mercenaries.

My economy was in ruins though, the army hopelessly overstretched and the Egyptians massing to attack Constantinople, the worst though was that the Italians were still dominating the seas, it wasnt until peace was finally made in 1400 that I could even trade.

It wasnt until with about 40 turns remaining (around 1410-1415) that I could go on the offensive properly, when I did though with only 1 main army I showed absolutely no quarter. My main tactic was to chase a small Egyptian garrison out of a province, then wait for the massed counter-attack, then i'd rout them from a defensive position, before charging down hill and taking hundreds prisoner. In 1424 I dealt the Turks a deathblow when the old menace was finally destroyed after a hard fight in Armenia.

By this point the Russians whom I was at peace with now, had drifted south into Georgia and Armenia which I couldnt hold through lack of men so allowed to rebel. With Asia minor back in my hands I turned west and ended once and for all the Hungarian threat by smashing them in Hungary itself and annexing their homeland.

By 1450 I was sitting pretty and happy that the game was going to end happily, when I decided that the Popes constant scheming against me was provocation enough, I invaded Italy and on the very last turn took Rome itself.

I was curious though how, if I had had more time the game would have gone, after Italy I had grand schemes of a Justinian type reconquest, but all in all it was a great campaign which really challenged me.

Kenshin the vega bound

09-09-2006, 23:16

Vladimir

09-11-2006, 13:00

Ok I'm dying to know if anyone has tried using gunpowder tatics. I've been able to recreate my success using harbs with other factions but want to see if anyone else has tried it. It's fairly simple as long as you're armored and engage at maximum range. That .05 increase in accuracy that I gave them shouldn't have affected their performance too much. I'm sure you'll find the simplicity of only having to use 3 to 4 unit types to your advantage given the situation in late.

_Aetius_

09-12-2006, 10:32

What sort of armys did you use Aetius? I find trying to copy catholic tatics with the Byzantines doesnt quite cut it, but they still do have acess to many interesting, and effective troop types.

Sometimes I struggle in the start, but as long as you focus on one opponent at a time, knocking the mout quickly you should be ok.

Even on expert I have done really well.

Well I found myself using more mercenaries to make up for the shortfalls in the Byzantine military of this period, Italian spearmen, Billmen, Longbowmen even were things I sought out and hired when possible.

You have to realise that the Byzantine infantry will not stand upto the heavier Catholic foot, they lack the armour and morale to stand firm long, so if you must engage them make sure its to your advantage. That the general has alot of command points and morale boosting virtues to help even things out abit, also make use of cavalry by having them in numbers to flank and rout. If you can upgrade armour it will also help your infantry withstand the onslaught in any case.

However you shoudnt often find yourself pitted against many Catholic factions, really I only faced Hungary head-on, I was at war with other Catholic factions, but it was rare that they invaded with a full blown late period Catholic army. Then though I tried to make sure I was on the defensive against them.

I remember an occasion when i played a really tough Byzantine campaign on expert starting in early. I'd had a really rough time, by the high period I was back in the ascendancy and I was overrunning the Levant when I invaded Tripoli which was held by the Sicilians. My army was a top of the line Byzantine army of the high period, however even though I crushed the Sicilians killing over 1800 I lost 850 men, which is alot of casualties for a victorious army. It shows that even though I could beat them, that their armour and attack power could seriously damage my army, attacking a Catholic army is a very dangerous thing as the Byzantines.

Kenshin the vega bound

09-12-2006, 17:14

Ban all crusades from crossing your land in late. This way you can practise ag against them. (Heck do it in high even, its a good challange!) I had trouble with those nasty catholics at first. I dont bother with hardly any Byzantine Infranty, I just have a cavary heavy army with loads of missle troops. Even with armour you can still do a lot of damage when you have loads of missles. Knock the general out, and pick the right targets with your cavary, and you should win.

Attacking is a bit harder I admit, but it can still be done.

I dont hire mercenrys as I find that boring. The limits of the Byzantine army make the campain more interesting to me.

Maloncanth

09-14-2006, 22:18

As an afterthought, I should state that everything I ever say about the Byzantines is about the Byzantines starting in Late. None of it applies to other eras since you can build a stockpile of Varangians and actually develop provinces to build cool stuff.

SCRIBE

09-15-2006, 04:04

Ah the Byzantines are 1 of my favourite factions along with the Almohads.
Both are quite similar historically and almost militarily wise.
Both deteriorate throughout the medieval periods and their troops will find it hard fighting other factions.
The Almohads have weak melee troops.
The Byzantines loss their fighting strength as their armies are quite 'old-fashioned' when it comes to fighting heavily armoured guys.
But still both factions interest me. Kinda like they are the remnants of the age of antiquity before the Modern Age hits in.
The Byzantines are basically the Romans, and the Almohads are ancient people as well.

Being a Byzantine thread, my army right now would consist of a high ranking general with the most advanced armour and/or iron weapons belonging to Byzantine Infantries, Kataphracts, spearmen (they'll still do the job), treb archers, P. Allagions, and the Steppe Heavy Cavalries. Also any mercenaries will fill in the gaps left undefended in the aging Roman armour, most notably the Longbowman, Italian Infantry, and Billmen.
Speaking of mercenaries, has any1 picked up any Almughavars or any rare mercs?

oz_wwjd

03-05-2007, 14:00

Deus ret.

03-05-2007, 16:46

I never run out of the Vargarian Guard as I devote 2 or 3 provinces to producing them non-stop and then attacking everything in my path that dares to even stick a foot on my territory.With decent numbers of these guys who needs heavy calvary,they seem to handle heavy calvary units fine...

Quite right in general, although I found that a juicy charge by some chivalric knights breaks even Varangian backs. So you'll have to put them in the woods for maximum effect, there they'll make mincemeat of those lofty lance-wielders :charge:

oz_wwjd

03-06-2007, 11:37

I usually have a few units in reserve,to flank those Clhv Knights,I found if I'm engaging one and 2 more engage one on either flank,the knights drop quickly.I usually do try and put my infantry in woods but sometimes that just isn't possible...

Kenshin the vega bound

05-21-2007, 20:36

Heres a hardcore challange. I think it simulates the problems the eastern Romans faced.

Start in high or late. Expert.

No Byzantine Infrantry to be trained. All Current Byzntine Infrantry to be disbanded. (Not realistic at all.)

Only allowed too conquer one province per emperors reign. (No getting your Emperor killed on purpose just so you can Conquer more)

Your not allowed to attack first except against rebels.

All crusades are banned from entering roman territory. (Doesnt matter if you got 100 peasants to defend with. You still have to bar them from entering)

I find this makes the game a lot harder. You basicly need to armour so your spearmen are not totally useless. You can end up in a two front war with the Turks or Hungerians.

caravel

05-24-2007, 13:43

No Byzantine Infrantry to be trained. All Current Byzntine Infrantry to be disbanded. (Not realistic at all.)
This is debatable. The equipment, armour shield and sword are all typically Byzantine. The sword is a curved single edged paramerion which is more suited to a Kataphraktos and not an infantry man. Ideally the Byzantine Infantryman (Skutatos), should be armed with a double edged straight Spathion sword and a spear.

oz_wwjd

04-05-2008, 08:55

Just a question: I recently decided to start a new campaign on hard,with XL version 3.0 and the egyptians sent a diplomat over to my 3 islands and managed to bribe 2 of them.After a few loyalty uprisings thet sent over reinforcements via ship,which i didnt have any yet as Cont was producing Byz Inf to fend off the serbs and Hungary with.Any tips on how to make it harder for them to bribe said provinces? My governors at the time had about 6 to 7 shields of loyalty..

Ludens

04-05-2008, 21:47

This is not the correct forum for asking questions about a modded version of the game. Faction-strategy related questions can be asked here (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/forumdisplay.php?f=239), however your question is more suited to the Main Hall (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/forumdisplay.php?f=20).

To answer your question, there is little that can be done against bribery beyond increasing loyalty. Increasing the army size might help, but if the A.I. is bribing it usually means they have money to spare, and I doubt it would be helpful in this situation.

shovon

02-20-2009, 14:13

I assume I'll want to have ships churned out on a regular basis, as well, to connect with multiple-commodity provinces.

Any advice? Who to ally with, who to shun, who to backstab? I don't want to conquer the world. I just want to conquer my corner of it. The provinces in the Balkans which start out Orthodox. Along the coast down to Egypt. (Especially Jerusalem and Egypt, though mainly for historical reasons. Any benefit to Jerusalem, aside from the impressive governorship?) I'd like to keep my three islands. I think I'll want to stay away from north of the Black Sea, especially if the Mongols come in. Let them wipe out Novgorod and the Poles

Geezer57

02-20-2009, 15:05

Any tips on how to make it harder for them to bribe said provinces? My governors at the time had about 6 to 7 shields of loyalty..

If you have more than one unit per island, don't stack them. The enemy Emissary can only bribe one stack at a time, so if he's faced with multiple individual units, he can only turn a minority to his side. You'll still have loyal forces there when he's done to fend off the traitors.

It also helps if you have Assassins - they can get rid of pesky enemy agents who get too big for their britches...:laugh4:

Geezer57

02-20-2009, 15:15

I just want to conquer my corner of it.

The perfect setup for just about any faction that starts in this area is the "Golden Triangle" (Constantinople, Georgia, Egypt). Take all the provinces between these points, and you'll end up having to defend only the 3 provinces mentioned by name. Georgia and Constantinople have good defensive terrain, Egypt is a desert province, so (with armies built accordingly) your defense is relatively simple and efficient. With a little tech development, lots of income and powerful armies can be yours.

You'll still need a navy in the eastern Med to cover your coastal/island provinces. A fringe benefit of this is the trade income you can generate. Once the triangle area is yours, turtle for a few decades and develop - the game is probably yours! :2thumbsup:

Don Esteban

02-20-2009, 17:05

The perfect setup for just about any faction that starts in this area is the "Golden Triangle" (Constantinople, Georgia, Egypt). Take all the provinces between these points, and you'll end up having to defend only the 3 provinces mentioned by name. Georgia and Constantinople have good defensive terrain, Egypt is a desert province, so (with armies built accordingly) your defense is relatively simple and efficient. With a little tech development, lots of income and powerful armies can be yours.

You'll still need a navy in the eastern Med to cover your coastal/island provinces. A fringe benefit of this is the trade income you can generate. Once the triangle area is yours, turtle for a few decades and develop - the game is probably yours! :2thumbsup:

I'm not sure I'd want Constantinople as a frontier - just in case.

I'd push out two more provinces, Greece and Bulgaria and you still only have a 4 province border but have more time to react if any massive attack comes in the direction of Constantinople.

oz_wwjd

02-21-2009, 04:06

I've always used Bugaria and Serbia as my intial provinces in that area. It usually works ,although I've had some invasions when the AI got lucky with sinking my ships. As to the Byzantine Inf not being able to stand up to the heavier Catholic infantry I got tired to them being unavaliable so i slightly modded my game so they are avaliable in all eras,although they are slighly more expensive to make up for that,or Latin auxilaries work in a pinch..

Martok

02-21-2009, 16:51

Also, keep an eye on the Sicilians and Italians. They're your main potential rivals for naval supremacy in the Mediterranean, and will likely attack your shipping at some point.

oz_wwjd

02-22-2009, 10:59

Indeed. At times I've had them launch an attack on my shipping,followed by a invasion of Greece or Nicea,which can be a pain in the ass to beat off,if you are busy with the egyptians,or a turkish re-surgence,or best of all ,the Mongol Horde.

caravel

02-25-2009, 23:24

In the vanilla early era the Byzantine can get strong fleets together pretty quickly, though at the expense of developing your land armies. I tend to but fleets on the backburner until my border defences are stronger. In my experience it's usually the Egyptians that attack first. Then they do something silly like invading Cyprus with the Sultan... Cyprus, Crete and Rhodes are not worth a fight and I tend to favour ceding them to the rebels or rival factions rather than fighting potentially costly battles for them. It is better to have a few extra units of Byzantine Infantry in Constantinople or Trebizond that maintaining garrisons on the islands.

Gray Beard

03-12-2009, 04:02

I disagree with some of the posters here.
In the early era start by building watch towers in two of the island provinces. In the other I crank the tax rate down and build a fort. When the fort is finished I build the next bigger fort (Castle?) then a shipyard. Ships and and ports create a lot of wealth and facilitate movement and secure your borders Those island can become cash cows not because they make so much but because you don't have to defend them if you have a navy that keeps your trade routes open. Naples I defend because it is the easiest way to eliminate the Sicilians. If you manage to take Sicily the Sicilians can't normally build any more ships and you can eventually sink their navy.

The whole plan works like this.
Turn #1
Greece: Watch Tower - tax to VH
Bulgaria: Fort - tax to H
Constantinople: Stable tax to VH - Setup a que of 5 Byzantine swordsmen
Nicaea: Watch Tower - Tax to VH
Trebizond: Watchtower Tax to VH
Georgia: Watchtower Tax to VH
Lesser Armenia: Watchtower Tax to VH
Anatolia: Fort Tax to VH
Naples: Watchtower Tax to VL
Crete: Watchtower Tax to L
Cyprus: Watchtower Tax to L
Rhodes: Fort tax to VL

Combine your troops and move as many of the archers and infantry and cavalry into anatolia as you can.

There are several things you need to be able to build: Heavy Cavalry, Ships, and basic infantry including spearmen and archers as well as Byzantine infantry. To reach those you need to reach the Master Horse Breeder and either the Master Armorer or Master Spearmaker in Constantinople, a swordsmith in Anatolia and a dockyard in Rhodes. You need at least a spearmaker and boyer in Anatolia You also have to develop the abilities to build an army in Naples.

If you are using auto resolve a very good Byzantine Army looks like
2X Heavy Cavalry - Kataphraxs or Pronoai Allegion
4X Byzantine Infantry
3X Spearmen
3X Archers

In Naples you can quickly build an army of
2X Horse Archers
7X Spearmen
3X Town Militia

Plus you have a Byzantine Infantry and Naptha-Thrower unit already there. If the Sicilians build lots of ships they will have a hard time beating that army if you stay on defense

The fort in Bulgaria gets you Serbian Spearmen which are a melee unit that isn't very good but that is light years better than peasants. This lets you move Byzantine infantry into Anatolia faster.

By the time you get to the point where you can build ships you should have a full stack heavy army in both Anatolia and Trebizond.

You'll have your Emperor and the Varangian guard unit in Constantinople as a reserve to fend off an Italian attack on Greece. You'll be able to build at least spearmen and archers in Anatolia and on your way to building infantry units

Once you reach this point, move on Rum if the Turks haven't attacked you and crush the Turks

gollum

03-12-2009, 11:27

Originally posted by Grey Beard
I disagree with some of the posters here.
In the early era start by building watch towers in two of the island provinces. In the other I crank the tax rate down and build a fort. When the fort is finished I build the next bigger fort (Castle?) then a shipyard. Ships and and ports create a lot of wealth and facilitate movement and secure your borders Those island can become cash cows not because they make so much but because you don't have to defend them if you have a navy that keeps your trade routes open. Naples I defend because it is the easiest way to eliminate the Sicilians. If you manage to take Sicily the Sicilians can't normally build any more ships and you can eventually sink their navy.

The whole plan works like this.
Turn #1
Greece: Watch Tower - tax to VH
Bulgaria: Fort - tax to H
Constantinople: Stable tax to VH - Setup a que of 5 Byzantine swordsmen
Nicaea: Watch Tower - Tax to VH
Trebizond: Watchtower Tax to VH
Georgia: Watchtower Tax to VH
Lesser Armenia: Watchtower Tax to VH
Anatolia: Fort Tax to VH
Naples: Watchtower Tax to VL
Crete: Watchtower Tax to L
Cyprus: Watchtower Tax to L
Rhodes: Fort tax to VL

Combine your troops and move as many of the archers and infantry and cavalry into anatolia as you can.

There are several things you need to be able to build: Heavy Cavalry, Ships, and basic infantry including spearmen and archers as well as Byzantine infantry. To reach those you need to reach the Master Horse Breeder and either the Master Armorer or Master Spearmaker in Constantinople, a swordsmith in Anatolia and a dockyard in Rhodes. You need at least a spearmaker and boyer in Anatolia You also have to develop the abilities to build an army in Naples.

If you are using auto resolve a very good Byzantine Army looks like
2X Heavy Cavalry - Kataphraxs or Pronoai Allegion
4X Byzantine Infantry
3X Spearmen
3X Archers

In Naples you can quickly build an army of
2X Horse Archers
7X Spearmen
3X Town Militia

Plus you have a Byzantine Infantry and Naptha-Thrower unit already there. If the Sicilians build lots of ships they will have a hard time beating that army if you stay on defense

The fort in Bulgaria gets you Serbian Spearmen which are a melee unit that isn't very good but that is light years better than peasants. This lets you move Byzantine infantry into Anatolia faster.

By the time you get to the point where you can build ships you should have a full stack heavy army in both Anatolia and Trebizond.

You'll have your Emperor and the Varangian guard unit in Constantinople as a reserve to fend off an Italian attack on Greece. You'll be able to build at least spearmen and archers in Anatolia and on your way to building infantry units

Once you reach this point, move on Rum if the Turks haven't attacked you and crush the Turks

Or instead of doing all that, just move on to Rum with all the forces available in turn 1 from lesser armenia, Trebizond, Anatolia and take it from there :beam:

By 1100AD you should be passing from Jerusalem and by 1125 taken over Hungary. Attack is the best defence.

caravel

03-23-2009, 01:31

Yes, blitzing the Turks off the map as either the Byzantine or the Egyptians is a no brainer. Allowing them to surive in order that you can face a decent challenge through the high/late era is the more difficult option.

:bow:

gollum

03-23-2009, 16:10

As the Byzantines allowing the Turks to survive actually might decrease the challenge in high/late if you play the cards right. If you turtle by taking over Serbia in the process - you dont have to face the Mongols and allow them instead to spread out in the steppes and weaken the Turks/Egyptians.

If the Egyptians take over the Turks then challenge might rise somewhat but that usually happens well before the high era. The Egyptians then become a true threat and the Byzantine player is forced to take them out by conquering the Levant essentially repeating the first route. This unfortunately doesnt always make the challenge all that much better because of the Egyptian stack composition so modding out peasants and ballistas is always good.

Another way to make a challenge for the Byzantines comes in editing the starting garrisons in vanilla imho. They have way too many byzantine infantries at the ready.

As the Egyptians however there is no need to blitz the Turks - time is on the Egyptian side because the second front (Cyrenacia) is weak and not a threat really (while at the same time their lands produce lots of income). Just make up a srtong garisson in Jerusalem and build up until the Turks break the peace/alliance and then take Syria from them.

However for the Byzantines the second front (the Balkans) is potentially dangerous and also there is the issue of Crusaders and the potential of naval invaders, the Byz homeland is way too much of a cross road.

:bow:

Gray Beard

04-27-2009, 13:27

By the time the Mongols show up I have 15 to 20 full stacks sitting Trebizond waiting for them and 500K in the bank.

I wait to attack the Turks because it seem very often that when I do I get the Egyptians coming after me as well By the time cross the border I have pile of money rolling in and if I start tajking out the Turks sooner I will lose the battles. I can no longer play the tactical battles even if I want to because my video card is too advanced and it takes a while to get an auto resolve army up to snuff

Also, you seem to keep a better reputation if you let the Turks attack you.

ZlOpOgLeDjA

10-11-2009, 12:37

:duel::duel:The greatest unit Byz can get in early is [SPOIL][AVAR NOBLES/SPOIL]!!!:book:
Only in Moldavia, only in early. Second level - Keep HBreeder+Armourer.
In fact, they Kataphracts! Much easier to get, maintanance is cheaper.
Trebizond vs Bulgarian? Bulgarian are better but you need a cidatel for them:dizzy2:,
Trebiynod Archers are available in fort. Genoese Sailors are available in Keep
but you have to conquer Genoa for them:whip:. Genoese and Bulgarian have the same stats
but Genoese are cheaper to mantain.
Steppe Heavy and Steppe. Scandinavian units:smash:.
In 1025 you can form an army without any, any Byz unit:
avar nobles, steppe hvycav, steppe cav, gensailors, huscarles.
Chep and effective.

The other issue is high and late.
You have crap units there. All you can do is to assassin enemy gents.

oz_wwjd

10-14-2009, 09:01

Actually when I played BYzantium I slightly modded it using the Gnome editor so I could train the Varangian Guards in all ages,but to compensate for that, I upped the amount it took to train them as well. Also you'll want Arbalesters at some point,around when the horde appear,as it's the best way to stop those Heavy calvary charges.

gollum

02-15-2010, 18:55

Originally posted by Greybeard
By the time the Mongols show up I have 15 to 20 full stacks sitting Trebizond waiting for them and 500K in the bank.

By the time the Mongols show up i have 4 stacks in Khazar/Georgia, 4 stacks in Germany and Italy pushing west into France and 4 stacks in Iberia pushing north into France and 50k in the bank.

Too much turtling.