Golden Hoard Arrival

[NoTalent]

Hi,

I've only played a handful of campaigns, and this current one is the only one where I have not run out of money big time and gone bankrupt (it ties in with me reading up on economic tips etc on this forum - coincidence http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif

Anyway, I'm playing Normal/GA/Egy/Early, it's 1177 and I've
50K in the bank and sitting nice. From what I can gather, I'm due the GH at some point, is there a set year for arrival, or does it vary?

cheers

NT

[Cazbol]

They come at at the end of 1230. If your realm reaches up to Georgia, Khazar or Volga-Bulgaria then I suggest you start producing arbalesters and saracen infantry but most importantly hire all the halberdiers and billmen you can find. You'll need to keep your finances in order to do that.

Facing the Mongols in desert battles will make their heavy cavalry pretty useless but their horse archers will still be a pain in the butt.

[Armchair Athlete]

one really cheap trick you can do if you dont want to fight them is build a ton of assassins (preferably from Syria where they have the bonusus) and assasinate the Khan as soon as he shows up. Because he doesn't have any heirs, they will all turn rebel. THen use your emissaries to bribe all the rebel stacks and have Mongols of your own http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[NoTalent]

hi,

thanks for the advice guys, I'm feeling a bit tasty, so I'm going to face them head on.

I'm more concerned about their Hvy Cav. I've found that HA are terrible against foot archers of any type and get annilhalted big time.

Best ready the troops.........

cheers

NT

[SpencerH]

Kill the Khan. It seems to be a very effective tactic for neutralizing the GH aggression. I found that the resulting rebels will still attack other provinces but to a lesser extent than the GH.

[Cebei]

Well I once had my 9 star general with a very capable army of 10,000 men and confronted them in Khazar but still lost. (auto-resolve)

[garion]

you lost? Which units did you use, only peasants, no archers, what's your secret?

[ah_dut]

GH units are easy to kill, They engage in none too clever bridge battles all the time. What faction are you by the way? If the Nov/Rus just get halberdiers, sit on the bridge supported by pav arbalesters, turn on inf ammo and no fatigue and enjoy the horde get slaughtered simple http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/cheers.gif

[Daveybaby]

Hehe, if you have infinite ammo and no fatigue on a bridge battle, then you can beat ANYTHING.

[Cebei]

Quote[/b] (garion @ May 18 2004,09:39)]you lost? Which units did you use, only peasants, no archers, what's your secret?
My trick is that I autoresolved; I would have won 10 times had I fought myself... but poor laptop, cannot run crowded battles. I used tons of kataphraktoi, trebizond archers, pronoiai, lancers... all the pride of Byzantine army, with a 9 star general. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-surprised.gif

[garion]

then it's still a weird result. I have the same problem with crowded battles with my computer but usually the most important battles are the non-crowded ones in the beginning

[Xiphias]

It does seem odd. Usually I autoresolve and beat them with a few stacks of troops (Two full stacks of Viking Huscarls led by a seven star general and a few more incomplete stacks of assorted spearmen/feudal sergents/more viking huscarls was what I won with last time).

Whether you choose to autoresolve or fight it yourself the key is lots of good quality troops and a high star general.

[Gregoshi]

Bah Blast the bridge

I fought a little bit at the bridge and then decided to cross it to chase the routers, then up the hill and fought most of the battle on the hilltops at the Mongol end of the battlefield. I won but it was a near thing a few times. They almost overwhelmed me with their shear numbers, but I prevailed. Burn your bridges Free yourself from their tyrany Up men and to your posts

http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-blush.gif Eh, sorry about that - got a little carried away there.

[NoTalent]

Hi

it's interesting that alot of ppl Autoresolve their battles, I only do that when I'm beseiging a fort and dont want any attrition loss. Other than that, I fight every one, it's where alot of the fun is for me. And after reading some of the strange AutoCalc results here, I definately wont use it http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-confused.gif

cheers

NT

[katank]

you shouldn't turn on inf. ammo and no fatigue as otherwise it's too easy.

if so, you have no tense moments when fresh MHC arrive while your halbs are dead tired and your only pav arbs are walking back with no ammo left.

these are the best moments and all very interesting.

I suggest a little naptha.

they do wonders against MHC when these armored beasts are all crowded on the little bridge.

[son of spam]

The Golden Hoard arrives in your treasury when you've got 80% farmland upgrades everywhere and a trade network stretched across the map http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[mambaman]

Strangely i once beat the GH playing as the Byz E-i faced em down with masses of Cav of my own and fought a couple of epic engagements in the East (in one they attcked with nigh on 100,000 troops vs my 20,000 odd-i had a great general, some heirs, loads of Kataphractai and beat em after something like 2 hrs

I can tell you that i almost wept at the end such was my palpable sense of relief-an example of how this game can really suck you in

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

[katank]

mass cav against GH?

I've never done that.

I feel it's a great waste of precious florins.

arrows don't cost money.

when your treb archers/slav javs/arbs run out of ammo, withdraw them to fight another day.

a simple shield of byz inf.+varangians grind them up well and last long.

this tactic means very cost effective erasure of horde from the map.

[Cazbol]

But pixelated men are expendable and die well, so fight with style for the fun of it.

[Nowake]

mass cav against GH?


I think he refered to this in conjunction with arbs; otherwise it's no use, even if elite, they'll get exhausted quickly and you won't have probably 1-2 waves of reinforcements.

[NoTalent]

Hi

1230 draws ever nearer in my campaign. I'm looking forward to my first encounter with the GH. I've read everyones advice/experience with the GH, and I'm planning on using Saracen Inf/Muw Inf/Arb/Arc/Gazhi Inf/Arab Sword Inf/Mamulk Cav.

I have found the Mam Cav to be amazing against Knights etc. they've really done the business for me. I won't bother with Arm Hvy Cav, as I've found them to be fairly poor - more likely the way I'm using them..

Anyway, for those interested, I will report back on my first battle, probably some time over the weekend.

Thanks again for the advice

NT

[katank]

I really suggest some naptha to take care of khan and the grenades kill armored horse really well.

saracens as bridge plug with ghazis on either side to shred cav engaged with saracens is best.

try using some nizaris as you are using eggy, right? they are good missile duelers.

mamluks are good for flanking but only use them on charging engaged MHC or golden horde warriors.

MHC headon, your mamluks are going to get killed.

MHA can run around and shoot your mamluk cav up.

stick with mostly static bridge defense and don't wander far from heavy missile support or the GH can destroy your army.

massing 4-6 catapults in your first wave also does wonders and the shots bouncing through their massed troops trying to walk onto the bridge is awesome.

also, they outrange the mongol missiles and you can take a few potshots while they are incoming.

[zelda12]

Archers lot's of archers especially longbowman and lot's of peasents and hevy infantry. First find a hill deploy your heavy infantry at the bottom of the hill with your archers at the top. Then use lots of peasents in front tie up golden hoard troops whilst you fire arrows into the melee kills two birds with one stone kills peasent's and golden hoarders. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/cheers.gif

[katank]

umm, zelda. I never had peasants hold long enough to be much use.

are you playing on easy or something?

MHC charge usually means instant rout for the peasants as their lines get punched clean through.

Use heavy spears to hold them and flank with swords /polearms while using missiles is a good idea.

I never advocate a cav heavy approach to the horde as you will just be trying to out horde the horde and out cav the master of cav at the time.

[zelda12]

Nope, But when I use peasent's I use them in great numbers the idea being to preoccupy the enemy thus expose them to longer periods of missile fire meaning that their fast cavalry hit and run tactics are nullified.
Also on hard I have had peasent's holding charges from chivalric knights whilst my longbowman and crossbowman destroy them. Although when I do this I usually produce them in places with blacksmith tavern etc. to get them as good as they get.
Although they still get slaughtered. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-2thumbsup.gif

[garion]

it's important that you fight the battle yourself if you use a lot of peasants because if you autocalc the computer could think that a vast majority of your army routes instantly and this will cause you to lose the battle

and indeed , nizari's are great. good bowmen, and when they run out of arrows the still have a stingy charge for the baffled enemy

[Peredhil]

Comparing the Horde's two main strengths MHC and MHA with Eggy units:
Mamluk Horse Archers will beat MHA hand-to-hand if they can catch them, but MHA have a run of 24 compared to 22 for Mamluk HA. Vanilla HA have the same speed but woeful hand to hand stats. The best answer is probably Saharan Cav outnumbering the HA 2 to 1. This is not too hard as they are dirt cheap.
Khwarzarmian Cav are not as good as MHC, but you can afford to outnumber them as they are cheaper. The building reqs are high, though. Mamluk Cav are better as they are armour-piercing, and even cheaper. But, considering they have to come to you eventually, it is best to use Saracen inf.
It seems the best solution as Eggies is to outnumber them (admittedly hard due to their huge numbers), pour arrows into them, take away their mobility and leave the heavy cav killing to spears and the HA killing to Saharan cavalry.

[katank]

grab cyrenacia from Almos.

then go to master horse and soon you have V2 saharans who have 4 attack although defense is still shaky.

armor them up a bit and they are awesome. they actually pack more of a punch that ghulam cav

I like castle defense in khazar and bridge defense in Kiev precisely because it takes away their mobility and their horses are going to get shot up and shredded.

[katank]

@ zelda, taverns don't improve anything.

better armor up those peasants and have a cathedral or something to beef them up enough so that they don't rout.

I would personally chose pumped up vanilla spears or slav warriors over peasants and they all last longer.

also consider celtic warriors for another cheapo unit that can last.

all better options than see own shadow and run peasants.

[NoTalent]

Hi,

the GH turned up on time, but only in Kazhar, I had 3 big armies in Crimea/Gergia and Edessa. It's a hell of a sight, lining up to fight 3000 odd GH, with about a third of it MHC. Damm good fun though.

Did I win?

Through a combo of 8* General, Saracen Inf/Arb/Arch/Ghazi Inf/Sah Cav/Mamulk Cav(awesome) I gave a good account of myself and beat them off twice.

There's a long way to go, but I'm off to a good start.

Thanks to all who took time out to put some helpful notes on this post.

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

cheers

NT

[-Amon-]

i found new tactic..try this:


produce a lot of jihads..(in expert mode i produced around 20 jihads in different provinces)

incrase zeal in jihad producer provinces..

i produced jihads in trebizond,anatolia and rum..(trebizond's and anatolia's zeal was %66,rum's was %75)

when horde arrived in georgia,i retreated..and declared most of jihads..

result was very good i have around 10000 troops in jihads,and i took back georgia..next turn i attacked horde again and i ransomed their khan

use this tactic if you are playing with muslim faction.


PS: you need least 4-5 star general to invade horde's lads succesfully..

[katank]

Amon, this tactic isn't new.

I've done this with early turks.

I cranked Imams from Const. and had one in every province of my empire with stretched from Egypt to Novgorod to the borders of Germany as well as outposts in Ireladn, Scotland, and Scandanavia.

from just moving them out, I got Const. up to 80% zeal.

with silver amor, the horde had to face about 40k Turkish troops pouring into Khazar with quite a few jannies.

it was fun the first time but then it lost its appeal.

absuing jihads just make the muslims OP and I now classify jihad the horde to death to be the same level as assasinating him.

Fighting him in Kiev is probably the most fun.

[-Amon-]

Quote[/b] (katank @ May 24 2004,18:39)]Amon, this tactic isn't new.

I've done this with early turks.

I cranked Imams from Const. and had one in every province of my empire with stretched from Egypt to Novgorod to the borders of Germany as well as outposts in Ireladn, Scotland, and Scandanavia.

from just moving them out, I got Const. up to 80% zeal.

with silver amor, the horde had to face about 40k Turkish troops pouring into Khazar with quite a few jannies.

it was fun the first time but then it lost its appeal.

absuing jihads just make the muslims OP and I now classify jihad the horde to death to be the same level as assasinating him.

Fighting him in Kiev is probably the most fun.
hmm,sorry then..i don't know http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-oops.gif


anyway it is very good tactic http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/bigthumb.gif

[katank]

it's ok, it's fun to experience it for a first time although it's one of those get old real fast things.

try medmod where jihads take 5 years to train and it's no longer so spammable.

[Mightypeon]

Well, as a russian my usualy way is: Get your Halberds and wait in a particularly big wood.
Bridge battles tend to be really easy, Just make sure you have enough Arbs. Oh, Some thing I experiencd is that it is usually better to defend behind a bridge than on it.
On the bridge it is a 1on1, a bit on your side it is a 3 on 1.
It speeds things up, and thats always good with some 15K of enemies.
The only thing that gives me fits is attacking them.
You have to amrch through the entire map, than you have to cath and defeat them and than your exhaustd guys are near their get out point when the reserves are coming.

[katank]

they idiotically launch themselves at kiev and these bridge battles can wear them down until you can attack them without too much casualties.

there coudl still be tense moments with bridge battles where your halbs are utterly exhausted and most of your pav arbs just ran out of ammo and you have to march them off the map and get reinforcements.

it sucks if a MHC charge was pouring full force across at that point.

as for attacking the mongols, I always find it better to fight a ground based battle in which you march your halbs forward slowly with arbs covering their tracks and gradually force the GH across the map instead of trying to run after MHA with halbs.

[Serpent]

I my self dont find Mongols to be problem...I pläy whit hard level but still.

I Usually play whit Hungary and i use 2 Joggaby, 4arbs , 4halb,one cav Most likely my general,and any kind of heavy cavalry as much I can have. 3-4 stacks of these and there should be no problems.

Firstly any javelin unit is good to have bridge batles in Kiev. 2 halb on your side of bridge is good way to kill people...ards are effective and they have long range Steppe heavy cavalry has good fighting stats and when they dont have anything to do they can kill people whit bow´s.Also if you see problem point they can come for aid... Avar is also good...now when halbs start to be tired attack whit fresh units and bull other 2 away...then decide if they are good enough to rest and kill some more or should you get new units also when arbs lose their arrows wait a while attack if necessary and always lose heavy cavalry if you need new units....and most likely first 4 units that you need is halbs.if there is 2 bridges guard other one whit 2 Heavy cavalry units......

Secondly dont chase them they will turn back and attack.
and keep them on the other side....one more trick ...When they emerge use lots of arbs or any other bow units you can find and also some cavalry whit High moral...sacrifice our cavalry and shot most of them down...if you can kill general.Withdraw your archers.

[katank]

well, just to elaborate. resting your halbs is very important.

if they are below 3 bars, swap them out and rest them ASAP as otherwise they are less effective and risk routing.

the plug is all important in a bridge defense.

[Ragss]

If you are sitting in keiv waiting for a bridge battle...dont. Those smart mongolian bastards moved to the single province that didnt have a river to cross into keiv, which I though did...That was one freaking hard battle. I had to stuff my entire army into a small forest. I managed to pull it off, about 2000 kills and 300 deaths http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif


Also be ready for them to apear in the province right east of Rum, that one caught me off guard...

[Serpent]

I dont know if this is just pure luck but if Kazar is ruled by repels they always attack whit me there only..? And once i did take it and most of them attacked Kazar and some near Rum. There was one time when I ruled almoust whole map but then I had civil war 1229... Needles to say Whole civil war went under Golden horde control.....17 provinces. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/eek.gif

But it was interesting if I could rise to my former glory.
http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-toff.gif

And I did.... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smokin.gif

[katank]

@ragss

I had reasonable garrisons in pereslavyl, chernigov, volga bulg, and ryazan? also.

they never went for that though and only bashed themselves against the rock that was khazar.

also, the other provnces are also bridge battles IIRC. at least chernigov is (single bridge in fact).

also, yes, they do appear in armenia if there's less than 200 loyalty there.

they are always heat seeking missiles and head in my direction.

I'm only safe from them if I'm way on the west end of the map like the Aragonese or something.

High Russians, Poles, Byz, or Turks, be prepared to get hit hard.

you'll probably prevail in the end but it's tough going.

[Lord DeVeau]

I tried to take on the Golden Horde because I had twice as many men. BIG MISTAKE. I lost big time. They came up and just as my new troops ran on the field from off of the field they dropped them dead or made them run, I won't do that again, unless I have at least half as many Royal Knights.

Later,
Mike

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

[Lord DeVeau]

When I took on the Golden Horde, I had twice as many troops, a few royal knights, and other horsemen, some 6 or 8 units of spear men, 6 or 8 units of archers, but they came around the pond in the middle in both directions.

There king came straight up the middle so I tried to kill him with everything I had archer and my knights to no avail.

It was not good. Then when my reserves came onto the field, there archers just waited and mowed them down or made them run. I learned a lesson from that.

I will get them. I am still building up my forces and I may have to fall back a bit but I will make a stand and a come back.

Later,
Mike

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

[katank]

try to fight them on appropriate terrain like over bridges and then they lose the power as only 1 unit of MHC can charge at a time and MHA don't have room to run every where but their cav will be mowed down by your arbs.

[Lord DeVeau]

Thanks for the http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-help.gif...

KaTank

Arbs Long range archers?

Later, MD

[katank]

yep

arbs have range 6000, same as long bow while regular archers and x-bows have 5000

arbs are also capable of firing in the rain with no reduction in accuracy and are armor piercing iwht high lethality although the reload time is rather long

volleys of arbs mow down MHC like nothing.

concentrate 6 units of arbs and the khan goes bye bye in 1 volley http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/bigthumb.gif

[Ghostmonkey]

I'm also due to experience my first Golden Horde in about a century. I'm playing MedMod 3.14, any advice? Is there anything substantially different than in the regular game? Are horse archers a good idea or should I just stick with arbalesters? How good is the Mongolian infantry, will I be able to take them out with heavy cav?

[son of spam]

Quote[/b] (katank @ May 25 2004,21:24)]it's ok, it's fun to experience it for a first time although it's one of those get old real fast things.

try medmod where jihads take 5 years to train and it's no longer so spammable.
It's unfortunatley still somewhat spammable, because they give you more troops/jihad. Still, it's a tiny bit better.

[son of spam]

Quote[/b] (Ghostmonkey @ May 29 2004,13:28)]I'm also due to experience my first Golden Horde in about a century. I'm playing MedMod 3.14, any advice? Is there anything substantially different than in the regular game? Are horse archers a good idea or should I just stick with arbalesters? How good is the Mongolian infantry, will I be able to take them out with heavy cav?
Depends on the civ you are playing as.

For either the danes or the Swedes, the horde is mainly a nuisance. A couple of 3v svea axeman can hold off tons of MHC and chinese infantry in a forest, where arrows from MHA and MW can't hurt them.

For the Russians, you just have to prepare well, but it's mostly the same as regular MTW.

I dunno about the rest: here's my guesses

Turks: OK, AP AHC is sweet, and they have plenty of archers to fight off the MHA and MW which will be your primary concern anyway (MHC and CI are just a joke)

Burgundians (ie. Outremer): Should be easy. the heavily armored mongols will cook if they try to invade u in teh desert, and you can dismount KT into CFK. Plus you have ILF (outremer inf or something like that)

Polish: Dunno, I wiped them out when playing as the swedes http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif So I guess they are hard to play agaisnt the mongols. Their units are pretty good tho, like Pavise arbs and Polish Militia.

HA are NOT a good idea against mongols. They are very missile heavy, and will massacre your HA in no time.

I would not recommend using any cav against their CI either. Though they do suck, they actually are competent against cav.

[katank]

their chinese inf is equivalent of buffed saracen inf.

the mongol warriors are also improved.

HAs agianst them are a bad idea so is heavy ca as it's impossible to beat the mongols at their own game.

try to find a nice bridge to defend and use hard core defensive inf as plug and then use as many arbs or other missiles as you can.

pure foot missiles can shoot em up well.

[Ghostmonkey]

I'm playing as the Russians.

Bridge battles I can do, but does Khazar have a river between itself and the Mongols?

[katank]

nope, no bridge battle in defense of khazar.

there are plenty of forests to hide in with your swordsmen and axes though.

also, your spears suffer less than their cav in woods so putting your spears into the woods isn't that bad.

try to fight delaying action in khazar.

then retreat to the fortress and defend that.

if the fortress doesn't hold, defend kiev against them in bridge battles.

by the bridge battle time, the horde may well be whittled down to only about 10k.

I know it sounds funny to say only 10k but it's quite true that they don't have nearly as much by assaulting a fortress after a hard fought field battle.

I actually managed to hold the assault off twice in the fortress there.

[barocca]

bumping,
this topic has been refernced in a new post in eh,
so up to the first page it goes,

B.

[mfberg]

(early/expert/huge)It's 1230, I have just sent 8 of my English armies into Khazar to bait the horde. The horde responds by invading with around 20 stacks well mixed silver armour. I move the other half of my non-garrison troops in, including 7* King William. Chaos ensues, the battle is so long I have to turn it off The next night I auto-resolve first (and lose). Then I try and play the battle out. 5 hours later I am still fighting and the power cuts off (thunderstorm outside) I will never get to the end of this battle.

mfberg

[The_Emperor]

i had a very interesting battle with the Byzantines against the Horde... Emperor John II personally commanded the defence against the invasion.

After seeing off wave after wave of Mongols after killing the khan, the AI stopped attacking and responding... Basically when the next wave came on all 16 units were squashed in at their rally point.


How many mongols are in this screenshot?
http://www.imperator.v21hosting.co.uk/howmanymongols.jpg

[Assassins_Shadow]

When I first started playing MTW I got annihilated by the Golden Horde. Resolute not to make the same mistake again, I started a campaign as the Polish. Unfortunately I though they came at 1175 instead of 1230. I owned every territory east of Poland except for the far South(Eggys were giving me trouble)I put all of that on the back burner and trained units from everywhere and sent them to the terr. were the GH appears. I had units of every strength, value, and type. Of course, once I realized they were not coming at 1175 I got paranoid about leaving those terr. undefended. So I just kept building up until I had trouble fitting more stacks onto the terr. I had alot of simple spearmen, archers, UM, and cheap cav., but I had a good 8 or so stacks of decent troops too. Unfortunetly my comp crashed before it got to 1230. After reading this I would have predicted losses(for me) in the tens of thousands. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-jester.gif

[Jihad2Death]

I tried something new against the GH.Playing as the Turks,I decided not to take on the GH as soon as it showed up.I quickly launched an attack on the Byzantines,and took everything to the east of Rum,including Lower Armenia.I finally defeated the Byz,took Georgia,then pulled my army out.I also turned up taxes in Armenia to very high,and pulled my army out of it as well.My plan was to have a defensive line of provinces,formed by Rum,Lower Armenia,and Trebizond.I let Georgia & Armenia riot,so the Horde would have a passage to go through without having to attack me,I also made sure I took Georgia so I could launch Jihads on it,as well as Armenia.I put as many armies as I could in Rum,Lower Armenia,and Trebizond to discourage the GH from attacking me.My plan turned out perfect,my allies the Russians took Georgia,and the Eggys took Armenia.The GH showed up in Khazar,and Armenia.They beat the Russians out of Khazar(losing men),while at the same time they took Armenia(losing more men).In the next turn the GH attacked Kiev,and were beaten by the Russians,who launched a counter attack on Khazar.This was just what I wanted to happen.I lauched two ready made Jihads on both Georgia,and Armenia.I also sent a few of my armies that were in my defensive line.The best of the GH army was in Khazar dealing with the Russians so they couldn`t send any help to Georgia,of Armenia.I attacked with loads of Crossbows,Armenian HC,Muwahid Spearmen,and Saracen Infantry.That combined with my two Jihads, was enough to defeat the GH armies in Armenia,and Georgia.The Khan of the GH got killed up in Khazar,and his army was defeated soon after.

[katank]

nice job. like your nick.

ever tried total jihad spam? I pumped markers for 50 odd years before.

Never worked for me. the Mongols seem to be heat seeking missiles who go straight for me unless there's two or three factions between us.

[Spartiate]

Has anyone tried editing the startpos and giving the horde starting cash of say 90,000 florins.I could be wrong but i think when they invade they have an even larger army.It's a long time ago since i did this but if memory serves(and it probably doesnt) i think it was the most difficulty i had with the horde when playing as a a western faction.I was the French and i got into a real meat-grinder of a conflict with the horde all across central germany.I cheated and did a quick .matteosartori. and sure enough they were half-way across north Africa as well.I eventually won that campaign because after a series of epic battles they had a civil war and i eventually finished off the Khan.There were only the Aragonese,Italians and the Pope left however and i quickly became bored.Very tense times though. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif

[Tozama]

I still recall my first ever campaign that lasted up to 1230. I hadn't read really anything in the manual or online but just was playing MTW and learning as I went.
So I had ZERO clue about any Golden Horde until I read this message window after hitting end turn in 1229.
I am thinking ahhh no biggie, just another reappearance type thing. My eyes glance over to Khazar where I had about 5 peasants in a garrison long since forgotten as my real armies are battling in central Europe at the time. All provinces in that region I had only peasant garrisons and nothing more.
OMG There's like 20 stacks of gold colored dudes in Khazar WTF http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/eek.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/eek.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/eek.gif
I realized immediately my whole Asia-Minor pocessions were going to fall like dominoes and I was in a hot and heavy war with the Catholics and couldn't spare nearly enough men to stop it from happenning. And of course NO ONE would agree to any peace with me by then. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif
What a lesson I learned. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-book2.gif

As soon as 1200 rolls around nowadays I have plans for how to handle the horde. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/bigthumb.gif
If I took Khazar/Rum/Georgia previously I start building my counter-Horde armies up and deciding which general will lead the region defense.
If I left the area alone I still have my eyes on the region to see how the Byzies or Turks or whoever are doing getting wasted and whittling the horde down for me before I move in to clean up the scraps.

One surprise was enough for me

[katank]

ahh so true. that would have been bad.

My first time, even though I knew about it, I was still shell shocked to see so many killer stacks.

they aren't as bad as they look though since I often castle defense against them and/or bridge battles which is massive slaughter for them

also, they are broke and can't build anything so aren't that much of a threat.