View Full Version : Sweet Crap On A Stick
CountMRVHS
05-23-2004, 03:52
After watching my wife play a GA English campaign for her first official MTW attempt, I got inspired to venture once more into the medieval campaign, and leave behind the Viking map for a night or two. I randomly decided to start a HRE Hard campaign, which I would play as a "strict" GA game -- basically, just follow the GAs; nothing else.
I'd tried the HRE before and gotten pounded, but this time things seemed to be working out. The Italians picked a fight with me, but it just happened to coincide with my "Holy Roman Empire" goal, so I counterattacked and took Milan. Tuscany went rebel, so I grabbed that too. A few years went by of nothing more than building and defending against Italian attacks, and then the Sicilians got excommed -- they had a Papal army besieged in Naples. I had a crusade waiting around to be declared, and 250 florins later I was on my way to a victory in Naples and a couple more GA points.
It would have been easy to go into Sicily and utterly destroy the backstabbers, but I was playing within certain parameters so I left them there. The next turn, the King and a bunch of his no-good bully sons invade my king in TUscany. My Swabian swordsmen make short work of them all and the next-in-line for the Sicilian throne takes over. Then, they start to sink my boats in the North Sea. No trade. No ceasefire. No ceasefire with the Italians either, so I'm constantly worried about them striking out when I least expect it.
And then, from nowhere, the Hungarians invade... those horse-archer-loving*&$^%(&@#$...... The Huns relieved me of Bohemia and Austria and that's where things stand right now. I fear this game will end like my other German attempts-- a noble last stand in some isolated province.
What do you successful HRE-players do? I'm not by any means beaten yet, but maybe I can get some hints and salvage this game before I go past the threshhold of massive civil wars and even bigger loyalty problems. I've had this game for the better part of a year and it shames me that there still may be a faction I'm incapable of winning with http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-embarassed.gif . Although I guess it's nice to know there's still room for improvement and I'm not sleepwalking through the game.
Appreciate any advice,
CountMRVHS
Oleander Ardens
05-23-2004, 10:49
I`m just all to familiar with the Hungarian backstab - if there is no room in the east or south to expand they will attack you. Try to regain Austria and Bohemia and try to regain sea control in the Mare Nostrum as "we" call it http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif
Q: Are the Magyars ex-comm ?
Then a little crusade might help, togheter with a good deal of mercs, as they don`t cost support when being on a crusade....
Q: Have you enough missile units?
From my personal experience I know what a pain this Szekely can be, and even the Jobbagys can hurt.. if you lack firepower. Pavise/ Normal Arbelasts are together with some merc archers the solution to all Hungarian problems when you combine them with the Swabians and some good spear...
If I were you I would try to capture the King with strategic pincer movements. Attack two provinces at once, try to isolate him and get the florins you deserve...
Croatia and Serbia were often the trap for Hungarian Kings
You need two rather strong armys to do so, but this way you capture many enemys without even fighting, enriching yourself http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-glasses2.gif
to speak in the words of the honourable Katank:
rush denmark, rush italy
if you're fast or do it in the first 10 years you won't get exommd. then slowly build defences agianst france and eat away at poland and hungary. and as alwasy, don't take volhynia because it's a natural border
Well I did it with wesmod wich people have said is one of the hardest campaigns under the wesmod. Well it basically worked good for me. The Italians took Provence and I saw I had no chance of taking it back anytime soon so I said the heck with it, its a gift from me, have it. Then France attacked me while I was trying to build up a force to deal with the Italians. The real reason this works well is the fact that Italians own the med with ships. The A.I. can go crazy when it has full seapower. I played a different campaign as the French and the Italians after about 20-30years into the game decided to take about 90 percent of there troops wich came close to 10'000 and attack me and leave all borders open to the other factions. I thougt this was kind of gay as I could not even think about doing that as everyone would come knocking for my land and when your only a few decades into the game 10,000 troops is deadly.
The easy way to deal with them is to let them have all southern borders so they can't mass all there troops in 1 spot against you. Then when you can easily deal with them smash them. I let them have Province and a few southern territories until I had all of France with my back protected I then turned against Italy.
CountMRVHS
05-24-2004, 02:16
Yeah, I just don't know if there's anything I can do at this point to get me out of this situation... Because I simply don't have the troops to counterattack effectively into Austria and Bohemia.
Well, that's not quite true. Earlier today I *did* successfully take back Austria, but it was a close thing. Then the next year they moved back in with lots of HA, lots of Szekely, and enough other crap infantry units to give me some problems. I'm just now working on a Horse Breeder(?) where I can train Mounted Crossbowmen, but I don't know if I have time to get a good amount of those guys on the field.
My only hope right now is that the Hungarians will STOP with their greediness for awhile so I can have some peace and build up a decent, mixed army again.
I think my problem was that, while I was concentrating on keeping a good force in the South to invade the Italians, I didn't keep a large standing army in the East to ward off the Hungarians. Meanwhile the Hungarians just sat in their 3 provinces and made HA after HA after HA, just waiting for this opportunity. The bastards.
If I manage to survive this I'll let you know how I did it... although it will probably have more to do with the Hungarians' mercy than my strategy...
CountMRVHS
have you read the guides sections?
thanks for garion's mentioning.
Just to elaborate.
minimal garrisons on all borders is ok for hte first few years.
in about 1089 or 1090, hit Milan, Venice, and Genoa with everything you've got.
Make sure to hit Venice with enogh that they retreat.
Genoa and Milan don't have forts.
collect excomm warning
thus, you can move right onto Tuscany provided you keep an eye on loyalty.
hitting Tuscany and storming allows you to avoid excomm and the Italians are in no shape to attack you for the next 10 years as they have to ransom their king if you played your cards right.
Killing the Danes is equally painless as you can maul them with your starting saxony garrison.
hit them the very first year.
if excommed in war with italy, hit rome and take it for the HRE GA and Naples while you are at it.
Beat pope into castle and starve him until almost dead and then pull out. This way, he's not a threat and won't reappear.
Taking Sicily is also fine if you take Naples as the Sicilians get iseas about Naples sooner or later.
Defend thyself against the french. while they may be annoying, leave them be and slaughter their knights with waiting militia in the woods of lorraine.
pump archers en mass from switzerland to deal with annoying hungarian HA.
when time is ripe, hit Hungary and the king goes to either croatia/serbia or carpathia and then hit their for fat ransom.
same thing with french king, hit ile de france, champagne, flanders and ransom him off to toulouse and then off to brittany.
ransoming kings is good as as HRE, you are always cash poor.
First Italy, than France m8. After that the game it's easy. Anyway, don't forget to eliminate Poland in the first 2 turns, it is very easy http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif
Guys, did none of you read his post? He's playing a "strict" GA game, with apparently some "no invasion" rules. While your typical "swarm everything" tactics may work in general, they don't seem to be appropriate to his situation.
Count - what troops are you working with? I find that this can be the determining factor in what tactics you want to use.
Bh
then go for the italy glory goals asap, I mean before you actually have to do them, and the same thing for drang nach osten
fine, then not Danes.
but you gotta hit Italy anyhow.
drachy nacht osten also almost requires strategic removal of the Polish as the 2 P's are hard to keep otherwise.
CountMRVHS
05-24-2004, 21:34
Yeah, thanks for the replies & I may try the "rush" approach in a conquest game, but for the most part I like to try and sit tight for awhile, building up slow.
I'm something of a MTW masochist, as I like to be in these awful, dangerous situations.
I guess the HRE is a good faction for me then http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif .
As for troops, I've got a fair amount of Swabians, Feudal Sgts and FMAA availability (though they're a few provinces away from where I need them right now), and easy Urban militia & archer capability.
My big problem is that the Hungarians just counterattacked me in Austria and won a big nasty victory, so my army in the East is basically wiped out. My king is trapped in the fort so I'm going to have to break out of there and retreat to Tyrolia & leave them the province.
Sadly, I've got about 2 stacks of nice soldiers sitting in Naples as a result of my Crusade there a few years back. Even got some Mounted Crossbowmen, which would be VERY nice to have right about now (I'm working on being able to train them in Francland; a year or two to go on the horse breeder). But I have no ships whatsoever, not even a port in Provence, Naples, or Tuscany, and barely enough money to train a unit of Swabian Swordsmen and an Archer each year. It looks like those guys are stuck in Naples for awhile.
Like I said earlier, I just don't have enough men where I need them. Playing the HRE is quite a different scenario, because usually you have no problem moving your troops around between the "problem" areas on your borders. but as the Germans, if you need to maintain a large garrison in Provence or Milan, you've got problems if you get invaded in Austria and Bohemia.
The only thing I can think of right now is to practically empty those "interior" provinces and hope for no rebellions, so I can amass a second army in the east. It'll be awhile before I can take back those provinces, though, and if the Hungarians decide to push further....
CountMRVHS
key is maintaining a triangle.
burgundy, austria, and saxony should all have large forces with high command generals (king/heirs).
everywhere else, retreat and then counterattack with these lynchpin provinces.
be sure to win with those forces as getitng those wiped out would mean years of movement as you are experiencing.
better to treat HRE as separate factions at the compass directions with friendly borders between them.
use piles and pile of peasants to maintian loyalty in the interior.
forgo swabians as they cost too much for a cash strapped HRE.
I would use heavily archers, and slav warriors who are available in bohemia, and franconia?
slav javs are also a low cost unit that's effective.
use UMs too
use SWs to pin and later chase routers and use UMs in forests against knights/armored units or flank in the open.
use archers as covering fire (duh) and slav javs for knocking out armored units.
pin with SW in hold hold and maneuver the slav javs to the rear of the enemy, fire away the javs and then charge home for the kill.
enjoy http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/bigthumb.gif
Well Katank also made me think of something else that works like the triangle method. It came about when I was struggling eith the Hungarians. The comp will almost always go for your richest Provence. What I have found that works very well when I have a border is to see wich is the richest province is and put the best and most amount of troops there. I was struggling with the Hungarians and was ready for sweet revenge after trying a 3rd campaign and the comp tageting the human player hurts when you have a lot of potential foes. This method worked quite well as it kept the Poles Germans and Italians off my butt while I was conquesting the Byzantines only to find out the Byzantines had let the Turks march right into Constanople.
that's true to some extent although the french woudl always hurl their troops at Lorraine though Provence is so much cheaper.
as for hungarians, hitting Venice ASAP is a good idea as it gives nice province with ship yard and cripples Italian dominance of the med.
CountMRVHS
05-26-2004, 20:56
That "triangle" strategy sounds like a great idea. I knew I needed to start thinking about the whole setup differently, and it sounds like that's the key. It reminds me of a recent Northumbrian campaign I played where the Vikings were throwing raids at me early on. All I had were the initial Northumbrian lands, and I discovered that the province of Elmete (the skinny one in the middle) can reach all other Northumbrian provinces in one turn. So I kept the best 1-stack army I could afford in Elmet along with my king & heirs and just counterattacked from there whenever I was invaded in one of my coastal provinces. So the triangle approach is just an expanded version of that Elmete strategy... interesting...
thanks for the advice
CountMRVHS
no problem.
the HRE needs that for a true porcupine defense as they can't adequately defend everything.
if you lose a battle, your generals almost all lose a whole shield while the effect is negligible for a withdrawal into the castle and a victory from counterattack in the next turn may actually have a positive net effect upon your influence which is all important for HRE as if civil war breaks out, you are sunk or close to it.
Um, this thread is making me nostalgic for a HRE GA game - it's one of the most fun (and hard) you can play.
As far as money goes, I always prioritise trade - continually build ships in the three northern provinces (one ex-rebel) and also in Provence. Crank out ships into every sea on the map. Yes, this is exploiting a weak AI but you need the help if you are going to turtle as HRE. I also build up mines and some farms ASAP.
I tend to find the early game a high wire act - if you build up your armies sufficiently (tough to do given the long border and ship-building), there is a chance you can deterr attack (makes for a little dull game, but you can always go off to Palestine to crusade).
More likely, one faction will hit you (could be any, although French and Hungarians are perhaps most likely) and then the rest of your neighbours pile in like sharks in a feeding frenzy. After that, ten years in the game can seem like a lifetime - there are so many battles. The French tend to be weak (poor unit selection) but the Hungarians are very frustrating - archers and woods are your friends.
yep, you should also be sure to beat off the attacks in high style or you may have loaylty drops and civil war galore.
The Italians are also quite annoying and sometimes, even the pitiful Danes join in.
when that kind of weakling faction decides to pick on you, you know there's a problem.
My suggested Italy, Danes and then turtle becomes more secure as richer lands solves the cash strapped problem, early victories gives boost to influence although it's still a bit of a tight wire act, and access to viking units means more punch for your forces.
son of spam
05-28-2004, 04:09
Quote[/b] (katank @ May 26 2004,16:38)]no problem.
the HRE needs that for a true porcupine defense as they can't adequately defend everything.
Actually the HRE can do that. With medmod, you just need to pump out archers, knechte, and heerban like crazy, and defend Provence, Friesland, Burgundy, Saxony, and Austria with enough units.
If you do, you can hold off a "grand alliance" type attack which will overwhelm you. If one AI declares war on you, all the others join in.
The problem is taking out the Italians in medmod, but since you're playing VI, that shouldn't be such a big deal, because there's no more OP ILF. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif
Yeah, watch out for civil wars, but I find that usually you don't have to worry about that if you never retreat from the key provinces.
retreating almost never hits loyalty that badly.
the problem is consecutive defeats in battle.
three or four battles lost in a row and civl war galore erupts.
son of spam
05-29-2004, 05:31
Quote[/b] (katank @ May 27 2004,22:29)]retreating almost never hits loyalty that badly.
the problem is consecutive defeats in battle.
three or four battles lost in a row and civl war galore erupts.
Yeah, but retreating gives you horrible vices.
true.
but vices vs. civil war? decisions, decisions.
I pick vices and I'll later kill him off once the dust has settled.
Mightypeon
05-29-2004, 19:35
Retreating on the stragic map has less chances for vices than retreating out of the battle screen.
I think it only gets hairy if the commander in question retreats more often than he fights.
In my expereince Italy always attacks you first. If France and England dont get into a war France will attack you.
There is a slim chacne that they attack aragon, but well, this chance is really slim.
The Poles tend to get beaten up by the medmod P&P rebels and are usually no concern.
Danes attack if you are weak, a Garrison at Saxony keeps them at bay.
be wary of Hungarian medmod crusades.
If you get excommed KILL THE POPE Immediatly No hesistation Kill him or everyone and his granddaddy will crusade you (apart form Spain who go for Almo) as you are perceived weak, and easier to hold.
My problem with GA is: If someone attacks me I have to kill him or he just becmomes a constant maritime nuisance (try to let at war danes live in medmod, you will never get trade...).
Oh, cruse you singel ship in the med around as much as possible. I was somehow able to keep the Italian uber general on Korsika.
I hate Italian aggression and that's why I charge my forces to hit Italy right away.
crushing them has many advantages.
Austria is still useful as lynchpin for holding Huns at bay, wiht some detterence to the Poles, and guarding Venice.
Mightypeon
05-30-2004, 18:02
Hmm, playing nme recent HRE campaign on hard (wanted to get a break form this insane morale bonusses) its actually quite easy.
I immeidatly went for the Italians, caputering Milan and Vanices on turn 1, stroming the Milan level 2 keep at turn two (while invasding genua) the Venice force moved into Tuscany on turn 3, this got me excommedn so my brave warriors moved into rome at turn 6.
Duke 6 Star still has shown up on the mainland, and I got a nice ransom for the King. The Sicilians and french suprisngly became my allies, which was imporant as the Sicillian army had a loyalist uprising which forced papal armies back. (I think the pope attacked Sicily on turn 3 or so).
While doign this I got FmaA prod in Swabia (no VI for me so no Swabian Swordsman) Feudal Knights in Bavaria, Feudal Spears in Brandenburg and Bohemia backep up by some urbanmilita from Tuscanny and Swiss.
The other border provinces were building a bunch of Spearmen for "appearing strong" reasons.
Needless to say that the ransom money helped me a lot.
I got it because my funny super pirate accidently was in the right place when I sacked Tuscanny.
It got shot up the next turn but it releived me of Duke 6 Star and got me 11K cash.
After this, 4 Spears, 2 Bows 2 Royal Knights and 2 urban Militas defeated 9 Spears 7 Urb Militas and assorted Bowmen by killing the Italian general and starting a general rout....
Would have been far more diffeicult on expert.
I figured that i eventually would have been able to sit it out and play defensivly as I got the "the Hungarians have started a Crusade against you prepare to defend" Well, the goal was rome which was one turn away form getting its castle breached.
The Crusade moved next to my borders and was suddenly...
Disbanded. It was no longer a crusade but the units were now normal Hungarian regulars.
This made the thing more difficualt as the Hunnies were now able to threat Bohemia, Frankonia and Venice at the same time with a bunch of Feudal foot knights.
I send my troops to Venice, and a make shift garrison force (composed of a lot of spear backep up by some better units) to Bavaria in order to be ready for a counter attack.
The enemy moved against Bohemia.
As I did not choose to use 4 spears, 2 Archers and 1 FMAA agaisnt a full crusade I retreated into the Castle.
The next two turn saw a general siege of Bohemia while I was ammasing forces for a couter strike.
The hungairains finished up with Bohemia, and moved... Agaisnt Frankonia, I was kinda suprised and Frankonias Garrison whad to retreat.
However, the big fat batch of Hungairan super troops led by a 2 star was in the middle of my realm.
However, this also posed some opportunities.
Time for payback.
The Venice Garrioson invaded Croatia, The Austrian force stormed Bohemia, and ever singel trooper available in province around Franconia rushed into to relieve the siege.
And now I did somehting funny.
Altuhough I had numerical superioirty, My army was mostly composed of Spear and urban Milita, backep up by less than one stack of Feudal troops. He had roughly two stacks of Knights templar and Feudal foot knights.
the third stack were fanatics only.
So I send my first wave.
8 Spears, the general 5 bows and 2 Urb Milita marched forward.
Using and sburd amout of luring, pseudo charging and routing in delibarete direction I was able to sperate the Knights (who went after my Bows and stranded in the Spears) from 4 of their backup units. I let 2 Spear units attack from another angle. The Feudal footies immeidiatly turned and started to slaughter my men, I immeidatly told them to rout.
So they happily ran to by edge of the board, the Foot knights in hot pursuit.
Meanwhile an all out Slugfest was in rpogress as the remaining foot knights also egnaded my hapless spears.
My Urban militas counterchasrged at some Knights, while my Arhcers wheelded around them, got in their back and tried to look dangerous (there is no way that archers can defeat not ocmpletely tired Feudal foots, not even even they attack from all directions, inclduing above and below.)
Finally somehting funny happened.
"The enemy general has benn killed"
Yeeeehhaaaaaa
Run you suckers MAUAHAHAHHAHAHA
The enemy started a general rout, with my troops in hot pursuit. It kinda sucked that the fleeing Foot knights nearly obliberated my Arches.
In a desparate measure to prevent them form regrouping all of my troops followed.
Nearly to the edge as the Hungairan reeinforcemnts arrived.
My happless and heavily disorganized force of Spears, nearly dead milita and out of ammo Bows was no match for a stack of units roughly as nast as the last one.
Well if anyone is wonmdering what my general was doign? I had a special plan in mind and tried to presever him, he was meanwhile kicking the buts of on the the lured away feudal foot knights.
So, my brave Spaers rout and were could cut down.
My Milita somehow fighted to the death and took some knights with them.
My archers were told to withdraw into the woods, and then to withdraw form battle.
So, their cav was happily butchering my fleeign Spears, his rest was running after my arrowless archers and general (mighty warrior heir) was somewhere on the other side of the battle field duking it out with a unit on Feudal foots. Got charged by another unit and alos routed.
So the enemy Cav approached my own zone my first units of reeinforcements arrived. Luckily they were Feudal Spears and were promptly ordered to charge the pursuing Cav.
I was fealing quite bad when they were already wavering because of the fleeign troops.
However, their moral rose back up as my general rallied in their vicinity.His remaingin 8 men immedialtey charged a unit of templars that was trying to flank my spears.
The question was: Would I be able to overcome the Cav before the feudal foot pursuing my Royal knights would appear on the scene?
Not really, hoever my next reeinforcements, 2 units of Swabian Men at arms (Swabia is +1 valour for FmAA in 1.85)
appeared and promptly charged the foot knights.
Meanwhile I got distrated and my arrowless bows were caught by the footies and beaten up badly.
I at least managed to direct their rout away from the new main battle.
Under the weight of new reeinforcements coming in their Cavalry began to buckle, their foots support was locked in comabt with kinda fresh FmAAs who were worse fighters but had +2 valour compared to their enemies when the catastrophe ensued:
"Your general has been killed"
My Men at army stayed, but the Feudal spears stated to run. Things were looking grim once again, but my pride, 2 full units of Feudal knigths arrived in time, charged strighth trough my fleeign spears and succesfully (they were fighting downhill) beat theTemplars.
This allowed my spears to rally, and engage the Feudal foot knights on the Flank routing them.
My men at army gave hot pursuit while my spears turned to assist the Feudal Knights agaisnt the templars.
Things were looking good once again, then I noticed a "wavering" symbol on my Men at arms.
They purued the fleeign foot knight, reight into the arms of the rest of the AIs footies, beeign exhausted nad badly outnumbered I immediatley ordered a retreat, but in vain, the slightly fresher Feudal footies got them and beat them to a man.
I immidealty needed good reeinforcements, however (You cannot sort your reeinforcements in my slightly old version of the game) I only got my garrison peasants and Spears who would just get beaten up.
Finnally I got what i wanted, some other Feudal men at arms backep up by some spears and 2 units of mtd. Seargeants.
In a gruelling slugfest I managed to beat the rest of the Foot knights taking heavy losses.
However, the majority of my reeinofrcements were out (I order the incom,ing Spears/Peasants to retreat from battle in the moment I saw their appearing Icon) and the final wave of Hungies was coming in. Roughly 1.2K of Fanatics.
Who dieced to camp on a hill.
Now I had to defeat this Fanatics in a short amount of time (I was the attacker) with 2 units of feudal knights (each at rughly 10) 2 full units of Spears, 2 full units of mtd. Seargants 2 full units of FMAA and a collection of under half strength units.
I send the full units in first, alloowed the Fnatics to Swarm them and then attacked the rear of the Fanatics with my other units.
The sneaky mtd. Seargents did a little run and attacked their rear from above.
It was a close call (my troops were "panic" because of Flanks, fighting uphill, losses and enemy numbers) but the fanatics broke and fled before I did.
Finally, Franconia was mine again.
The other batltes were easy wins, However, look would not shine on me as the pope reappeared and the Byzantines tarted a naval supirse attack on Venice and Tuscanny.
Ill post how this went out another time.
wow, that sounds like a nice and fun battle.
you playing medmod 1.85, right? It would be far worse if you were playing 3.14 in which the Italian Pavisiers and assorted units can destroy your early rush like nothing.
I hate pretzel formation pavisiers whoc can resist flanking and rear attacks and hold off an entire army even while non-jedi royal
Mightypeon
05-31-2004, 14:05
Well, I live in happy 1.85 land and dont even now what a Pavisier is:P Pavise Arbalesters? The AI always has them on skirmish so they trie to run away what gets them killed pretty fast.
On to my report.
Situation update: A big fat batch of papal troops reappereared in rome, My single ship in the Adira got spanked by the Byz who somehow managed to incade Venice and papal States in the same turn.
My Garrison Spearmen decided to elave the province in a hurry.
I choose to leave rome, as I simply did not have the force neccesary to combat the new pope.
However, I figured out that the best defense is in fact a good offense, My victoriios troops startet a push into Hungary, While I was trying to tie the Byz up with some 500 men strong pseudo forces(something like 5x Spears).
I succefully took Hungary, My serios force and the papal states got beaten into a pulp by a single Varangiarian Guard Jedi (who wlked inbto my army, looked for my general and simply killed him.
My Pseudo forces tried to look menacing but backep off without suffering casulties.
And now the ultimate medmod terror happened
Loyalist rebellions There were dozen of Knights, backep up by Feudal foots and coutnless other troops...
But wait, this troops are...
BLACK
Well, this is the first time ever that I was on the good side of a Medmod early loyalist uprising.
Well, 2 full stacks of crack feudal troops simply choose to appear in Venice and papals, which put the Byzantines into a kinda disadvantedged posistion. To add some insult, Kroatia just finished a Barque which blocked the Adriatic
Well, the Pope took rome and was not at war with me, however his first course of action was: "The pope asks you to stop attacking Hungary." Well, I had some Byzantines to kill anyway. So I got into a real pietous mode and sent a Crusade agasint Constantinople. it kinda sucked that I got no Knights, but I got a lot of Feudal Footies.
Needless to say that the Byzantines Invaders where beaten into a really bloody pulp by my fierce heavily armed citiszens, I killed the stupid Jedi Guy and was generally fealing nasty.
The the Poles started a supirse attack into Brandenburg, however a rebell counterattack into poland forced them to abort it, which saved me a lot of trouble. Well, I made a mental note to be nice to rebells after this.
The next turns saw the following events:
The French beat up the English, ally with Almos and beat Aragon and Spain.
Egypt beats Turks.
Russians get beaten by rebells.(ouch)
Poles and Byzantines get mauled, Egyy get asian parts of Byzanz.
Danes do nothing.
His holy majesty Peon the 1. and only Captures byzanz, Bulgaria and greece, sinks the Byzantine Navy (with some help by Eggy) then turns his most gruelling wrath on the traiterous poles, caputring their lands and Isolating the Byz king in Moldavia.
As the papal warning experies he finishs off the hungarians without loosing a single man (auto reatreated from everywhere.).
The excumminication of the Sicillians (they actually dared to defend sicily agasint a papal invasion lend to a queick sinking of the Sicillian fleet and the sacking of all of their countrys.
Well, the HRE had a western border with france, its easter borders where Kiev and Lithunia, its Southern border was Byzanz and a strong Garrison in Saxony held the Danes in check.
My king accumulated a total of +70 happiness. It looked like I had the game in the bag, I started some serios buildup.
however, some suprises where yet to come.
son of spam
06-01-2004, 00:56
Paviser=Chiv Seargents availaible to Italians/Scilians in early.
Good job on holding off so many enemies without rushing them. I doubt I could stop myself from blitzing the french right away. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif
hey, I thought blitz everybody was my line http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif
pavisiers are insanely overpowered.
why did wes include them in early? this makes italians and danes share HRE and that's not cool.
Mightypeon
06-02-2004, 10:06
Than Disaster struck my king died.
To add some problems, my heir (6 Star) somehow accumuleated greed in the same turn.
This was an overall drop of 80 hapiness in all regions.
But this wasnt all, his popal majesty decided that all of Italy is his and attack the papal states, got beaten into a bloody pulp (I wonder why he left his two uberstacks at home) and promptly excommed me.
It was not looking that good anymore.
Sicily, Naples and Malta rebelled, with the Siciialns making a reapereance. Fortunuatly my forces kept the captured Polish, Hungarian and Byzantine Provinces in chek, however I overlooked another province briefly hold by the Hunnies. King whatsorever the 2. of the Hunnies decided to reappear in Franconia.
Oh, Eggy declared war on me.
....
In the Ai turn a lot of things happened.
The pope and the Eggies attacked Naples, together the the loyalist uprising.
This was the 1. time that I se a 4-way battle on the Campaign map.
I was the defender so I ordered all of my men to wait in a pretty big wood in an obscure place, My while Generals RK unit was doign a bit of Scouting.
The Sicillian and Papal forces clashed first, the fight was even unitl my heirs unit joined the cmobat. Well, he did not really make the difference, but the 800 Eggys who were chasing him all over the map sure did.
The Eggys got attcked by some popal/ Sicilian troops (did not care, had to stop my general fomr perma running) and a big and really chaotic mellee insued. I wisely decided to stay away, as the enemies slowly brought their next stacks in.
Eggy was depleted first and got killed. The Sicilians only had 1.5 stacks agasint the Papal 2.0 and also lost out.
Now the remaining papal troops turned on me.
Well, they did not really turn as I started a large attack on their rear at the very moment the Sicillian General got killed.
Which did not worked because the flanked, reared, depleted and really exhausted feudal footies still beat my Spears into a bloody mess.
My 2 FmAAs were mroe succesfull, and I was able to complete wrap around the remaining Papists.
I was feeling quite good as my royal Cav charged into the last opening.
The battle passed... and passed... And all of my men got killed.
well, shit happens.
On to Franconia:
Seeign that he was outnumbering 2:1 the new Hungarian King decided to camp before the HREs X-bows and got killed. Causing a general rout of the Hungarian army.
Hmm, not my problem.
However, the Eggys were up for some aserios action at Constatinoples. 12k troops moved into the province, My good things were that the Defender of Konstantinoples was a mighty 6 star, while Eggys Sultan was only at 3.
The first wave ohnciste only of the King and Futtuwa Warriors, I beat them and Killed thew Sultan.
The rest of the battle was outright boring. The Eggys marched in in endless waves, got slaughtered by valour 6 FmAA the survivors were cut down by steppe Cav and so on. 6K prisoners, 400 losses 2K killed.
I dicded to kill the prisoners as I did not want to fight such a wave again.
I got the "butcher" trait which got +2 Fear factor.
that's not that bad
at least you didn't get a civil war, right?
butcher is a very nice status symbol I try to get for every one of my generals. of course I'm not bloodthirsty http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif
Mightypeon
06-04-2004, 11:58
Nope, everything was still connected, and my new King still had a starting influence of 4 or so.
His Fear facotr of 7 alo might have somthing to do with it.
Oh, I now have some full valour 7 FmAA, and thats wihtout Generals Bonus. The leader somehow got pride and brave beyond belief.
I am just hoping that France and Denemark will leave me enough time to finish up my current foes.
Kristaps
06-04-2004, 16:15
Hmm, wasn't the topic about HRE GA game in the standard game version (Viking Expansion)? :)
V7 FMAA with utterly fearless and pride? sweet.
these boys can chew up most everything.
I'd like to see them flank a spear wall.
they can probably carve through the entire spearline in a matter of seconds. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif
Mightypeon
06-18-2004, 12:16
Hmm, It got quite easy after this.
However this Valour 7 FMAA Are now at Valour 11 or something like that.
And they got the 4 püoints in a single battle.
I had the usual "Hold the tide" battle against a certain Golden menace near a certain lovely river.
After some of the usual "Mongol Heavy Cav gets killed on a Bridge", "Mongol horse Archers get killed on a bridge" etc... The Mongies came with their infantry.
They shoot a bit and partly stormed the Bridge.
My little Deathdealers of Uberdeath formed a casual 45x1 formation and marcherd right into their back.
They got split, fought something like 6-7 Mongie units at once, killed somehting like 200, got 4 losses, depleteted every unit in contact with them to roughly 20, made them rout, and proceeded into the hopelessly crammed bridge.
Than they chewed through a big bridge full of Mongol Units of all kinds, in less than 30 seconds. It was like Lancers charging Peasaats.
They did this little operation 4 times.
I than replaced them.
And got down to 30...
Because they got one of my own Catapult shots ARGGGHHH
oh that stinks.
having a high valor unit hit by your own siege hurts.
before catapult hit, did they still have 50 something men?
Mightypeon
06-20-2004, 11:30
Yup, it may be a bug but they somehow did not lost valour by retraining.
Well, my King always dies with 57 so I figure that my version is quite bugged anyway.
The Catapult reduced them from 42 to 34, really good one....
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