North Umbrians

[Josephus V]

I decided I wanted to try to play with some Huscarles and I figured I start with the NU..wouldn't be as easy as Sax or Merc. At the beginning it says it fairly hard. Well seems incredibly hard to me. How do you start?

The Vikings raided and killed my small economy so I started over. The vikings destroyed my ships one by one. Not a good idea, so I started over. I was cruising along for 50 years the next time and the Vikings raided and I couldn't recover economically. That's the real problem. Where to get money since they live on crappy lands. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

[Rufus]

what difficulty level? I was the Northumbrians for my first campaign, but it was on easy. I summarized my strategy in the Guides forum, if you want to take a look.

[Josephus V]

I play all my games on hard...but I'll take a look. Thanks

[CountMRVHS]

The Northumbrians are one of my favorite factions, Josephus. Of course, you'll notice I say that about almost every Viking era faction.

Seriously, though, they're a lot of fun. At first you'll be looking at their unit roster thinking Ok, huscarles are good... wait a minute; my unique unit is WOODSMEN??? What the -- ? But don't underestimate these guys. They're dirt cheap and come with armor-piercing axes, so as long as you take care of them they can inflict some nice casualties against armor-wearing foes.

I play on Hard too, and one thing you can do to ensure you'll live a little longer is ally with the Vikings. A princess works best for this, as I usually have my Bishop's requests get denied. But maybe you're a freak like me and you don't WANT to ally with the Vikings. Well, you can still survive. Here's some suggestions.

Don't build up a navy right off. For some factions, building ships early on is a priority -- I'm thinking mostly the Irish and the Welsh here, because the Vikings usually don't get to your lands very quickly and if you're lucky you can get decent boats in the water to help protect your coastline before the VIkings start raiding. But as the Northumbrians, the Vikings can basically attack you on the second turn. You probably won't have time to build the standard 2 boats per sea region that will deter their naval attacks, and having just 1 boat in a sea region will just encourage that sneaky AI to sink it. If you get an alliance with the VIkings, sure, go ahead and build boats. It will be great to have them for the trade income so you can start making some cash once other factions build ports. But if the Vikings are neutral or at war, I don't bother.

In my last Northumbrian campaign, I told myself I wasn't going to ally with the Vikings. Things got a little crazy for awhile but I was able to survive up until the point where I just got tired of the game and moved on because I'd gotten pretty big but didn't want to stick it out and fight those last few huge battles to get 60% victory.

One great trick to use if you're on the defensive is the Elmete hideout strategy. Elmete is a useful province for you, for 3 reasons: Location, Iron, and Woodsmen valor bonus. It has crap for income but the fact that it's an inland province means that the Vikings can't raid it at will like they can with all your other starting provinces. I kept my king, my heirs, and a good sizeable army in Elmete. All my other provinces had a small, fairly weak army, with at least a couple archers. When the Vikings invaded, say, Dere, I fought a little skirmish trying to kill as many as possible, then withdrew or got annihilated and the survivors hid out in the fort. The next year, my king and his army invaded from Elmete. Usually the Vikings retreated and moved on to raid someplace else. See, the thing about Elmete is, it touches *all* of your other starting provinces -- Lothene, Beornice, Dere, Cumbri, and Pec Saetan. In 1 year you can counterattack from Elmete into any of those places.

Of course if the Vikings choose to fight it's more difficult. That's when your archers prove their worth. Because you're attacking, you choose the dry weather and march your bowmen to their position. Take out as many of their guys as possible, then from there you'll have to rely on swarm tactics or your huscarles.

That's the other thing. Get up to huscarle-training ability as soon as possible. Probably the huscarle province will be Beornice. I like to make archers in Dere, and woodsmen in Elmete. Eventually Cumbri can make upgraded armored spearmen and other units, but you probably won't have the cash to do that right away.

Speaking of cash -- in the early years if you're not allied with the Vikings (and therefore can't rely on trade), mines will be your easiest investment. The return isn't so great, but it's something. I can't remember which provinces start with basic farms, but you should try to get those up to at least 20% farmland as soon as possible, because trying to upgrade from forest clearing to basic farms takes like 15 years and 1500 florins; whereas going from basic farms to 20% farmland costs I think 600 and takes considerably less time.

In terms of invasions, you can go north or south. The further north you go, the poorer the lands get (basically), so it would be more worth your while to invade the Mercians if the opportunity arises. Of course, that's easier said than done. I try to ally with the Mercians just to keep them off my back while I'm fighting the Vikings. Eventually I can worry about them when I get the chance.

That's all I can think of for right now-- good luck and let us know how it goes

CountMRVHS

[Tricky Lady]

Quote[/b] (Rufus @ May 28 2004,19:10)]what difficulty level? I was the Northumbrians for my first campaign, but it was on easy. I summarized my strategy in the Guides forum, if you want to take a look.
And you forget to mention that you wrote a great story about your Northumbrian campaign (http://www.totalwar.org/cgi-bin/forum/ikonboard.cgi?act=ST;f=24;t=18709).

I enjoyed reading it very much. Makes me wanna read another story of any campaign you've played.

Are you going to write other stories?

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

[Rufus]

Why thank you very much That was my first campaign, and I'm on my second now, a German/GA campaign. I've been trying to keep good notes on that one, too, so it could also make for an interesting story. It's also on Easy - maybe next time I'll make that bold leap all the way up to Normal

Maybe I'll start writing now, before it's finished, as others have done ...

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

[Tricky Lady]

Quote[/b] (Rufus @ May 28 2004,23:13)]Why thank you very much That was my first campaign, and I'm on my second now, a German/GA campaign. I've been trying to keep good notes on that one, too, so it could also make for an interesting story. It's also on Easy - maybe next time I'll make that bold leap all the way up to Normal

Maybe I'll start writing now, before it's finished, as others have done ...
Looking forward to it http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/gc-smiley.gif

[katank]

for vik map, cash strapped factions can always use abbeys for building up income.

just don't get them raided or they give a 2k boost to the viks and kill your valuable investment.

appointing smart govs is also vital in these cases.

delay tactics in relatively weak borders with central reserve for coutner attack is a fairly common and powerful defense technique.

for example, this can be used on HRE on larger scale with lynchpins at Austria, Burgundy, Saxony, etc.

[Ironside]

Also your main enemy is Mercia, if you son't take them out relativly early they WILL outproduce you. Don't do the same mistake that I did and tried to take out the Picts.

[katank]

mercians are always the evil empire, rarely overwhelmed by the saxons.

rushing the mercians give good facilities and nice farmland so trying that is worth it.

[Oaty]

Why not try playing as the Southumbrians instead.

Actually why did you pick them for you first campaign. I played as the Mercians for my first and found them quite easy and also it gives you an idea of the Viking units, so when you play as another faction you get a good idea of well they will perform. you can always save the game try another faction to get good knowledge of the viking era units then go back to them