Egyptian campign......

[RollingWave]

hmmm playing as the eggies in early... i think i'm faced with 2 major choices.....

1.when to attack syria.... should I attack on the second turn or wait for 4-5 turns until i have a few more prodcution buildings?

2.Should I immediately press on after taking syria? should I attempt to overrun the turks immediately or sue for peace and build up?

I think for answer number 1.... you almost have to wait for more production buildings.... due to teh fact that you start out with only egypt being able to prodcue anything... (and you can't produce any archer or cavs off the bat.. ahve to wait at least 2 turn for desert and 4 for saharan)
while you COULD beat the turks out of syria on the second turn you have a very hard time holding on to it when ur only pumping out troops from 1 province that takes 3 turns to reinforce syria too...... good luck beating mass horse archer counter attack with 1 archer and no light cavs (and only 2 royal body guard at most) am i wrong in this assumption??

For question 2... pressing on immediately seems hard.... as syria border 3 turk province.... while if you trade province with the turks it usually benifit him mroe as now he can strike at ridiculas amount of ur province... u might kill him in the end but not before he gut ur alerady poor infrastructure.....) you seem to need a very large army to safely tackle the rest of the turks.... (or wait till they start fighting with the byz...)

Eggy start with such poor infrastructure (1 fort 1 spear maker 1 palace .....) for such a vast kingdom with so many borders :/..... takes a while to really get them going..... and by then every damn catholic wll be sending crusades down ur throat while all ur muslims brothers have their jihad goals on ur land too.....

[katank]

wrong

instant blitz

you don't have production but neither do the Turks

hit Syria immediately and only keep the sultan and other guys in antioch

everyone else move into Syria or towards Palestine.

you have a 6* gen who is fine leader.

morale wise, you are safe.

pump out nubians until egypt can produce DAs and then mass those.

after taking Syria, sack Rum immediately and then attack whichever province the sultan is (usually Armenia) for a ransom then finish off the Turks, buy some mercs from Palestine and prepare to strike at the Byz in Const through Treb.

if the Turks get time, they have more annoying HAs and their forts being complete means you having to siege them.

war on Byz should end with control of triangle Const/Egypt/Georgia

[Doug-Thompson]

Agreed. Don't even wait until the second turn to attack Syria. Invade it first, without even knowing what's in there. Attack with everything that isn't nailed down or can be pried lose, except for a small garrison in Antioch.

I like to seize Syria first, then attack Rum. The Turks in Rum retreat to Edessa. Then you abandon the siege of Rum and invade Edessa. The forces there have nowhere to retreat to. You whip them badly and the ransom for the rest breaks the Turkish bank, along with the lost florins from any buildings they were making in Syria and Rum.

Then take Rum back and go finish the Turk sultan in Armenia.

Camel and merc the Byz to death. As discussed in another recent thread, Jedi Kataphracts can't defend every province, and attrition will waste them.

[Vanya]

GAH

Vanya sez... Taking Syria shrink your border. Whether or not youz push onwards is therefore irrelevant, as you can then combine your garrisons and form a formidable army out of them. With this youz can then move on or hold the line as youz see fit.

This way, youz have Syria-Antioch line to the North and Egypt in the south. Or, a total or 3 border provinces instead of the lengthy border youz start out with.

So, when in doubt, take Syria and make the people of Damascus your beotches.

GAH

[Magraev]

I dislike massive blitzes, but I usually also attack Syria fast. After that you reduce your borders from 5 to 3 provinces and get the best province in the game for assasins.

You could stop there and sue for peace or go on and sack rum and then the sultan - your choice.

[econ21]

I'm with Magraev here, I think instant blitzs are often very effective but just feel "wrong" to me. However, there are some exceptions when the starting position is so intolerable, they are not only excusable but irresistable. Syria is perhaps the clearest instance of this - it threats virtually every Egyptian province (I also find France's initial divided state hard to bear).

You could have a look at the Egyptian PBM I started in the throne room - I went for Syria on turn 1, built up for 10 years and then spent the rest of my reign eliminating the Turks. This leaves Egypt in a very secure position, with the next move probably being to head for Constantinople.

[Magraev]

Nice colours there Simon - and I agree completely. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/medievalcheers.gif

[Kristaps]

attack Syria in the first turn and start building inns in antioch, tripoli and palestine; start a fort in arabia right away. the conflict with the turks will will the inns in a turn or two so you have good quality troops nearby if needed (and since you have no fort in these provinces to start with, the likelihood of mercs appearing is higher) once the fort in arabia is done: start pumping camels out of there. proceeding from syria into rum or further or pleading for truce is your choice. meanwhile, massed camels from egypt can push your borders west-wards consolidating muslim holdings in north africa all the way to marocco.

[Tozama]

Having played Egypt on expert many times I echo the consensus: Attack Syria turn 1 and wipe out the Turks non-stop with no waiting. All I would add is that I build a couple Inns early on and buy mercs every turn in order to kill off the Turks as quickly as possible. Once you have Armenia/Rum you can soon build Armenian Hvy Cav. which adds nice complimments to your future armies in the early era.

[katank]

don't palestine start with an inn? whenever I do the kidnap sultan routine with turks, I find an intact inn in Palestine for me to hire some dudes to kill more Eggy.

[Tozama]

One of the starting or nearby Provinces does yes. I thought it was Antioch but I don't remember. I do build a couple more Inns early in game usually though to get that instant/non-sucky army together.

[katank]

have any of you considered the guide forum? there are some good stuff there.

[Martok]

I agree with what Magraev and Simon Appleton said. Conquer Syria immediately, and you can then decide whether to continue going after the Turks or offer them a truce. I've found, however, that it often doesn't matter whether I press the offensive or not, as either one or both of the following things will happen:

1) The Turks tell me to go screw myself when I ask for peace, and I therefore have no choice but to continue; or

2) The Byzantines decide they will "help" me eliminate them and invade from the west. When this happens, it's usually a race between Constantinople and myself as to who can take out the Turks the quickest. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smokin.gif

[RollingWave]

I see... but i preferr not to mass merc abuse if I can ... (not that fair since the AI doesn't do it usually)

BTW... is the syrian assain bonus thing only for VI? i never seem to notice it in my normal MTW games (goddamn no company here in my country bother to get VI in... :( )

[Martok]

If I recall correctly, yes, Syria also has the bonus to assasins in regular Medieval, even if you don't have VI. It's been a long time since I played regular MTW, however, so don't quote me on that


As for "mass merc abuse" (good choice of words, by the way http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/cool.gif ), I also agree that seems like kind of a lame tactic to use--not to mention unrealistic. If you're just conquering Syria without taking the rest of the Turks' lands, however, you shouldn't have to worry too much about having to do that. Since you'll have just reduced your number of "border" provinces from 5 to 3, you should be able to rely on your regular units just fine.

[RollingWave]

Martuke ... but you start with 1 desert archer and will take you at least 2 turns before you could acturally build some more (from a province that takes 3 turns to reinforce syria too) while u need at least 4 turns before you can build anything other than from Egypt... conquering syria with ur initial army isn't that hard part.... acturally holding on to it with only 1 da and no reinforcement against mass horsearcher hell and maye even a early AHC or 2 is....

A bit ot but trying out the abyssian gaurds a bit more i think they might be slightly too underrated... they survive much better than ghazi which will tip the scale on the damage done overall too (obviously... more ppl alive and wacking is better ) espically true if you can't get a good flank/charge.... in these situations ghazis are just horrible cannon folders while abyssians will hold on quiet a while

[mercian billman]

IIRC Syria doesn't have a bonus in regular MTW but, I haven't played in a while either.

I do know you can't pump 5* star assasins out of Syria in regular MTW but, it is possible on VI.

No VI sucks though http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/mecry.gif

[katank]

yep. regular MTW is buggy and refuses to give units that share region bonus the valor and thus Nizaris get their valor from Syria while the assasins don't.

@rollingwave, abyss guards isn't relevant to this discussion as to take syria or not. besides, you only get them in High and at that time, the Eggy start with Syria.

I still respectively disagree as it's almost always possible to draw out the AI for a good flank or rear hit and the ghazis are cheaper and more effective the way I use them.