Alemanni help please vs Vandals

[Razor1952]

Vanilla BI vh/vh

I've progressed to take 8 provinces from the WRE including Ravenna and Mediolanum and its 377ad. Soumar is still alive ( multi-star leader general for Alemanni).

Of course the Vandals have now attacked . My problem is that my army of Upgraded lomabard archers/spearmen occasional alan mercs vet cavalry beserks and 3 units of generals is having trouble with the Vandals.


The weirdest thing is that if I auto-resolve I win and if I fight I get annihilated. Thats pretty unusual as I would normally do much better than an autoresolve.

My normal tactics are to pepper them with my archers, perhaps use a peasant unit as sacrifice to their horse archers. Attack front on with infantry and flank with cavalry if I can't provoke them to attack(which I couldn't get the vandals to do).

BTW I had little trouble with the WRE even wiping out a 1st Cohort( provided I had similar numbers)

I prefer upgraded lombard archers to chosen archers as their missile power is better though are worse at melee, do other people prefer chosen archers?


Also BTW any thoughts on Alemanni dogs and Berserkers welcome. Thes units seem pretty susceptible to missile making them less useful IMHO.

Any advice for dealing with Vandals as Alemanni please.

[CountMRVHS]

First of all, you are NUTS for playing VH/VH. :skull:

Just had to say that.

I only ever play H/H, so take my advice for what it's worth. My most recent BI campaign was with the Alemanni as well, and I managed to keep my head above water for quite some time before moving on to a different game.

What is the rough composition of a typical opposing Vandal army? Are they in horde, or non-horde? I'm guessing tons of HAs, some crappy horde cav and inf, and possibly some decent heavy inf. Your biggest problem is their HAs and whatever generals they've brought along.

I think you've got the right instinct with the archers: go for the ones that have better missile capability/range. Can't remember -- are the ranges different for chosen/lombard archers? Your instinct to pepper them with archers is the right one, but you might get into trouble if they have overwhelming numbers of HAs. In that case, I'd prefer to close with my melee troops fast, and aim for the general. The HAs will scatter out of your way, and the enemy general usually is a sucker for being targeted for a charge. Get him involved in a melee and slam him with everything you've got, if possible. Once he's dead you'll have an easier time of it, obviously.

One problem might be your infantry line-up. You've probably noticed that the Alemanni infantry is pretty weak until you get up to Chosen Axemen, and you didn't mention having any of those guys. Berserkers are cool but I wouldn't have more than a couple units in any of my armies -- they're too unpredictable and tend to get themselves into suicidal situations, then rout, and end up damaging the morale of my other troops. The Spear Warband is as weak as they come, but at least they have a big shield to protect them from those arrows. You might use them to soak up missile fire while you send a detachment of Chosen Axemen to do some nasty work on the flanks or against the enemy general. Finally, Night Raiders *might* give you an edge morale-wise against their infantry. Not sure how it works on VH, though.

I'd use Wardogs, myself. Again, only a unit or two per army. Just send them at a weak nearby unit and, once the dogs have connected, quickmarch the handlers back behind your lines. At least they offer a distraction, and used in conjunction with a couple Night Raiders might help rout the enemy infantry.

I can't believe your 3 units of generals are having trouble, though, especially under Suomar.

Here's what I'd do in a nutshell. First, forget about their HAs. Just ignore them. March your infantry against their infantry. The goal here is to hold up the enemy inf. Meanwhile, send your awesome cav and generals all against their general/heavy cav. The HAs will be annoying, but they'll be getting out of your way in skirmish mode, so just leave them be. Try to kill the general first, then work on the infantry. Lastly, worry about the HAs.

One last thing about your cav. Just like the description says, your Lancers *are* weak in a long-term melee. So pull out your cav if they don't break the unit in a few seconds, or when your cav starts to lose 5 or more men (I play Large unit sizes, btw).

This advice of course is based on assumptions about your army and the enemy army. If you've got more details you can give, that might help me with some ideas. I hate that every horde faction can make tons of HAs. Doesn't seem realistic to me, and it certainly is annoying. Good luck!

CountMRVHS

[x-dANGEr]

Oh and, I play on VH and I know hor crazy units are on it. So one advice: Avoid being charged by the enemy general head on.. If you must, make the unit he's going to charge stand in loose formation, and put support behind it for direct assistance.

[snevets]

Why is it nuts to play VH/VH? So you're units always run away and you lose more often in battle and very unfortunate stuff happens to you all the time. It makes winning all the better!

[Razor1952]

Thanks for the replies, particularly Counts


Progressed to 15 provinces now and killed off both Vandals and Goth Hordes, as well as beaten back several full stacks of ERE, boy everyone seems Pi$$ed with me.!.


Still having trouble handling their HA in the hordes, I think morale hit on VH is the problem combined with the faction of course. maybe those silly Golden band guys will do better.


The weirdest thing is that autoresolve is doing much better for me than fighting the battles myself, that I can't explain as in many years of total war battles thats never happened before.

BTW I've always played on VH/VH so I have no handle on how different it is to other levels. I thought the main thing was a morale hit for the human player.


One very funny(ha ha & unusual) thing was one army of HA (3-4 units) when it ran out of arrows attacked by swimming across the river, of course I stationed some spears on the bank and the HA just swam around an around till they tired out and all yes all drowned. The horses turned turtle and chucked their riders off and then floated down the river.

[Mr Frost]

...Still having trouble handling their HA in the hordes, I think morale hit on VH is the problem combined with the faction of course. maybe those silly Golden band guys will do better...
Most units have a base moral of 5 , Night Raiders have 11 and the Golden Band 13 . To give you some comparative perspective , Chosen Axemen and Noble Warrier have only 9 and Lombard Beserkers 15 .

Both units could greatly help your armies moral woes .
Night Radiers are better than most credit them and the Golden band not only has better moral but a huge attack stat {16 !} and fairly good defense .

On the mention of Beserkers , I consider them fire and forget troops only good for one "move" and largly prefer war hounds on campaign given the dogs themselves are all that need risk actual combat {so the hanlers often survive without loss} and regenerate losses after a battle {talk about fast breeding , must be battery dogs :p} .

[Razor1952]

Thats very interesting I never know those morale modifyers, thank you Frost.

BTW do you know the morale differences on playing levels?

[Mr Frost]

BTW do you know the morale differences on playing levels?
I'm sure I read them somewhere once , but I cannot remember the numbers now . I think they might be in a thread on the RTR.org forums . I'm quite sure the moral modifyers for difficulty settings were revealed by one of the developers some time ago .