Crusades Campaign: Antioch

[frogbeastegg]

This topic is for the Principality of Antioch faction in Kingdoms expansion's Crusades campaign.

[hellraiser]

Finished it in 127 turns. M/M.

Strategy employed:
1. clean the western turkish possessions (i had also to kill the mongols since they allied with the turks)
2. Keep the egyptians in check in the south (which will steamroll certain Jerusalem Kingdom's cities) -> Krak de chevaliers was super upgraded and crancked out massive numbers of knights.
3. Kill off the turks by capturing their central asia minor towns together with a well timed amphibious invasion of Constantinople (to meet the final objective)
4. click,click,click for 10 turns to end the game :)

Diplomacy:
You start off allied with JK, which in my game bever betrayed me.
I allied asap with the byzantines to secure my northern flank which has very important cash producing cities.

Assassins
Mass produced them because the numbers of imams and assassins and whatnot the AI buys is sickening.

Spies
Tons!
You need to have that FOW cleared for obvious reasons.

Navy
Minimum necessary to ship troops and engage ships threatening my ports.

Building/Troops

I decided to play a longer game and upgrade a lot of the cities/castles.
The troops were well taken care of: the battered (and xped) ones were retreated and retrained instead of merged to another ones.
No rush game this time for me (although on this difficulty, a rush game is the bes option imho)

note - i haven't found a way to upgrade the armour of the knighs despite building the very last of the smithy. I mean no cool shield was observed on any of my knights units...which made me very sad :)

[Henry707]

Morning All,

I am some turns into an Antioch game so I thought a few observations may help out.

So, you've chosen Antioch - you've got your reasons & you are faced with quite a spread of cities, castles & regions. The note above gives some advice on who to tackle next so I'll stick with a few pointers.

(1) Unit Mix - this could be a big problem if you are not careful - you've a real mix in there & if you don't get some sort of standardization you could end up with bits everywhere. Also be aware that some units are very costly & money needs managing!!! Decide on your mix of armies - noting where they can be re-trained etc.

(2) Krak de Chevaliers - be aware of it's importance to your units...you'll see why in the game - don't want to spoil it. Can easier be built into a super-fortress. Have a look on google at the real castle - nice...

(3) Alliance with Jerusalem - a Christian ally in the East. You need them so keep them sweet & honour the agreement.

(4) Help is on the Way - crusades will arrive to help you. Some great units but of course they also cost on an ongoing basis. Think about what you want to do with them carefully.

Overall, I don't want to give stuff away but prepare your mini-empire carefully. Merchants earn some but not much for me so far. Murder the Imans at will & train priests. Focus on your core cities - you've got some miles away, maybe cut them off for a bit - you can't build up/defend everywhere at once.

My one tactical tip is that the Turks have a much more robust frontline now, they have beefed up with some good heavy units so don't expect your men to just trawl through - heavy-style!

Good Luck

Henry

[ViolentRebellion]

The best thing Antioch has going for them is Krak de Chevaliers, Regent Reynald and Philip.

-Krak, as stated above, is the best troop factory in the game. In fact, I only built my attack forces there for first 50 or so turns. It was my only castle, made everything else cities as money can get tight fighting the endless horde of Turks. Used militia and archers to defend everywhere else.

-Regent Reynald, if you keep him happy, is a force. His dread rating is always maxed. Keeping him on the offensive with a large army of hospitallars scares the crap out of the AI. Many times I found myself using him as bait to keep the Turks from attacking my cities as they were forced to play on the defensive with him running around with 1,000 troops. I usually had him rolling with the two unique units, the Canons of the Holy Sepulcher and the Marshal of the Hospitallars, lots of Hosp. spears, lots of knights and lots of hosp. crossbowmen. I play a very ruthless game with Reynald and he ended up being King Reynald Lord of Terror. He alone with that dread rating routes tons of enemies. Good times.

-Philip is a good general, with a great special ability. But his best asset is in a 1-2 punch with Reynald. Turks will send some big armies to challenge you and on VH/VH they're very smart to surround you and outnumber you on the campaign map. Having Philip and Reynald work in unison on one front gives you a potent strike force. Reynald sacks the cities and Philip does the cleanup and assimilation of the exterminated cities(Philips chivalry rating works great here) but they both fight the large battles.

I don't like the idea of having one great general on one front and one on another. I employed a tactic of maximum force to take out the eastern Turkish cities on my march to Baghdad, and sending smaller less advanced forces with lesser Generals or no general to the southern, eastern coastal cities of Turkey for strictly economic purposes.

All in all, this is one of the most fun factions to play with. Lot of options where to expand, the Turks are a tough opponent and the Mongols are you final test. And unlike the Jerusalem campaign, I found that my ally needed help a lot more than I thought, and it is important to help. I found while playing as the KOJ, Antioch more than took care of itself, but then playng as Antioch, Jerusalem gets spanked by Egypt. I had to retake Jerusalem twice. Both times I gave it back to KOJ, because, well, I didn't want to deal with 2 seperate Jihads. So I left a large garrison in a fotr nearby just north of Jerusalem and everytime Egypt or the Turks were beating my ally, I would intervene and turn the tide.

-Canons of the Holy Sepulcher are great. Nuisance to have to retrain them constantly so I don't lose them, as with the Marshal units, but without a doubt the best melee infantry in your campaign. Use them as them wisely.

Decide early which way you're going to expand, and focus on it. The Turks are no enemy to be taken lightly, they've got large armies with lots of ranged units that can chop you up. Be ready to take heavy casualties when you close on them, they're agile and precie ranged units are nasty and aggravating. But once you do close, feel confident that you're troops are better and once you get hospitallar knights, its over. The Turks are definately stronger to the east of you and a bit weaker in the west FWIW.

[S.Selim_1]

Hey..i wana ask a question about the expansion in general...since the 4 campaigne maps are smaller..does that make them smaller and easier than the M2TW without the kingdom expansion? coz i think it's more fun to play the longer version...can someone plzzzzzzzz help me coz iam not sure to buy kingdoms yet:dizzy2:

[ViolentRebellion]

Hey..i wana ask a question about the expansion in general...since the 4 campaigne maps are smaller..does that make them smaller and easier than the M2TW without the kingdom expansion? coz i think it's more fun to play the longer version...can someone plzzzzzzzz help me coz iam not sure to buy kingdoms yet:dizzy2:

Its smaller but still huge. Probabley over 50 provinces in the Crusades or Brittania campaigns.

[Katana]

is there any way to get your canons of the holy sepulchre back if they die? my last few veterans just died squashing a rebel force outside mosul, which they just took along with a large army under phillip. i should be able to recruit a new unit in krak now, yes? yes? please?

[Katana]

bump

also, because i need to vent

HOW THE HECK DOES PHILLIP DIE WHEN FIGHTING A FRIGGIN' MANGONEL CREW? it wasn't even like he got cooked, either: his unit was flanking the actual crew, and he somehow died on impact. i swear the ai cheats sometimes.

is anyone else finding mangonels useless as nipples on a breastplate? they seem strangely effective for the ai...

[Boyar Son]

bump

also, because i need to vent

HOW THE HECK DOES PHILLIP DIE WHEN FIGHTING A FRIGGIN' MANGONEL CREW? it wasn't even like he got cooked, either: his unit was flanking the actual crew, and he somehow died on impact. i swear the ai cheats sometimes.

is anyone else finding mangonels useless as nipples on a breastplate? they seem strangely effective for the ai...

lol

MTW2- flaming missles miss all the time right?

Kingdoms- Flaming mangonels missle hits my general dead on, only HIM!!

Ya the AI is jerk :P

[Ignoramus]

Newton's Third Law of Gravity: What gets hit hits back.

[G^2]

I found playing as Antioch rather easy on M/M. The alliance with KoJ will last throughout the game, so there is one secure border to your south. Also, your income is great. Antioch's economy is easy to get up and running.

First Moves:
Take as many rebel provinces in the area as you can. I combined all my troops into about three stacks and started producing more; one for the north west (Antioch), one for the South (created from Arce), and one for the East (Edessa). I focused on the rebel near KoJ first then took the city next to Antioch. After a turn or two a jehad will be called and 1 and 1/2 stacks of Turks will appear around Alleppo and Antioch. Once all rebels are eaten up and the treat from the Jehad repelled, its time to go on the offensive against the Turks.

Mid-Game
I focused on the Eastern Turks first because the cities were richer and this secured a second border which allowed me to focus on a single front in Anatolia. When fighting the Turks I used all calvary armies to counter their HA. The Turks infantry are weak so your Heavy Calvary should be able to take them out. Even spearmen if you hit them with two units of elite knights. Use light calvary (mounted sergeants) for the HA and flanking. When you take out the Eastern Turks start preparing for the Mongols. Byzantium should have approached you for an alliance which you should except. Between the two of you it should be easy to sandwich the western Turks, who are suffering from a poor economy.

End Game
The tricky part is holding Constatinople for 10 turns. Once the Turks are eliminated the Mongols should be arriving (I lucked out and won as the first Mongol stacks entered the map around Bagdad). You don't want to fight a two front war against Byzantium so, wait for Venice to gain control of the City first. I sailed two stacks, some priests, and a good chivalry general to Constatniople and then waited until Venice took the city, promptly sieged and EXTERMINATED the city. I tried sacking the city my first try and quickly lost it to rebellion. By exterminating the city it easily stayed green for the remaining ten turns, by replacing all those Orthodox with Catholics (no offense).

Mic.
-Regent Ronald would always rebel on me (two games) within one or two turns outside a castle. Couldn't figure out how to keep the man happy.
-Philip is excellent as a general, perhaps the most powerful Hero in the campaign. Use him as much as possible.
-If your looking for a challenge, try quickly conquering the Eastern Turks and then waiting until the Mongols arrive to finish the game.
-Spam priests and assassins. Use the priests to convert your next target and the assassins to take out any non-catholic holy man.
-Don't worry about your reputation, KoJ won't betray you and the others don't matter.
-There are great merchant resources in Egypt, by the end of the game I was getting around 300 florins on one resource with mid-level merchants, beware Egyptian merchants thought. Also, even thought your relationship is bad with Egypt and your ally is at war with them, you can still get trade rights.
-All calvary stacks are your friend, easily re-trained and can ground any Turkish or rebel field army into the ground. Use all infantry stacks behind the Cav. to take cities and castles.

[leonardo]

HI:2thumbsup:
I had a problem with the large mass of missile cav. and artillary:furious3:
i mean the heavy cav and armored nights cant keep up so i just wait for their heavy inf. butby then half my men are gone (sometimes my general gets hit:shame:) and my crossbowmen reload to slow for my standards so can anyone give me advice on battle schemes.:help:

[G^2]

Hey Leonardo,

I personally found that all calvary armies worked very well against the Turks in the field. To prevent missile casualties you have to quickly get into melee with the enemy. Your knights (Hosplitars and Knights of Edassa) can easily smash Turkish lines with ease, even their spearmen in a frontal charge. Take three or four unites of mounted sergeants to take down their horse archers and have the rest of the stack consist of heavy knights. You could even use some of those mounted sergeants for flanking to cause the Turkish line to route. You will still take some loses from arrow fire, but they will be lessend because of the speed of your calvary. This worked very well for me in my campaign, although my mounted sergeants need to be retrain after almost every battle.

[leonardo]

Hi G^2 thanks for the advice, so you dont use infantry at all or just if you are or being sieged?:book:

the cavalry idea makes a lot of sense a against a mainly lightly armored army:idea2:

[G^2]

Yeah, for field battles the extra movement and speed of all cav. stacks seemed to make more sense. I would then have a all infantry stack that would take out the cities while my Cav. stacks fought off reinforcements. This is expecially practical when you reach the far easter end of the map, around Bagdad, because the territories are spread out more.

p.s.
I don't know how well all cav. stacks would work against the mongols, which have better armor and moral than the Turks. From what I've read here on the Org. the best way to take out the Mongols is defending bridges and cities/castles at choke points. In general, an army crossbow (ap ability) and spears (anti cav.) would work well. Search the Org. for the Mongol Killers Tread also one in the Medieval 2 Fact and Strategy tips by econ21.
G^2

[leonardo]

Thanks once more G^2 your great thats an awesome campaign map strategy tou know your stuff.:book:

[Anonymous II]

I have a small question:

Does Antioch, Byzantium, Venice and Jerusalem have princesses... being christian factions? (I don't own Kingdoms yet).

Me

[Alexzander]

What difficulty should i be playing Antioch. Have played RTW and MEII so i am no newcomer to either. But from my experience a VH campaign just means the AI spams loads of armies.

Any advise?

[Myth]

VH/VH on any game, any expansion, any faction. Anything less is you giving up. The AI is stupid anyway, so long as you don't autocalc you will always trounce it.

[Alexzander]

Yes in the end because it was my first try at this campaign i choose H/VH and i am not finding it very challenging.

So unless you are a total newby to Medieval II go for VH/VH