CKs and Pav. Arbs...

Mkay, CK/CFK takes care of the Cav/Anti-Cav/General Melee part while Arbs are raking up the kills from afar. Normally, that's all I use in a field army (with an occasional sprinkle of a couple of Archers and Light Cavalry).

I gotta say that so far, this has been the ideal Army composition for me, sort of like the Catholic version of Mongol Horde.

My question is, what kind of troop roster can handily beat the CK/CFK/Pav Arb combo?

Yeah, I can see it falling to a flood of Ghazis (and I mean LOTS of Ghazis), but short of that, can anything beat them? Say, in a slightly hilly, lightly fiorested mediterranean map.

but you can only have that that army in the late era, right?

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Originally Posted by elbasto

but you can only have that that army in the late era, right?

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you can build the CK/Pav. arb army in high (from 1205) on. It can certainly be beaten by a jhi army, or by a good combo of heavy spearmen, maa and light cavalry.
No army is unbeatable.

Personally I ignore all missile units and concentrate all my missile fire on melee/cav units. The reason is when a melee starts, I re-aim my missile units to attack their missile units, and the only ones that give any stress to inflict casualties on is pavise units. These I will attempt to attack via flanking with light cav or an expendable unit like urban milita.

Found the AI tends to fire into melees quite often, inflicting casualties on both side.

As for CK's, high morale spearmen or or better pikemen with high armour upgrades on hold position do quite nicely while you flank with a bonus vs armour unit like gallowglasses.

And cannons! Must have cannons! Great for blasting through rows and rows of knights. Want to kill their general right from the start? Blast him with a cannon.

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Originally Posted by rvg

My question is, what kind of troop roster can handily beat the CK/CFK/Pav Arb combo.

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I'd say a combination of Pavise Arbalesters, halbadiers and good quality spear- or pikemen could beat it with some care. The Halbadiers do need some valour or morale bonuses, though.

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Originally Posted by Evil Eddie

Personally I ignore all missile units and concentrate all my missile fire on melee/cav units. The reason is when a melee starts, I re-aim my missile units to attack their missile units, and the only ones that give any stress to inflict casualties on is pavise units. These I will attempt to attack via flanking with light cav or an expendable unit like urban milita.

Found the AI tends to fire into melees quite often, inflicting casualties on both side.

As for CK's, high morale spearmen or or better pikemen with high armour upgrades on hold position do quite nicely while you flank with a bonus vs armour unit like gallowglasses.

And cannons! Must have cannons! Great for blasting through rows and rows of knights. Want to kill their general right from the start? Blast him with a cannon.

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Well, the whole idea behind CKs being so great is the fact that they can be turned into CFKs at will. CFKs will mercilessly slaughter pikes/spears/maa.

I mean yeah, as a raw power of numbers JHI beats both CKs and CFKs, but GETTING JHI in large numbers is problematic at best, while CKs can be spammed from multiple provinces without a problem.

Well, I suppose anyone would admit that you can win the campaign game by spamming a few certain units in large quantities, but those don't need to be Chivalric Knights.
While they are strong, even more so as CFK, they are still a 40 man unit and they can get shot up with crossbows or arbalesters all the same; so a sizeable missile contingent, a few cav, and infantry with some Militia Sergeants will do in most cases, in other words, a standard MP army can win, especially in wooded and/or hilly terrain and skill levels being even.

It is far better to use a good mix of units then to spam just a few. I use CK for calvary only, I never use them as foot Knights. That role is filled by Halbadiers and CMAA.

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Originally Posted by Brutal DLX

Well, I suppose anyone would admit that you can win the campaign game by spamming a few certain units in large quantities, but those don't need to be Chivalric Knights.
While they are strong, even more so as CFK, they are still a 40 man unit and they can get shot up with crossbows or arbalesters all the same; so a sizeable missile contingent, a few cav, and infantry with some Militia Sergeants will do in most cases, in other words, a standard MP army can win, especially in wooded and/or hilly terrain and skill levels being even.

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and

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Originally Posted by m52nickerson

It is far better to use a good mix of units then to spam just a few. I use CK for calvary only, I never use them as foot Knights. That role is filled by Halbadiers and CMAA.

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i agree completely, the fun is really in using the wide variety of units for their specific purposes. CFKs are great anti-cav but only 40 men and susceptible to missiles and AP troops.

Chivs are better as cav, except maybe at a bridge or castle.

ichi:bow:

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Originally Posted by ichi

i agree completely, the fun is really in using the wide variety of units for their specific purposes. CFKs are great anti-cav but only 40 men and susceptible to missiles and AP troops.

Chivs are better as cav, except maybe at a bridge or castle.

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I guess it's my mistake. Maybe I made it sound like I send the CFKs running into a full frontal charge. No. My Knights are there to:

1. Protect the Pav Arbies

2. Mow down the rabble.


CFKs only engage when the enemy charges my Arbies. CKs mop up once the enemy formation are disrupted.

Another odd implication of having armies with large numbers of knights is that AI is far less likely to retreat (since you have so few men), which means more fighting and more ransom.

Also....my casualties are minimal. Along the scale of 73 (knights) to 1300+ enemy (including about 400 prisoners).

Knights rock.

Well, I rather doubt the AI is going to come up with any 16 unit army that's going to beat yours, but that's true of quite a few armies in SP mode. The biggest downside I can think of with an army heavily invested in CK is the expense. You could field a much larger army for the same price. However, the unit limit and technical limitations of MTW really reduces the focus on cost effectiveness in SP. If I could field 270 Militia Sergeants for every 40 CK you brought on the field, I think I'd have an advantage. But if I can only field 60 MS at once (in one slot) and the rest as reinforcements the advantage goes to CK.

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Originally Posted by Vider

Well, I rather doubt the AI is going to come up with any 16 unit army that's going to beat yours, but that's true of quite a few armies in SP mode. The biggest downside I can think of with an army heavily invested in CK is the expense. You could field a much larger army for the same price. However, the unit limit and technical limitations of MTW really reduces the focus on cost effectiveness in SP. If I could field 270 Militia Sergeants for every 40 CK you brought on the field, I think I'd have an advantage. But if I can only field 60 MS at once (in one slot) and the rest as reinforcements the advantage goes to CK.

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eeeeeeeeeeeeeeexactly.

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Originally Posted by rvg

Also....my casualties are minimal. Along the scale of 73 (knights) to 1300+ enemy (including about 400 prisoners).

Knights rock.

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In my battles I get the same results. Less then 100 dead on my side, and a lot of dead on theres. The only difference is my armies cost less, and are less expensive to replace.

You can use pretty much what ever soots you to bet the AI. Thats the nice part about single player, you can use a few troops, or a mix. There is no real "must use" units..

Since were talking about CK in this thread, which would indicate your talking about the great ColdKnight himself, I will attempt to bestow wisdom.

I have led many other Coldknights into battle and I will tell you that the key to beating us is armour piercing attack, especially my little foot knight brothers. So as already mentioned JHI are very good and very flashy but there are other ways indeed if you don't like flashing and very good. I believe that I have faced certain types of militia with armour piercing attack, but only use these from the rear, never achor the line with these puny big sharp blade stick weilding men. Also england has some very nice billmen when can hold a line.

Aso don't worry about the Pav. Arbs, they won't hurt if you don't believe they can hurt you.:san_grin:

I love halberdiers, theyre one of the best infantry units in the game... but thier morale is very poor and so they need valour to really be put to good use.

You guys should really try playing multiplayer, it will give you a good insight into the kind of armies which are most effective overall.

in MP a good army must be versitile and also cost effective, which is why an army made entirely of ck , cfk and pavs is not a good option

although in campaign mode i agree it could probably deal with most threats... but then the battlefield ai is a so poor it wouldn't put up a fight even if it did field a decent army ! :P