What the heck, no chivalric knights?

[Mongothegreat]

I'm playing a campaign as the Venitians. The whole time I'm waiting to get dismounted chivalric knights, I've built every possible building in my citadels, and no chivalric knights available. It's now late 1300s and I've taken over every settlement and am fighting the Timurids, and still no chivalric knights. Is this some kind of a bug? I don't have any patches installed. Also, are canon towers more effective then ballista towers? They seem to turn off after a set time.

[PBI]

I suspect Venice don't get CKs, not many factions do since they are top-end cavalry rather than standard units available to most factions like they were in MTW. Many factions get something similar as their top cavalry such as Famiglia Ducale or English Knights; I suppose the Venetian equivalent would be Broken Lances (the actual top-end Venetian cavalry are Stradiots, which are elite light cavalry).

As for cannon towers, they are brutally effective at long range but do suffer from a minimum range, which makes the useless once the enemy are at the gates and on the walls (which in my experience is where the real business of a siege assault takes place). Perhaps this is what is causing them to stop firing? Personally I actually prefer ballistas for out-and-out siege defense since they will keep firing in the killing zones around the gate and on the walls, but cannon towers are excellent for sally battles since the enemy will not approach within the minimum range; instead they will form up in the range of the towers and get slaughtered expecting you to sally out and attack them. This is something of an exploit though.

[Quintus.JC]

The Venitians doesn't get Chivilric knights, the two northern Italian states are notorious for their bad cavalry. Broken Lances are good but very expensive to maintain, Stradiots are too light armoured, although their speed and mace is a big asset, the other ones being Fedual Knights and Men at Arms, both cavalry are fairly avearge but are quite affective in battle.

[TheLastPrivate]

You always have the option of using the templar or hospitallers for heavy cavalry needs.

[PBI]

You always have the option of using the templar or hospitallers for heavy cavalry needs.

And let's face it, those two units are better than most factions' best cavalry anyway.

[Quintus.JC]

And let's face it, those two units are better than most factions' best cavalry anyway.

Plus they gain extra nice exprience bonus if you constract Master or Guild headquarters.

[TheLastPrivate]

Swordmaster HQ + Templar HQ = profit.

[Cardinal Bard]

Im not much of a crusader so really never get the knight HQs as Venice

Broken Lances are good enough and your usually earning enough to pay for them any way

Men at Arms i find are pretty average compared to broken lances but that could just be the castle city availablility clouding my mind

[Old Geezer]

If one does not have a cavalry unit as good as Hospitalers or Templars fighting the Mongols/Timurids is much more difficult unless one has very good fast cavalry or one just remains in and assaults fortified settlements.

[Flying Pig]

It is a pain, but the awesome infantry Venice gets compensates. Plus, the only time you really need cavalry is against the Mongols/Timurids, and if you're in a position to fight them you probably have at least one Knightly Order.

[Mongothegreat]

That's too bad. I guess it's a holdover from original MTW that I assumed all catholic factions get CK. If anyone knows what factions do get them, I'd like to know. I know I've fought against Spain who had CK. Speaking of the Mongols/timurids, what is the best strategy to defeat them, when money is not an issue. I'm currently trying muskateers and mounted crossbowmen, but with little success.

[Flying Pig]

Infantry get killed at an appalling rate, but against élite cavalry, heavy knights and mounted missiles the mongols die easily if you can keep the initiative. The best method is to rout then kill the infantry, while holding the horses, then bringing the anti-foot arm found to shatter the Mongol cavalrymen. Sometimes in defence of a city polearms/pikes and elite missiles work, but you need heavy cavalry to beat them in any engagement.

Killing the Timurids is hard. They have the best artilley of anyone (the rochet launcher) for field battles and the single most deadly unit in the game (elephent cannons) and super-heavy cavalry. If you can find enough guns to stop the supers, then wait for them to die, and then treat the engagement like a normal field battle you should have some success.

EDIT: 300th Post!

[Eikon the Magistrate]

Barring a website to look up all units for every faction, you can easily determine this by setting up a custom battle. You can select any faction you wish and see their available forces and their stats. You do not need to load into the battle and can go back whenever you wish and select your faction again.

I like to whittle away at the Timurids b4 engaging in large field battles,reduce or eliminate as many elephants as possible and sometimes if I have anything left,some of their Hvy Cav.Then you can take em out in the field with your regular stacks. I have only stopped the Timurids multi-stacks on arrival vs my 1 1/2 army cold in 1 field battle and it was a bridge defense. For the Mongols I prefer to defend w/e city/castle they are foolish enough to attack.

The most effective, but also most boring way to gaurantee victory is to sally.
You can sally attack both the Mongols and Timurids and destroy 3 or 4 of their stacks at a time and every other reinforcement horde later if you have ballista or preferably cannon towers in your city. Cannon towers in fact make it nearly impossible to lose a sally if you are patient. The Mongols are not well equipped to siege anything, for the Timurids make sure to run the elephants out of ammo b4 you sally some missles or militia of your own.

[PBI]

Just from memory, Spain, France and Denmark all get Chivalric Knights; I think Poland and Hungary might as well. Many factions get something which is virtually identical but called something else (usually a point or two different stats, or get armour-piercing maces as secondary weapons instead of swords), such as Portuguese Knights, English Knights, Famiglia Ducale, Imperial Knights etc.

[Nebuchadnezzar]

lol Mongothegreat if you are not playing the gold version then you need to patch your game ASAP b/c the unpatched game is terribly broken including the ballista/cannon towers, CTD's fighting timurids, peasants beating DFK's and the list goes on.

Defend at choke points such as mountains & river crossing. Its way more satisying to see an entire enemy army insta-rout.