Praise to the camel!

[Sir Price]

I started my first muslim campaign a few days ago (Egypt, hard, GA). I have of course met the Egyptians before, as the danes when they showed up in Novgorod (they were BIG!), and multiple times as Spain, and I have always had a healthy respect for the Bedouin Camels. They are very annoying against my cavalry-heavy spanish armies, especially because they almost always show up in vast numbers, and now I know why: they are dirt cheap! These smelly things cost nothing, and are scary good at what they do. I was really surprised by that, as I always figured they were the muslim equivalent of feudal cavalry, or something like that, and it turns out they are peasants on camels! I faced a Turkish reemergence, following a little back and forth with a french crusade, and they had tons of Armenian Heavy Cavalry. No problem, just micro the camels a bit, and the AHC, as well as the rest of the turks, were sent running.

So who needs spears, here's to my knew anti-cav favorite: the Bedouin Camels!

[derF]

Many horse units will suffer severely from a frontal camel attack because the horses are afraid of them (maybe the smell?). As a result, when attacking camels with horses you often need to have additional support to deal with them.

On a negative side for the camels, they are one of the most units vulnerable to missile fire! Rock, paper, scissors anyone?

[Mithrandir]

Behold, the camelmaster.
I'm still not sure wether I'm proud of that title ;).

I've used Camels since the day I started to play online & people learned to respect them. They are great, I used 3 units in my almo army, which was enough to counter up to 5 or 6 enemy cav head on,and defeat them, and left me space for my own cav...and money for pumped up militia sergs :D.

Beware of horse archers though (and spearmen duh), anything else they can counter, they can even hold vs. the more elite inf. for a while.

[_Aetius_]

The negatives to camels unfortunately outway the positives, everyone knows how weak they are against any kind of arrow or javelin fire, they are slower than cavalry, have poor morale and really advanced heavy cavalry have no problems with dealing with bedouins. They just cant hold there own, especially when flanked.

Id still rather have feudal knights or chivalric knights on my flanks than bedouins, just to weak.

[Mithrandir]

hehehe....hehehehehehehehe....
Bwhahahaha.... I'll reinstall MTW,VI and the patches just to prove you wrong Aetius...
It's about high time I started playing again.
V2 camels can easily take on any melee cavalry unit and they cost less.

You bring your cavalry on your flanks and I'll bring my camels...but not on the flanks...
That's where my cav is...

[Sensei Warrior]

Ahh yes camels as the Egypts I love him, nice to crush any mounted tin can in two seconds flat. Tired of those high powered knights crushing your army to bits? Play the Egyptians, and your army will say, "Where did those Knights go?", and you will respond, "I believe my camel is standing on him."

As anybody else grr those smelly mounted peasants can be a pain. Luckily I come well prepared when I go to fight any faction that employs camels. I tote along contingents of archers and spears and mostly leave my mounted units home. And typically, the eggies and myself as well will produce them in hordes.

[CherryDanish]

Going hardcore on camels isn't only gross, it gets really ugly on castle assaults.

How close does a cav unit have to be before it takes the morale hit against camels?

[Sir Price]

Yes, archers are a pain of course, as always, but the Saharan Cavalry take care of those. And I also try to bring a good amount of mounted missile troops, to bring chaos to spear units before i charge whatever I got handy into their backs. The turks brought a lot of archers, but they never really played a role, as they turned an ran when their heavy cavalry came running past them. And as for the speed of camels, well, the AHC actually rallied once or twice on the way out, but by then they were depleted and disorganised, and really no problem at all, and camels are still fast enough to chase down archers while trying to keep up with the horses.

All in all I must say I really enjoy the new tactics I have to employ as the Egyptians, as so far I have only played as catholics, with spears to soak up charges and arrows, and heavy infantry and cavalry to break the enemy. It works. But the skirmishing with a lot of mounted troops is just a lot of fun to me!

[_Aetius_]

Lol well you can try and prove me wrong if you like but the amount of times ive routed units of camels far exceeds the amount of times camels have routed my feudal knights or chivalric knights, certainly royal knights. I havent even mentuoned gothic knights and the knights of the crusading orders lol all of which massacre camels, the impact of a frontal charge from these advanced knights causes massive damage to poorly armoured camels.

Poor morale bedouin camel warriors against excellent morale excellent attack heavily armoured knights mis match :P

[ah_dut]

mate, look at the relative prices, 125 IIRC for a camel and 475 and 875 for a fuedal or chivalric...not a mismatch on price either, you can get far more upgrades and more money on the camel

[Sir Price]

Yes, with the difference in cost and support, I would say the camels are much more cost-effective. Plus I have a tendency to loose a lot of knights if I don't keep an eye on them at all times. This is also true of camels, but it doesn't hurt as badly...

[ichi]

When MTW came out I played a lot of campaigns before going online, and had decided that camels were cheap (therefore poorer in quality than expensive knights) slow (I like speed) big (vulnerable to missiles) and low morale (easy to rout).

I hadn't been using them to their best advantage when I campaigned as Muslims, and to top it off I had failed to realize that the AI isn't really very good (compared to some humans) at using Camels either.

So, when I went online and faced some camels I got my horses ass handed to me (prolly more than once by Mith lol) and online the routing of your cav can lead to a chain rout of your entire army. Well I'm a fast relatively fast learner (ignore howls of laughter from the balcony please) and soon came to respect these ugly awful stinky spitty humpy beasts and their peasant riders.

To this day I really only dread facing JHI, CFKs, and Camels. Sure there are other units like LBs, VG, Swiss Pikes, Gothic Knights that I pay close attention to, but when I see JHI or CFKs I immediately try to focus my missiles on them because they can hold their own against infantry and really rip up horsies.

Of course Camels are vulnerable to missiles (and, like equestrians, to polearms like JHI).

But, even today, Camels make up an important anti-cav portion of some elite armies online. The fact that after after a few years some of the best online players still rely on Camels is a testiment indeed.



ichi

[Saracen_Warrior]

I love all Egyptian Units. Expecially Hashishan. Camels also make good general soften dont forget that. I guess when your a peasant you have lots of time to study warfare.

[Saracen_Warrior]

As egypt you should take constantinopel and georgia as soon as possilble, then youll have the msot defessnsible empire ever, just make sure to get ships to protect against back door invasions. And put like 2 armies in georgia to protect against horde. Then build up and tech up. After this youu can build up your army and take over europe without ever having to resupply your units if you build enough. Also build lots of jihads, you can launch multiple jihads at provinces. Then invade any easy provinces even if thyell get taken right back, so you can send jihads there way and get free nizaries and kwarzmian which seem to show up a lot in jihads in early game.

[Mithrandir]

Ichi :
JHI are no problem at all, they tire fast and beefed up Militia sergs (about the same price) take them down without too much problems...CFK same story. Camels, well you have to keep your cav away from them at all cost or your battle will be lost.

important!
I perceive camels as being the best units in the game, not per se cause they are so strong,fast or whatever, but because they are the deciding factor in my 'perfect' army (nearly never lost with it in dozens&dozens of online games). Because I have camels, the enemy's cav is nearly useless unless very well employed. Hence I don't need to rely on my own cav to take his out.

My cav&camels 'therefore don't need as much upgrading and I save money for the main punch of my army, my inf.

I'm only talking about online play btw.

Poor morale bedouin camel warriors against excellent morale excellent attack heavily armoured knights mis match :P
Armor doesn't matter, that's just to counter arrows.
Try this : take a V2 camel (I believe the price is around 600) and a v0 Chiv knight (675). The camels will win. And I'm not even talking about desert :D.

[_Aetius_]

I dont know, maybe im just a cavalry general at heart lol, when i go egypt i dont train camels after say 30 or 40 years, i stick to mamluks and ghulams cant have hurt since i won the game :P i know camels are strong against cavalry but heres an example of the flaws of most muslim armies.

Ive never seen chivalric knights be routed by BCW in my experience the charge of the cavalry kills enough camles that they are worn down and routed quicker than the cavalry are, the difference is the charge.

The armour isnt just about arrows defence, some cavalry just wont die whereas the camels lack of defence means sometimes even feudal men at arms can defeat them, ive just been playing as the sicilians against the egyptians then and my feudal men at arms caused mayhem, whereas if the enemy had charged with ghulams my infantry would have been surely routed.

Guess its down to preference in the end but i feel more secure with feudal or chivalric knights on my flanks than BCW in most situations anyway. :)

[Mithrandir]

I guess the misunderstanding comes from the fact you play singleplayer an I play online.

I can imagine in offline games camels aren't as effective because you can't chose to upgrade their valour and you don't have the same budget as your enemy.

Armour is only to counter arrows, defence is used for melee calculations.

[_Aetius_]

Id play online again if it wasnt full of annoying n00bies or laggers *sigh* many a wasted hour.

[Mithrandir]

We can arrange a match, I'm not sure how my connection is these days, but it used to be decent enough...

My online name is Glorfindel, should you chose to come online...

[Ludens]

How close does a cav unit have to be before it takes the morale hit against camels?

The 'frightened by camels' penalty takes the form of a penalty to attack and defence when fighting camels. It's not the men that's afraid of the camel, it's the horses.

[macsen rufus]

No-one's mentioned here the BIG factor for camels - terrain. They rock in the desert, but get seriously underpar once you go further afield. Not only do they scare horses (bye bye Sir Crusader the Broiled), but they get combat bonuses for the desert, and more (I believe) in sandstorms. Once you get to arid they lose the bonus, and lush gives them a penalty.

I just love the irony of these little Bedouin peasants routing those souped up, noble Chiv Knights and Hospitallers etc etc etc

[Red Harvest]

I'm a camel lover too, but my play has been SP. Camels are very effective in the arid/desert climates. They thrash knights even and they are cheap. I don't use them much in temperate climates, because they take various penalties for wet environments.

The desert is all about light troops of course. When playing a non-muslim faction and preparing for desert conquest, I always keep a few provinces at minimal armour levels so that I can build all sorts of units that don't fatigue too quickly. Armour is mostly a detriment in the desert unless you can win with a quick strike. Light cav, camels, and horse archers are quite powerful in the desert. This is one of the things that MTW simulates very well compared to RTW.

[macsen rufus]

I'm purely SP, too, battles don't mean anything outside of a campaign to my mind..... nothing like going in to kill THAT unit of Halberdiers becasue it's lead by the enemy's Grand Chamberlain or whatever.

They say the first rule of war is "never march on Moscow", but I reckon "Don't crusade in the desert" comes a pretty close second!!!

When playing a Catholic faction, my desert campaigns usually start by bribing lots of camels, plus the lightweight guys like Highland Clansmen, Slav Warriors, etc (depending on what provinces I have by then...) and even lots of mercenaries. Unlike many, I do find mercenaries.... handy.

Currently I'm head to head with the Almos trying to take my (Turkish) Tunisia. I expect another invasion next time I turn the game on again, but I wish I had some berber camels. That's the hardest part of the Almo army to deal with. Anyway, they're on their last heir now, so should soon be lots of rebel berber camels to bribe next year, he he.

[TwinMfg]

I played an Eggy SP campaign and quickly learned the value of the camel; they easily defeated all the Turks horses. Quite handily.

But I grew a bit contemptuous of the AI. In my current game (French, Early, GA), I have set out to build my Krak Shack in Tripoli. By around 1135 I have ships all the way to the Mid East. I'm ready to launch a crusade. My admiral reports that Tripoli is lightly defended by a few peasants and camels. Antioch and Palestine are swarming with camels, augmented by 3 archers, 2 nubian spears, 1 ACH, 1 UM, and 2-3 napthas. There were, in all, about 25 camels in the area.

Well, in the typical european fashion, I snubbed my nose at the desert filth and launched my crusade. It consisted of 1 crusader knights (don't remember which the Froggies get), 2 foot knights, 5 feudal sarges, 2 FMAAs, 4 archers, 6 mounted sarges. As soon as I set foot on the shores of tripoli, the desert scum fled to their castle, just as planned. One turn later, the Eggys attack with everything listed above, just as planned. Oh, wait a minute! Where did that 8* (yes, EIGHT) general come from? My admiral failed to mention him. My 2* general tries to hide his sudden panic attack so as not to worry the men. Well, retreat is not an option, so I line my spears up on a hill, place my archers behind, put my FMAAs on either side of the spears and my mounted sarges on flank. My knights stay in the middle so they can support either flank.

For the first time since I've been playing MTW (which ain't that long), the AI actually played smart. I can remember the as if it just happened yesterday. Oh, uh, it did happen just yesterday. The Eggys sent 1 ACH and 3 cams around my right flank, 2 cams around my left, and engaged my center with archers, peasants, nub spears, napthas, and more cams. Obviously, my right flank was the most threatened, so off goes my knight/gen; he takes 1 spear, 1 FMAA, 1 archer, and 1 mounted sarge with him. Well, while I was dealing with my center and left flank, thinking the Eggys were still marching around my right, they quickly turned and charged (unbeknownst to me). My left and center fully engaged, I turned my attention to my right flank- oh horrors of horrors! The ACH went straight for my FMAA and 1 cam for my mounted sarges (both of which are starting to rout), with the other 2 cams in reserve. My knights quickly swing around to charge the ACH from the rear, knowing full well it would leave them fully exposed to those camel reserves. What valiant men! My spears charge the cams that have pinned my mounted sarges while my archers rain arrows of death on the reserves- after they slammed into my knights.

Things were looking bleak to say the least. My FMAAs routed; my mounted sarges were down to 9 effectives; my knights were only 7 strong. But the right held- by the skin of my teeth. My spears were steadily chewing through the enemy's center- but at a horrible cost. It's amazing the amount of damage peasants will put up with when led by an 8* general! But alas! The Eggys made a fatal err. Their general (UM) moved to my left flank to support his camels! He was now exposed and vulnerable. I threw everything I could spare at the scoundrel and soon had him surrounded, then killed. Then the spineless currs ran for the hills, the remainder of my cav in pursuit.

To make a short story long, I withdrew 4 of my more devastated units and called in my 4 fresh mounted sarges while the second wave of camels came pouring over the hill. I quickly reformed the line and gasped in despair at how few men were left. I put all my cav on my right flank, hoping it would draw the camels like stink on camels. It worked! The foul beasts charged at my cav, which began to "retreat," allowing me spears to quickly swing around and fall upon their exposed flank. The second wave of camels were slaughtered, but at the cost of two fresh groups of mounted sarges and even more spears. I reformed the ever-diminishing line and awaited the third wave of camels.

They crested the hill and saw the field of battle covered with heaps of their brothers' broken bodies and fled. The righteous army of God won a great victory- pyrrhic though it was.

I was left with a total of 4 knights, 9 mounted sarges, less than 300 spears, about 150 archers who had run out of arrows and had to be used as inf. Had I been playing vs a human, I wouldn't have had a single man standing. The camels chewed threw my cav and inf, and took a toll on my spears. Praise to the camel!