New Faction Preview - Sicily

[Hochmeister]

On IGN

http://pc.ign.com/articles/735/735311p1.html

[Hochmeister]

Wow they have a great unit roster, looks like theyll be fun to play!

Heres just a few!!

Sword and Buckler Men
Dismounted Broken Lances
Halberd Militia
Pavise Crossbowmen
Sicilian Muslim Archers
Hand Gunners
Norman Knights
Knights Templar & Hospitaller
Ribault & Mortar!!

[ByzantineKnight]

Cool!

[Kourutsu]

Of all the factions they could have previewed...they picked the Sicilians.

[Furious Mental]

"The crossbow is an excellent weapon for the militiaman, being easy to use, although slow to reload. These men carry a large pavise shield to give them some protection while reloading. Being relatively wealthy townsfolk, they can also afford decent armour. A certain number of militia can be maintained in a city for free."

Did anyone else notice this? Hopefully the AI takes advantage of this feature to ensure it doesn't get caught with skeleton garrisons.

Sword and buckler men sound interesting. Perhaps they have bonus against pike formations.

[Martok]

"The crossbow is an excellent weapon for the militiaman, being easy to use, although slow to reload. These men carry a large pavise shield to give them some protection while reloading. Being relatively wealthy townsfolk, they can also afford decent armour. A certain number of militia can be maintained in a city for free."

Did anyone else notice this? Hopefully the AI takes advantage of this feature to ensure it doesn't get caught with skeleton garrisons.

Yes, I found that interesting. Looks like CA may have heeded our requests that towns get a certain amount of free militia units. Happy day!

In a way, I think the most interesting unit was the Muslim Archers. I'm not sure how historically accurate they were, but it's nice to see CA throw a nod to how the different peoples of Sicily lived in relative peace. A pretty good preview overall.

[hoom]

Indeed, free militia as long as they stay in city should be great & assuming the campaign AI can handle the concept

[Polemists]

Look, I think you guys are worrying wayyy to much. This game has been through it's rounds, and tested, it's just doing some final testing now. They've done enough city attacks from all videos, and I have yet to see a unmanned town, so i'm sure comp will know to keep free units and extra and what not in there castle.

[hoom]

As opposed to all those videos of RTW with empty cities huh?

[Polemists]

haha Look my only point is I rarely ran into a empty city in RTW. However I did see videos of rome total war of like 100 v 100. In every MTW video i've seen with a castle invasion it looks like a thousand against a thousand easy.


I'm just sayin have some faith in developers.

[Hobot]

Hmm pretty nice unit roster with very defensible position on the map. Sicilians look pretty good to me, unless the AI learns to use ships that is :)

[Crazed Rabbit]

Nice looking units, though the sword of the sword and buckler men looks a bit narrow for a war blade, even a cut and thrust type sword.

Crazed Rabbit

[anders]

muslim archers are spot on, and were considered among the better archer troops awailable in the medieval world.

one question, how can they field dismounted italian MAAs without being able to field the mounte ones?

[Peasant Phill]

Hey if Italian militia are in, maybe Flemish militia are in to. (I really hope so)

[Lord Comnenus]

ign just released new vid about sicily, ooooohhhhhhhhh new faction. well at least they look great but the flag's not! 3 legs and a head?!

[Stig]

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=69670
here you are m8

looks pretty good tho

[Ituralde]

You can find the article here:

http://pc.ign.com/articles/735/735311p1.html

Really nice information and the sweetest bit come right in the text about the Pavise Crossbowmen:

A certain number of militia can be maintained in a city for free.

I just have to love CA for that. Their new recruitment system rules supreme! Can't wait for the game.

Cheers!

Edit

Ituralde

Edit: And here's me posting in the first post he sees something that has already been posted in the other thread. Just ignore this please!

[Furious Mental]

Interesting that they only get arquebusiers. I guess some Catholic factions will have to make do without being able to train musketeers, although they will probably be available as mercenaries. Also the organ gun ought to even the score a bit.

[econ21]

I have a hunch that the faction previews do not exhaustively list all the units available to a faction, although I could be wrong. Dismounted MAA may be what you get from mounted mailed knights, so there may be a dismounted chivalric type unit that the preview does not show. Or maybe CA are reserving that for the English, who are supposed to have strong infantry (the continentals being modelled as too proud to dismount).

I was very interested in the mention of armour upgrades. It sounds like instead of +1 armour, you will get + plate armour or something. Which would make a lot more sense. But I am curious - what's the difference between plate armour and Gothic armour (mentioned with the Chivalric knights)? I would distinguish full mail, transitional armour (coat of plates etc) and full plate - ie what we had in MTW with feudal, chivalric and Gothic knights. Are CA using "plate armour" to mean transitional armour - some plate and some mail, with Gothic meaning full plate? Or is there really a distinction between full plate and Gothic armour?

[Empirate]

Historically, Muslim warriors were a staple of Sicilian armies at least under Frederick II of Hohenstaufen (1194-1250). He conquered the last pockets of Muslim resistance in Sicily proper and shipped most of the population to Apulia (on the Adriatic, the "heel" of the Italian boot). They were then formed into several colonies in which they could perform their religion and culture freely and even built some cities (of which nothing is left nowadays, unfortunately). Muslim eunuchs guarded Frederick's concubines, as he had a court much like that of an Oriental potentate, and they also formed his personal bodyguard. Furthermore, Frederick recruited thousands of Muslim warriors as a kind of standing army that helped him out time and again, because they were unafraid of excommunication (a fate that befell Frederick once or twice...). These Muslim elite troops were feared in Italy, as they were frequently ordered to committ rather gross atrocities - or probably that was papal propaganda. Anyway, Muslims formed the backbone of Sicilian armies for at least twenty years. I have no idea what happened to them after the rather abrupt demise of the Hohenstaufens in 1268, though... Frederick's grandson was captured by the new ruler of Sicily, Charles of Anjou, and decapitated in the great Piazza in Naples.

[anders]

recruitment of muslems dropped after the swabian defeat, they numbered hundreds rather thn thousands. this probably had to do with them being perceived as a bit too lojal tothe swabians from Charles poin of view and decreasing effectiveness of archers against heavier armor.

[Bob the Insane]

Well it looks like a fun faction, small and right in the middle of the action. Do they get a land bridge to Italy?

That little titbit about the no maintanence militia sounds fun too and will greatly help with garrisoning settlements. Also explains why we see so many militia missile units too...

[Darth Nihilus]

I was wondering the same thing Econ, regarding whether all of the units were listed in the faction previews. Hopefully not, but I guess we will see. As far as Sicily goes, they seem like they are a pleasant suprise on their very protectable island position. I'm also curious to see if they get any exclusive units. Those dismounted Norman Knights look cool.

[econ21]

I was wondering the same thing Econ, regarding whether all of the units were listed in the faction previews.

Actually, I take it back - I just counted the number of units on the Portugese custom battle screen (32+) and it is very close to that in the Sicilian preview (c34). So as Warner Bros says "That's all folks!"

[Fate]

Oddly enough, on the topic of free militias, i was thinking about how good itd be if they had it in Total War! This stemmed from reading sharpes prey were the british landed in a danish fishing village, it would make sense to make say one 1/4 of the the population into militamen eh?

[econ21]

Yup, free militias are a great idea. I was wondering how the AI (and I!) would cope with the requirement to garrison city walls for their defenses to work. Also, together with the recruitment pools, it will help foster historical armies - not just maxing out on elites. Additionally, in the medieval period, I suspect most militias did come into play mainly in defending settlements - men-at-arms or other cav and missiles dominated many field armies.

[Furious Mental]

I'm wondering how the introduction of late period units like sword and buckler men will be handled. From a historical point of view one wouldn't expect them to appear until gun powder was developed since (as far as I know) that was the catalyst for the appearance of fast moving infantry in half-armours in many armies.

Also, although strategy purists will accuse me of surrendering to the dark side of "finishing moves" and other flashy animations, I gotta ask, does anyone else think it would be really cool if the sword and buckler men punched people in the face with their shields?

This might be a bit difficult since it actually looks as though they have the buckler strapped to their forearm. Now, I'm no expert on medieval sword fighting, but wasn't a buckler held in the fist?

[Dave1984]

Also, although strategy purists will accuse me of surrendering to the dark side of "finishing moves" and other flashy animations, I gotta ask, does anyone else think it would be really cool if the sword and buckler men punched people in the face with their shields?

This might be a bit difficult since it actually looks as though they have the buckler strapped to their forearm. Now, I'm no expert on medieval sword fighting, but wasn't a buckler held in the fist?

Either way if you try punching someone in the face with your shield you're opening yourself up to a stomach wound- invariably fatal- it doesn't seem like a fair trade-off, does it?

[CaesarAugustus]

Im glad they chose to preview an italian faction this time.....wish it was the Venetians though.....

Sicily looks like a fun faction to play, starting off the same way ther scipii did in rtw. One thing I noticed.....didnt the normans make their italian capital in naples not palermo.......i could be wrong im no historian.

[Furious Mental]

Like I said I'm no expert, but weren't bucklers sometimes used as a sort of weapon? I think some even had a spike on them.