France

[Bongaroo]

Gave up on the first french campaign a long time ago when I realized most of my problems were due to bugs (and not seeing the gift button and wondering why no one would accept money, whoops! lol). Carls bugfixer and the 1.1 patch have made the game playable again but I have yet to come back to start another campaign as France.

I think trying to play the good and noble way with armies of large powerful cavalry will be fun to do. I think this will be my next campaign.

[Lorenzo_H]

I decided to start a long campaign as the French, after completing one as the Spanish. The French have a far worse starting location to the Spanish, being surrounded by aggressive, catholic (so non sackable, Pope gets mad at you for being at war with) factions such as Milan, England, Portugal and the Holy Roman Empire.

Milan in particular for me is giving me some pain. They have a large military, and have succeeded in taking over most of Italy already (turn 43). They recently declared war on France, Venice and HRE.

Since the French are not as economically suited as the Spanish are, I am having considerable trouble with money. In particular, I cannot spare enough florins to upgrade Toulouse, my Fortress which is begging to become a citadel. Other settlements are having trouble because I don't have enough money to upgrade all of their buildings which annoys me. But at least I recently got promoted to "Best Production" which means that other factions are having the same trouble.

France is a challenging descision for a campaign. The tough start location and economic difficulty means that experience is needed. Thankfully, I do have quite a bit from my Spanish Campaign. For instance, this time I know how guilds work, and that there is gold in africa near Timbuktu which is really useful knowledge since there is no better place to send Merchants when you are a faction groping around for every Florin you can get!

I like the French unit selection, but sadly have not reached a level of advancement or economy to fully exploit the vast selection of melee and ranged infantry and excellent cavalry. I am surprised at how much better the French units are compared to those of other factions I have seen, like England. In my opinion, the French units are more varied and better than those of the English. Even the superb, allround Spanish unit selection is only slightly better in my opinion.

I'll see how it goes.

[RoadKill]

A small and quick tip for people whom are around turn 40 - 60, if your still not at war with the english try to increase your reputation with england then later one ask them to give you caen for mariseille, in all my tries they always agree if i throw in some 1000's, and after that let milan crush them and you can use them as a shield from milan, well that helped me in my french campaign a lot from getting comptly pwned by milan.

[Lorenzo_H]

Why are Milan so powerful when you are the French? They were eliminated relatively quickly when I played as the Spanish, yet now they are the no. 1 for military. Marseille for me is being constantly assaulted by them, and Roadkill I can't do what you suggested because I already took Caen from the English and then they begged for peace from me.

Also, anyone got any tips for making some serious money in the turns where I am now (40-60+)?

[Slaists]

Milan will attack France at some point but their strength mostly lies in their spear militia and crossbows. Unless you want to take the war to Milan militarily or fight them every other turn, take the militia advantage from them. Train a couple assassins and spies and take out Milanese militia barracks in Milan ang Genoa. Every turn... It's cheaper than maintaining a large army dedicated to fighting Milan. Additional benefit is that your ruler will get extra authority for successful sabotage missions.

A side note: I took Bern early in my campaign. Bern is a rebel castle Milanese usually go after pretty early.

[Lorenzo_H]

Nice tips, I never thought of destroying the Milanese Barracks!

[_Tristan_]

Messieurs les anglais, tirez les premiers !! (ie, English sirs, shoot first !!)

Ah the french, all those lovely knights...

Campaign Report

A quick report on my H/H 1.1 campaign as the French...It is 1230...

For the first few turns I engaged in diplomacy gaining alliances with almost all of my neighbours and further (Milan, Venice, Sapin, Portugal, Danemark, Russia, Hungary, Byzantium) except the HRE (who refused all of my offers...) while taking any and all rebel sttelements on my borders (in order, Dijon, Metz, Rennes, Bordeaux).

Having secured modern day france, I led an army to the border of the Caen region and provoked my former ally the English to attack me...
I then rapidly took Caen and led my conquering army on English soil... Not yet having a diplomat around Rome, I had to stop my advance and took profit of a crusade to leave the British Isles...
I rapidly got a ceasefire proposed by the English who then stayed neutral...

My crusading army was around Marseille when the Crusade was called off... the Hungarian beat me to it. Nevertheless I had a second stack around Iconium (Central Turkey) which I tried to put to good use...

I must admit that at this point I was in dire straits because of not taking into account the cost of upkeep of the crusading armies when the crusade ends...

So I disbanded most of my home stacks and kept that last crusading army in the Middle East as it had gained experience and was led by one of my best generals...

I used him to conquer Turkish Adana killing the faction heir in the process ... And some time later gained Antioch when the Pope started a crusade...right on my front step...

I won it easily..and boosted my Pop-o-meter to the top in conquering Aleppo and giving it to the Pope.

On the home front, I built forts as soon as possible to keep an aggressive ally (Portugal) from reaching Toulouse and Bordeaux... I was also attacked by Milan on Marseille and drove them back to elimination rapidly...

At this point, I was attacked by both HRE and England. England sent a full stack on Antwerp which I had gained from the Danes earlier after taking Bruges from rebels...

HRE made a half-wit attack on Bern, easily rolled back...

Right now i'm at turn 75, the cash commences to flow in, notably from merchants around Antioch... I own 25 provinces approx.

I've countered the Spanish attacks on Zaragosa and Pamplona conquered from Portugal who is now reduced to Cordoba and got me a ceasefire...and captured Valencia from Spain.

I've asked from my Pope a crusade on Tunis and won it easily the moors being otherwise occupied in Spain, taking also Algiers in the process...
My goal in this being two-fold : securing the riches of Africa (Ah famed Timbuktu.... ) and attacking the Spanish from both North and South, after getting rid of the Moors...


I now turn my eyes to plague-ridden England and on the Mid-East front, hearing of the arrival of Mongols I've started a drive both south (Acre) and West (Iconium) to prepare myself to face them.

Only a few more turns to victory in this short campaign...

Unit report

What to say of French units...
On missile troops, not very good ones until the Scots Guard, which requirements I've just reached... Haven't tested them yet... Can't wait...
For the rest, I generally grap each and every Merc Xbow i can put my hands on...The rest is just scrap and can only be used as a complement when out of funds...

On infantry : I must admit that it's not again the strong point of France but they hold their own against the neighbouring factions... The main threat to my footmen was the Portuguese almughavars (javelinmen)...
For the main part I use my foot as a protection for the shooters letting them skirmish back behind the line of infantry, thus taking the brunt of the charge...

On cavalry : The french rely mainly on their infantry... Anyway that's how I see the french medieval army...
I rely mainly on Mounted Sergeants (MSG) and Mailed Knights (MK) to engage the enemy missile units due to their speed and shock capability (they are also much faster to disengage should enemy infantry try to charge back on them to defend its missile).
Then I rely on Bodyguards, Feudal Knights and most of all Crusader Knights to flank the enemy or even charge head on if it is peasants or town militia.
With the patch 1.1 on, charges comme to good effect and give a nice routing effect in the enemy line. Bodyguards come particularly handy in charging the best troops as their 2hp give them such a good staying power waiting for reinforcements. Their morale is such also that even against big odds they will continue to fight.

On artillery : In my Campaign, gunpowder hasn't appeared yet and i've only made use of ballistas, catapults and trebuchet.
The last is my main choice be it assaulting or defending in a siege situation. The diseased cow shots have a devastating effect on the army assaulting your walls and if you have reinforcements coming from the back or side (as I always try to have...), the enemy is fair game...

On agents : : I tend to make a rather intensive use of them... So far they've given me the possibility of eliminating Milan, to give access to the Papacy by removing the former Pope, to replenish my coffers when i was broke by lauching a seires of trade attacks on foreign merchants (cashing in 1K or 2K per every two merchant every turn and gaining XP in the process)...
The sole ones I haven't got to use at the moment are princesses, there are none of age in my main family line...

I don't know if this will be useful to somebody but I love playing the French and hope those insights will help you find your own tactics aruond the map...

Many of you will probably thing I play as a blitzer but in fact I try to get as much development in my cities as I can (As a proof I regularly comme as the mostand one of the main cash flow in my treasury comes from sacking, so I try to get a new region every other turn to keep the cash coming and to continue developing...
I would really like to sit by and look as the time goes by, but my treasury won't let me...

[_Tristan_]

On cavalry :The french rely mainly on their infantry... Anyway that's how I see the french medieval army...

Oops !!! The french rely mainly on their cavalry...

[Lorenzo_H]

Yeah I was wondering...

I think the French infantry is good though. I have managed to get Dismounted Fuedal Knights, Armoured Sergeants, Dismounted Noble Knights and Voulgiers pretty fast, and they seem to be decent to me. I have almost got Pikemen, just a few more turns. I was seriously questioning their value though, the "Armoury" building required to build them costs 9600 florins, but I went for it anyway.

I do think the French Cavalry is beautiful though - Noble Knights...oooh ye!

[_Tristan_]

Yeah I was wondering...

I think the French infantry is good though. I have managed to get Dismounted Fuedal Knights, Armoured Sergeants, Dismounted Noble Knights and Voulgiers pretty fast, and they seem to be decent to me. I have almost got Pikemen, just a few more turns. I was seriously questioning their value though, the "Armoury" building required to build them costs 9600 florins, but I went for it anyway.

I do think the French Cavalry is beautiful though - Noble Knights...oooh ye!

A man according to my own heart....

My main difficulty in playing the French is fielding any infantry... I like so much the loof of those cavalry unit that i wolud filed a 20-unit stack of horses if I could...

@Lorenzo H : I agree that French infantry can hold its own but it's no better than what you might field in any other catholic faction and sometimes much less compared to say the Danes or the Italian City-States...

[Magraev]

I like to play as France. Gotta love that accent

In my latest (M/M) game i focused on securing the french heartlands (bordeaux, metz, dijon, rennes), and then sent a crusade to jerusalem.

I now hold Jerusalem, acre, gaza and cairo, and am sieging alexandria. The main reason for my rampage was, that my economy was destroyed when I had to start paying for all those crusader knights. I had to keep fighting and pillaging to stay out of the red.

In europe I only had trouble with Milan (as usual). I blitzed them quickly in retaliation and took Bern and Genoa on the same turn. They were eager to sign a ceasefire after that...

My main problem is money. It seems farming is essential for France, but I don't like to go above lvl2 - to avoid too much squalor later.

All in all I think I have it made now - only worry is the potential for wars with Venice, milan, spain, portugal, england, denmark and HRE at the same time, as I share borders with them all. Not to mention Sicily, turkey and egypt in the Levant.

Looking forward to the mongols...

[DS_Legionary]

After tinkering aroung with several campaigns, I have finally settled into a campaign as the French. My first goal was to get all those pesky rebel provinces nearby. Dijon, Rennes, Bruges and Bordeaux all fell within quick succession. The English beat me to Antwerp, which I didn't mind letting the English deal with that stack. I avoided taking Metz as I had noticed several HRE armies trying to take it and I wanted to avoid an early war with HRE.

After securing the homeland (minus Caen and Antwerp which were Enlgish held) I went about building up a solid economy base. I converted the Castles in Bordeaux and Toulouse into cities. In hindsight I probably should have left Bordeaux as a castle as it doesnt generate nearly as much profit as Toulouse, and with it being a castle I would also have a much more defined line of defense against the Iberian factions if needed.

Whilst this reform was going on in the homeland I sent Diplomats abroad. I secured alliances with Venice, Poland, Spain, HRE, and the Papal States. In retrospect I should have paid a bit better attention to the Iberian front as it turns out Portugal has become the dominant faction, all rebel held provinces as well as the two Moor provinces on the penninsula. Spain still has a chance though. With almost two full stacks running about they could turn the tide. If not I do have pretty good rep with portugal, and I'll probably try to marry off a princess to their heir.

Around turn 25 I decided the English have had a long enough stay on the mainland. I siege Antwerp and Caen simultaneously. I decide to wait them out, and the garrison in Antwerp gives up without a fight. Caen attempts to sally forth, but to no avail. At this point the Pope finally calls a ceasefire. (I had been gifting him 500-1000 florins every turn to keep my rep at perfect and try to prolong the time before he called the ceasefire) Before the ceasefire was up England decides to blockade Bruges. The pope decides to excommunicate the pesky Enlgish. So now it is fair game on England.

Right after the English war began I got a mission to take Metz (HRE for some reason still hadn't taken it). So I figured I would take it for the free 1500 florins (war with HRE would be inevitable anyways). Immdeiately after I took it HRE sent a half stack and laid seige. I beat them back and the HRE has since been preoccupied with the Danes and Venice so that was all the hostile activity I have seen from them, but I am laying seige to Bern which is HRE held, so I'm sure either the pope will intervene soon enough or the HRE will shift attention my way again, or both.

Milan also decided to lay seige to Marseilles right after I took Metz. Again another half stack which was completely decimated. Now I am besieging Genoa, and Milan has no army in sight to beat me back. (They have been embroiled in a long war with Venice who was excommunicated twice thus far).

The pope called a crusade on Jerusalem, which being a good little catholic I heed the call and send a full stack, with a very promising young general. I made it there first, and took the city which was only garrisoned by Egypts faction heir and a unit of archers. Funny thing is Egypt seems to have stalled out this game, only making it as far north as Antioch without much semblance of a standing army. Matter of fact I have only seens once major stack that was 3/4 full. After completing the Crusade I wasn't counting on the upkeep on that full army in Jerusalem, so I did the logical thing. I have abandoned Jerusalem and gone about sacking the Middle East. I went south into Egypt sacking Gaza and Alexandria, then back north up to Acre where I am currently. I think I will keep Acre and use it as a staging point for future Crusades as well as Middle eastern expansion.

So far I am only on turn 40 or so, but I control all of France. I am making a solid push into the HRE as well as northern Italy. London is under siege and the city north of that (don't recall the name) has only a token garrison. Scotland has the rest of the British Isles, including Ireland. I have sent a diplomat to see about securing an Alliance with the Scots. On the Iberian front things are quiet, and I expect them to continue that way. The middle east is my oyster. Population rich cities with small garrisons are begging to be plundered. It seems thus far I have either been very lucky, or I have just outpaced the AI. Right now I'm putting it as lucky, the HRE and Milan could still put up a pretty good fight and Egypt is certainly not happy about having their cities sacked.

Only things I would have done different so far is I would have left Bordeaux as a castle as the income increase of it being a city is very small. Also with that army running around in the Middle east it is eating up my treasury. I was making about 3-4k florins per turn, now I am losing money every turn. City and Castle growth has come to a standstill despite the pillaging that has gone on in Egypt. Though the current Pope is old, and I have been playing the good catholic, going out and converting the heathen masses in Africa. I have two Cardinals with 8 piety, one of them being a Preferati. With my alliances and my decent enough rep the next Pope should be French. If not French money will make him that way :)

[Vuk]

Vuk's Overview of the French Campaign

I believe that I will get back here and write a full player guide for France, but right now I just want to give a quick line or two of advice.

First of all: Cavalry!!!! This is your key to winning! All cavalry! There is no such thing as too much cavalry (of course this is coming from the guy who invested fully in cavalry while playing as the Danes on the hardest skill level :P I am particularly good with my cavalry. ).

Second of all, take all the rebel provences around you at the beginning, then crush the HRE, then England, then Danmark. (not a typo)
I have played as France (and one) on all skill levels, and I have used this strategy everytime. (or one very similar)

Thirdly, use your priests. Erode enemy support in the East at the very beginning of the game and sieze control of the Papacy. Once you take the Papacy, place the largest army in existence there so as to keep the Pope completely under your control.

Hope this helps. :D
I will try to come back some other time and post something more full and helpful.


Vuk

[Burns]

Currently playing as France I did some things differently. At campaign start I combined all my forces into a southern and a northern army. I captured the majority of the rebel cities in the direct vicinity. I converted Angers, Bordoeux to cities for the money. I converted Marsaille to a castle to keep the Milanese at bay. Its worked so well they barely bother moving against it. To the North I utilized the combined force and invaded Metz. In a brief war with HRE I took Bern and one of the castles to the North east.

If there is one lesson to learn is to NOT wage war on your home territory. It just hinders your economy way too much. Taking the fight to neighbouring lands is far more beneficial.

[hisn00bness]

Might I suggest to everyone starting to play the game and reading the tip above about turning marseille into a castle :

I say this with all respect due tothe poster above me and in all cameraderie; but I think it means gimping yourself.


Arguments:
_ Marseille is a cash cow as a city; can make over 5000 a turn before the mongols invade.

_ Its centralized location at the border of the mediterranean and touching the italian peninsula makes it a great place to go for a merchant HQ or a thieves HQ.

_ If you want to 'hold off Milan' ; it probably means that you are not intending to wage an expansionist war againts Italy any time soon. So instead of a castle; put up a fort somewhere along the mountain ridge that milan usually uses to attack marseille; and have a missile/voulgier heavy garisson in marseille to block of the bridges to the north if Milan would try to invade France though there.

_ Marseille is likely to be your first huge city as france (unless you crusade against Antioch) which means that Scottish Guard; mounted archers; and gendarmes are only a few turns away; so it's not like you will not have any decent recruitement pool there to hold of Milan even if you keep it a city.

[Airfix]

First:
Thanks to all the people for posting such a lot good suggestions.
After getting the hang on the game with Moors I started a campaign with the French.
Basic idea:
Fight only one war at a time.
I started to bribe every neigbour.
I sent an envoy to Scottland: They still don´t like me
I sent an envoy to Endland: They still don´like me
I sent an envoy to the HRE: Slightly better standing
I sent an envoy to the Pope: Very good standing
The moment Milan attacked me and after I won the first battle, they where excomunicated.
I put all my prisoners to the sword and got no bad trait. They are only heretics after all.
I got my second cardinal and hope one of them becomes Pope in some years.
Surprisingly the Moors offered an alliance!
I said yes and now all my merchants are on their way to Timbuktu.
Army:
Armoured sergeants and bowmen are very good at holding the line.
After the initial contact the heavy cavalry attacks the back of the enemy and some light cavylry will pursue the fleeing heretics.
Works very well for me.

[Soulforged]

I see that some problems still exist with the AI, and some of them are of the fun breaking kind. On Rome TW I could easily deploy a single stack of any heavy or light cavalry in front of a hostile enemy wich didn't possess more than 1 stack of the same and win the fight by luring them into persuing me (wich happens only when the odds START against you) and then I just drove them into exhaustation taking their cavalry first and then their infantry units one by one. The same is still true for MTW 2, the AI is more agressive on the Battle Map and on the Strategic Map, but that doesn't make it so much better when there's a clear problem of design.

This is what happened:
1- I start a new campaing on VH/M with France.
2- I build every comercial building possible and recruit every cavalry unit possible.
3- Move my agents to their respective possitions and recruit a merchant.
4- I take four separate cavalry units and order them to siege four different settlements (Dijon, Bordeaux, Metz, Rennes). Yes that's right only one stack for each one, even when two of them have a healthy stack of mailed knights.
5- Set all cities on very high tax level and pass the turn.
6- England offers me trade rights and map information in return. I ask for money.
7- Is the turn of the rebels. Everyone decides to attack my lonely stacks and one by one, as described in the strategy above I take on them and defeat them. No sweat.
8- My turn again, only one turn passed and I already have 4 more settlements with almost no loss (or at least not regreatable loss).

How cool is that!!

[tarbanrael]

IT may be that you can win with one unit of mailed knights on account of the M difficulty you selected. At H and VH I cannot get that result. They slaughter a lot of rebel troops but get crushed in the end.

Otherwise, at H/H with France, I have a very aggressive attitude at the beginning. I send my princess to the English to cement an alliance and trade rights against money (usu, about 2500fl) but do not marry her as I get a better suitor than the Robert knight in Caen.
I send my spy to Metz, send the troops from Rheims over to Metz and if I'm lucky storm the place on the 2nd turn if the gates are opened. I use the same army slightly reinforced with spearmen from Paris to then lay siege to Dijon a few turns later (by which time you usually get that mission from the council of nobles).
I get Louis down in Toulouse with most troops to move up to Bordeaux and siege the castle. It's mine by turn 3.
I build a ship in Marseille and sail my troops from there to Corsica and take it by turn 3. Then go to Sardinia and take it by turn 7.
I use my king with the troops from Paris, bar 2 to keep the English from getting any ideas, and mercs to move up to Brugges and siege. During the rebel turn they come out as they are more numerous and get slaughtered as i usually have 1 archer with at least 2 xbow men which decimate their troops by the time they get in reach of my spearmen. I take Brugges and the following turn i move and repeat with Antwerp.
Finally at Rennes, I send the troops from Angers over, get at least 1 merc X-bow men and following turn add the 2 cavalry i can generate from Angers. The town is mine by turn 3.
I turn Angers, Toulouse, the island settlements to towns to get more revenue. Keep Bordeaux as a castle.

I then start to build all money making buildings from turn 4 onwards, on account of all the revenue that is flowing in at this stage, and also start to get a few diplomats to get trade rights, alliances and money for these from my neighbours. I try to grab a SPanish princess to protect my southern border for a while. And then I set enough troops from Louis over in the south east for the inevitable attack from Milan . I also start generating priests that I will send down southern Spain in Moors country to get their piety increased.

[Soulforged]

IT may be that you can win with one unit of mailed knights on account of the M difficulty you selected. At H and VH I cannot get that result. They slaughter a lot of rebel troops but get crushed in the end.

I know that, of course. But that has nothing to do with better AI, it has to do with sheer numbers. On VH the enemy receives crazy stat boosts that's why even attempting to fight one on one with two same units on VH is suicidal. VH is much to difficult at least for me, and it's no improvement over the AI of RTW. The thing is like this: a system like the one applied on this game overpowers the enemy too much on VH, better AI means that you can play on fair grounds and still have a challenge. Of course I suppose that this is not going to be fixed by the devs, and as the AI is still hardcoded no moder will do anything to change it either.

[tarbanrael]

That's a very good point. Since i started with MTW, I picked H/H for my first steps into every new TW. And then as i grew more confident, i would turn to VH/VH. I should try the battles at M.

[PuppetMaster]

My exploits the French:

Very good. I played on H/H, and enjoyed it thoroughly. Here is what I did (if i recall correctly lol).

1. Secure French homelands while simultaneously bribing the pope onto your side

2. Take Antwerp and Bruges, simultatneously converting Bruges to a fortress...make sure Bordeux is a city btw, it can get like 3500 cash from trade, which to me is pretty good if I say so myself.

3. Smash England with a 3 pronged assault from London, nottingham, and Caernavarn. Scotland falls soon after. Next, convert all English castles to cities in order to have a secure region safe from attack and dedicated to money.

4.Germany. Blitz through Denmark in order to launch an attack from the North into German lands. You should have enough money at this point to fight a 2 front war with Milan, b/c those treacherous snakes will deffinitley have back stabbed you by this point.

You guys get the rest I assume; I kill Germany, conquer Italy, get crowned on Christmas day, ifso facto I'm the next Charlemagne.

French Gendarmes, Noble Knights, and especially LANCERS rule. French heavy infantry are wonderful too, plus they look really cool too lol.

[PuppetMaster]

My exploits the French:

Very good. I played on H/H, and enjoyed it thoroughly. Here is what I did (if i recall correctly lol).

1. Secure French homelands while simultaneously bribing the pope onto your side

2. Take Antwerp and Bruges, simultatneously converting Bruges to a fortress...make sure Bordeux is a city btw, it can get like 3500 cash from trade, which to me is pretty good if I say so myself.

3. Smash England with a 3 pronged assault from London, nottingham, and Caernavarn. Scotland falls soon after. Next, convert all English castles to cities in order to have a secure region safe from attack and dedicated to money.

4.Germany. Blitz through Denmark in order to launch an attack from the North into German lands. You should have enough money at this point to fight a 2 front war with Milan, b/c those treacherous snakes will deffinitley have back stabbed you by this point.

You guys get the rest I assume; I kill Germany, conquer Italy, get crowned on Christmas day, ifso facto I'm the next Charlemagne.

French Gendarmes, Noble Knights, and especially LANCERS rule. French heavy infantry are wonderful too, plus they look really cool too lol.

[grapedog]

A lot has already been said about expansion and whatnot, so I'll just mention how I managed not to get attacked. By turn 15 I had my starting towns and all the rebel towns including Antwerp under my control.

My princess was married to the English forming a very strong alliance there. Somewhere in the first 5-10 turns, the Danish had sent a princess as an envoy. After reading someone elses guide about keeping your heir un-married until a good offer comes along, I grabbed the Danish princess cementing an alliance with them. That should pretty much take care of those two factions bothering me for quite some time.

That leaves Spain/Portugal/Moor on my South-West front...with HRE and Milan on my South-East and Eastern fronts. With the rebel towns, that gives you easily four castles. I have Tolouse and Bordeux watching the Iberian Penn...and the two castles on the Eastern Front(can't remember their names) keeping an eye on the HRE/Milan.

After I knocked off all the rebels, I worked/am working on my economy. Getting the basic structures up and running, and tuning my castles to either Cav or Archer with regular militia in both. So far, so good...except the Pope is asking me to drop my alliance with the Danish...fat chance of that right now while I am still re-inforcing my towns.

A number of my towns were completely un-defended early, but they were inner towns, and I had alliances set up pretty quickly. It was dicey for a few rounds, but nothing happened.

[TheLastPrivate]

One thing I didn't like about French campaign too much was that their early-medium units were dull and unoriginal. The problem is that due to so many expansionist neighbors you have hard time teching and defending your own, you end up expanding with feudal knights and stuff and by the time you get lancers most of Europe is finished...which is ironic in a sense that i never got to use my "best cavalry power in the west" during the most heated times.. (feudals and mailed don't count as the "best cavalry" because all other factions have access to them)

[Seyfullah]

Just a quick info on Milan. When I played the French they were a big pain and it took me some time to get Marseilles back. They have sank my rare transport ships; I usually fight on land. They have sent disturbances through the Alps. And when I was about to crush them with an amphibious assault(I had already landed by Sicily, had just 2-3 turns to Florence) by my King Louis the Merciless, the Pope personally called my king to a crusade and they were spared. But their lucky streak is about to end; I have built up since the last crusade so that I could take care of Europe. While this is Milan in my French campaign, the Milan in my brother's Turkish campaign was completely different. If I can remember correctly my brother and I saw Milanese banners over Paris into the 60th turns. This strikes me as very interesting and I thought I should share this with you because this is almost blasphemous. I thought French took the Milan in real life.
Just an instance of something concerning the French and Milan...

[Mete Han]

Dear Puppetmaster

currently i am playing a vh vh campaign with france. i am on turn 22 and i have thrown out all the outlanders from the french provinces, conquered frankfurt with a crusade bla bla bla....

the problem is I checked the french troops from the custom battle and the building browser and I think their late armies are not satisfying. they do not have superior heavy infantry and their archers cannot lay stakes. in the late game when people start to use musketeers you are stuck with those archers because you do not have muskets. The heavy cavalry seems to be superior but not very much. I mean, statistically the lancers have like little advantage over knights hospitaller... I like commanding cavalry armies but the weaknesses of french will seem to haunt them in the late game as well for example the english archers will be much better, spanish will have better gunpowder units and venetians and germans will have better heavy infantry plus pavise crossbowmen... can you tell me, other than cavalry, where does the french arsenal excel? Are voulgiers worth using them or just a waste of money? because i will really linger on in order to play a good late game and i am not sure if playing with france in late game will be fun..

thanxs are in order

[TheLastPrivate]

Lancers are So much better than Knights hospitaller as they come pre-equipped with Advanced plate, which is more than your general unit. Not to mention lancers have more mass which gives them added shock value as well. Also mounted french archers have AP and scots guard are never too weak compared with english archers and aventuriers hold solid ground against pavise crossbowmen. And Voulgiers are probably the only spearwall halberd unit that is better than milita-grade as well. And finally they get serpentines :D

[Mete Han]

Lancers are So much better than Knights hospitaller as they come pre-equipped with Advanced plate, which is more than your general unit. Not to mention lancers have more mass which gives them added shock value as well. Also mounted french archers have AP and scots guard are never too weak compared with english archers and aventuriers hold solid ground against pavise crossbowmen. And Voulgiers are probably the only spearwall halberd unit that is better than milita-grade as well. And finally they get serpentines :D

So, there is more to it than just statistics concerning the Lancers? But still I am not convinced about the heavy infantry.

[Iavorios]

The fun with th French is in the overall strategic situation. Fighting at all fronts is really a big challenge. As for the army the DFK are not to weak compered to the another heavy infantry. Scots guards are exelent even thou they dont have a shield, but they come from a huge stone wall only. And they are the only catolock nation with the possibility to play as the Mongols, with troops only from the huge sites- chandarms, french archers and scots guards. And they have very easy axes to armored sergeants, feudal and noble knights. France can easy play any game stile you want. So yes there is fractions ho have samethimes better units, but none is fun and challenging as France. O, and by the way I am not seing this because I am french- i am Bulgarian and my ancestors kick their bottom in 1205 .

[TheLastPrivate]

I just did a series of tests with voulgiers and venetian heavy infs.
I took both, none-upgraded, and pitted them, both with spear wall on/off. I tested this for 3 times each, and voulgiers were victorious in 5 cases out of 6 total trials. One loss was because voulgier general died first and the unit routed.
Voulgiers won mostly because VHI routed of general death, but the numbers were a bit in favor to the voulgiers as well. With both the 2h bug and shield-bug fixed i think this proves that voulgiers are better than most ppl assume them to be.

I just did another experiment pitting them against zwei handers, and voulgiers took care of them with much more ease. AP and spearwall mixed together is just too good. Their charge is 5, which doesn't suck much either.

All my experiments were done on grass terrain with Very Hard battle difficulty.

Of course, voulgiers are more expensive than VIH, but they can stop cavalry charges much better than VIH so its well worth it. They're weak to missile due to lack of shields but you have DFKs for that, and Dism. chivalrics in multiplayer as well.

With upgraded voulgiers in line, scots guard in back, aventurier in front, and lancers at flank and mounted french archers - my basic french army setup - its hard to beat. And it's so versatile too. You can practice my french-ed up version of macedonian phalanx line with voulgiers and cavalry, or you can add/substitute dism.feudals and dism.french knights for shock value, increase french mounted archers, etc.... just so much versatility and lacking in no category - Unlike Englsh who have piss-poor cavalry, and better ranged than HRE. Although the lack of musketeers is disheartening, you don't exactly need gunpowders all that much as heavy cavalry tactics work fine without gunpowder.

Wait..I don't even play French that extensively yet Ive become an advocate of their roster. Must be the lancers hands down, lol.