Timurids: Elephants (Medieval Uber Unit)

[Shahed]

You know there is a quickfix for the crash bug yeah ? It's stickied on the top of this forum.

Hopefully the training will work.

[zulukiller]

Yeah i know mate im just trying not to cheat i want them to be super hard and give me a challange i just dont want the crashs at the most inconveniant point. That what was really annoying i didnt mind the crash bug every now and again but it would always happend at the most important inconveiniant point

i.e. ive just fought of stack after stack after stack then i get the black death and im left with virtualy no garrison at all but i know i can win the battle if i use my citadel walls properly. And then bam i get the crash bug when ive got virtually no garrison and its the last stack of timurids around for miles.

[Shahed]

Test against Timurid Elephant Artillery.

The results have convinced me I need go no further with this. I will however test vs Timurid Elephant Musketeers (or what's it they are called).

The limitations of these tests are:

1. Single unit type.
2. No other enemies to contend with on the field.
3. Terrain differences, although extremely minimal for gunpowder units.
4. Small sample size.
5. Ideal weather conditions enjoyed by both armies.
6. My somewhat skewed (by some standards) sense of humor.

The 2 test battles featured (drumroll!):

2 Janissary Musketeers
vs
1 Timurid Elephant Artillery

Test Conditions

• Palm Beach.
• (Gotta love the).... Sunset.
• Clear.
• Very Hard Difficulty.
• All units are experience 0.
• All units are armor upgrade 0.
• All units are weapons upgrade 0.
• Jannissaries deployed ranks 2 deep, loose formation, hold ground.
• Jannissaries fire on command, not auto fire.

THE RESULTS:

The enemy General is shot down!.


His troops are shot down!.


Some choose to retreat.


They are hunted down.
Primarily for the ivory (which is legal trade in this scenario).
Secondly for marksmanship training vs large slow moving objects.


Summary


Conclusion
Please keep in mind the limitations of this test. I believe it will be harder against the musket elephants. With that unit I believe it will be necessary to draw their fire to another unit, perhaps the General, or another cavalry or infantry unit/s so that the firearms are free to aim and fire without distraction. This is achievable though not by all and though not under any circumstance. With the right leadership under the right circumstance it is achievable by all.

In this case the elephants were annihilated with NO survivors for the loss of ONE Janissary casualty (which may be healed in campaign). This shows clearly that against this unit a simple duo of Janissary Musketeers can do the job very well, when they work as intended without bugs.

Point is if muskets kill these elephants they should theoretically kill any other elephants too.

Salute !!!

[supadodo]

Okay I'm into my campaign against timurids as Turks and I have 3 units of musket elephants and 3 units of artillery elephants all upgraded with 3 - 4 chevrons and new guns from my alchemist HQ and university. And so Timur the LameA$$ decides to attack me. Their elephants are no match to mine coz I focus fire my arty ellies on their own elephants while having my cannons pound explosives at them. I use my musketeer elephants to keep their other units at bay and to absorb all that arrows. In the end their elephants run amok and cause more casualties among their ranks and once everybody has routed, I kill of the berserk ellies so that they won't return to the campaign map. Now i'm beset by that bloody elephant CTD bug and the worst thing is, its caused by my own elephants

[Shahed]

Ok tried it with Musket Eles.

Beat em every single time with 2 units of muskets, with heavy losses, about 85% of the muskets die ever time. It's very close.

The AI prioritises enemy gunpowder weapons and ignores other units, so my hrose archers, spears etc get ignored, most of the time and the AI is shooting at the muskets.

I think there is a bug where the muskets don't shoot back half as much as they should. I'm not sure this is a feature or not. They get stuck trying to reform perpetually failing to do so. Despite this bug, they win most of the time.

I have reported this issue in the bug list.

[zulukiller]

Hmm sinan i dont think your test will work out the same in campaign mode against the real Timurids with there upgraded elephants and a ten star general backing them up you know tactick wise. Have you done the test were your controlling the elephants and the AI is controlling the Janissary units ?.

I'll tell you what ive figured out with the elephants you need both types for starters for them to be truely effective. Also the elephant artillary is exacterly that its artillary (not realy a combat unit) and super artillary at that with 15 cannons (on huge battles). Thats why your first test is completely bogus when you only lost one unit (your giving yourself major false hope there mate). The Timurids are not going to send there artillary crashing into 2 units of muskets (would you send your artillary crashing into the enemy front lines) there going to stick them as far away as possible and pound the crap out of you with all 15 cannons out of range of your muskets (if there cannons shoot that far).

I've also figured out that against infantry & cavalry the elephant charges are no were near as bad as youd think they are unless its a confined space like on a bridge or a street in a city or citadel. Then your men just instantly die i think the way that works is your men dont have the room to fall over so they get crushed instead and it leads to massive cassualties.

I actually made that mistake when taking a city, having my elephants at the point when fighting inside the city. What happend was i breached the walls and the enemy fell back to the square so i sent my entire army with the eles at the front up one of the long streets towards the square. Because i didnt know how to use the eles i didnt double click behind the enemy to charge through them i tried to attack them. So anyway my eles went berserke and turned around and desimated my army charging back down the road and out of the city. I went from a full Army with barley a couple of men lost to an army with only at most 20 men in each units. And ive never seen any ele charge before or since that killed so many men and they were my own men and my own eles :(.

LoL i went on one there and forgot to make my original point anyway try this for a test ill put money on it the eles win. Have 8 Units of AI controlled jannisaries v you with 2 ele heavey cavalry & 1 ele artillary (if you throw in some upgrades and another ele artillary i bet you can take on a full stack of jans). Try useing these tacticks aswell stand of at a distance and blow the crap out of the jannisaries with your artillary. When you've run out of ammo group all your eles togethor having the now out of ammo artillary elephants in the middle of your line. Disable fire at will and then have your eles charge as a line behind the jannissaries (right click and drag behind jans and then click run). After the initial smash into the enemy (bodies flying everywere) turn on fire at will and just keep on charging through the jans back and forth and in no time i garantee the jans will rout then all you have to do is chase them down.

p.s. If you Want to fully upgrade your eles capture and fully tech up Mosal & Baghdad ones a city and ones a citadel in my campaign and both give different upgrades.

p.p.s. In my campaign the Merc eles only have arbuequest but i am England and England dosnt get muskets so maybe it depends of the faction your playing i honestly dont know.

[dopp]

No, the merc eles only get arquebuses, even the Timurid ones have arquebuses. Good enough, really.

[Whacker]

Ok tried it with Musket Eles.

Beat em every single time with 2 units of muskets, with heavy losses, about 85% of the muskets die ever time. It's very close.

The AI prioritises enemy gunpowder weapons and ignores other units, so my hrose archers, spears etc get ignored, most of the time and the AI is shooting at the muskets.

I think there is a bug where the muskets don't shoot back half as much as they should. I'm not sure this is a feature or not. They get stuck trying to reform perpetually failing to do so. Despite this bug, they win most of the time.

I have reported this issue in the bug list.

When I tried this exact same test 3 times awhile back, 2 units of Jan. Musk. vs 1 unit of Musk. Elephants, I lost every single time due to the reforming bug. My Jan's would get off two rounds each before the Ele's engaged, and invariably bullets would hit both units and they'd never get another shot off. I don't know for certain but it would seem that this might be chalked up to the general "blobbing" problem that the game has. If that were fixed, I have no doubts that even a single unit of Jan. Musk. could most likely take on Musk. Ele's, and win the majority of the time. The Jan's can only get off two rounds before the Ele's are in range, but those two rounds do a LOT of damage, more often than naught the 2nd round will kill 2-3 ele's.

Cheers!

[zulukiller]

Sinan i get were you coming from mate i think but i dont know why people make those types of analoges except for x can actually kill y when there beyond flawed heres a WWII analogey for you to try and explain my point.

You've got 10 British soldiers using a piat (worst A.T. weapon ever) versus a retard (a captain) driving a King Tiger tank the british soldiers totally rip the tiger apart the Tiger with zero loses. Now change the situation and stick Rommel (a 10 star Gen) in the Tiger he will annihlate the British soldiers take the whole surrounding area call in reinforcement and open up a new counter front possibly changing the whole out come of WWII.

Do you get were im coming from now, in no way am i having a go at you sinan im just giving you as much warning as possible what ever your planning on doing tripple it. Look at these and other boards on how people are complaining about the Mongals being insanely hard. To me the mongals are just a normal faction there not really that hard in fact in my curent campagin there the ones begging me for peace becuse im kicking there arse so badly. But i truely and honestly fear the Timurids, in my previouse 2 campagins they took near enough the entire world over while fighting every faction at the same time saying there overpowered is an understatement honestly.