The Moors the Merrier

[CaptainSolo]

After messing around with various factions in the custom battle section i have a real urge to try a grand campaign with the Moors.I have fancied a change from my English campaign which i also played to death in MTW and this is the only muslim faction that appeals to me,mainly as it is close enough to the Western European factions,which i'd still like to have some involvement with.

Now i'm not after a walkthrough guide by experienced Moors players,i'd rather find out the good/bad/ugly myself and enjoy playing a faction i have no experience with.

I suppose i'm after a feel for the faction,their starting position,terrain,units,cities and diplomatic relations with neighbours including the catholics.I'd also be interested to hear from Moors players and people who have fought against them to find out a little bit more about their units.Which are a pain to fight against etc.

Thanks in advance for any replies.

[KARTLOS]

the moors are a fun faction, your armies will be made up mainly of light troops and the are a good contrast to the european states.

they have fairly shoddy infantry, will usually be worse than your opponents in this regard.

The javelin horseman can be lethal if used correctly. i would suggest 6 or more units per full stack at the very least. move them behind your opponents and shoot them in the back. when they are sufficiently weakend engage with your infantry- and then charge the engaged units with the horses once they are engaged. You will end up with some v experienced cav units because they take alot of casualties.

the desert archers are an ok archer unit, and of course they dont run out of arrows as quickly as javelin units do.

being used to armies with heavy cav i was a bit wary of the arab cavalry, but they are actually an ok unit if used correctly. they are suitable for charging down missile troops + charging into the backs of engaged troops. If you have enough of them they are ok for a frontal assualt, but you are quite reliant on the opponent breaking quickly. if the opponent doesnt break pull them out quickly.

your general units are particularly important as it takes you a long time to get similar quality. i would reccomend having several in one army where possible. (try to get alot of "man of the hour" for this purpose).

use jihads as much as possible. i didnt know how to call a jihad until my campagin was always completed, but i found them very useful playing as the turks. the jihads will provide you with fairly decent cheap inf. i think you will only be able to recruit the jihadi mercs in highly muslim lands, and maybe not outside of iberia.

I reccomend trying to take the iberian penisular as quickly as possible. I went all out at the beggining, moving all my troops from africa to the extent that i left algiers undefeded for a few turns. Following council of noble missions i took valencia and zaragosa. by the time i took zaragosa the army that took it was a full stack spain had also been planning to take zaragosa and so most of their troops were bunched in the north east. this meant that i was able to sneak up with a small army and take leon, and then dealt with the rest of their armies with my full stack before taking toledo.
portugal then declared war on me. rather foolishly as it turned out as i took thier two cities very easily by virtue of having larger armies.
i am guessing i had taken the entirity of iberia by around turn ten.
following this i invaded france (after they declared war on me) with most of my military force, whilst a small troop went off to take , corsica, sardinia, tunis and tripoli. i also conquered sourthern italy up to rome and london.
my expansion then run out of steam for several turns as it was necesary to maintain large garrisons on the towns i conquered because of the difference in religion. i am now invloved in an intersting conflict with milan in italy (they have bologna and venice whilst i have genoa) and england in england. in both instances i have reached a technological impasse as the english are fielding armies with lost of unmounted knights etc, whilst the italians have their excellent milita troops.

taking all of iberia gives you a very solid position- because it is the edge of the map you are only going to face conflict on one border and thus dont need to leave many troops in the penisular. the same applies for north africa. i have never been attcked - in fact i have never seen the ai mount a naval invasion in any campaign- it mostly tends to attack what is next to it.

i seemed to make loads of money as the moors on h/h i think this may partly be becasue they have weaker(lighter) troops than most factions i have palyed with previously and hence cheaper upkeep.

get timbuktu fairly quickly as they have some gold mines annd decent meerchgant spots down there. i wouldnt prioritise this over conquest though as the income from sacking cities is always going to win out over merchant income.

[Beefeater]

Regarding the Arab Cavalry - the Moors racked up many notable successes against the Iberian Christians by using their cavalry to tempt infantry out of formation, and then using their greater mobility to gang up on individual units once they were tempted out. I've had success doing this with mounted sergeants as the French, and it should work with Arab Cavalry too.

[grinningman]

Desert Cavalry are ridiculously good, especially with the passive AI bug. Their javelins take down anything. Hashishin are also good (build and use lots of assassins to be offered the guild).

Head south for some lucrative trading opportunities... as Kartlos said, there are better ways to earn cash, but it's fun to explore.

And a whinge: why do Tuareg camels riders have such a huge upkeep (300 gold)?! I love camels, but I don't think they're worth it for the cost.

[CaptainSolo]

Thanks for the replies lads,i was starting to think that maybe i was the only one that was going to be playing as the Moors.
Parthia was probably my most played faction in RTW so i'm used to commanding the lighter troops,i suppose thats one of the reasons i felt tempted into trying these.

I have seen a few different spear types in the unit roster along with the urban militia which have returned from MTW and what i presume is their best infantry unit,the dismounted Christians.How do they fare against their European counterparts.?

I also presume that these units have the upper hand in desert warfare,is this still the case in this game and is it more or less so?

[quote=grinningman]And a whinge: why do Tuareg camels riders have such a huge upkeep (300 gold)?! I love camels, but I don't think they're worth it for the cost.[quote/]

Well that does seem expensive,more than feudal knights,but i'll have to stand the cost i suppose,to have a desert faction with no camels would be unthinkable.

Thanks again for the info lads.

[Darth Nihilus]

Get Timbuktu! Thats all i can say. Those gold mines and ivory resources are priceless. In every campaign I play, i always buy Timbuktu off the Moors for the resources, because it's a huge moneymaker.

[giskard]

I won the grand campaign for the first time playing as Moors.

Id say the biggest problem is distance. You pretty much have to travel a long way to attack on one flank and moving units to spain also takes time because of the distances involved in your initial empire.

After you take spain, it gets easier but distance is always your enemy as moors.

Id recommend building a strong navy, that will cut out the distance factor considerably.

Giskard

[CaptainSolo]

Thanks for the additional input Darth Nihilus and Giskard.

I suppose the distance along North Africa is both a blessing and a curse and is something they tried to achieve in the first MTW (giving you a land shield against the Egyptians) Although due to the map was impossible until now.
I must admit i'm really looking forward to getting cracking with this Faction as everything will be sooo different,terrain,units enemies etc.

Cheers for the posts lads,it's just wetting my appetite while i wait until tomorrow.