New World- what kind of army?

[Molinaargh]

I haven't seen much of America, but they have a few archers that can counter missile cavalry.

I would go (and I am going) with Arquebusiers (cheap and effective), heavy infantry and light cavalry (after a few cannon shots and Arquebusier volleys the morale should be low enough to rout them after a quick charge).

[Warluster]

I will go with everything, train everything, ship them over there and wipe them out like a horde!

[Zenicetus]

Horse archers sound fun, but might be hard to maintain at full strength over there. I think the only local mercs you can hire are Indian infantry. You get the special Conquistador unit, but that's a mounted knight, isn't it? To maintain a HA army against all those full-stack waves of Aztecs might require a steady stream of reinforcements from the Old World.

I'd like to try musketeers, with local Indian mercs as a sacrificial pinning force, and whatever cav I can scrape up. But they probably have the same recruitment/retraining problem. There won't be any big cities over there with the ability to replenish lost units for a while. Might have to go bog-standard for army composition in the first several years, unless you have a whoppin' big economy and lots of ships for sending reinforcements.

P.S. that's all just armchair generalship, since I'm playing Spain but haven't reached that point yet.

[Comrade Alexeo]

After experimenting with HRE vs. Aztec custom battles, here are some possible helpers:

1) DON'T bother with sword or spear infantry. They'll be destroyed by the Aztecs in melee.

2) DO use lots of of pikemen and, perhaps, halberdiers. In the case of Spain, you're lucky that you have Tercios.

3) DON'T use heavy cavalry unless you can ensure they'll get a good charge, as they also tend to fall apart in melee

4) DO use missile cavalry, especially those that can melee reasonably well (like HRE Reiters); you can charge them in after you weaken the enemy with barrages. Those that don't (like, I suspect, Mounted Crossbowmen), be prepared to micromanage them.

5) DON'T use exclusively gunpowder infantry.

6) DO use Musketeers AND Pavise Crossbowmen in concert. The former are to scare the Aztecs, while the latter are there for sheer killing prowess (and survivability, as your supply lines are effectively nonexistent in the New World).

7) DON'T expect artillery to be a panacea, and don't bother with really big artillery pieces either.

8) DO bring artillery like Serpentines and try and concentrate them on the enemy general; and/or some Ribaults to strengthen your flanks.


Hope these help!

[Ice]

After experimenting with HRE vs. Aztec custom battles, here are some possible helpers:

1) DON'T bother with sword or spear infantry. They'll be destroyed by the Aztecs in melee.

3) DON'T use heavy cavalry unless you can ensure they'll get a good charge, as they also tend to fall apart in melee



Hope these help!

Even if I have the highest level knights with upgraded armor and weapons? How will unarmored aztecs tear them apart?

[Comrade Alexeo]

I've tried Zweihanders and Gothic Knights (mounted) against Aztec armies. The Zweihanders often scatter within a minute in once in melee. Gothic Knights can be devastating if you manage to get them to charge (difficult with all the trees), and will slog their way through a melee for some time, but are quickly bogged down due to the huge Aztec armies and eventually fall, taking some but invariably not enough Aztecs with them.

[Marius Dynamite]

Whatever you do, Fill your boats with Priests and spies, Assassins, Diplomats and Merchants.

[Marius Dynamite]

Whatever you do, Fill your boats with Priests and spies, Assassins, Diplomats and Merchants.

[zulukiller]

Ive been to the americas in one of my campaigns and its not that easy over there but heres what i think.

1) The best thing i think you can do is take the rebel settelments in the Carribean & the US just so youve got somewere local to resupply.

2) When crossing the Atlantic move up to Ireland (by sea west coast) about the middle of it then go directly west its the fastest way to get to the americas. As your movement across the deep ocean is reduced alot and i think this is the shortest distance to shallow waters again.

3) Take at least 2 stacks actually take as many as possible with as many generals as possible(for hireing mercs) and have plenty of cash to tech up the rebel settelments as fast as you can for resupply & retraining.

4) Forget about the cavalry and cannons it is litterly near enough all jungle over there (were the aztecs are it is anyway) with very little open spaces. So take your best units that have bonus for fighting in the woods (i.e. if you were England heavey billmen would be proberly best). Maybe sherwood archers would be good aswell if youve got a good woodsman guild.

5) In between every turn while traveling build forts because they will mob you with 3 stacks at once.

6) As someone else said take loads of spies, assasins, and preist/imams

Thats my plan anyway in my new campaign for what im going to do when i go to the americas although ive just had a good idea. Im goimg to hire myself some elephant mercs near baghdad if i can and take them with me and see what carnage they can cause.

[dismal]

Whatever you do, Fill your boats with Priests and spies, Assassins, Diplomats and Merchants.

That's my current plan as Spain.

I extended my short campaign (which I won 100 years ago) just to have a crack at the New World. First ship just departed with about 12 agents only. I'm hoping it'll be my only voyage.

Gonna see if I can conquer the new world without sending troops over. Just bribery and conquistadores, etc.

I'll probably make a stack of mounted crossbows just for the heckofit I want see what they can do. Problem is I can make them in my castles in France and my active fronts will be the Aztecs in the New World and the Mongols in Egypt.

[econmists]

Playing as the Brits I sent a newly minted stack of: dismounted knights (swords and warhammers) and feudal calvary, cannon battery, longbowmen and arquebusiers in support + one family member general unit. I also recruited a whole stack of native mercs. I found out a couple things: one: in the thick foliage it is damn hard to see what is going down, two: cannons *at least the ones I was using* were worthless, three: calv charges were broken up by the heavy tree growth, four; unsupported merc natives are hopleless. My merc indian stack was ahead of my main stack and it got jumped and annihlated. Stacks seemed to be swarming from everywhere and I had to fight my way back to the city I had taken. I was then sieged and overrun. Too busy fighting pretty much all of Europe to get another army together.

Meanwhile on the lower american land mass, which was easily conquered, my occupying force was pushed out of the town during a rebellion. Rebellion seemed to come outta no where, regardless of the fact that i had built a town watch & church plus had a full stack occupying the town.

[Shaun]

Playing as the Brits I sent a newly minted stack of: dismounted knights (swords and warhammers) and feudal calvary, cannon battery, longbowmen and arquebusiers in support + one family member general unit. I also recruited a whole stack of native mercs. I found out a couple things: one: in the thick foliage it is damn hard to see what is going down, two: cannons *at least the ones I was using* were worthless, three: calv charges were broken up by the heavy tree growth, four; unsupported merc natives are hopleless. My merc indian stack was ahead of my main stack and it got jumped and annihlated. Stacks seemed to be swarming from everywhere and I had to fight my way back to the city I had taken. I was then sieged and overrun. Too busy fighting pretty much all of Europe to get another army together.

Meanwhile on the lower american land mass, which was easily conquered, my occupying force was pushed out of the town during a rebellion. Rebellion seemed to come outta no where, regardless of the fact that i had built a town watch & church plus had a full stack occupying the town.

What British faction is this?

[Anubis King]

Has anyone thought of hiring elephant mercenaries and using them against the aztecs?

I haven't reached America yet but that is a idea I had to deal with the numbers. I know the elephants devasted my army very quickly.

[lars573]

After experimenting with HRE vs. Aztec custom battles, here are some possible helpers:

1) DON'T bother with sword or spear infantry. They'll be destroyed by the Aztecs in melee.

2) DO use lots of of pikemen and, perhaps, halberdiers. In the case of Spain, you're lucky that you have Tercios.

3) DON'T use heavy cavalry unless you can ensure they'll get a good charge, as they also tend to fall apart in melee

4) DO use missile cavalry, especially those that can melee reasonably well (like HRE Reiters); you can charge them in after you weaken the enemy with barrages. Those that don't (like, I suspect, Mounted Crossbowmen), be prepared to micromanage them.

5) DON'T use exclusively gunpowder infantry.

6) DO use Musketeers AND Pavise Crossbowmen in concert. The former are to scare the Aztecs, while the latter are there for sheer killing prowess (and survivability, as your supply lines are effectively nonexistent in the New World).

7) DON'T expect artillery to be a panacea, and don't bother with really big artillery pieces either.

8) DO bring artillery like Serpentines and try and concentrate them on the enemy general; and/or some Ribaults to strengthen your flanks.


Hope these help!

Foot Conquistadores can take it to Aztecs in melee. Mounted Conquistadores should be used to assassinate the Aztec generals. Then the Aztecs tend to retire. My Spainish armies in Mexico are Conquistadores (6 foot 4 mounted) 4 musketeers, basiliks, and my general.

[Siebharrin]

As the scots I beat 4 full stacks of aztecs with 7 Noble Pikemen, 8 Noble Highland Archers, 4 Knights and ze General.

Just siege a castle and wait for the rescueattempt...

Hole up in a corner of the map with your inf and general, while the knights
hit'n'run... You run out of arrows pretty fast, so I'm wondering if crossbows
would have been a better choice. But I've never had so many perfect charges =)

Seeing four units of aztecs go down in two seconds was awesome =)=)
(I'm not much of a cav player)