I need a better Venetian stack

[andrewt]

If it's campaign, venetian heavy is a lot cheaper to maintain than dismounted feudal knights, so I barely use any dismounted feudal knights.

[sapi]

Personally i'd either drop most of the cavalry or all of the infantry.

I find that mixed armies often suffer from being the jack of all trades and the master of none, so it's sometimes easier to have both an all infantry (+ the general) and an all cavalry army operating at the same time; you can use either one as the situation demands...

[monkian]

Personally i'd either drop most of the cavalry or all of the infantry.

I find that mixed armies often suffer from being the jack of all trades and the master of none, so it's sometimes easier to have both an all infantry (+ the general) and an all cavalry army operating at the same time; you can use either one as the situation demands...

You NEED to have a mixture - i.e a couple of cav units at the very least.

[sapi]

You NEED to have a mixture - i.e a couple of cav units at the very least.

Yeh - i generally have the general and one cavalry unit (or, later in teh campaign, two generals)

With the Venetians I have used lots of militia units. The Carrico standard has helped hold their morale. I have also had them drop the standard and fight. They are pretty good IMO. My Carrico standard in my main army has a silver chevron from their various battles and have over time only lost a total of three men. Some of these battles against Milan have been brutal with the dead stinking in the sun. But the Carico standard has stood over the piles of the slain.

On a similar note, the holy cross (for crusading armies) is the only unit i've seen which can stand up to a mongol charge

[Musashi]

You NEED to have a mixture - i.e a couple of cav units at the very least.

I disagree. Pure infantry armies can work beautifully. You just have to accept that you can't pursue routers very well.

[Ars Moriendi]

I disagree. Pure infantry armies can work beautifully. You just have to accept that you can't pursue routers very well.

Yes, they can work beautifully, but only in a very limited set of circumstances :

- What about fighting against horse archers ? An all inf army can't deal with that...

- What about an heavy cav enemy ? You'll just get surrounded and mass charged to hell from all directions...

- What about fighting against massed archers on a hilltop ? Your all-inf. army will get shot to pieces on the way...

- What about achieving the ideal victory ? That would be making the enemy rout as quickly as possible with minimum engagement, thus limiting your losses and maximizing theirs in the rout. You can't get them to mass rout quickly with an all inf army (that would require cavalry rear charging the engaged units) and if you can't catch the routers...

The only circumstance when an all inf. army will work well is in sieges or in forest battles, where both cavalry and archers are not very useful.

.............

Yesterday I fought a very illustrative battle against the Venetians : they had 1+1/2 stack (~30 units) wich - except for 2 heavy cav and 2 catapults - was composed of heavy inf: a mix of dismounted knights, broken lances and heavy venetian infantry. My army (byzantine) was much lighter (5 spears, 4 archers, 4 byz. inf, 6 horse archers, general). The pre-battle screen showed 3-1 (or 2-1?) in their favour. I wouldn't normally engage under such circumstances, but I was forced to. The and result : I won, losing ~2/3 of my army, the venetians lost all their men (half dead, half prisoners). If they had brought along some more cavalry and some of their xbows they would have certainly stomped me with minimal losses, but their lack of flexibility killed them.

[Nepereta]

I assuming this is single player grand campaign:

go do some successfull crusades you'll get one of the crusade cavalry which tends to be as good as generals bar the hp difference.

[Quillan]

You had 10 missile units, though. That makes a HUGE difference. No, they can't handle that. My typical in-campaign Venetian stack has 4 pavise crossbow militia, 6-8 venetian heavy infantry, 2 mounted sergeants for chasing down routers, and a load of generals for heavy cavalry. I'm not using any governors to avoid bad traits, so they all wind up in the armies. I've had as many as 7 bodyguard units in one army. In some armies deaths have whittled them down, so I replace the generals with feudal knights or Hospitallers. I prefer the St. John knights, but I've only got one castle where I can build them, so only armies near there have them.

[katank]

Since you mentionned BGs, let me simply say that a 20 BG stack is very uber. Just about nothing can stand against their combined charge.

If you want to exploit passive AI to its fullest, have no melee infantry. Have about 12-14 units of xbows/Venetian archers and the rest all heavy cav. Shoot them till they all die and mop up the rest with your cav (simple charge should rout the depleted units) and then have fun rout chasing.

[Musashi]

Yes, they can work beautifully, but only in a very limited set of circumstances :

- What about fighting against horse archers ? An all inf army can't deal with that...

It absolutely can. Since half my army will be high quality foot archers or pavise crossbowmen, I can cut his horse archers to ribbons while my much hardier troops easily weather his weaker arrows.

- What about an heavy cav enemy ? You'll just get surrounded and mass charged to hell from all directions...

I've set myself up with all infantry armies versus full on crusader armies (Heavy Cavalry dominated armies with light infantry support) and turned them back easily. Pikes can stop Heavy Cav easily, and even Armored Sergeants or some form of Heavy Infantry can hold them and inflict grievous casualties while your crossbows volley and break their morale.

It's also completely possible to deploy in full square, or to lure the enemy into charging the wrong point and envelop and overwhelm them with superior numbers (150 infantrymen per unit vs. 80 men per cavalry unit).

Heavy cavalry is overrated.

- What about fighting against massed archers on a hilltop ? Your all-inf. army will get shot to pieces on the way...

This is trickier, but it can be done. The fact that they are taking a stationary and defensive stance allows you to split your forces and envelop the enemy. The AI seems to have no concept of the "square" formation.

There are other strategies to deal with this situation as well.

- What about achieving the ideal victory ? That would be making the enemy rout as quickly as possible with minimum engagement, thus limiting your losses and maximizing theirs in the rout. You can't get them to mass rout quickly with an all inf army (that would require cavalry rear charging the engaged units) and if you can't catch the routers...

I think you underestimate the ability of massed crossbows to create routs.

[andrewt]

In playing the Russians, it's fun fighting infantry heavy armies using Dvor and Cossack cavalry. I just use my speed to envelop the enemy army and shoot from all directions. Even the top infantry take a lot of casualties when being shot up from behind and from the side. Of course, I need to hit pause a lot since the AI is dumb when it comes to choosing targets on its own.

It's certainly a lot different from my Venetian campaign, where I barely used missile troops at all. I found the Venetian archers get tired way too quickly. Their melee prowess is not that great, considering they are already tired just from firing a few arrows.

It is certainly possible to use all infantry for sieges and all cavalry for field battles. Some factions lend themselves better to either or both of those strategies.

[Ars Moriendi]

I think you underestimate the ability of massed crossbows to create routs.

I most certainly don't, I used them quite a lot in MTW... (hey, where are the arbalesters in M2 ?!).

It's just a bit of semantic misunderstanding here : when you said "pure infantry army" I read "melee foot soldiers only" - ie. no missile units, no cav & no arty ( - see what gets selected when you press CTRL-I in battle)

In the case of a mixed heavy melee / pav-xbows army, your points are correct - a long range, shielded and protected mass of AP missile units can turn the odds against horse archers, can force the campers off the hilltop and get those knigths charging when they shouldn't.

Still, I wouldn't leave home without a few horsemen, they're just too much fun to run around...