Lithuania in XL

[macsen rufus]

I've not tried Lithuania yet, always looked a little scary stuck in the undeveloped corner of the map. Maybe I'll give them a run when I get the urge for a change of scene from my current era... Looks like a challenging campaign from what you're saying

[doctrellor]

Yeah that area is a challange

I see the Novos & Lithuanians at war almost all the time, with 5 out of 6 games going to the Lithuanians...

If I have the Volga Bulgars or Cumans, I then steamroll the victor

The Lithuanians are usually smart and ally with the Poles/HRE/Hungarians and go North & East usually

The Novos usually stay in the North and go after the Swedes/Danes, and in one game, the Novos actually overwhemlmed the HRE

So I think the Kiev faction probably has the hardest time as they are sanwhiched in between 3 tough factions (Cumans, Lithu, Volga)

[macsen rufus]

Well, I gave them a try last night (Early era, Hard setting). First thing I noticed on the unit roster is the boyars - these are your real strength, and the Lithuanian infantry are quite handy in a scrap as well The economy is quite poor and it's always a balance between developing that and keeping a big enough army to hand. I was quite lucky in that everyone seemed to want to ally with me, including both Novgorod and Kiev. I made an early grab for Chernigov and Smolensk, but lost Chernigov to loyalty problems, then Novgorod nipped in there. Next I pushed northwards to take Livonia and Estonia. These are already pagan, so helps with the loyalty. After that I took the western route along the Baltic coast and took Prussia from the rebels without a fight.

I had a pretty lousy heir by this stage, so I decided that I would send him on a suicide mission to clear the line to the throne for his younger brother. Of course, he wasn't to go cheaply, so I sent him into Pomerania, where the rebels had fled from Prussia, and had an army consisting of 1x mounted Xbows, 1x Xbows, 1x Archers and 1x spearmen. Rather than waste all my boyars, I stripped the heir of as many men as possible to "top up" the other princely units. So in the end my useless heir took 42 boyars to fight, outnumbered 10 to 1. To cut a long story short, my boyars won, although only four of them were left at the end of the battle, having gained 3 valour and a "skilled attacker" and "skilled risky attacks" along the way The best I was expecting was to reduce the rebel army a bit before he snuffed it. In the end he died due to siege attrition the very next year, when my old king also died, so I ended up with the younger brother on the throne as planned.

At this point I had just dropped my alliance with the Cumans because the Hungarians (at war with Cumans) offered me a princess. The Cumans had taken Lesser Poland from the Poles. Then there was a loyalist rebellion just as the Poles offered me an alliance - easy task for me to join my new allies and "liberate" Lesser Poland (with just a few more troops than the Poles had ) As my other allies from Kiev defeated the Cumans in Volhynia that year, my war with them came to a quick end as I was now isolated from the Cuman hordes by the Kievans. Novgorod launched a seaborne invasion of Saxony (with their Grand Prince, no less, they may regret that later) and I had built up enough forces by then to take Brandenburg from the HRE, which finally brought my economy into something resembling respectable. I had struggled financially to get any ships in the water as they're so expensive (700fl compared to annual profits of ~100fl most years so far...) but I now have two ships and can trade as far as Skagerrak (wow!)

Next phase is to regroup a bit, get my economy developed further and "buff up" some of my troops by running them through the armourer and pagan sacrificial shrine in Lithuania (morale bonus much needed with the low quality troops). Lithuania's valour bonus for woodsmen also comes in handy as they make quite good AP flankers and do well in the woods (surprisingly enough...) I tend to use Slav warriors for garrison numbers, as they can fight if needed, even if they're no match for heavy inf, and like woodsmen have low upkeep. I would quite like to get my hands on Volhynia to reduce my borders (but that's held by Kiev, who could whup me if I betrayed them), and also Bohemia for the iron (but that's held by a small Polish army, but their main army is bigger than I care to think about right now ) I also don't attack allies, but that's my own "house rules" you may not feel constrained by....

Tactically I have depended on the boyars as missile and heavy cavalry, Lithuanian cav and mounted Xbows for flanking and breaking wavering troops, Lith Inf for the "footslogging" and woodsmen as infantry flankers, with archers as an initial formation breaker/harrassing force. I have not been fielding many spears as the cav I've been up against so far has been mostly horse archers, best chased out of the way with Lith Cav or shot with archers. Now my borders have reached the "Western" world I'll have to look more to a spear component for field armies, as I'll otherwise struggle against knights. Armies for the west will require mounted Xbows, Slav Javs, spears/armoured spears, Lith Inf and of course boyars. I haven't bothered with any siege eqpt yet as all the castles I've needed to assault so far have been wooden, and a unit of archers is enough.

Strategically, I'm keeping a largish army in Lithuania and another in Brandenburg. I expect sooner or later either Kiev or Novgorod to attack me, so I hope to be ready.

[Vytautas Lietuva]

You...have...BOYARS?!

They don't seem to be on mine. I'm playing XL mod, early era, normal setting. How come I don't get boyars?!

I'm gonna run back to my Lithuanian dumpster (where I live) and cry myself to sleep.

Yours,


Vytautas LT :P

[doctrellor]

Yeah, all my nobles are Boyars..So when I put the King with 2 or 3 Princes together, they rock...since your looking at about 120 to 150 of them

Last night, I had like 5 rebellions, and I executed the leaders taking his dread to 7 and his command to 5/6..My King lived to about 62, so the battles were plentiful..:)