so, Strategies... share them!

[Anubisnl7]

How did you lose only 4 men when you go against desert cav? How did your BG even get close to the javelin cav with next to no losses? Unless you have other units being sacrificed as fodder?

Ever seen the movie serie of Rambo?
It explains it all!
Terminator movies also coffers this well

No your right, or its played at easy/medium difficulty, or its a combination of Rambo and the Ex-the governator Arnold Schwarzenegger!!!
now to think of it, a bodyguard with the speaches of Arnold Schwarzenegger, ... that would rock
think of this, a massive army lead by jullius Ceacar, Napolion and the local bakery shop owner(that or Homer Simpson)

Looks over the field, and he only says this: HASTA LA VISTA BABY, and the whole army shouts loud out!!!
...well maybe something to add in SS

While true, I'd have to say it's very easy to completely wreck an AI army with them if you're using them correctly. Unless your opponent outnumbers you in cavalry, a heavy cavalry unit is a for sure way to guarantee any unit that doesn't have a bonus against cavalry or is other cavalry is as good as dead. Even unprofessional spear units are as good as dead against a unit of heavy cavalry.

It's not until later in the campaign when you start seeing much more professional armies that cavalry begins to loose its superiority over almost everything.

I agree on that point, Heavy Cavalry is realy badass, but most in the beginning before all the factions are spear/pike/cammel/Rambo rich,
but i wouldn't discard them at all unless i don't have the economic for it.

they charge the hell out of any unit,



Yesterday I had the most beautifullest "almost" Victory ever
I was fighting against a rebel settelment with Genoa (2 Cavalry Millitia) and as reinforcements that first Pope army,
the rebels attacked me so they came out the castle and chased one of my cavarly.. With there WHOLE army,

so i sent the lad that was chased further in the field with that army behind it, leading them basicly to the Pope army,
and, just when they where far enough, i charged the twin brother of the chosen one into the city center and waited, and... i had the setelment if the Rebels only have missed the bus, i still had 2 seconds on the timer... ow and the Pope didn't do anything exept walking and enjoying the fieldsight.

[Lego_Bman]

The Pope does a very important thing when he enters the battle: he give his blessing to the troops, so thats why the Pope joins the fight.

[Alfonzo over Innsmouths]

Amazing strategems that may or may not work.

1: Try to get rid of an insane king by combat - send in your king on his own. No supporting army, nothing. Have him charge at the juiciest heavy infantry you can. When he loses too many men, chances are he'll run. You'll get a 'crushing defeat' or something, but your king will now run back, probably back to a settlement. Next turn - bam, all his guys are back, sometimes with a lot more chevrons than when you started.

(I Say insane king because, Murphy's law, you'll never be able to get rid of the bastard. And if you do, the heir is probably going to be worse.)

2:Combat crossbows - you get these as Lithuania as a fanatic unit, and mercenaries work as well. Simply stick a skirmish line in front of your troops, get rid of skirmish and put them on guard. They'll take down a few and absorb a charge quite well. Also - if you want to preserve them, put them on your flanks, and have them run behind the enemy and shoot.

3:Levy archers with flaming arrows used en masse - did this against the French in an early era campaign as Aragorn. The french ran away screaming. Never even phased the Portuguese or leon. The knights I soaked up with using peasants and mercenary crossbows.

4:Massed Militia - get four spearmen militia units. Deploy them essentially one on top of another in a chokepoint, and put them in guard mode. Greatest sticking force ever. It's like suddenly pulling a parking brake for cavalry charges.

5:Massed light cavalry - nuf said.

The only problem is that all of these tactics only work once when the army is at full strength. So think of it as the ultimate in delaying an enemy until a proper army shows up. If you're going to use militia or light, then use them as a red tide marching forwards socialism, crushing the capitalistic dogs, buring them in the glorious red death of Mother Russia!

[Anubisnl7]

The Pope does a very important thing when he enters the battle: he give his blessing to the troops, so thats why the Pope joins the fight.

And Blessing was what they did, and what they keep doing I

CAN'T WIN A WAR WITH 2 CANS OF COKE ON HORSEBACK!!!
I NEED MORE BLESSED CANS OF COKE, and they blessed me. God I dislike the taste of Coke.

Amazing strategems that may or may not work.

1: Try to get rid of an insane king by combat - send in your king on his own. No supporting army, nothing. Have him charge at the juiciest heavy infantry you can. When he loses too many men, chances are he'll run. You'll get a 'crushing defeat' or something, but your king will now run back, probably back to a settlement. Next turn - bam, all his guys are back, sometimes with a lot more chevrons than when you started.

(I Say insane king because, Murphy's law, you'll never be able to get rid of the bastard. And if you do, the heir is probably going to be worse.)

"I am the King of Rome, and above grammar." Emperor Sigismund at the Council of
constance 1414, to a prelate who criticized his grammar. (quick Google and SSteal qoute )

So a King... I wouldn't use my king to deliver my Coke to the front, its very dangerus for a man with a crown on his head.
But I get your point, instead I would use 2 to 3 (to keep it small) generals, better to manage on the field, and way less inportand,


the rest, well the levies in a choke works good, you should try it when in the city center and your general is in a Spear unit with Schiltrom, that makes one though unit!

[Byg]

My battle tactics.

I usually set my army up as an anvil and let the enemy break their hammer upon it.

obviously I use the hill advantage and set up with a line of spears and missile units very close in front of them. Archers are useless at retreating so I may need to intervene and retreat them as the enemy close.

each end of the line is reinforced with an extra layer of spear, sometimes at an angle to prevent flanking.

Any heavy or other infantry are used either along the rear of the spear line ready to assist against breakthroughs and in readiness to counterattack or I may weight them behind one particular flank to run around to the enemies rear once most enemy units are engaged at the front.

If some enemy do not engage then my flanking infantry do as above but one unit of spear will not rush into the engaged enemy rear ,but when behind them will instead turn to face unengaged enemies to protect the flankers.

Playing bgr, I'm usually outnumbered and I often don't have the luxury of easy battle winning units like heavy cavalry. If I have missile cavalry then as the enemy approaches, or before, they sweep to their sides and wittle the enemy down.

Any Cavalry I have I use to tickle the enemy archers, keeping them moving. They may also charge any isolated missile or siege units.

If I have a unit or two of heavy cavalry and the enemy have more, then they stay at my rear ready to assist where necessary as a fast reaction force. Often I may be flanked and these units can temporarily hold the flanks until spearmen or can take over, allowing the cavalry to then return to a position of readiness.

The general stays in the centre, close at the rear by default. He rushes to either flank to encourage as necessary. committing and losing him can be fatal for everyone so he only engages in the at critical moments to save the line or turn the battle when the enemy begin to show signs of weakening morale. At that point I may issue the order for the whole line to charge and I keep everyone moving forward to prevent and wavering or retreating enemy from recovering morale.

[recentiy03]

My battle tactics.

I usually set my army up as an anvil and let the enemy break their hammer upon it.

obviously I use the hill advantage and set up with a line of spears and missile units very close in front of them. Archers are useless at retreating so I may need to intervene and retreat them as the enemy close.

each end of the line is reinforced with an extra layer of spear, sometimes at an angle to prevent flanking.

Any heavy or other infantry are used either along the rear of the spear line ready to assist against breakthroughs and in readiness to counterattack or I may weight them behind one particular flank to run around to the enemies rear once most enemy units are engaged at the front.

If some enemy do not engage then my flanking infantry do as above but one unit of spear will not rush into the engaged enemy rear ,but when behind them will instead turn to face unengaged enemies to protect the flankers.

Playing bgr, I'm usually outnumbered and I often don't have the luxury of easy battle winning units like heavy cavalry. If I have missile cavalry then as the enemy approaches, or before, they sweep to their sides and wittle the enemy down.

Any Cavalry I have I use to tickle the enemy archers, keeping them moving. They may also charge any isolated missile or siege units.

If I have a unit or two of heavy cavalry and the enemy have more, then they stay at my rear ready to assist where necessary as a fast reaction force. Often I may be flanked and these units can temporarily hold the flanks until spearmen or can take over, allowing the cavalry to then return to a position of readiness.

The general stays in the centre, close at the rear by default. He rushes to either flank to encourage as necessary. committing and losing him can be fatal for everyone so he only engages in the at critical moments to save the line or turn the battle when the enemy begin to show signs of weakening morale. At that point I may issue the order for the whole line to charge and I keep everyone moving forward to prevent and wavering or retreating enemy from recovering morale.

That sounds like a good plan if the enemy is largely infantry-based but do you find it difficult when facing an army with a lot of archers?

[ihranator]

Here's something I like to call Crowd Control.

First you get a spy to infiltrate a city. When he opens the gates, you rush to the main gate with your cheap spearmen, locking their units into combat. Meanwhile your light cavalry/horse archers go around the sides with your best spearmen. You place the best spearmen to block the entrances to the city center (which you must clear of enemies first) then start capturing the city with the cavalry. Every enemy will now rush from their battles with the cheap spearmen to the city center, allowing you to block them with your good spearmen and flank them with everything you've got.

[Byg]

That sounds like a good plan if the enemy is largely infantry-based but do you find it difficult when facing an army with a lot of archers?

it's good vs infantry or cavalry biased or mixed. Anyway, if my own archers can't counter them, I either have to close with them very quickly or use the general and any cavalry to go and get them or occupy them, preventing them firing whilst the rest of the army closes. Though I would probably avoid battle with such an army in the first place if I thought I could not deal with it.

A Mongol army consisting of horse archers and foot archers would be best avoided without tons of archers or siege, for example.

[HannibalII]

Honestly, their is really not much in-game strategy to this game. Granted, SS is a dramatic improvement over the vanilla ai but it still really is not all that difficult no tw game's ai is anything other than predictable. If you guys want a challenge of in-game tactics I would highly suggest rtw's mp, the best and most strategy/skilll dependent multiplayer of any of the total war games (and yes I am absolutely including shogun in that statement).

However, the game is not necessarily all the conducive to historical/real-life strategies. The computer is programmed a certain way and gives bonuses and for specific movements that require little real thought (particularly as the ai cannot really readjust its thinking).

[Zhokar]

You are right. It is still a very rewarding thing getting an idea of historical military tactics even if you only get to use them against an enemy with a squirrel's IQ.

[Baywatch]

If you guys want a challenge of in-game tactics I would highly suggest rtw's mp, the best and most strategy/skilll dependent multiplayer of any of the total war games (and yes I am absolutely including shogun in that statement).

As someone who has played both I'm very curious as to why you think this. As far as unmodded games go, absolutely RTW is many times better than any in the series for MP everything but, I'd have to place SS right up there with it.

[Zhokar]

I feel a bit ashamed to say I love the artillery-heavy and extremely positioning dependent battles in Empire. "Haha, I will smash your flank with my heavy ca...*BOOM*...oh bollocks."

[Alfonzo over Innsmouths]

If you guys want a challenge of in-game tactics I would highly suggest rtw's mp, the best and most strategy/skilll dependent multiplayer of any of the total war games (and yes I am absolutely including shogun in that statement).

I would believe you, if the Macedonian Royal V wasn't horribly, horribly broken.

[HannibalII]

Essentially, rtw's mp community has created a set of rules that make the game both balanced and challenging. So in terms of player v player games I believe it is the best game that is well played enough to actual afford games at essentially any time of the day.

SS I think would be cool for a hotseat campaign or something, possibly even one more fun then rtw, but the mp in rtw far surpasses anything tw-related

[Baywatch]

Essentially, rtw's mp community has created a set of rules that make the game both balanced and challenging. So in terms of player v player games I believe it is the best game that is well played enough to actual afford games at essentially any time of the day.

SS I think would be cool for a hotseat campaign or something, possibly even one more fun then rtw, but the mp in rtw far surpasses anything tw-related

To each their own I suppose but if it weren't for the lack of a MP player base I'd have to go with SS over an unmodded RTW. You don't need house rules to make it balanced and I'd have to say in a player vs. player situation SS surpasses RTW in strategic depth especially if you are either playing in the All or Late era.

Don't get me wrong, RTW is great but some of the heated battles that come right down to a handful of troops standing between my friends and I in SS easily trumps any satisfaction RTW has ever been capable of bringing me. IMO, its only (albeit huge) drawback is the lack of a player base.

[Anubisnl7]

Hotseat? that would be nice to use it once..
I have this mod since 6.3 i gues, and i have tried it once, is there a way to do it online?

(waaaay offtopic )

[Zhokar]

There's a sticky.

[me_hungarian]

Disregard the above if you are playing as the Cumans, otherwise good advice.

Anyone actually try the Breakthrough/Refused Flank? I really couldn't see either working in practice unless the AI lost a few more screws and just stood static as you had your way with them. Unlike in reality, orders can be given and received in a moments notice in a TW game so the AI should collapse its ranks on you and have you completely surrounded before you can do too much damage. Maybe I could see Breakthrough working if you have some really tough cavalry and the AI has low quality troops.

Regardless awesome list. You get + rep from me as well.

I'v done refused flank or at least something close. It worked very well against Venice. One mass force and a thin layered flank filled with defensive units and crossbows spread out for best effect.
I = Infantry
C = Crossbows
S = spears
H = hose
X = siege weapon


S-S-S--------S-----S----S
I-I-I-I-----C-----C----C----C
C-C-C-C----------------------H
------X----X----X
----------HH

the idea is to push with the main force while the horse provide cover and flanking, the thin flank allows a crossfire with the Xbows, on anything engaged with the spears. while the main force pushes slowly upon one flank of the enemy, the thin force moves if it must to support the main. siege weapons also are very nice to use with this formation. Note this tactic will not do very well against a horse heavy army works great against infantry heavy armies due to the thin line being able to survive longer.