Author: Spartan90
Original Thread: Spartan90's Strategy Guide - Defending Against Mongols / Timurids

Spartan90's Strategy Guide - Defending Against Mongols / Timurids
Spartan90's Strategy Guide - Defending Against Mongols / Timurids

This guide is a thorough analysis of strategies to defend against the two most powerful and formidable, and equally famed and feared factions - the Mongols and the Timurids. They are two nomad horde factions that appear in enormous waves of troops during the late period of the game. Make peace with your current enemies, fortify your cities, and prepare for the most intense fighting you'll ever experience in the campaign.

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Mongols

The Mongols are the first horde to appear. They come in several waves during the start of the late period, and pop up near the east of the map, either near the extremities of the undefended Steppes of Russia, the eastern Turkish settlements or even more south than that. They are quite unpredictable, and I have personally seen them attack as deep into Europe as Poland and the Balkans before settling in. However, their main targets are generally Russia, Turkey and the rich Holy Lands - specifically Antioch. Generally, if the Player has settlements nearby, the Mongol AI seems to be more attracted to your cities.

For the sake of this guide, let's hypothetically say you are in the area where the Mongols have invaded. The AI is hopeless at defending against these unstoppable hordes, and it will generally be up to you, the Player to stop this steamrolling faction. The Mongols tactics are very unpredictable, and may involve stumbling around for years in the Steppes, or get straight into their conquering and exterminating ways. Usually the latter is the case.

The Mongols' strengths lie within their ability to fight in huge numbers. There will generally be around seven stacks of Mongols in close proximity, which means you will have to support enough forces to fight thousands of the strongest units in the game in one battle. Their other strengths - and more famed - are their incredible horse archers. Their cavalry are world-class, the Mongols seem to have learnt to ride a horse before they learnt to walk. Apart from this, they have a very decent backing of heavy spear infantry and some deadly archers.

In the open field, you will get absolutely smashed by the Mongols. If you use spearmen to combat their cavalry, they will just sit at a distance and pepper away at your ranks of soldiers. If you fight them Horse Archer versus Horse Archer, you will face unnecessary casualties, which I’m sure no Player could really afford. Plus, there are easier ways…

Any commander with half a brain will tell you that one of the best strategies to fighting the enemy is to fight them on your ground, your way. Many Players get intimidated with the hordes of Mongol cavalry sweeping through the Steppes exterminating everything in their way. Their strength is in their mobility. So all a good commander has to do is take that advantage away.

The Mongols are unstoppable in the open fields, so try and fight them by blocking various choke points or behind castle walls. These are the two primary ways to fight the Mongols effectively. I will now explain them in further detail.

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Strategy 1 – Bridges: The Mongols love fighting in flat open fields so that they can encircle you with their cavalry and unleash deadly volleys of arrows into all sides of your army. Fighting them at a chokepoint such as a bridge or a river crossing really limits their abilities to do anything other than fight in a concentrated frontal assault. Bridge attacks are very simple. All you have to do is have strong soldiers to hold the bridge, and have better artillery than the enemy if they try and outshoot you over the river.

The Mongols will always send their infantry over the bridge. Meet them with your heaviest spearmen halfway and engage them of course. Now they will either send their cavalry across the bridge as well, if the AI is feeling stupid, or more sensibly sit at a distance and try to thin your ranks with their horse archers. This being said, you will want your artillery to be focusing on their horse archers. Their dismounted archers aren’t that much of a problem, as your own cavalry will be able to chase them down when the battle between the infantry on the bridge begins to waiver. Concentrate all artillery, archer and musket fire on the horse archers. You may not kill them all, but hopefully you can send them into a rout. When your infantry finally break through the ranks of your enemy, send your cavalry charging through to get rid of all routing units, and more importantly to dismiss their dismounted archers.

Strategy 2 – Sieges: If you are okay with the Mongols devastating your lands, the more safer option is to hide behind your castle walls. Eventually the Mongols are either going to pass your lands, or lay siege to you. If the latter is the case, siege defense can cause catastrophic amounts of damage to the Mongols. If you have built cannon towers, you can wipe out huge chunks of their army while they sit outside your walls. If you still only have ballista towers, you can still thin their ranks quite effectively.

The strategy is much the same as the bridge battle. You want to force them to fight in chokepoints, be it your gate or your breached walls. The upside to fighting in a siege instead of a bridge is that it least your towers can aid in your defense. Man the entire side of the wall that the Mongols are facing to get the most use out of your towers. Hopefully before there is a breach in your gates / walls, you should be able to thin their ranks by 10 – 20%.

When there is a breach in the wall / gate, clog the area with a few units of your heaviest spearmen. Their cavalry will try and rush the breach, and in this confined area, you can really dish out terrible amounts of damage to their cavalry. Use your archers to shoot at any valuable units, generally horse archers or siege equipment. After a breach, send you cavalry out of a side entrance gate and surprise their siege equipment and archers that are firing into your city. With their horse archers occupied at the breaches, you should have no trouble dealing with this threat. Then charge your cavalry into the rear and flanks of their horse archers fighting in the breaches to completely surround them. Enjoy the slaughter!

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Rinse and repeat either of these tactics to wipe out this nomad faction. It is a pretty good feat to be able to defeat the Mongols. Just know that the worst is yet to come..

The Timurids

The Timurids are the next and final horde faction. If you thought facing the Mongol horde was a nightmare, facing the Tirumids is the equivalent of going to hell and back – twice. They still have the formidable horse archers, but realizing their weaknesses in cavalry, they decided to upgrade. Meet the infamous, and near indestructible elephants. Not only will they wreak havoc to your infantry and cavalry using melee, but they also decided to whack on some cannons on the backs of these beats. Yes, I said cannons. Oh, and if that’s not enough, the Timurids also have rocket launchers. Yes, I said rocket launchers.

Okay, so I’ve painted a pretty daunting picture of this faction, but there are some upsides that you can smile at. Firstly, the Timurids’ forces all come in one bunch, not in waves like the Mongols did, so you can deal with this threat knowing that when they’re defeated, they’re not coming back. The second and most important factor is they appear around 150 years after the Mongols, approximately 1360 – 1400. This gives you plenty of time to recover from the devastation of the Mongols, but more importantly, you may have finished the game by this time and have no need to fight the Timurids. But that’s no fun now is it?

Although your tactics to fight the Timurids are much the same as fighting the Mongols, as their armies are still very cavalry-orientated, you have to use more strategies to combat their near invincible elephants. The Timurids will still attack the same areas as the Mongols, and will still usually exterminate any settlements they capture. So keep this in mind when you fortify your defenses.

Let’s talk about strategy. The threat of horse archers are a thing of the past when you compare them to the Timurids’ new threats – elephants and rocket launchers. Although the latter is more of an eye-candy item, it can still dish out unpredictable and random amounts of damage to your infantry. They aren’t the effective against walls. What is effective against both walls and infantry are their elephants – quite easily the most deadly unit in the game. Their horse archers are still just as deadly as the Mongols, and the threat just as worrisome, but the elephants still take priority. Also, the Timurids utilize the strongest gunpowder unit in the game – the Monster Bombard. One shot from these bad boys can take down an entire wall. On the upside, it does take around 45 – 60 seconds to reload, so grab you cavalry and rush these cannons. Make them your number one priority in siege battles, in the field they are of less importance due to incredible inaccuracy.

The “Fighting on the Bridge” tactic is near useless, as the idea is to fight in a concentrated mass on the bridge. When fighting against elephants, as you probably know, they can plow straight through the thickest of ranks, killing men faster than Rambo. If you have no choice to fight on the bridge, the only upside is that elephants are big targets and easy to scare. Use accurate gunpowder artillery and all your archers / muskets to concentrate firepower on these beasts. It should knock a few down, but more importantly, make them frightened and send them into a frenzy that will see them go wild, killing more of their own men than yours.

The other upside for elephant friendly fire is that they are reasonable trigger happy with their cannons on their backs. This can result in heavy amounts of friendly fire, and they can hopefully send themselves into a frenzied riot with only a little encouragement from your basilisks.

Fighting in a siege is exactly the same, when they breach the walls, clog it up. It is difficult with their elephants, so your main objective is to man all your cannon towers and hopefully you can knock a good chunk out of their elephants. Utilize your castle’s layered walls. Dish out as much damage from your cannon towers as possible, before retreating to the next ring and setting up a defense there. Each time, the Timurids should lose vast amounts of their elephants. Setting up stakes from your archers in the streets should slow them down during your retreat as well.

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Much as the Mongols, rinse and repeat until all of the Timurids are gone. Congratulations on defeating the hardest horde, the strongest faction and the most difficult challenge in the game!