Turks' strategy after Janissary is weakened? (are they?)

[fant]

Hi all,

I am new to SS. I used to be a Turk player, as I like it's all around army. Heavy infantry, cavalry and house archer are all among the best in MTW2.


When starting a new SS game with Turk, I find heavy Janissaries was weakened significantly. They was about the 2nd best heavy infantry (second to Gothic, am I correct?) in the original MTW, but now got sliced by French noble foots. While it's house archers seems to be strengthened comparing with the French one.

Any suggestion on new strategies? Plus ... will some of the new mercenaries become hire-able in cities? Not just for Turks ... actually I like the new units a lot, but it's pity that we can hire lots of them in cities. (it 's good if we got more city-based units)

[Point Blank]

Janissary Heavy Infantry will beat Feudal Foot Knights. Against Chivalric Foot Knights its about even, and at a slight disadvantage vs Noble Foot Knights. The JHI are cheaper units than all those opponents. Also, upgrading their armor makes them significantly better.

[Chola_Kingdom]

Janissary Heavy Infantry will beat Feudal Foot Knights. Against Chivalric Foot Knights its about even, and at a slight disadvantage vs Noble Foot Knights. The JHI are cheaper units than all those opponents. Also, upgrading their armor makes them significantly better.

but it's not historically accurate because janissaries are the backbone of the turks everyone knew that and they are rare so if you call them cheaper you are saying in money or quality?
in history they knocks out ventian heavy, varangian guards[Byz], even the egyptian mamluks, and also a constantinople crusaders
so the janissary heavy should be better than those noble knights mate

[ProneStar!]

but it's not historically accurate because janissaries are the backbone of the turks everyone knew that and they are rare so if you call them cheaper you are saying in money or quality?
in history they knocks out ventian heavy, varangian guards[Byz], even the egyptian mamluks, and also a constantinople crusaders
so the janissary heavy should be better than those noble knights mate

not really accurate historically, and i wouldnt compare them to the mamluks too much as they basically the exact same, but with mustaches : D
the reason the janissaries fell apart is the exact same as the mamluks loss of power. They were simply professional soldiers(slaves as well) who were trained to fight. Really doing a comparison between military styles is pointless as there is no definitive answer.

[Point Blank]

but it's not historically accurate because janissaries are the backbone of the turks everyone knew that and they are rare so if you call them cheaper you are saying in money or quality?
in history they knocks out ventian heavy, varangian guards[Byz], even the egyptian mamluks, and also a constantinople crusaders
so the janissary heavy should be better than those noble knights mate

Are they the backbone or are they rare? Don't think they can be a rare backbone Noble knights are more heavily armored, that is their advantage. If the JHI get an armor upgrade they will be at least as good. And as I said they are cheaper, largely because their armor is not as expensive, but they are very capable of beating more expensive units. They are also disciplined and highly trained and much better in melee vs cavalry because their halberds gets an anti-cav bonus.

[Chola_Kingdom]

Are they the backbone or are they rare? Don't think they can be a rare backbone Noble knights are more heavily armored, that is their advantage. If the JHI get an armor upgrade they will be at least as good. And as I said they are cheaper, largely because their armor is not as expensive, but they are very capable of beating more expensive units. They are also disciplined and highly trained and much better in melee vs cavalry because their halberds gets an anti-cav bonus.

ohh now i get it you are talking about the game units. sorry i missed you thre and thought it was history .btw in history they were cheap because they have been captured in mainly Greece and other near countries around Turk. they are professional soldiers they only thing they know is how to kill the enemy from childhood.
they are lacked and armour but not in tactics and trainings
in the game mtw2 put them as low class units compare to the nobles
those Turks ruled over Entire northern africa and the Asia minor and the Modern day greece, macedonia
sorry for the Off topic info

[delra]

Strategies. Well. Get a lot of archers. Build Ottoman infantry and mix it into the team. They are I think the best hybrid (armored archer) around the place.

Build Naffatun to reinforce your archer-heavy line against armored swordsmen of all types. Build horse archers and manouvre (i never know how to spell this word) them behind enemy lines to get the max from their arrows. Finally, make sure you deploy stakes and that your flanks are secured with the heaviest cavalry you can get (to smash his cavalry and then everything else). While fighting Mongols just deploy stakes on your side of a bridge and see them dying.

[Poisoner]

In the original MTW the Janissaries would rape anything that got in there way. Second best my ass, they stomped everything. In the old MTW I used to make armies of Janissaries that I would let loose upon the world. They only stopped when they ran out of land to pilage.

[Henry X]

In the original MTW the Janissaries would rape anything that got in there way. Second best my ass, they stomped everything. In the old MTW I used to make armies of Janissaries that I would let loose upon the world. They only stopped when they ran out of land to pilage.

It's true, they raped And killed all in their way!

[whhyy]

^ And a healthy portion of Europe before that.

Basically just spam the hell out of missile units.

gg.

[fant]

Hi thank you very much for all your replies. Playing style for Turks do change a lot from the original MTW2. JHI got sliced by noble knights very easily. While the top cavalry of Turks seems able to beat Lancers in many tests. I am not good at medieval history, but this is quite different from what i learn from the media (and internet)

JHI are slaves, but if we consider the costs and time for them to be trained, and the rewards the received, they aren't really cheap. Of course, they could still be cheap than noble knights, but the situation, may more likely to be (just some imagined example):
1. Noble Knights, a team of 20, costs 800
2. JHI, a team of 100, costs 1000
3. Spearman, a team of 500, costs 250 (well they are not professionals)
Their costs should differ a lot, but individual skills should be close (for 1 and 2)

Yes JHI got bonus against cavalry, but in MTW2 most units who doesn't know spearwall will be crushed in seconds, even charged from the front. Again I am not familiar with medieval history. But is that spearwall such a rare thing in history? See most muslim units don't know spearwall. What will they do against cavalry charges?

OK, if they really don't know spearwall (or sth similar), it's reasonable for infantries (even those elite one) to be crushed by a charge from the front. But what unrealistics is:
1. The cavalry charges into the front of infantry should suffer much heavier loss.
2. Number of men per infantry unit should be several times larger than cavalry unites. Say, 1000 vs 150.
3. Most Infantry should be able to make some kind of obstacle in front of them. Not just at the begining of the battle. Also, knights who shot by arrows and fell from the houses will also become obstacles, and cause losses to their own side.
4. Trained infantry should know to bow down, to let arrows of their own side to fly above them. And to stand up when enemy cavalry gets close.

[Point Blank]

Don't forget the cost of armor and equipment (eg warhorses), its a huge component of the cost.

I agree with a lot of what you say about JHI (and non-spear/spearwall infantry in general) vs cavalry. In M2TW the main attributes vs cavalry are having pikes or spears. Many polearm units get neither of those. There is also the CA 'rock-paper-scissors' approach, which specifies those infantry types as vulnerable vs cavalry, and there is only a limited amount we can do within the game mechanics to counter it. Compounding that is the apparent problem that polearm spear_bonus vs cavalry does not appear to be working except for phalanx polearm units. The next version of RealCombat, which is used by SS, will do the following to help somewhat:
-All polearm units get a functional anti-cavalry bonus via a different mechanism than the spear_bonus. They will be better in melee now vs cav.
-polearm units have increased mass to better resist charges
-redesigned mount mass model to compliment above
-reduction in cavalry unit sizes by 25%

I will however say that historically, polearm units were very vulnerable to cavalry charges, their strength lay more in melee (hence the Swiss mixing halberdiers in with their pike units etc)

[smitty]

I already started another thread about my complaints with SS's changes to the JHI, and I wanted to lend my input here as well and mention that I want a stronger JHI unit. I started a Turkish campaign with SS 4.1 just to use JHI's and now they suck!

[delra]

You can always edit EDU and tune them to your likes.

I'm with Point Blank here and I think the fixes he will make in RC 1.3 are sufficient.

[Point Blank]

OK, lets examine how they 'suck'. As I stated above:
-they will currently beat Feudal Foot Knights
-they have an even chance versus Chivalric Foot Knights
-both of those units cost more in campaign than JHI. Both of those units are also 'elite'
-they are highly disciplined, highly trained and have very high morale
-if their armor is upgraded, which is very easy because its only light mail, they are substantially better
-they have a big bonus in melee vs cavalry
-they have a very high charge bonus
-they fight well in the heat because of their lighter armor etc

On the minus side, they are vulnerable to cavalry charges and missile fire, having only light mail (notice they beat units with heavier armor?).

If they were 'uber' before they were probably overpowered, which is something RC is trying to avoid. In fact, in assigning stats to each unit with RC I make almost no subjective decisions. Virtually all stats are assigned based on a table or algorithm of some sort.

How would you suggest they be improved, consistent with staying in balance with other units and their unit cost?

[delra]

Point Blank is right here. They are cheap and still damn strong. I really see no valid reasons for your complaints guys. And "they were overpowered in vanilla so we want them overpowered in RC" is not an argument. RC stands for REAL Combat. And it does make the combat much more real than vanilla. If you don't like it, nobody forces you to use it. If you don't like it but still like other RC changes, you can always edit the file by yourself and give them whatever you want. There's no point in harassing RC devs to do things against their will.

[Graywolf]

Meh I just edit the stats of the Janissaries to make them stronger. Though it's a little hard with the new system RC uses, idk which numbers are for which stat anymore so a little trial and error is done.

[Wolfcp11]

Though it's a little hard with the new system RC uses, idk which numbers are for which stat anymore so a little trial and error is done.

It is the exact same before, just new numbers...

[Point Blank]

Also, some of the numbers (like the attack value) may look low, but have been balanced with the animation that the JHI unit uses, which is a very powerful one. If all units used the same animation, the attack value would be higher. Also, don't forget it is using an AP weapon (halberd) so halves any opponent armor.

[fant]

Thank you for all your reply, and sorry for my late response.

Though I haven't mentioned in any of my previous posts, but if you ask me if I want to see a stronger JHI, I will say yes. This is just like a Protoss player (in starcraft) want to see Protoss to be stronger in the next patch -- you can regard such thinking and discussion as chitchat or spams, etc ... but these are not "complaints" or disrespect to the modder. For sure.

In fact I truly appreciate they hard work and changes made to the game. I enjoy playing Turks since MTW1 as I like it's flexible playing style. In SS, Turks is improved in many aspects. Many of it's units become cheaper and much more cost efficient. Horse archers are improved noticeably - better melee and fast moving, while horse archers of France and Byz are weakened. JHI becomes (relatively) weaker but stays as good anti-cavalry units. These changes make Turks looks more close to MTW1. I like MTW1's unit patterns more than MTW2. MTW differentiate factions' characteristics better than MTW2. Also, in terms of gameplay, now I have a reason to bring Naffatun with me. In the original MTW2, I seldom use them. A good RTS should make every units be useful. In this sense, changes to the JHI is successful.

Some of us say JHI is stronger and some say it is weak (relatively). Actually we are comparing 2 different aspects: one-on-one, and total cost efficiency. JHI is weakened comparing with that in original MTW2 (though you may think it over-powered in MTW2), but strengthened in terms of cost efficiency. Of course, it is more cool to have a few elite units than many not so elite units. Every faction should have some powerful, but not cost efficient units. If I am correct, Qapukulu can beat Lancers now, can't them?

Possible changes to JHI could be (without changing the relative strength of units):
1. Make JHI stronger, but raise it costs significantly.
2. We can make there more people in a JHI units, and less in a knight units (eg 40). In this way the total strength of a units can be unchanged. Of course, stats of knights have to be increased in this case.
3. Knights (and other heavy armor units) get tired easier on battlefield. They will get tired even they don't make lots of actions. They get tired easier in desert, and still get tired (though at a slower rate) outside desert. And their moving speed can be lowered. But knights' stats should be increased, to compensate them and to balance the game. These changes should be realistic. One will get tired if he wears many Kg of armor, even he is not in a desert. And he cannot run fast. I know such elements are already made in MTW, but we can make the difference to be more significant.

Thank you Point Blank for telling us the changes in the anti-cavalry aspect. I would like to make some suggestions:
1. Crossbowman and firearms: For example, they make a formation of 3 rows. Currently, after the first row fired, the second row step forward and then fire. My suggestion is to make such step forward / backward much much more faster (is it possible technically?), but do not change the total reloading time. As a result:
(1) Firepower against infantry is the same, as total reloading time is not changed.
(2) Firepower against cavalry charges is increased. Now that all rows can have chance to fire before the cavalry hit them.
(3) Units shots more accurately when enemy is not far away. So, when you see the cavalry is charging towards your units, but given the long reloading time for crossbows, you know that every row can only have chance to shoot one time. Therefore, you will ask your crossbow man to hold fire until the cavalry come closer, and then open fire at the same time to make significant damages. It will be even better if damage of crossbows also diminishes as distance increase.

2. Is it possible to let units be able to make sharpen stakes not only before, but also during battles? Placing sharpen stakes should take the units some time. And also, more units should be able to prepare sharpen stakes. This sound realistic and infantries even know how to build seige machines, like rams, etc. (well, I admit I like Braveheart)

3. What is schiltrom for? It seems this formation is not good against cavalry. So it's used for infantry-battle?

4. Heavy cavalry can be even more powerful in melee and charge. But, they should get tired easier, even not in desert. Think total weight of armor for the knight and the horse should be around 40 - 60 kgs (is it correct?) They will get tired even they just standstill in europe, and it should be a disaster if they are in middle east. In real history, the armors should be too heavy for the knights to wear them themselves. They needed servant to help them put on armors.

5. Since armors were very heavy, knight would wear them only before the battle. (is this correct? I just read from some googled sites)And due to the complex design, it really takes some time for them to put on armors. So heavy knights should receive penalty if they were attacked in countryside, to reflect insufficient preparation for the battle.

Of course, we may need to raise knights stats to make the game remain balanced.