To Mongol, or not to Mongol?

[NobleNick]

...That is the question.

I am on about turn 92 in my English M/M campaign (vanilla 1.2). I have 41 settlements. In the next 6 turns I expect to send Spain, HRE, and the Danes to meet their extinct neighbors Portugal, Venice, France, and Milan. This will give me 4 more settlements for my required 45. The Poles will also donate to the cause, for a total of 46. I think I can raise the required stacks to take Jerusalem and get them there in 15 turns. So I think I will have won by about turn 110.

Meanwhile, the Mongols are just getting started. They have about 12 stacks, but no cities yet. I am thinking that I may take Jerusalem before meeting up with the Mongols.

Has anyone else run into this situation, where they finish the game before the Mongols become a player? I expected to win without seeing the Americas, but without meeting the Mongols? ... Or am I in for a surprise?

[J@mes]

Yes i have , I completed the game objectives before the Mongols had a chance but i always carry on playing just for the chellage of the Mongols, timruids and Aztecs.

[Marcus Scaurus]

Best thing to do is to just conquer Jeruzalem and the other cities in the Levantine. They can generate quite a lot of money, allowing you to build up armies for the great leap towards America. Problem is of course that the Mongols will flood your eastern provinces with their stacks. Just play on the defense: get enough archers and dismounted knights in your cities and their horse archers won't stand a change if they attack. By playing it smart you can keep the cities and with it the income.

[J@mes]

to had to that if you feel you going to lose the city to the Mongols just destroy every building in the settlement this stops the Mongols from gaining money from this settlement and make them change there mind about taking it for a captial.

[Marcus Scaurus]

Don't think destroying buildings will make a difference... A normal faction can only field as many units as the treasure can support, but the Mongols don't seem to pay upkeep as they can still have 6-7 stacks with one city in possession. And with the Mongols gone and you back in your city, you will have to rebuild everything.

[Yogol]

Kill them.

There are ALOT of them, but they don't have alot of cities, they can't make alot of new troops.

So, what you need to do is kill them. You usually can't win battles against them, but you can kill a lot of them even when you loose the battle.

Make an army with
- 1 top general
- 4 very fast cavalry
- 6 very strong defensive infantry with shields
- 9 very strong offensive infantry

Then attack them...
- move the defensive infantry towards them to soak up their arrows.
- circle the cavalry to their back.
- move the offensive infantry to their sides.
- keep your general behind your defending infantry.

Once they stop firing arrows, attack them with your offensive infantry and kill off all routers with your fast cavalry.

At a certain point, you'll loose the battle because they'll send in reinforcements, but that's okay, you achieved your goal : killing alot of them.

Try to get your general and alot of your troops out alive and repeat it the next turn or -even better- the same turn with a new stack that attacks the same stack as you just attacked.

If you got enough troops, you can kill them in 10 turns or so.

[Grey Bahamut]

Personally, I'd use an army consisting of the following;

- Longbowmen: Their high missile attack will make a mess of mongol light cavalry, and their stakes can blunt any charge long enough for a counter charge. Put these units in the centre of your line.
- Demi Lancers: Speed and high attack power make this unit great fr flanking the mongols and hitting their infantry in the flank or rear.
- English Knights: Better than average heavy cavalry to counter mongol heavy lancers.

These 3 units, plus a decent general will be your game-winners - other units can supplement them: placing billmen behind the archers would give you cheap an effective counter charging unit.

Good luck, mongols are tough, and not every faction can easily get all-cavalry stacks (like byzantines or turks).