The Turks.

[surferman 101]

How do you guys start as the turks. They're infantry in the beginning ins't that good and the HA's are expensive. What settlements do you go for and what's your early army like. Thanks for any help.

[Miraj]

HAs are expensive? I never noticed that tbh. If you have good HA skills you can grab settlements like Adana and Tbilisi with a handful of HAs. The secret is to send a small army which makes the AI miscalculate and sally forth. And even a few HAs can truly pwn an army in sally mode (you'll kill a lot right at the gates).

[surferman 101]

All right I'll try that, I thought they were expensive but I don't really play the turks so I must've been mistaken.

[Samurai Doc]

Well, speaking as a Stainless Steel mod player, your best bet is to consolidate as much power in Asia Minor as possible. Claim the northern port towns that border the Black Sea.

I traditionally keep standard infantry in my economic settlements and keep a large network of spies and watchtowers active on the borders to know when to beef up security. The Byzantines will be your biggest obstacle in the beginning and I don't recommend taking them on to early.

Send diplomats everywhere and buddy up with all the European factions (Pope included). On your eastern front, take over Baghdad and move south towards the Persian Gulf to take Basra. (might only be in Stainless Steel). Beware of the Holy Land settlements. Antioch, while a money cow and terrific staging ground for further expansion, can be quite alluring for a Crusade. Edessa is good to have too.

I'm working on recreating the Ottoman Empire myself. When the time is right, I will probably create small forces of heavy infantry and horse archers to take multiple Byzantine towns at once to throw them off.

Just beware of Egypt though. You are bound to bump heads eventually and it's good to have a strong economy to fund the inevitably long war with them.

[Sher Khan]

Decide on what to do in the long run.

Do you plan to take all of the Holy Land and face Egypt, the Byzantines, rampant Crusades, and the inevitable Mongol invasion?

If so, take Antioch and work your way south after securing Anatolia.

If not, avoid Antioch, and if possible, abandon your settlements east of Caesarea, focusing your muscle and focus on taking on the Byzantines.

[antaeus]

the turks are the only faction i really like going on the offensive with.

secure an alliance with egypt and the byzantines at the outset. to stop them un neccessarily going to war with you at the outset.

then set about securing all the free space on your southern and northern borders. if you consolidate your existing forces you shouldnt need to do much recruiting except for garrisons for your new territories.

pause at antioch and when you border the byzantines. then consolodate for a few turns, get your merchants going and your cities in the black. this should be about 10 turns into the game. you should get about 4 or 5 turns before the egyptians decide they want antioch and the byzantines decide they want western anatolia. they will attack you preserving your reliablity status. crush them mercilessly. by the time you're finished dealing with them and have pushed well into europe and africa you can consolidate again.. get your provences secured and build up some strength at antioch and acre.

you should then be ready to face the mongols. stick armies on the bridgeheads near antioch and they will come to you. its their favourite location so even if the wander around arabia for a bit they will eventually go there. it will take a few years and you'll need reinforcements to be ready nearby (cyprus, acre etc) expect to have to take on a good 8 full stacks over 10 turns or so before they decide its too much effort.

if you really dont want to fight them... let them have a provence free (maybe aleppo or antioch) once they are in a city, trade them another provence miles away (i usually give them the crimea) for aleppo. their armies will all wander the long way up there and be someone elses problem.

onwards and upwards.

[ulrien]

The turks are probally my favorite faction for the campaign game, mainly because of the opening. I found that the best way to start as the turks is to go ultra aggressive in the beginning, taking as much as you can before the mongols arrive and consolidating your power in anticipation of them. Firstly, the most important thing is your economy and antioch is a must for this and should be your first priority. Then, conqueor all the eastern meditteranean coastal cities and conqueor egypt before turning on the byzantines. You should be able to use jihads to wipe out the byzantines, do this as quickly as possible because you need to build up your units for the mongols. As for the mongols, use the terrain to your advantage, bridges and mountains are your friends, sometimes just plain numbers too. Don't let them get a foothold and you should handle them ok. As for early armies, their HAs aren't that expensive, and you should be able to wipe out any AI non mongol force even outnumbered. One of the fun things about the area that alot of their fighting in is the terrain, make sure to pay attention to the terrain you're going to be fighting in before attacking/defending. Saracen militia are fairly decent, but HAs in the beginning should be enough to beat the rebel armies and egyptians.

[Imperator_Maximus]

I would suggest start consolidating power the region. Grab cities along the Levant down to Acre and take Jerusalem if you dare. Once you have this foundation, you have a few choices. An advisable thing to do is get the Byzantines out of Anatolia, since they don't seem to do alot of work getting that land back. Try to stay at peace with the Egyptians and soak up the Crusades. Brace yourself for the Mongols by garrisoning your settlements on the eastern border and Antioch. Once the Mongols and Timurids are done with, I say go Ottoman. Just rush out and take everything from Baghdad, to Constantiinople, Cairo, Tunis, and Vienna. Muhahahaha!

[loquar]

What Ulrien said virtually to the letter. Imo factions with HA's early on have a massive advantage