How to dominate the Mongols with France out in the open fields!

[Elta]

Rules for the match up:
I gave both myself and the Mongols 7,500 dinari. - I picked this number because it is around the average number of units in my grand campgagin battles.
I picked the grassy plane because it is totally flat and this would give the Mongols an advantage.
All other setting standard.
Pressed random to generate the mongol army

They had IIRC 2 or 3 spearman
2 knights
1 body guard
6 horse archers - half heavy, half light
1 peasant unit


Here is what you do: set your long range fire over your own men capable artillery in the middle set on double lines.

On the outside of them protect them with heavy spearmen like so:


As you can see I have five units outside facing outside prepared for a cavalry rush and one in reserve to help when the others get attacked.
As they come to me ( a few units off screen )
[
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Here is how these fights always happen:

1. They will fire arrows around you and take out some of your men: Don't move! At the same time they will move their Knights/light horse spearmen and infantry/infantry archers closer.

2. When they are close hit them with the artillery!
Remember the you will only kill a few of their men with this, but the reason you bring them is to force them to attack. Other wise they would just pepper you with their rockets (which they didn't bring this time) and arrows till they were ready, then they would send in every unit to rush you. Then you would have a mass route and lose.
You force them in and beat them close up. They don't really have any ground units that can hang with your spearmen and you will beat their cavalry close up
.
3. After the horse archers run out of arrows they will rush you as well and of course get crushed.
In the end it should look something like this


[IMG]

http://img246.imageshack.us/img246/2128/france4jk3.png[/IMG]

Enough of that only fight them in seiges nonsense.
Don't let Europe get turned into pasture land :

[Korlon]

So it's basically like the phalanx box of RTW. Looks cheap.

[Lord Raneus]

The Mongols are cheap.

I'll have to remember this, I can probably pull it off as Denmark, it will be nice not to have to cower in castles.

[Elta]

The Mongols are cheap.

I'll have to remember this, I can probably pull it off as Denmark, it will be nice not to have to cower in castles.

Hell yeah the mongols are cheap
Remember it is hard to strech out the units when they are grouped together. So grab each one and stretch it out so it is only two man deep and really long.

@ Korlon ... phalanx box eh? I thought I did something original

[eggthief]

The Mongols are cheap.

that is true, but there are 2 different ways of being cheap, the mongols are cheap if u look at their costs and the OP when it comes down to tactics. I would never play cheap, in online games I even call everyone who plays cheap a faggot, though this is offline and doesnt ruin the gameplay of other people so dont feel offended, Elna.

[Lord Raneus]

Labelling tactics as "Cheap" is retarded, in my opinion. Total War is a warfare simulation. There are no such things as cheap tactics in warfare. Now, I understand the desire to make games more fun by outlawing tactics that are annoying, but the "noob circle" is a legitimate tactic, and one that probably could be used in actual warfare. So it's fine if you don't like it, but don't label other people as "noobs" for using an effective military stategy in a warfare simulation. You have the initiative, simply adapt to it like a real general would.

[Lord Raneus]

If you've never played RTW and used/seen that formation, then it is original; you came up with it on your own. Unfortunately, there's something similar preceding it.

[Sher Khan]

A few problems.

Playing the grassy plain map does not give the Mongols an advantage, it gives the Western faction a combat bonus.

To simulate true situations, try the battle again in the Arsuf map. It's flat, and accurately represents a field of battle a player would face the Mongols on (unless it's a rare game where they actually expand into Europe proper instead of playing tag in Kiev or Arabia).

Plus it doesn't give a European faction like France a combat bonus to make their spearmen unmovable walls.

[Sith_Lord]

yeah, with the greek hoplites, you could do something that vaguely looked like this:


but i did that 2, lol. Thought I'd found an amazaing formation, lol. only to find out some people call it the n00b box, i was kinda bummed about it 2.

[jman47]

Bah, i dont believe in that noob cube garbage. heres why-

the game is about warfare

true warfare has no set rules

sometimes playing dirty pool is the best way to win

In war one should take any advantage given to them, without hesitation or doubt, if they truly wish to be victorious. Honourable warfrare is a myth, anybody who has fought in a battle IRL can tell you that much.

i remember once for fun i set up a custom battle with me having 20 units of longbowmen, and the enemy having 20 units of heavy knights. i set up my bows in a square, put down sharpened stakes, and watched the fun roll by.

Setting rules in warfare is as stupid as telling a hooker to wear a condom every time shes with a jon, your just defeating the purpose.

[Archus]

Put some crossbowmen into the centre and tell them to fire when the mongols get nice and close.

[ComnenusTheOne]

Plus the fact that the Mongol horde armies are all full strack silver chevron ranged units and not 7500 den randomly chosen units.

[-Traiano-]

I've never done a battle using that cube, i have completely differents defense formations but i agree with L. Raneus when he says that is a effective military strategy and who does it can't be called "noob"

[eggthief]

u know that n00bs are the ones who say that their tactics aint nubish? but a noob is someone with little skill in a game, this could exlude some of the people who use this tactic, but they are cheap nonetheless.

[plonk]

France you said?
Hmm, aren't the Fench Mounted Archers the best horse archer unit in the game? Only one with armour piercing? So then you can just HA the Mongols to death. Proof of the tactic is online and i promise any HA commander worth it's salt will eat you alive . Trebuches are not very good versus canrabrian circle.

[Ältester der Motten]

u know that n00bs are the ones who say that their tactics aint nubish? but a noob is someone with little skill in a game, this could exlude some of the people who use this tactic, but they are cheap nonetheless.

Hiding with their cannons behind hills is "cheap" aswell.
"N00bish" you would say? I am not that sure.
Also, what's the bad thing about it, less dead and wound on one side, more on the other. Effectively the same when it comes down to ultimate victim numbers.

[Harry Lime]

Moved to Battle Planning.

[Lord Raneus]

u know that n00bs are the ones who say that their tactics aint nubish? but a noob is someone with little skill in a game, this could exlude some of the people who use this tactic, but they are cheap nonetheless.

If someone forms a battlefield formation that is highly effective, they are not skilled how?

I've seen the so-called "noob box" used on Youtube; the player didn't have enough skill with it, and so the enemy broke through and slaughtered him. However, if a player can form this formation and effectively use his troops to hold it and defeat the enemy, to me this indicates a good general, not one with no skill. A poorly skilled general will still be defeated by a better one given the nature of Total War games. If I played someone who used this and I got trounced, I'd say "good game" and then start thinking about ways for me to beat this formation rather than labeling my opponent as a "noob".

[N3rull]

One problem is that the "noob box" is this game's feature only. Historically, Greek commanders could easily stretch their 20-or-more-thousand hoplites into a phalanx that would be over 2 kilometers long. That was enough to cover the whole battlefield, from one natural barrier to another, and stay 6-15 or more ranks deep. Outflanking such a formation, even with cavalry, would take half an hour or more (because Greeks chose battlefields with naturals barriers at the sides, forests, rivers, cliffs). It is this game's malfunction that it would not let you form a phalanx long enough ( <3 the unit limit per army) and that the formation you can form can be circled by enemy cavalry in 60 seconds.

So basically the "noob box" is but the only possible way to make phalangi work. Historically, it would not be necessary, because the phalanx was long enough to really cover the battlefield, forcing the ones who would flank it to stride through rivers, over mountains etc.

As for the OT, either zerg the Mongols with French Horse Archers or make 15 Aventuros/Scots Guard + 5 Spearmen and shoot them out like pigeons.

[eggthief]

Well u must really suck if u cant get an undefeatable phalanx box, a little bit of knowledge on how to use it and then u hardly have to give any commands as soon as the battle starts.