Difficulty of Venice

[Egbert]

I've heard that Venice is one of the hardest of the original 5 factions. Still, it's been said that the Venetians do has good infantry and an excellent navy. What do you think? Is Venice easy, medium, or hard to play as in the Grand Campaign? Is there any strategies or ideas for success that are useful for Venice?

Thank You!

[Hazzy101]

Well it is true that Venice relies on the navy. It is also surrounded by enemies and can hardly expand on land apart from going to war with the byzantines which they will probably end up going to war with anyway. It has those good italian spear militia and are also one of five factions(much later on) that can field and recieve muskets and one of only 2 factions that can get monster ribaults. So in all are about Medium and will rely on overseas trade for finance.

Hope this helped in giving an overview of Venice

[Carl von Döbeln]

Venice Late infantry is exellent

[Lunatic1701]

I found venice easily the most interesting of the original factions. For me it's less "difficulty" and more whether I find them interesting.

They do have a pretty easy to learn army, consisting mainly of large blocks of militia spearment backed up by interesting things.

[Viking Prince]

Also - a venice do not forget about Tripoli in Africa.

If you have not yet played an Italian faction and Sicily is unlocked -- this might be a better first choice. The pope is a buffer (allied as a good friend also). North Afica is available (Algiers, Tunis, and Tripoli). Sardinia and Corsica are also two quick islands that are rebel held. For only the problem of war status with the Moors, you will have 7 settlements early on. A great economic base for growth.

[Celsius]

You will have aot of enemies around you, but all in all, it's probably medium.

[Confederate Jeb]

Easy. They make a lot of money, just like Milan.

[Obliterate76]

Venice is extremely fun to play with. The late infantry, cavalry, cannon, muskets, grand ribault is all just the best. I think I'm going to start a Venetian campaign right now! Thanks for the inspiration!!

[Random Emperor]

Venice high-tech units, unbeatable Italian SpearM, and VHI and good navy. medium level to me

p.s. I think HrE is more harder in vanila

[Wheelchair]

Venice is my favorite faction hands down.

To start off, Make sure you disband your naval units you don't need, you start off with 8 ... you only need 2, for transportation.

Disband 3 near venice and 3 near Iraklion, use them for transportation; the only time you will need them will be later on in the campaign when you go to war with HRE (Attacks from Bologna by sea) and attacks from Byzantines, which will follow later. (reason for disbanding is to give you additional funds that would be otherwise wasted)

Use Iraklion as a base of operations to invade into the Byzantines land. Take the governor of Iraklion and about 7-8 ITALIAN SPEAR MILITIA, not Spear Militia, because you want to outgun the Byzantines.

First off, take Corinth (Athens if your playing SS), taking corinth will ensure that they cannot make ANY good units.

With Venice, build up Militia as much as you can, send the general that is close to the city between you and the hungarians (Cannot remember city name) Take it and build it up as much as you can. Send all but 1 unit of militia back to venice, where from there you will try and conquer Bologna, get Trade agreements with Milan and HRE, they will eventually go away due to war but might as well get the additional funds.

You will have enough income to have wars on 2 fronts right away, In Byzantium and in Italy. You should be able to win no problem, especially against Bologna as your units are 3 times better.

[Xamt]

the few times i have played venice i opted to first destroy milan asap and leave the byzantines for later

the milanese tend to leave both milan and genoa lightly defended in the first few turns (at some point at least)... so if you have access to siege weapons (even ballistas) you can siege and capture both in a single turn, thus eliminating the milanese, having 2 great money making cities, free access to sardinia and corsica and a solid base to defend/expand from

as for further conquest you can try eliminating cicily the same way if they havent managed to expand (make sure to send a night fighter if u can spare to their cicilian fortress coz they usually keep some extra troops there), or turn your attention to the byzantines

the only catholic factions worth going to war with is milan coz they will eventually attack you and have better troop choices early on (genoese crossbowmen) and cicily (you can rule all of italy - exept bologna)

i would leave hre alone coz apart from bologna and a castle or two they have nothing you can use... landlocked, low income territories and since they are surrounded by enemies they wont bother you as much

one thing to note is to make alliances before overexpanding (and everyone hates you )

[Gornard]

My first game was as venice, and i didn't understand the game that much at the time so it ended fairly quick. Out of the 5 starters it is probbaly the hardest, as it is hard to expand to the immediate area, there are several direct neighbours who will declare war on you fairly sharpish. Of course with a bit of experince you can make use of their good economy and excellent unit roster.

Sicily is the easiest italian faction, great starting position and probably the best early units in the game (norman knights)

[Jared Sinn]

I think venice is relatively easy. It has one of the best economies of the game, cities are close together, so not a lot of marching and has great early and late units.

Personally, I go for Florence first, then the milanese. This gives you 4 of the big 5 Italian cities early on which can really boost you economy. Its also about a 50/50 shot that bologna will rebel from HRE (especially with a little help) and then you can take that without angering you northern neighbors. I usually just try to defend Irkalion for as long as I can without investing too much into it because the byzantines seem to really want it and it too far away to send troops to quickly. Sicily will attack you sooner or later and then, when you beat them back, you have all Italy except Rome and the world can be your oyster. Can't beat the location for going in any direction you want from here.

[Wheelchair]

I've played over 5 Venice campaigns and have tried over 5 different strategies for all of them, and have refined it, Why leave bologna when you can take it with 6 militia and only lose around 20? lol you might as well take it. Once you take Bologna you can then recruit more Militia. The Milanese are not that much of a threat. While all this is happening you could have taken Athens and Corinth and maybe Arta and Durazzo if your ambitious

[TeeWee]

The easy part about Venice is the economy. Once I understood the way free upkeep units worked, and the fact that the italian militiamen are as good as the basic units castles generate, things started to go smoothly. It's easy to recruit good units and still have a healthy income. Plus, you have easy access to the rich northern italian lands. And, since a decent navy is a "natural" state of being for Venice, easy access to the Holy Lands with a springboard from Crete.

The hard parts are:
- Strategic shape is bad: lengthy shape, spread about. This tends to create long fronts and makes secure naval transports crucial.
- Enemies abound, most of them (with the exception of Byzantium) Catholic too.
- Easy to overextend yourself with commitments everywhere, ranging from your core in northern Italy to Greece, northern africa and the middle east.

Tips I can give you are:
- judge carefully which places you want to keep as castles. At the start, you'll probably have more castles than you want/need.
- choose your enemies carefully. Try not to get excommunicated, or better, try to get your enemies excommunicated!
- The pope can be a difficult, but useful friend.
- Use crusades carefully! E.g. in my current campaign, I sent "Antonio the Crusader" directly overseas to Jerusalem, which I think in hindsight was a mistake. Why not take the traditional detour past Constantinopel instead!
- northern Italy is rich!
- I believe your strategic concerns should be, in order: northern italy as your main power base; modern day Greece as your natural expansion area; the Holy Lands because you're Catholic.

[KittySN]

Venice is pretty easy.

You can nab 7 territories in roughly 3 turns so long as you don't mind going to war with HRE and Byzantium on turn 1. There’s also a chance you could be excommunicated, but after the captures you’ll be so powerful it won’t matter.

Capture Zagreb with your heir. Next send your diplomat to Bologna and net ~1800 for trade rights with the HRE. Then siege Bologna with the Doge and Venice troops. The pope tends to ignore this because he dislikes the HRE. Attack on turn 2 and then siege Florence with only the Doge. Florence will sally, and on open fields the general's bodyguard will own so long as you use tactical charges: 1) archers, 2) general, 3) weakest to strongest melee. After that, build up a little and sail to Corsica/Sardinia. Use Allessandro and the castle forces for attacking Durazzo. Finally from Crete, divide your forces sieging Corinth with Christiano and mercs (it has 2 starting units!) and send the rest to Rhodes. The Italian spear militia will overpower their defense in a tactical ladder assault. On turn 2 after assaulting Corinth, Christiano can sail over and invade Turkey hiring more mercs. Byzantium will be surrounded, and Christiano can easily build a half stack, then sneak north to rape Nicaea and Constantinople while Assessandro can slowly slink over for attacking Thessalonica. Within 10 turns, Byzantium will be destroyed with its land armies rebelling and the game is essentially over. (Most of the time, nailing Constantinople and Nicaea kills the faction leader and heir, so Thessalonica rebels.) You might even swipe Sofia if you’re fast enough!