How Do You Startup with the Byzantines

[xxxMoRaVexxx]

I'm planning to do a byzantine campaign and also planning to focus on creating Byzantine Infantry as the backbone of my army, therefore creating more cities are the key, but I'm so used to creating castles instead of cities in my byzantine campaigns in the past, any tips guys? thanks

[Wheelchair]

ooooo_O.... You only need 1 castle during the first. (Corinth)

What mod are you playing? SS3.2 adds many cities and castles around your location which can greatly help you out.

Leave all your cities that are cities... and have Corinth as your castle, it is where the bulk of your early armies will be recruited. Take Sofia before the Huns do, that will secure your foothold.

Assuming you know economy well, you should be receiving 2000-3000 a turn by turn 7-8.

Take Iraklion as soon as you can to give you control of the Aegean sea.

Depending on the situation by turn 10 you should be at war with Venice and MAYBE hungary. Avoid war with Turks.. Get trade rights and alliance.

This is a low detail strategy and in the Future when I get my new PC I will be making detailed videos with commentary on how to play factions.

-Wheelchair at your service.

[Mithrane]

You start with 3 great cities which can quickly grow to the level for Byz. Infantry with a few chivalrous generals and a focus on growth. They are centrally located, and in good position to field your men in any direction. Aside from turning islands to cities, I actually rarely transform many castles as Byzantium. A few exceptions among the Turkish regions exist, though.

[Xamt]

changing towns to casltes and visa versa is usually extremely expensive in mods, so i'm assuming you are talking about vanilla

imo convert all non-coastal settlements you get into castles and all coastal settlements into towns... obviously you shouldnt do that right away (e.g. converting sofia and corinth will leave you without a castle in the balkans, while converting smyrna will leave you without a castle in asia minor)

i do however convert any and all islands i have/get into towns asap and lower their tax to low to get them to grow and take advantage of sea trade

on a more serious note, byz infantry kinda sucks (to base your army around that is) - having said that.... i know you dont have much of an alternative :/

[symbiont]

I am playing the Byzantines know and I am quite satisfied how it went so far.
Here is what I have done:
I took all rebel cities as quickly as possible - Sofia is a MUST because the Huns can became really painful... Shortly after that Venice attacked me and I answered with storming Iraklion. Then I focussed on taking over the whole Balkan and established Zagreb as my main fortress to prepare further campaigns into central Europe. The Hun couldn`t develop properly because of the strong Polish, so I finally wiped them out with taking Budapest.

I used the most of the money I got through these moves to strengthen the economy in my "homeland" (the classical Greek cities) and to establish some powerful fortresses against Russia/Mongols (Iasi and this one northwest of Bucharest). Expecting a Jihad or the Mongols/Timurids I made the fortress south of Constantinople the strongest and I am keeping it `state of the art`.

Then I found out that the most Turkish garrisons were surprisingly weak - they fought against Egypt and tried to take Baghdad from the rebels - so I had to use this chance before they will become too powerful... The problem was, I had no money. So I checked the HRE`s "status" and attacked successfully Vienna and Innsbruck and with that money I built up two fulls stacks in the east which started to take one Turkish city/fortress after another. I stopped this attack after taking Trebizond, Tiblissi and Yerevan in the north and the fortress northwest of Antioch - which I made to my strongest outpost over there.

After taking over Vienna and Innsbruck the HRE got really mad. Innsbruck was easy to defend, but Vienna became a hell of a battlefield. The HRE sent stack after stack to get it back, supported by its ally Venice - which had nothing left than its original capital. The battles over there went on for decades and Vienna started to become a "black hole" for all my profits, so I needed to do something. It took a while but I finally got recruited one stack in Zagreb and one in Innsbruck and attacked Venice while sending another from Budapest into the HRE`s mainland to attack Nuremberg, Frankfurt and so on. Within three or four turns the whole situation in Europe changed totally. The HRE and Venice are gone now - I got extremely rich and there is "All quiet on the Western Front". The only faction which did not accept my new power role in Europe were the Papal states. They attacked Venice without success - I answered with taking all Italian cities except Sicily. Surprisingly they asked me for ceasefire after a while which I mercifully granted.

In the East Egypt became the big player, holding the Holy Land and still pushing against the remaining Turkish regions. They tried to take my fortress northwest of Antioch as well but it ended up in a total disaster for them. While I got attacked by them I built two brand-new stacks on Cyprus and shipped them down to take Alexandria and Cairo what was done easily. Now I am preparing a last big strike on Jerusalem and then this "mission" (long campaign) should be accomplished...

Regarding heavy infantry - it should work in the East, if you are focusing on taking and defending cities and fortresses. Open battles against the Turks, Mongols, Timurids and Egypt with all their cavalry might become a little bit problematic. I would say that you will definitely need some cavalry as well - at least to protect your infantry.
In the west you can play however you want to do it. You can use your horse archers to attack the enemy`s artillery or spearmen while your HInf is holding the line or attacking the enemy`s formations or whatever. You have an advantage with your cavalry but you lack high-end heavy infantry unless they are armour-upgraded and well experienced. Your infantry archers are pretty good, the Byzantine Guard Archers with an attack of 13 can decide battles...

Needless to say, the economy is the key. Keep a good balance between building up trading and military facilities and have an eye for strategically important places which you never ever should lose. The success in diplomacy comes with your military success - at the beginning you might have some problems if you try to establish more than just trading relations...

And you should show "no mercy" to your new citizens after taking a settlement from you enemies, never! ...if you know what I mean...

Ok, a bit long, sorry for that, but I hope you can gain something from it...

[Wheelchair]

Symbiont. I will begin work on a Byzantine Video Guide tomarrow for you, It will be done probably in 1 day so You can view if you like!

If you want now, you can watch my England game, I offer some neat little tips and Build orders which are generic for pretty much every faction ^^

The guides are in my signature.

-Wheelchair