faction with the most/best profesional armies

**knight of virtue and valor** · October 27, 2008, 10:33 PM

so, who do you thing is the most professional? it seems that Italy or Spain is the main pick. what do you think?

**Skooma Addict** · October 27, 2008, 10:34 PM

Spain or France.

**Gogolometro** · October 28, 2008, 04:32 AM

All Iberian, France, England.But HRE is more than good to counter any of them.Italians get the muskets, cheap militia and VHI.Never forget in mercenary pools are great soldiers who can fix any issue of lack of some soldiers for something you need.

**Vince Noir** · October 28, 2008, 05:45 AM

The invincible horde of the Scottish Rabble, very professional. Although don't let them into any town/city that might have a brothel. Its impossible to sober them up to fight.

**Skooma Addict** · October 28, 2008, 10:57 AM

Originally Posted by Norman_Knight

The invincible horde of the Scottish Rabble, very professional. Although don't let them into any town/city that might have a brothel. Its impossible to sober them up to fight.

At least you didn't mention carrots this time.

**Landwalker** · October 28, 2008, 11:06 AM

If you're rocking Real Recruitment, almost all of the Byzantines non-militia units are professionals. While I don't think the Byzantines have the best single unit in any given category, I do think that they have the best overall roster, and the vast majority of that is professional-grade.

Cheers.

**tls5669** · October 28, 2008, 12:58 PM

Originally Posted by Landwalker

If you're rocking Real Recruitment, almost all of the Byzantines non-militia units are professionals. While I don't think the Byzantines have the best single unit in any given category, I do think that they have the best overall roster, and the vast majority of that is professional-grade.

Cheers.

Ya the Byzantines do have a kick ass roster. It makes you wonder how they fell so easily.

With the Byz roster its not too hard to re-establish the roman empire. Of all the factions ive fought the Egyptians are the hardest. Just wish there was a way to get the firethrower like im suppose to. Im doing fine without them but would like to have them none the less.

In the EDB it says gunpowder has to be discovered, when I think they used the firethrower long before then.

**Paranoid Android** · October 28, 2008, 01:41 PM

Originally Posted by tls5669

Ya the Byzantines do have a kick ass roster. It makes you wonder how they fell so easily.

With the Byz roster its not too hard to re-establish the roman empire. Of all the factions ive fought the Egyptians are the hardest. Just wish there was a way to get the firethrower like im suppose to. Im doing fine without them but would like to have them none the less.

In the EDB it says gunpowder has to be discovered, when I think they used the firethrower long before then.

Yeah, they did. The CBUR (Complete Byzantine Unit Roster) project, which, by the way, is compatible with SS, gives you access to them right from the beginning of your camapaign, albeit as 'gifts'. You can't recruit them early on, but you get them as presents for completing missions, same with the heavy units of cavalry, such as the Scholarii, which are possibly the most powerful cavalry in the game.

If you want to take a look, go here: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=182151

And no, I don't work for them.

**tls5669** · October 28, 2008, 02:04 PM

Originally Posted by Paranoid Android

Yeah, they did. The CBUR (Complete Byzantine Unit Roster) project, which, by the way, is compatible with SS, gives you access to them right from the beginning of your camapaign, albeit as 'gifts'. You can't recruit them early on, but you get them as presents for completing missions, same with the heavy units of cavalry, such as the Scholarii, which are possibly the most powerful cavalry in the game.

If you want to take a look, go here: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showthread.php?t=182151

And no, I don't work for them.

Way too far into my current campaign to DL that mod, maybe if I start another, I didnt look through all the threads, but is there a list of all the units, I dont mean a picture like he has on page 1. I wanna know what units are in the mod.

**Landwalker** · October 28, 2008, 02:13 PM

Originally Posted by tls5669

Way too far into my current campaign to DL that mod, maybe if I start another, I didnt look through all the threads, but is there a list of all the units, I dont mean a picture like he has on page 1. I wanna know what units are in the mod.

Right here.

I'm not downloading the mod myself, but it looks interesting. (If a wee bit unpolished in aesthetic and, unfortunately, the English of that page's author. I know a lot of people here don't speak English as a first or main-second language, but I can't help but be turned off by a post, especially one with so much information about a mod like this one, that is riddled with so many errors. I don't fault the author, it just grates on me. I'm very particular about language.)

Cheers.

**knight of virtue and valor** · October 28, 2008, 12:17 PM

cool, I am now trying Spain and getting more money then god by way of mines and loving being able to get allot of late era cool units from city's. love the Byzantines. I will have to try the Italians and french.

**frederickm** · October 28, 2008, 02:01 PM

Egypt, all slaves into war thus nothing less than professional

**knight of virtue and valor** · October 28, 2008, 02:31 PM

reincarnated RTW legionaries mwahahaha!

**Landwalker** · October 28, 2008, 06:01 PM

Sounds like there may be more than a little bit of balancing / mechanical issues, if everything is just flat out that good... :hmmm:

And I assumed that the author was Greek, but that doesn't really change or run contrary to my point, which is that poor language can make me indifferent-at-best towards even great mods.

Cheers.

**Paranoid Android** · October 28, 2008, 06:44 PM

Originally Posted by Landwalker

Sounds like there may be more than a little bit of balancing / mechanical issues, if everything is just flat out that good... :hmmm:

And I assumed that the author was Greek, but that doesn't really change or run contrary to my point, which is that poor language can make me indifferent-at-best towards even great mods.

Cheers.

Haha, well, in fairness, the Turkish Bodyguard Massacre was more down to the ineptitude of the AI than overpowered units! Granted, many of the units are strong, but the CBUR team have tried to decrease the availability of the very best: some like the super-heavy Scholarii and Emperor's own Spatharii tou Vasileos have crippling support costs, and are difficult to get your hands on. The campaign has also been made harder by making the Turks tougher in the early game.

As i said earlier, one of the nicest touches is rewarding you for completing missions with some the very best units in your roster. They wanted to simulate the fact that the Byzantines had access to some of the best troops in the known world at the time (when the early campaign starts), but didn't want you to be able to make unbalanced armies out of them. A down side of this is that the support costs can destroy your economy: On turn 10 i was given four units of Scholarii, on top of the few you start with. As a result, my income halved to about 600 per turn. Oh, and when you start, your empire is a lot less developed than it is in stock SS.

**tls5669** · October 28, 2008, 07:24 PM

Originally Posted by Paranoid Android

Haha, well, in fairness, the Turkish Bodyguard Massacre was more down to the ineptitude of the AI than overpowered units! Granted, many of the units are strong, but the CBUR team have tried to decrease the availability of the very best: some like the super-heavy Scholarii and Emperor's own Spatharii tou Vasileos have crippling support costs, and are difficult to get your hands on. The campaign has also been made harder by making the Turks tougher in the early game.

As i said earlier, one of the nicest touches is rewarding you for completing missions with some the very best units in your roster. They wanted to simulate the fact that the Byzantines had access to some of the best troops in the known world at the time (when the early campaign starts), but didn't want you to be able to make unbalanced armies out of them. A down side of this is that the support costs can destroy your economy: On turn 10 i was given four units of Scholarii, on top of the few you start with. As a result, my income halved to about 600 per turn. Oh, and when you start, your empire is a lot less developed than it is in stock SS.

So the spearmen are better? Thats good, the one thing I didnt like about the Byz roster in ss, weak spear units. I see they get a crossbow unit, thats nice.

What about the seige, and do they get any gunpowder units?

And I do like the Pronoia's AP mace.

**Landwalker** · October 28, 2008, 07:47 PM

Byzantium actually has some very good spear units. Byzantine Spearmen are solid, late professional units who are offensively as good as Armored Sergeants and who can form the Shield Wall formation (in my opinion, much better than Schiltrom). They can also get upgraded to Heavy Lamellar armor (I believe, which would put them on the same level as upgraded Armored Sergeants), and they are much cheaper.

That should be plenty to tide you over for the first half or so of the campaign, especially given that Byzantium has one of the best foot-archer rosters outside of England thanks to easily-available Trebizond Archers and the even-better Byzantine Guard Archers. Once pikes roll around, Byzantium has a very solid unit in the form of the Guard Pikemen (which I have found can easily defeat Dismounted Feudal Knights).

The downside? If you have Real Recruitment and BGR III, good luck recruiting them. As Late Professionals, you can only recruit them with the Faction Leader and Heir in 90%+ Orthodox provinces due to the large size of the empire.

Cheers.

Edit: This is completely unrelated to everything, but I wanted to mini-rant about the fact that I just had a line of Mercenary Crossbowmen get charged by a General's Bodyguard that had been whittled down to only two horsemen (and the general was already dead). Just on the charge, those two horsemen killed thirty five crossbowmen. What the hell?!?! End Rant.