Invastion of Italy

**Captain.E.Blackadder** · February 19, 2009, 05:21 AM

In my reacent byzantine campain on Ltc. I sent one army to reclaim Rome for a new roman empire. So I sent my army to naples and then to sisaly. Every think was going all right then I sent out spys to map out italy. What the spy saw was many armies of italy. So I looked and saw all of italy was allied ad then them they abushed my army and that was the first of many failed invastion. Any tips in conquering Italy and also what to do with the mongols invading my lands in the middle east.

**Pink Beard** · February 19, 2009, 05:31 AM

Originally Posted by David Cameron

In my reacent byzantine campain on Ltc. I sent one army to reclaim Rome for a new roman empire. So I sent my army to naples and then to sisaly. Every think was going all right then I sent out spys to map out italy. What the spy saw was many armies of italy. So I looked and saw all of italy was allied ad then them they abushed my army and that was the first of many failed invastion. Any tips in conquering Italy and also what to do with the mongols invading my lands in the middle east.

There's this search button you know... Just type in mongol (invasion) and something for Italy too...

**Silent Assassin** · February 19, 2009, 11:31 AM

Originally Posted by Pink Beard

There's this search button you know... Just type in mongol (invasion) and something for Italy too...

You are mean but you are right...

David you should have a llok in this part of the forum, there is atleast 3 different threads talking about the Mongols.

For Italian invasion taht is different, I don't recall seeing a thread on thism maybe you could edit this post nad re-write your questions.

Edit: here is one I found on the second page LINK but I know there is a couple more, have also a look in the Battle planning section.

Regards
Rebel6666

**Pink Beard** · February 19, 2009, 11:51 AM

Nah just a failed attempt to act like Eggthief. He truly is a master on that...

sorry David

**StalkAndStrike** · February 19, 2009, 05:16 PM

Originally Posted by Pink Beard

Nah just a failed attempt to act like Eggthief. He truly is a master on that...

sorry David

Poor old' eggthief.....no matter what thread i am on I feel very irritated at his manner of communicatiion...he should take lessons from Rebel

sorry for the bluntness but you need some sort or re-evaluation on manners?

**eggthief** · February 19, 2009, 05:32 PM

Originally Posted by Pink Beard

Nah just a failed attempt to act like Eggthief. He truly is a master on that...

sorry David

Originally Posted by StalkAndStrike

Poor old' eggthief.....no matter what thread i am on I feel very irritated at his manner of communicatiion...he should take lessons from Rebel

sorry for the bluntness but you need some sort or re-evaluation on manners?

Oh yeah lets start eggbashing, for the record I care little about the way you think about my behaviour, I'm above you and I know it.

Pinky, maybe you should try getting crappy parenting the first 16 years of your life, this should help you getting into the 'role'.

/Rant off

Well the Italians are a matter of winning battles as good as you can and the Mongols should be fought in siege defences only.

**claudius2007** · February 19, 2009, 01:42 PM

If you are Byz you should use a lot of Horse Archers (byz cavalry,etc) against the Italians. Their spear militia is too slow to act and you can pin their magnificent crossbowmen down useless with repeated fake charges.

**NeedsMoreNinjas** · February 19, 2009, 01:46 PM

Using 4.1 Stainless Steel mod as the Byzantines I've got all of Italy except the for Florence, Milan, and the city just south of Milan in my current game. Just attacked Milan so those should be mine soon.

For me the trick was trying to limit the number of simultaneous wars you are in. So I started against Venice because they attacked me. As soon as I took some Venetian cities on the Italian peninsula I started showering Hungary, HRE, Milan, Sicily, and the Papal States with gifts.

This didn't stop me from getting attacked by HRE eventually but it slowed down the inevitable long enough for me to solidify my position. After I did that I snuck attacked Sicily and kicked them off Italy and Sicily.

Another tip is to use lots of horse archers, the Byzantine infantry is too light in the loafers to go toe to toe with Italian militia and heavy infantry. I had to use lots of hit and run tactics to avoid getting overrun by their well armored units.

You also want a lot of agents on the peninsula, I had two or three orthodox priests converting in the territories I conquered and I'd always send a few into a territory I was going to eventually attack. You also probably want multiple spies on the peninsula, I would usually leave them in my cities to help catch other factions spies. That's how I knew Sicily and HRE were planning to betray me (both were my allies). When you can start sending assassins too so you can pick off catholic priests, spies, and family members.

You also need enough ships so you can quickly shuttle troops to Italy from Greece (try to get Ragusa). They are also useful to move troops from one part of Italy to another, I rarely marched my troops around I'd hop on a boat them drop them off where they needed to go.

All in all its a pretty complicated, challenging area and I had to make use of all aspects of the game to keep from getting swamped.

One more thing move your capital further west or you're going to struggle with public order in all your italian cities.

And just to be clear I'm suggesting you don't bother with Rome unless you plan to take the rest of Italy you'll be surrounded by potential enemies and they will eventually attack.

**Britannia Born** · February 19, 2009, 04:41 PM

If your tactics are good enough any army can be defeated. The Italian powers all rely on militia troops unless your in a later era, to which case they have pavise and genoese crossbowmen and heavily armoured (slow) troops. You should use diplomacy to get one of the factions to fight each other so they are preoccupied. Use spies and assassins to maximum advantadge and use lots of horse archers. Your problem will be the enemycrossbowmen as they will slaughter your horse archers, so use the Cantabiran circle to lure away enemy spear and cavalry units, then hit hard with infantry and cavalry. Also make sure you use Mercenaries to replace any casaulties sustained, and have a support army follow your main unit with militia troops and siege artillery to attack/garrison captured settlements.

**Don in the North** · February 19, 2009, 09:47 PM

pull back all your units, garrisons from the middle east except for the settlements you have with ports. all the rest, destroy all the buildings you can as well for extra cash.
move all the aforementioned units to become massive garrisons for those and just take on the mongols from your cities. get some stake-deploying units if you can at all, mercs can be bought from england if you drop off a single general to mize them.
deploying stakes at the gates will cut their cavalry down for size allowing you to survive with that many more men.
you cant destroy the mongols unless you focus everything you have on them, so its best just to hold them off and try to get ceasefire/alliance and let the other neighbour factions nip away at them untill they are stretched to limit, and thats when you move to take cities, otherwise the whole horde will bear down on you and it wont be a happy ending
once your defenses are sufficient in each of the middleast port settlements move the left overs back to greece and get all your stacks to gether and seige venice, and use the bridges if you can to take down the initial italian stacks, then once those are down push on to conquer italy from the alps downwards, leaving sicily for last.
or rome last if you want to seige and lift seige each turn just to keep them busy