Islamic Bodyguard

[Fakir]

Is it just me or do the Islamic factions' General's Bodyguard units have pathfinding issues? For reference, I'm playing v1.2, which no longer presents these kinds of pathfinding/charge issues for any other unit that I have noticed.

I'm playing as the Turks, and it just seems to me that their bodyguard is both slower and does quite a terrible job in pursuing and in charging - especially within cities. Whilst I realise that cavalry is not especially suited for narrow city streets, the Catholic and Russian bodyguard units don't seem to have this problem at all.

What gives?

[Nazgûl Killer]

The bodyguards are all the same with different skins, I believe, so I doubt the path finding issues are restricted only to Islamic bodyguards.
I have seen these path finding issues but they rarely bother me, I love micromanaging my cavalry in combat and the way I do it, I find no issues.
I highly suggest you update your Medieval II again and check if anything changed, and if all else fails, just micromanage them.

EDIT: Something I HAVE noticed though, the path finding issues while chasing after routing enemies is quite common, the problem being that the cavalry units target a single target at a time, and sometimes that target leads them away from the main fleeing force, this happens to all cavalry, not just bodyguards and not just Islamic bodyguards.

[Fakir]

I do micromanage them. That is why this is bothering me so much! Early on, I like to conquer important settlements as quickly as possible. Because of this, I rely rather heavily on my bodyguard units.

Anyway, I have my game updated, which is how I know that these problems have been fixed for most units. In my other games, the general's bodyguard unit performed rather well in all situations. I have just noticed that the Turkish bodyguard, specifically, isn't performing in the same way, and it's really annoying! This is my first time playing as an Islamic faction and I'm playing as the Turks. It may just be the Turks, really.

Are you sure it's just the skin?

[Nazgûl Killer]

I'm pretty sure it's just the skin, and I think it's that you only NOTICE those problems with the Turks, and I have a reason for that;
The Turks are extremely dependent of cavalry, especially early on, as such, the path finding issues are much more (painfully) obvious, making it look like the path finding is different.
Also, the way I realized it, path finding is exactly the same to all bodyguard units... So I doubt it's an issue special to the Turks.

[Fakir]

I've just found the answers!

note: I got this infofmation from totalwar.honga.net, which I'm sure many of you know already (if you don't, I highly recommend). -

The Islamic bodyguard units are, in fact, different from the ones I had used before! This is because there are five different classes of the basic (not the late-period) general's bodyguard unit in MTWII. They are as follows:

Class: Northern European Bodyguard for England, Scotland, Denmark, France, Holy Rome, Hungary, Milan and Poland

Attack: 13 + 8 (attack, charge bonus)
Defence: 7,5,4 (armour, defence skill, shield)
Cost: 820 - this applies to custom battles.
Mental attribues: is 11, normal, trained (morale, discipline, training)

Their mount type is "barded horse".

Class: Southern European Bodyguard for Spain, Portugal, Venice, Sicily and the Papal States

These have the same stats as the Northern European ones, except that they are more suited for certain weather conditions, and less suited for others.

Class: Middle Eastern Bodyguard for the Turks, Egypt and the Moors

Attack: 14 + 5. (attack, charge bonus)
Defence: 7,7,4 (armour, defence skill, shield)
They have a cost of 900.
Mental attribues: 11, disciplined, trained (morale, discipline, training)

These factions' bodyguard mount type is "eastern armoured horse", like most of the other factions' late period bodyguard units - and here is where I see that I was right.

Indeed, an armoured horse would move more slowly than a barded one. It also makes sense that the middle eastern ones have a lower charge bonus because of this.

Class: Eastern Bodyguard, unique to the Russians.

This one is a combination of the above two types (not counting weather strengths and weaknesses). They have the same stats as the Middle Eastern bodyguards, but their mount type is barded, which is why I never felt that they were slow. Based on that, I would say this is the best one.

Class: Greek Bodyguard, unique to the Byzantines.

Attack: 13 + 6 (attack, charge bonus)
Defence: 7,6,4 (armour, defence skill, shield)
Cost: 820
Mental attributes: 11, disciplined, highly_trained (morale, discipline, training)
Mount type is also eastern armoured horse.


It seems the Islamic bodyguard units are a better bet for prolonged melees than the others. Even so, I personally have to say that the increased movement speed of the more common bodyguard unit is nicer.

[Nazgûl Killer]

Very nice find there.
Actually, it's better to have your bodyguards strong at melees for three reasons:
1) Your general is MUCH harder to kill that way
2) You can totally destroy cavalry
3) It doesn't really affect the overall morale penalty for the enemy when they see you charging down on them, which is pretty much the most important thing in heavy cavalry.

[Fakir]

Thanks! I must say I really have noticed how much tougher they seem in meelee as compared to the European bodyguards. They're like tanks! Tanks with 2 HP.

I'm sorry, but I'm not sure what you're saying in your third point.

On a related note: When comparing the late period bodyguard units, the middle eastern ones are vastly superior. At this point, the European bodyguards become just as slow as the Islamic ones. But, the Islamic bodyguards have higher defence attributes and have AP in close combat.

[Nazgûl Killer]

What I'm saying is that the morale decrease of the enemy struck by cavalry is not related to number of casualties, so the penalty it gets from the strikes hardly ever changes, it depends on the number of horsemen you have in your group.

[Fakir]

Oh, OK. I didn't know that!

I do know that it does have more of an effect if the bodyguard you're charging with has a high-dread general. I won myclosest siege defence battle this way, by charging wth my six-dread General. I charged him and his last remaining bodyguard horseman into a unit of 9 Trebizond archers who were in a fire-fight with my 3 dismounted Dvor, which were my last units left standing. I blew the horn just as I was charging into them and the bastards actually routed, which caused the attacking AI's 14 spear militia (who had just re-joined the battle after routing themselves) to also rout! It was epic.