Late Era Byzantine strategies?

[arcanek]

I've been trying this for a while pretty unsuccessfully... but I like it. It's really challenging. But I want to know what strategies exist for this. I'm playing with RR/RC compilation in VH/Vh. These are what I've tried so far:

1. Try retaking rebel settlements around
Pretty much all eastern coast of Greece, Adrianople, and Constantinople are in rebel hands. Each is guarded by a full stack with balanced army consisting of 4 HC, 6 archer/crossbow, 4 spears, 6 infantries. Since byzantine is in pretty bad shape even mustering force enough to overcome those rebel settlements is difficult. It takes time so alliance with both Seljuks and Hungary is necessary. Scopia, Rhodes, Iraklion are relatively easy to take - Rhodes is a must! Once successful in taking those former territories back, it should become much easier... haven't gone that far. Seljuks always backstab.

2. Blitz Seljuks
Isparta, Sinop, Iconium, Ankara all have little garrison and looked much more manageable than rebel settlements. After taking Rhodes and Scopia, I besieged all four settlements within a few turns and took them. This was more successful until as I was bogged down in war against Seljuks, mostly defending, Hungarians started to attack my settlements in Greece. Soon I lost them all against Hungarians and Venetians, and as I could not progress against Seljuks, I just abandoned the game.

Is there any other strategy to pursue here? I think this campaign is only slightly easier than the Khwarezmian one... pretty difficult. Each time I tried to have main force as Skythions, as buildings for recruiting them was the cheapest, and as all know, HA are pretty unbalanced in their cost efficiency... even though their upkeep is pretty high.

[Tyrenia]

Hmmm... well isn't that a pretty pickle. I won't lie to you, you need a s***load of luck to survive the first 20-50 turns. While I can't offer a comprehensive strategy (you seem to have taken both the roads that have previously lead to early success in my campaigns), I will offer a few tips:

1. My personal preference would be for a second attempt at your first strategy. This is how I prefer to play my campaigns. Thus, an alliance with Hungary and Turkey is necessary. One way of ensuring an alliance sticks is by giving and recieving military access, though if (when) you eventually turn on the Seljuks or Hungary, breaking these will make your rep take a massive hit, much more so than a regular alliance.

2. ONLY OCCUPY!!! Not sure exactly what you do when you take settlements, but there is one major reason to occupy rather than sack or exterminate. When you choose either of the other two options, buildings get destroyed. As you need all the infrastructure you can get early on, sacking for a few quick florins is crazy if it means more time/money spent on rebuilding.

3. Roving horse archers discourage aggression. Pretty obvious, leave a couple of 1/3 to 1/2 stacks of the things near your borders. They can deal quite well (proportionate to size) with any aggressive force.

4. Focus on economy building. From the get go upgrade roads and ports like crazy (markets + farms help too, but aren't as important). In the words of the famous Roman Consul, Marcus Tulius Cicero; 'The sinews of war are infinite money" More money = more armies = more DEEEEEAAAAAATH!

I hope that I have been somewhat helpful, and not just repeated things you have already tried.

[Lord de Lyonesse]

I would recommend allying with the pope early on, when the political landscape takes shape (i.e powereful enemies of the pope appear, ally with them) I often found the Milanese often get excommunicated, I use this to decalre a war on both the pope and on the Venetians. It worked marvolously.

[AnthoniusII]

The last versions of RC/RR submod inqludes the late campaign (1205) of BtR also...
In this case diplomacy is your major ally ...
If the RC/RR mod did not changed the starting provinces (you do not have Constantinople and many other european regions)
then you should focus to make your country safe..
A good step would be to make some aggrements with the Turks(forget that they are your ennemies).
That would help you to develop your state..
Venetians will try to invade to your isolated european regions.
You can either to try to save them by develop them or to abandon them in order to save some time..
You must try to fight in one direction each time to save money and human resourses.
Development is not your primary ennemy,time is!
Your "neibourgs"are more advanced than you and they will try to take the "latin" parts of your former empire.
Long sieges are your main tool.Do not try to take the big and heavily guarded cities by asault even if it takes 10-12 turns!
Do not plunder the cities you take back.It will cost you money and time to rebuild them.
A good expantion road is in the balkans (Constantinople,Thessalonika,Andrianople,Athens,Mystras and Durazzo).
All of them can have ports that will boost your economy after some turns...
The next expansion could be the Aegean sea islands(Rhodes and Crete).Those islands can provide you a sence of safety plus to give you some more
income.Rhodes is another fort.It would be wise to transform it to a city only IF it will in low development.Other wise it could provide you an other developted castle and a second "door" for your expansion in the east.
If you choose not to take chances against the heavy armed "Latins"and try to invade to asia minor have this in your mind...
Try to "follow" the main central road to Antioch...
That means to try to capture Ankara and Caesarea...
That will give you the time to "fortify" your self and turn back to Iconium later....
You can take some ideas from this AAR of mine...
That does not mean that in your campaign you will face the same chalenges..

[arcanek]

This time I was ridiculously lucky - I mean, ridiculously. It was as if everything was going as I wanted it to.

I started off allying with Seljuks and Kiev. I took Constantinople and Adrianople around turn 12. Hungarians tried to take Thessalonica and in the process reduced the garrison to half what it was, so I just took it. Then I took Sofia in a surprise attack, and a few turns later Scopia after 9 turns of siege. Here was the first crisis, as my forces were spread thin, Venice attacked Durazzo, sent some more to Arta, Hungarians tried to take Arta and had a stack near Sofia. I managed to kill them all, but two Hungarian full stacks were on the move toward me.

Then my ally Kiev backstabbed Hungary and drew their attention completely. That was super lucky. Then I sent a spy down to Greece to see what's going on, and found that Sicilians took down most of Mystras garrison and some of Athens garrison. Around then Sicily declared war on Almoravids and no more sicilians were seen in the area. So I marched down there to capture those cities.

As I was about to take Mystras, the council gave me a mission to capture it and gave 4 archontopulai for reward, when I was in a dire need of heavy cavalry. And now as I was about to capture Athens, the Seljuks declared war against the Fatimids, securing my Asian side. I was worried about being backstabbed after Crusader States got destroyed.

So it seemed everything was in favor of me... God wanted the Byzantines to survive after all!

[JorisofHolland]

You could also have demanded your ally to attack Hungary, although it would have cost a lot of money - which you don't seem to have at the moment. You're very lucky indeed.

[AnthoniusII]

My friend arcanek that is what i call luck....
I wish i had some of it...
If you read my AAR you will discover tacktics and some historical info as well as minor quides of best ussage of units.
My AARs have this specific task...

[XICenturionIX]

My friend arcanek that is what i call luck....
I wish i had some of it...
If you read my AAR you will discover tacktics and some historical info as well as minor quides of best ussage of units.
My AARs have this specific task...

I second that, Arcanek. Use Anthonius' tactics and guides; the guides have helped me immensely in utilizing the Roman's military power.

[meese]

Haha that's what I love about this game - there's still an element of luck in it.

On a side note, I really should play as the Byzantines one day. But for some reason, I just can't make myself do it. I just don't like the Eastern Roman Empire I guess

[AnthoniusII]

Haha that's what I love about this game - there's still an element of luck in it.

On a side note, I really should play as the Byzantines one day. But for some reason, I just can't make myself do it. I just don't like the Eastern Roman Empire I guess

Everyone has his own favorite factions...
A small corection...
Roman Empire not Eastern Roman Empire...

[arcanek]

i just need to take caffa but Kiev rus isn't going to sell it to me, so i'm advancing to the west. I don't really want to go further east. after initial challenge of surviving it was not very hard - i took down hunagry, made it my vassal, took bari to fend of sicilians, then attacked both seljuk and Fatimids from behind when they were engaged in a fierce war against each other around Antioch. Basically I landed 4 full stacks and captured Jerusalem, Acre, Damietta, and Alexandria at the same turn and advanced two half stacks through Anatolia and captures Isparta, Ankara, Sinop within 3 turns. they didn't last very long.

i'm kind of scared to deal with papal states though. I don't know what Germanicus's new economy script did, but it is working greatly as AIs develop their settlements very well. But small factions seem to have too much money I guess, as this picture shows. Those stacks are full of handgunners and swiss halberdiers. Papal states got bigger army than France... what?!

[JorisofHolland]

How did the Kwarezmians manage to keep that settlement and be almost crushed? That's one of the most weird things I saw happen ever in that corner of the map. And Aragon is doing well to - altough they are kicked out of Iberia.

[TheBromgrev]

That looks like the Timurids, not Khwarezm. I thought Kwarezm was a teal/turquoise type color.

[JorisofHolland]

You're right! But on the other hand - the Timurids are red-black, right?

[Tyrenia]

Looks to me like HRE... but then again WHAT THE @*%# ARE THEY DOING IN KHIVA? Crusade?

And it looks like the Kwarezmians have survived on the edge of the Kievan Rus', but I could just be seeing things...

[arcanek]

Correct, that's Timurids on the far right side. HRE has only Vienna, right next to Hungary - reduced to single territory. Khwarezms are dead after making their last stand at Alamut. It was a fun campaign, and experiencing how Byzantine army begins to get obsolete with no new system was quite interesting. After full plate pretty much my entire army was obsolete, fighting at a huge inefficiency. I only get pikemen and handgunners after turn 260, and that's about it.

[AnthoniusII]

Correct, that's Timurids on the far right side. HRE has only Vienna, right next to Hungary - reduced to single territory. Khwarezms are dead after making their last stand at Alamut. It was a fun campaign, and experiencing how Byzantine army begins to get obsolete with no new system was quite interesting. After full plate pretty much my entire army was obsolete, fighting at a huge inefficiency. I only get pikemen and handgunners after turn 260, and that's about it.

Pronoiarii,Scithicon and Alamanoi can stand even in high and late eras!

[JorisofHolland]

So you better conquer the world before it becomes to advanced - that goes straight against everything I do (if I'm not messing around, at least ), as I usually use superior technology to unleasy whatever I have on my poor, unadvanced foes

[merocaine]

Prayer was a great comfort to me...

The Biggest problem I had was with Jihads and Crusades on Constantinople.

I was at war with the whole map apart from the Cumans and the Lituanians. After fighting off the Mongols and a Jihad at the same time, the Pope called a crusade. By stripping most of the garrisons shielding Constantinople I managed to cling on for a few turns before Venice took it in a 2 stack assault. The Hungarians rolled into belgrade and sofia, Siege Thessolonikia, Threbizond finally fall to the Mongols, ludicrous amounts of Mongols pour into Asia minor.
Faced with a choice, retreat to the Islands and try to cling on in a few Castles in Europe. Slowly rebuild, carefully husband my resources ect for the glorious reconquest.
Or give up, I give up, this is far to stressful!

[JorisofHolland]

The difference between "stand" and "crush everyone around" is way to big for me - how else should I win a 200 against 1200 battle?