Are the Mongols and Timurids really that hard to defeat?

[Aymer de Valence]

I have never played a single campaign long enough to see the invasion of the Mongol hordes or Timurids, but are they really as bad as people make out? I can imagine their horse archers may be a pain but they don't have infinte arrows and will have to engage in close quarters eventually. Are the horse archers still strong with their swords drawn??

Also, in order for them to take a settlement they will have to siege it. Is their infantry strong enough to beat back mid-campaign units like dismounted knights etc, and is the Mongol campaign AI scripted to never attack with ladders etc and instead force the defenders out to fight them on the open field?

thanks

[Aeratus]

No army is too strong to beat, obviously. The Mongols and Timurids are just stronger than the other enemies. The Timurids, in particular, have elephant artillery that will wipe you out. Basically, each unit of elephant artillery is like 4 units of serpentines, but more mobile and a killer in terms of melee combat.

I have some Mongol pics. This is from the Crusades campaign, though (so cavalry units are only 30 men, not 40 men, so their stack appears smaller). As you can see, one issue is that the Mongols travel in groups.

See attached images.

The second image is interesting because there are 5 stacks of Mongols on the battlefield, and none of my reinforcements have arrived. As you can see, a full stack of elite cavalry, including silver chevron Royal Mameluks and Khassaki are pretty effective.

The Mongols are more numerous in the vanilla campaign, but I don't have any screenshots from vanilla at the moment.

[Christonikos]

Once I played as Spain. I had captured Milan. Mongols had Venice! The half world was mine, the other half theirs. Unfortunately I did format to my PC and never had the chance to fight against them in battlefield.

[Vanderdecken]

Yes! Hell yes! Beware! They will rape you!

[Blom89]

I played as Russia about 7 months ago and got far enough that the Mongols came.

They besieged one of my best defended cities.

I literally had 10 archer units and 10 of the best spearmen russia had to offer.

They completely devastated me with there calvary. It was a nightmare.

[Aeratus]

I literally had 10 archer units and 10 of the best spearmen russia had to offer.

They completely devastated me with there calvary. It was a nightmare.

That doesn't sound like a force that could withstand a siege in a city. I've had a city defense of 16 Saracen infantry get wiped out by 2 sieging stacks.

[empr guy]

You will probably loose your first few battles if you have never faced them before for a few reasons, mainly
A) They travel in groups of like 4 full stacks, so numbers alone give them advantage
B) their units have lots of upgrades or chevrons iirc, on top of them being good.
and C) their generals have about full dread, meaning your troops will rout alot faster then fighting a normal army.

However, they are a horde and so long as they stay that way, they cannot replenish their numbers, so if you have trouble beating them you must out produce them and overwhelm them.

[FightInTheShade]

I haven't met the Timurids yet but I'm currently engaged in war with the Mongols. Not for the weak at heart mate. They always stick together at least 3 or 4 stacks. So if you attack you'll likely be fighting over 2,000 of them.

My campaign




First battle (I attacked)

[Aymer de Valence]

Ah thankyou all for the information, cannot wait for them to invade! Will be an awesome experience! Though i will probably regret saying that when they do lol

[Aeratus]

I prefer to have AI reinforcements when fighting multiple stacks of Mongols. Certainly makes it a bit easier!

[painter]

For a cheap way to destroy Mongol stacks, if possible, recruit archers with stakes and fight on the river crossings. Especially river crossings without bridges, as they're easier to stake, and as a consequence devastate the cavalry heavy Mongol stacks. This tactic doesn't work as well with Timurids due to the darned elephant artillery units long range or their elephants simply trampling over your stakes and clearing a path for their cavalry.

[Tidybeard]

Can Timurid elephants in M2 not be made to run amok with flaming arrows, a la Rome?

[nhinhonhinho]

Nope elephants in M2 still run amok if you hit them with fire arrow or fire ammo, artillery nor ballista even more effect (if you can hit them)

However the common problem is your troops often rout faster

[napoleonic]

[Tidybeard]

DOUBLE !

[Avetis]

O_o

looks like no George Bush in future ))

[Aymer de Valence]

Those screenshots look insane hahaha

[eXistenZ]

a way to get rid of them early (but not definetly): if you are egypt or turkey, and the date when the mongols will appear comes closer, place some stacks near baghdad or the other place where they invade. when the first two stacks appear,defeat them, and you will get a messae they have been destroyed. but a few turns later they will pop up at another place (russia mostly). it gives you more time to prepare

[PrestigeX]

Mongols are Timurids are good factions, but interestingly they're both armies that I find only other Eastern Factions are good at fighting, with exception to the French.

They show up with armies of .. Heavy Cav, Horse Archers, Bow Armed Infantry, and some regular bowmen / artillery / misc.

You want to outshine their Heavy Cav - this usually means bringing quite a few more yourself. Keep pace with their H.A. -- so your own, and fast light cav (not mounted sergeants / other heavy mount, too slow) - and foot archers able enough to handle some melee and dish it out with theirs.

Turks, Egypt Byzantines, or Russia all come to mind as factions best able to micmic & out do the Mongols. As they can all produce the same type of troops as the Mongols/Timurids.

Hungary & Poland maybe lacking a bit in the quality archer-infantry , but substitute with wte.

France has Mounted Archers - they're pretty good statwise / performance, plus Aventurier or Scotsguard - and then ofcourse it's France, so the various Knights - obviously great Heavy Cav.

If you want to fight Mongols with Infantry it'd better be the siege. Or if you're Auto-resolving!

[Aeratus]

If the idea is to mimic the Timurids, which factions have elephants to mimic them?

Don't say it's those mercenary elephants which takes ages to regenerate. Mercenary elephants are a joke compared to the 3x silver chevron ones the AI have. With no chevrons, Mercenary elephants run amok after losing 1/4 of its men, whereas AI elephans with 3x silver can still hold steady even 3/4 of their numbers have been burned by naffatun pots (which is why flaming arrows are nearly useless against them unless you shoot at them for 10 minutes).

Still, the best way to deal with Mongols/Timurids is to go all heavy cavalry.

The AI is terrible at using Elephans in melee combat. In particular, it doesn't know how to use elephants to charge (and use their mount crush against the horses). Because of that, a single unit of Tsars Guard, for example, can beat a single unit of elephant, because the elephants will just stand there and get surrounded. Try 1 unit of Tsar's guard vs 1 unit of elephant in custom battle.