England and Venice

[fluffypillow]

So throughout playing this game, I've completed the game as the Byzantines on hard. (One of my favorite factions) And a few other factions not worth mentioning. Through out the game I found out Venice and England are my other two favorites. I was gonna try another crack at hard mode but I was torn between the two factions. England doesn't really have many spear troops, but they make up for it with great missile units. And Venice has pretty good infantry, the Pavise Crossbowman are pretty nice too. So before I invest some time into a hard game. Out of the two factions, does one field a better army than the other? Or do they just require different strategies on the field of battle?

[Double A]

Or do they just require different strategies on the field of battle?

That's pretty much the basis for every faction in the game. No faction is bad, but some do have better stuff than others (England has the best ranged units in the game, Denmark has best melee infantry, Moors have Camel Gunners, etc)

[PrestigeX]

England is a little too dependant on the Castle Line of buildings -- I mean anything of quality comes from there!!

Venice has a very good city-level troops , as do all italians. I find this helps because your castles have less burden to make big armies -- ie. Venice can concentrate from cities making crossbows and infantry while the castles send out cavalry and specialists (like Venetian Heavy Infantry).


Venice with its crossbows and later the venetian archers / venetian heavy infantry / and Stradiots (imagine alan light cavalry but with maces) offer some interesting changes from the standard ITalian Faction. Those Heavy Infantry comes in handy because of their Armor Piercing Attack which is VERY high... their venetian archers are great for adding speedier volleys to help the crossbows - xbow on its own a bit slow, archers on their own -- not enough 'punch', but together - perfect! ,,, and light cav are always immensely useful rounding up all the enemy's archers etc - because they have maces they can help out heavy cav (armor piercing mace right )


England has an easier starting position - take down scotland, and Fortress Britain is yours - sit back and rake in the money, easy to stay out of trouble or expand where you choose. Venice almost always ends up in war with EVERYONE!!!

Lonbows are great, obviously, plus the Armored Swordsman ofcourse!!! The trouble I find with England tho, is I'm always wishing my castles/citadels had more recruitment slots and my Cities seem weakly defended by low quality troops... England, Russia, and Poland probably the worst factions for City Settlement troops...Hungary is exempt as they may receive Battlefield assasins.

[Aeratus]

England, Russia, and Poland probably the worst factions for City Settlement troops...Hungary is exempt as they may receive Battlefield assasins.

You're right that England has poor city troops. But Russia has definitely the best city troops in terms of practicality, since the Cossack Musketeer (which has a higher attack and range than the longbowmen) can be created from city walls without the need of a barracks, and the Russians can also produce cavalry militia from cities (to create a horse breeder guild).

[eXistenZ]

Venice is more fun then england, definetly

[ChivalrousKiller]

In my opinion, Venice has one of the best armies in the game, at least later in the game. The two units Venetian Heavy Infantry and Venetian Archers are extremely good, and along with Venice's perfect starting position, they are very good reasons to pick Venice for your next faction

[smthhappy]

the beardiche axeman also are recriuted from cities

[Drustan]

IMO venice has one of the best armies but worst starting positions. You are surrounded by aggressive factions, so no matter how hard you try it's almost impossible to keep yourself stronger than your neighbors. Furthermore, if you expand west you piss off the pope but if you expand east you have to deal with the Mongols, Timurids and muslim factions.

[In3x]

England is the best to play, more of a challenge. With Venice it is easy to finish the game in under 25 turns, this is much more difficult with England.

[Jianadaren]

England is the best to play, more of a challenge. With Venice it is easy to finish the game in under 25 turns, this is much more difficult with England.

Challenge Accepted

[In3x]

Challenge Accepted

What challenge?

[the new username]

IMO i think playing as Venice is harder than playing as england, with england u are safe on the british isles, while with venice u have to deal with the imperials to the south and the milanese to the east to secure venice, and it wont be easy to take care of them

[Nazgûl Killer]

Dearest Fluffy, this all depends on your style of gameplay.

England is much more bunker-friendly, much more easy going and much less intensive than Venice. It allows you to focus on one enemy at a time at very controlled fronts, be it the Portuguese who always attack Caernarvon, and nothing more, be it the French trying to take back Normandy or be it the Scots pestering York.

My point is that England is very contained with very contained foes, allowing for much more order rather than chaos, organized wars, time to prepare yourself and incredible trade using the Northern sea. My favorite move with England is to invade Scandinavia and take Scotland, thus creating a massive trade hub throughout the Northern sea.

England is my firm favorite out of most factions (The Holy Roman Empire is my favorite, soon followed by the English, the Venetians and then the Byzantines), they were the first faction I played and the faction I keep coming back to, very much like the first love

England fields a massive variety of incredible missile units and heavy infantry, and some powerful horses (Those English knights... My oh my...), making sure the lack of spearmen is rarely felt, and you can easily control all the seas with the number of ports you have - That's a huge bonus, almost every city or castle you hold (Every single one, actually...) will have a port at one point or another, this is an immense boost to economy and allows you strong reliance on powerful trade - And a navy recruitment ability that will rival even the mighty Danes.

As for the weak points, the English tend to be boring at times, especially after you destroy France - And not to mention the fact that the French dominate you in many aspects of the field of battle early on, forcing you to employ flanking tactics both in the campaign map and the battle map. The English are a relatively tough faction early on, with only Levy Spearmen, Peasant Archers and Peasants to field your armies... But they get better, and fast.

Another minus the English have is their vulnerability when it comes to naval assaults, being an island, once you take the Scots, you have no real front line aside for Normandy. The French, the Danes and the Portuguese can easily land armies at unexpected spots and harass you, I must say it gets annoying.

As for Venice, one of the most interesting factions to play with, no doubt about it - Also one of the more difficult ones. You face off with two of the strongest factions, if not the two strongest factions, in the game - The Holy Roman Empire and the Byzantine Empire. Those two usually team up to destroy you, making the game very difficult.

Venice is also heavily reliant on trade, easily monopolizing the Adriatic with ports and trade, and with some conquest can easily monopolize the Aegean as well, now, their naval units are far tougher than those of the English, so they must have if they are to face off with the Byzantine Fire Ships and Dromons.

As it has been said before, the Venetians have their armies relying heavily on militia units coming from cities, there's a bonus and there's a minus to that, the minus being that they are militias, inherently less professional than the units that the English boast, but the fact that they don't need castles as often is a magnificent bonus.

However, unlike England, Venice is at a dramatic strategic disadvantage when it comes to location, a disadvantage that can become easily frustrating and irritating and can easily lead to your demise with Sicily pushing down your Southern borders, the Byzantine to the East and the Holy Roman Empire to the North, Venice is completely enshrouded with foes.

Now you must also remember that despite the English having a lack of spears, the Venetians have a lack of proper horsemen. A disadvantage that, for me, is absolutely enormous as I tend to rely heavily on my cavalry.

A final note is that the Venetians are very close to the Holy Lands, making Crusades a great way to get on the Pope's good side and earn some nice benefits, like controlling the Middle East and its coastline, monopolizing trade across the Eastern Mediterranean, whilst the English are very far away from said Holy Lands, making Crusades sometimes a royal pain. Also, generally it would appear that the Venetians are much more favorable to the Pope than the English, as was right in history... Even though as the English you can take down the Spaniards, Portuguese and the Moors to take Iberia and North Africa, monopolizing trade of all of Western Europe and later on the Americas. That's a gigantic bonus...
And with both factions you can advance more into central Europe, even though I advise against it. The English find that the Holy Roman Empire are one of their most worthy allies, and the Venetians would find that the French and the Scots, perhaps even the Danes, are theirs.


Those are the basic tough and weak points of both these factions, it's up to you to decide which of them you wish to play as. Good luck!