Just bought Kingdoms Add on and not impressed.

[Kilroy88]

I have bought the kingdoms add on a couple of days ago and tried the americans and crusades expansion and was really looking forward to it but I just became frustrated and disappointed.

I tried the crusades first on hard setting and the game is totally unbalanced. Egypt declared war on me and its about turn 20 and I can not afford to buy any more troops and the egyptians are buying armies at a rate of nots. I have reached I stalemate where I can defeat their troops in the field but I have no hope of beating the Egyptians cities, because the computer does not seem to have to worry about money and can buy as many troops as they like. Its like WW1 in the trenchs a complete stalemate.

I quit the game and tried americas. I am the Spanish and its its turn 20 and its actually the same. I can not afford to buy any more troops and I cant leave my cities I captured otherwise they will turn back native. I have 0 florins in the bank and next turn I will be -2000. I think the add ons are totally unbalanced and in two separate games I have reached an inpass and I cant go on in the game.

Have u guys find the add ons hard? It seems the computer has an unfair advantage compared to the normal campaign

[Veliky Kaiser Theos]

1. I found the Spanish campaign easy.
2. The Crusades campaign is supposed to be challenging.

I found the expansion to be great fun, especially after having modded Norway to make it playable in the Teutonic campaign.

[Kilroy88]

what difficulty level did you play on? I just seem to run out of money and the computer has endless resources.

[Aeratus]

Don't be disappointed solely because it was hard.

In the first time I played the Americas campaign, I played as Spain on VH/VH and beat the long campaign at exactly 30 turns. The campaign is pretty easy, and there are essentially only three elements:

1. Exterminate all native cities.
2. Focus on using cavalry to charge directly into their battle line, then pull back the cavalry, then repeat charge. I think what made it really easy for me was that I got 6 units of Conquistadores early on by completing some mission, and 1 unit of conquistadore is worth 400 native warriors.
3. Hire lots of mercenary archers. Archers are way more efficient than musketeers because they have a larger unit size and higher rate of fire, while the armor piercing musket shots aren't useful because the natives don't have armor.

Regarding the Crusades campaign, this one is quite time consuming because of the size of the map.

In the Crusades and Teutonic campaigns, the AI will have endless resources, especially on VH/VH. Therefore, the way to win is (1) to have a huge economy so you can continuously pump out units from all castles, and (2) keep crushing the AI on the battlefield so that even though it has endless resources, it can't keep up unit production (try to get heroic victories for around half the major battles, and the AI will soon be unable to keep up).

[eXistenZ]

if you are not impressed, try the warpath campaign for empire, you will be even less impressed :p

[crzyrndm]

You're unimmpressed because it's too difficult on hard (most experienced players want better AI)

Crusades campaign is more challenging than the original because the AI is only worrying about 4 factions and so isn't always in conflict with itself. It also recieves much larger bonuses than in the grand campaign(IIRC ~30000/turn instead of 7000 in original for VH difficulty).
So, if you find it too challenging then turn the difficulty down. The difficulty of all the campaigns is independent of all the others, the setting you use on one will be too easy/hard on another (also if you think crusades is difficult try KGCM or TATW with improved difficulty).

The crusades campaign is actually a good one because it forces you to improve your strategy and tactics(and you get byz firethowers). Go back to basics and think about what you are doing. Assuming you are playing the crusader states, your heavy infantry is the ultimate in power killers(IIRC, the cav is about equal with the muslim factions). Start thinning garrisons that are well inside your territory to free up some money(all free upkeep slots full in cities, no more as long as face is not blue on VH taxes which you should be on). Start building an invasion force behind your frontier which has the best infantry and spears you can recruit(this is your seige force so archers and cav are less important). Move the stack to the front line, and wait for the next attack. Once it is repelled by the defenders, move this fresh attacking stack to attack the nearest settlement. If you win, move in a defensive force(march your defenders from previous front line foward to minimise useless armies) and retrain the seige force. Hopefully the other crusader state can keep the other three factions off your back while you repeat this to whipe out egypt. Focus any free money into developing economic buildings in your coastal towns(naval docks, markets, roads, farms). Before building anything, open the settlement summary window and check which building gives you the most extra income (probably the trade dock line, and roads). If you start having to increase the garrison in these cities, build some PO buildings to reduce upkeep costs.

Good luck

EDIT

So, I just fired up a crusades campaign as KOJ (who I'm pretty sure you're playing as) and the first thing I notice is that your starting armed forces are huge. Almost every city has 10+units of some reasonably good units. Second thing is a large expanse of rebel territory on the other side from Egypt. Adding those together, I'm going to use some of my starting forces to expand into rebel territory (those not near Egypt). The ones near Egypt are going to be consolidated into a large attacking force and move for a pre-emptive strike at Egypt. I'm going to trust POA to hold back the byzies and turks while I do these things.

Oh, and once I've converted the populace enough those two little coastal castles will be converted to cities to increase income. Also spamming priests due to high levels of opposition religion, focusing on Jerusalem and the other well developed city so I can minimise the garrison there.

[AJenny58]

I found the crusade campaingn and the Americas campaign to be quite easy. The diplomacy is super simple so you know who you will be fighting. This makes it so much easier to prepare for an attack. As KoJ you know you don't have to worry about the Principality of Antioch and vice versa, this gives you a huge advantage. In Americas you know you will be fighting everyone as New Spain so you have to make sure to expand quickly. In Americas the natives are so weak against cavalry it shouldn't be a problem for you. But if it is too hard just lower the difficulty, there is no shame in that if it makes the game more fun for you to play.

[crzyrndm]

OK, so just discovered why you may think Egypt is spamming stacks on you. Open up a new campaign and turn the FoW off. You will notice that their settlements are atleast as well garrisoned as yours (or more so). What you are experiencing now(the first ~30 turns) is the AI burning off it's surplus armies. They aren't actually recruiting that many new armies.

But continuing my campaign, the army I rushed down to Egypt with got destroyed after wiping out ~ 2.5 stacks. But on the way there was a nice bridge that I crossed that would make a great defensive point for someone less experienced at field battles.
Should have sent down a second army with the first one, then I might have got further than beseiging the Egyptian capital. The armies attacking the rebels have starved out 2 cities(out to damascus now), and are now moving to the egyptian border to begin expansion. Those two little castles on the coast have been converted to cities and now have free garrisons and better trade.The inland castle on the egyptian border has mines worth 700+/turn so that was a nice boost. Priests spamming out of Jerusalem has resulted in 100% catholic and a guild. Because all my cities(~7) all have free garrisons(and I burn't off a surplus army), I'm making about 5k/turn before construction and recruiting.

This is all by turn 13 on VH. It takes a little more thought than vanilla due to the large starting forces of all factions(disband or expand for economic security), but as AJenny58 said, you've got reasonably constant diplomacy which makes things a little easier.

[Teutonic Warlord]

The first 30 turns also have the Egyptian and Turkish Jihad armies. This really can make it seem like they are spamming stacks because of the cheap units with free upkeep (too bad you can't call a Crusade, right?). And don't feel ashamed to start out on a lower difficulty. Each campaign and faction have a different difficulty because they all have different problems and features, so playing on lower difficulty levels lets you explore the possibilities to surviving and prospering on these new maps. I am not ashamed to say I am still having trouble playing as the Teutonic Order on Medium difficulty (but only because all the other AI factions stop their wars, ally together, and all start to declare war on me (even my allies) and turn me into their punching bag after I defeat Lithuania). Just take some time getting used to the map, new features, and your faction so you can figure out what works, and you will find it isn't much harder than vanilla.

[Aymer de Valence]

ohhhh no Kingdoms is awesome!

[Scotius]

ohhhh no Kingdoms is awesome!

Pretty much this Enjoy Kingdoms because there will never, ever be another TW expansion with as much content in one package.

[dannyalex]

play more Crusades

[Sweger]

Yes, can only agree, isn't it better that you "have to" start off with an easier level so you get out more of the game and can have fun playing it for a longer time? What I always do is to ALWAYS conquer neighbouring and nearby rebel settlements before giong to war with any faction. If they declare war with you before you feel that you have completed this phase, just try to hold them off, and then when you are ready, have conquered the rebel settlements you want and developed them to a decent level, then you make the big push as soon as you got the troops for that.

In the crusades campign you're utterly unlikely to fight on to fronts, when i played as the Byzantines i got a monster economy as soon as I had secured most of Anatolia for myself. Throughout the game, I only battle Venetians, Turks, Egyptians and Mongols, interesting developents of actions made that I could take Antioch and Jerusalem for myself without going to war with any of the crusader states. That was on m/e however since it was my second campaign ever.

Playing as the Spanish in Americas, I tried m also on the battlefield for the first time, however, as stated above, it was easier than I thought since cavalry simply is too much for the natives. And here it is important to fight one native nation at a time. What I did was that I allied with the Tlaxcalan and Taraskans, and then they did the heavy job defeating the Aztecs while I was conquering rebel territories. As Spain you quickly encircle the Mayans, and then you should be quite able to take them down. Once this was done I conquered the last region the Aztecs had so I could fulfill that campaign goal. Then I expanded north from Cuba into North America until i bordered to the Apache. And by that point I had only like 7 territories left to conquer to achieve all the goals.

The real challanging battles in the Americas as Spain is when you have to face the English or the French.

But don't be disappointed by the difficulty, see it as more added value for the money spent on the game

[Leaf-Fan-Forever]

The best thing about getting Kingdoms is all the great mods you can now play

[In3x]

Kingdoms is great, the Brittania and Teutonic campaigns rock.

[Double A]

Egypt and Turkey also get about 1.5 stacks each on the start of the second turn for free.

PoA is easier than KoJ (Antioch is probably the richest city in the game, plus their units are sexy). Egypt is the easiest faction (I make tens of thousands of ƒ even in the early game), Byzies are somewhere in the middle (Venice is the only issue), but the Turks are really hard (your upkeep is crippling and you have too many castles/not enough cities - not to mention your empire is divided in half by PoA).

[Aeratus]

Even though KoJ isn't as easy as Egypt in terms of economy and unit roster, it definitely has the quickest path to victory. If you beat the Egyptians in the early battles, you've basically won the game. Egypt has very few cities that can defend itself once its army is wiped out. The only thing left to do is capture a few rebel settlements and march an army to sack baghdad. In comparison, POA has to fight every corner of the map to rid the Turks, and Egypt has to take Baghdad and Constantinople.

Another example of a "quick" faction is England in Britannia. If you make the right moves, you can win the long campaign in 20-30 turns or so, although making the right moves may be relatively hard.

[Double A]

Even though KoJ isn't as easy as Egypt in terms of economy and unit roster, it definitely has the quickest path to victory. If you beat the Egyptians in the early battles, you've basically won the game. Egypt has very few cities that can defend itself once its army is wiped out. The only thing left to do is capture a few rebel settlements and march an army to sack baghdad. In comparison, POA has to fight every corner of the map to rid the Turks, and Egypt has to take Baghdad and Constantinople.

Another example of a "quick" faction is England in Britannia. If you make the right moves, you can win the long campaign in 20-30 turns or so, although making the right moves may be relatively hard.

Byzies usually get tripped up by Venians, and Turks are fairly easy to counter. Horse archers don't work very well in mountains, but those two-handed unique guys they get, on the other hand...

Plus, PoA gets probably the best unique commander in the entire game. His ability is amazing, and he's actually young enough to be able to use it more than twice.

[ChivalrousKiller]

I found it fairly easy to conquer the entire map with Jerusalem. I think it's the only time I've ever played so far and done that.

[Aeratus]

I got bored with PoA because the victory condition requires that you destroy the Turks. But the Turks are all over the map, so you have to chase them around in the desert.