crusader states begining guide early

[atila9000]

read above and you will know what im asking

[dahooscarl]

I also would be interested in a guide to early crusader states. I started a game recently on vh/vh and had mild success getting alliances with Egypt and Turks but once that alliance was broken I was overwhelmed and forced ti cypress where I was eventually defeated. Def the hardest game I've played.

[atila9000]

in my case, im at turn 15 and im cheating money because im getting negative income by -6000 so far

[k/t]

Turn 1: Besiege Gaza.
Turn 2: Conquer Gaza.
Turn 2 - Turn 15: Kill off the rest of the Fatimids.

The end.

[Chazz1225]

Hahahahahaaa lol!

[Stario]

1. Make sure you get alliance with Egypt and Turks;

2. Send your diplomats to make trade agreements with rest of factions on the map (but don't go for alliance with Christian kingdoms);

3. Spam as many merchants as possible; make Jerusalem your trade capital and build merchant guild house there- once able, try to focus on monopolising gold resource;

4. Spam at least one priest for each of your own region, and have priest also converting on foreign lands that you plan to conquer in future. It will make things easier once you do decide to conquer and the pope will love you for converting infidels \(^o^)/

5. Conquer all rebel settlements;

6. Don't go to first crusade called (you most likely wont be established well enough by this stage), instead establish yourself first- don't worry the pope will not hate you as you're always converting infidels into Christianity, but if needed you can send some coin his way to improve relations with his holiness (good strategy is to always keep x1 diplomat near Rome);

7. Once all rebel settlement are yours and you're well established its time to make war on the Muslims, preferably open by having the Pope call a crusade on Gaza- let other factions join first and wait for them to arrive before joining yourself and make sure you take Gaza for yourself and then blitzkrieg Egypt into submission...

[atila9000]

if i have built a guild in a city and if i demolish it, can i get another guild proposal of the same faction and others. i have theologians (what are they useful for) in jerusalem, and if i take it down, can i build merchants guild in there?

[PapaRosario]

if i have built a guild in a city and if i demolish it, can i get another guild proposal of the same faction and others. i have theologians (what are they useful for) in jerusalem, and if i take it down, can i build merchants guild in there?

Destroying a guild will remove 20 guild points from all other settlements for that guild type. So you can destroy it and still get another theologians guild elsewhere, but it will be a little bit more difficult.

[Strengelicher]

Destroy the Theologian Guild in Jerusalem and replace it with... a Merchant Guild? Yargh. That's like destroying the Dome of the Rock and replacing it with a shopping centre.

[PapaRosario]

Better yet, convert the Dome of the Rock into a shopping center.

[dahooscarl]

I started a new game as crusader states. I immediately took gaza and requested a crusade to Cairo. I took allepo and the city below antioch but income wad still negative and growing. Muslims countered by calling jihad on Jerusalem. I ended up cheating money and a few battles to keep Jerusalem. There's just not enough infrastructure/income to support crusaders. I've tried disbanding all expensiven cavalry and I still don't make enough to support. Maybe ill add a few more units to their starting roster like LMAA or tempoar spearmen to help with initial expansion. I still feel like this is cheating though. Or is there a way to remove the chivalric code trait from the faction leader. I feel like if I was able to sack the first couple of settlements that would help boost my starting income.

[Chandr]

2 ways :
1) Hard, but most interesting - as mentioned above
2) Easy, but very boring - destroying the fatimids in 4 turns (what happened in my game )
1-turn: Send your king and all your units around Jerusalem toward Cairo
build a ship in Antioch, move some units from Edessa to Antioch
Send a diplomat to Seljuks for an alliance
2-turn Continue moving King's army to Cairo, board the army from Antioch to the ship and send to Gaza
3-turn Attack the Fatimid army next to Cairo, destroy them along with the reinforcement from Cairo (most important - kill fatimid's king), capture Cairo (or besiege Cairo)
Besiege Gaza with Antioch army (oh yes, it is useful to declare a crusade for fast movement)
4-turn Capture Gaza, then move your army to Al-Aqaba (or whatever it's called), attack and kill the last fatimid's family member if he outside the city or besiege the city and kill him on next turn.
That's it, fatimids are destroyed, you have alliance with seljucks and many rebel cities around you. Boring, it's much more interesting to give them some time to prepare for the war

[MaxIMF]

Conquer all rebel settlements, Kerak first. Then, when Egypt declares war to you, call for crusade, target Cairo, sack it. Offer piece for city + 10 000. That will keep you up for a pretty long time. Repeat with other towns when needed.

[MaxIMF]

edit: peace ofc. not piece

You have superior army, remember that. Templars or those special foot knights from Jerusalem can defeat anthing they can throw at you. Single unit on wall is undefeatable.

[k/t]

Yeah, ok, until the Egyptians start spamming Mamluks and Tabardariyyah. If you want a hard campaign, don't attack the Egyptians. If you want an easy campaign, rush them as soon as possible.

[╬Ritterbruder╬]

also, try to clear the Arabian penisula of Fatamids first, if you take Gaza and Quarisaya, it's way easier to hold if you also clear Mecca, Medina (and a third one I can't remember) from the Fatamids, the Sinaï is way easier to control if you don't have to worry about full militia stacks popping up your rear
I usually let the Turks, Byzantines and Kwazzies wear eachother down