Medieval Kingdoms Total War Research Thread

[Slytacular]

I thought Bondir in translation means farmers? I mean to describe the class that are freemen or land owning farmers. They are what I understood from the sources I read that the medieval Swedish farmers are not like the typical English Peasant which during a military emergency or fyrd would grab equipment from the nearest stockade. The Swedish Bondir who share the economic workload with thrall and hirdmen participate in the coastline patrols and engage themselves to shield wall drills. They could also potentially create or buy their own arms and armour and like their predecessors to "go viking." The social system was not Christian oriented and it defined that a person was either free, in debt, or enslaved. The Bondir unit is a combination of land owners, hired men, and people in debt. This is a unit that is more like a militia, but replaces the Levy, militia, and peasant units. To simplify the meaning of the Bondir, they are the 13th century outdated Vikings.

[Linke]

Yes bondir and the basic militia units can be the same, all you say is right. i am glad I can help the team and provably I can dig upp some shield patterns

[warman222]

Got another question for everyone, should Toulouse have any units or equipment from Catalan and/or it's Spanish Neighbors like Navarre and Aragon? I thought it might be a cool way to spice up the Occitan faction(Toulouse and Provence)rosters, but I'm not sure if it would be accurate. Also if it is, what units should they're be from this. I was thinking maybe some type of pike or schiltron unit, or maybe a light melee unit or both. Basically here's my roster idea so far for Toulouse

Spear Militia*
Crossbow Militia
Pike Militia*
Jinetes*(?)

Count of Toulouse, Count of Foix, Viscount of Beiziers, Viscount of Limoges(This crosses over with Provence):

Spear Serjeants/Schiltron Serjeants*
Serjeants*
Crossbow Serjeants
Heavy Serjeants(Two handed unit based off an Osprey pic)
Mounted Serjeants
Foot Knightly Retinue/Knightly Retinue


Not sure on late units yet either. Any unit with an asterisk by it means that might be worth having it be either replaced by a Spanish type unit or having a Spanish influence on it. Okay rambling over, time for your feedback,

[Slytacular]

Introduction of Spanish units would be precise, but I don't know about accurate. Jinetes from English to Spanish translation means "horsemen," and it is referred to the light cavalry that use Berber tactics. I haven't seen a source that specifies if the Toulouse region uses Iberian and North African style of troops. By 1215 Toulouse was undergoing a crusade within its region against the Carthars, but I think the majority of the aggressor troops involved were mercenaries from the Iberian Peninsula. If I were to create the units for Toulouse, I would follow the Frankish military design entirely except that the tier one troops have worse statistics than the more Northern part of France and no unit abilities, but the counter balance is that good Iberian mercenaries are for hire and the Toulouse region is significantly more economically balanced and wealthy in the campaign.

[Filips Augustus]

I agree with slytacular.

[warman222]

I thought that crusade was spearheaded by Northern French forces? Well anyways, thanks for the tips so far. I might do a full preview of the two Occitan factions later when I get more Spanish and Mercenary stuff done. Though I will get the French parts done now for sure. I'm finally wrapping up Burgundy, I got delayed slightly from being out of town last weekend. One of the last things needed to be done that I just implemented(albeit still a WIP) was something Medieval 2 fans will really be happy to see:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Need I say more?

[Slytacular]

The total war work around version of pavise crossbowmen. Its because of Medieval 2 I used to believe that was how pavise shields were used by crossbowmen.

Yes, the crusade involved Northern French troops which you can include on the campaign map at start(or use Northern French mercenaries), but the southern troops if recruited at tier 1 won't perform as efficiently as their Northern counter parts.

[+Marius+]

The total war work around version of pavise crossbowmen. Its because of Medieval 2 I used to believe that was how pavise shields were used by crossbowmen.

Well, to be fair, no game whatsoever got that right, even Mount and blade(and it's mods) with its individual soldier animation and engine was not able to properly make the crossbowmen deploy their pavises.

[gabeman27]

The total war work around version of pavise crossbowmen. Its because of Medieval 2 I used to believe that was how pavise shields were used by crossbowmen.

Yes, the crusade involved Northern French troops which you can include on the campaign map at start(or use Northern French mercenaries), but the southern troops if recruited at tier 1 won't perform as efficiently as their Northern counter parts.

Dependent upon the general really. Troops never solely deployed the shields. It was just a common tactic. The entire point of a shield is never limited to a single use. However maybe what you could do was add crossbowmen to have a deployable shield of sorts. Like stakes. Model them without it because most of the time in battle they'd have the shields deployed. Its a choice. Maybe give them all siege weapons? That being the shield. So they can drop the shield in front and pick it back up. This however is a lot of complex coding I assume but working it like small siege tower could work nicely.

[warman222]

Incidentally, I've been experimenting with a deployable pavise, still toying around with it, so stay tuned.

Also, I've been working on bringing some of Ltd.'s created factions onto the campaign map, even if it's not complete. Nicaea, Trebizond, Kievan Rus, Armenia have all been added. I'm almost done with the Cumans too. Once I'm done I'm going to move on to the Spanish and Occitan factions, starting with Aragon. I found this really helpful post in one of the War of the West research threads on them, so I already know how I'm going to make their roster. Here's what I had in mind.


King Jaime
Aragonese Nobles
Low Class Cavalry
Peones
Catalano-Aragonese Pikemen
Crossbow Serjeants
Almoguvars
Jinetes(?)

Calatano Knights (Possible AOR unit for Occitan/Spanish factions)

That's not counting militia units and later stuff I like to add. Also because how the Spanish kingdoms were about the feudal system and how Aragon is smaller, they won't be having a mini roster system like France or England.

[tryadelion]

aragon smaller? aragon was a crown formed by 3 different kingdoms and 1 principalty!

i'm from a aragonese crown reenactment group, will provide some info on atleast 3 sub-types on the army.

PART 1:
aragonese kingdom troops:

Knights. formed by the main three houses of aragon: Cornel, Ahones, Gudal.

Gudal: 12-point red star over yellow background.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Ahones :

gold bell over red background.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

cornel:

gold stars over blue background:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

and i could add more, but i think that's enough variety.

Aragonese serjeants: using the same shield patterns, they should wear more light equipment.

gudal example (left) vs another aragonese knight (right):

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

aragonese levy crosswbowman. no description required. low protection.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

aragonese levy spearmen behind.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[tryadelion]

​part 2

Catalan principalty.

Catalan knights.

The three main houses of catalonia were Urgell, Montcada, and Anglesola.

urgell :

black squares over golden squares.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Montcada : two red bulls over golden background, 6 golden circles over red background.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Anglesola, black striked lines over golden background:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

the same for the serjeants and levy as aragon.

Almogàvers:

they should be recruitable in the pyrinees and in the coast. there should be 3 different units.

Almocaden (almogavar leaders, heavy infantry). - mountain region castle.

they should wear knightly like units. they could be a bodyguard unit too. the most famous Almocaden is Roger de flor, leader of the Catalan Mercenary Company ( that fought Turkish invasors and sacked greece after the contract was broken by the bizantine prince).

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

they should war ( except the commander) plain mail with no heraldic signs, like the XI century norman knights.

Almogavar (light infantry, javelinmen, skirmishers) - montain region castle.

not as barbaric as seen in common culture, almogavars are skirmisher mountainmen , and they should wear light ( padded , leather or only cloth) armour, and swords, falchions and throwable spears.

round shields with the aragonese bars (vertical crimson over gold) would be a nice addition too.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Mariner Almogavar ( sea infantry, medium ,crossbowmen) - sea region city.

they should be wearing light mail / leather armour, a crossbow and a short sword. a round shield instead of a pavise could be a nice addition. they were crucial on the sea expeditions of the aragonese crown.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[tryadelion]

all of the knights and serjeant units should have mixed in them ( independant on the region ) kingsmen with the aragonese royal ensign ( crimson vertical vars over golden background).

[finix]

Very useful information tryadelion . Can I use the photos for the unit cards ? I must admit that I know little about the military tradition of the Aragon Kingdom and do not have access to any information

[tryadelion]

pm me your mail and i'll send you photos from a a history book compilation made here ( osprey is awfully bad for iberian kingdoms) you could use for units / unit card. feel free to use the images for them if you want to :p

[tryadelion]

sent! feel free to share with the dev team!

[finix]

sent! feel free to share with the dev team!

tnx

[warman222]

Thanks for the additional info. I should note that some of the pictures I've already seen here on post 24:

http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...f-Aragon/page2

However there is definitely a lot of stuff you said that is very useful. For example I now know how to set up the politics of Aragon. Essentially I'm going to make it so you can take control as one of the four ruling powers (3 kingdoms and Catalonia). Unfortunately because of how cities are divided by default, Aragon will only have at most 2 cities. Tryadelion, do you know the names of the rulers of those houses around this timeframe? i.e early 1200s. I want to be as accurate as possible with the names of the leaders.

[tryadelion]

Let me get home and i'll post as many info as i can.

[tryadelion]

the names will follow this rule:


Castillian name / Catalan Name / Occitan or aragonese name ( If avaliable, minor languages currently)

King names (XII-XIII)

Pedro / Pere / Pero
Jaime / Jaume / Jacme - Jaume
Alfonso / Alfons / Afons - Afonso
Sancho / sanç / sanç
Martín / Martí / martí
Raimundo / Ramon / Ramon

Queen / Princess Names (XII - XIII)

---- / Violant / Violant
Sancha / Sança / sança
Petronila / Peronella / Peronella
Berenguela / Berenguera / Berenguera
Constanza / Constança / Constansa
Maria / Maria / maria

Aragonese noble names (XII - XIII)

Pero
Cesar
Calixto
Chaime
Chavier
Flavio
Sancho
Alfonso
Afonso
Honorio

Catalan / Occitan / Valencian / Mallorcan noble names XII - XIII

Udalard
Ramon Berenguer
Berenguer Ramon
Berenguer
Ramon
( i know, weird combinations everywhere )
Arnau
Marc
Jaume
Alfons
Pere
Ermengol
Borrell
Ramon Borell
Bernat
Galçerà
Gispert
Roger
Guerau
Otger
Guillem