The Danes : Starting an all out attack campaign for Turtlers
Well you must have guess, this is a kind of guide to play the Danes.
Well it is oriented for people like me that like to turtle, or just take their time building their empire, but still want to have a try at a very offensive campaign. (and by offensive i dont mean insulting :hmmm: ).
So, lets start with a little faction overview :
- Location :
The Danes start with just one province, a city, but have no faction on its borders, and the city is accessible only by sea or a bridge. South of the river bording this city, is Hambourg, a rebel castle protected by rivers and the sea.
This castle will be vital for your defense and offense as it will protect your beginning belongings.
North of Arhus, your city, you'll find two rebel settlements (a castle and a city). They are quite remote but will be quite a blessing as these wont be attacked very often.
These are your secondary objectives as they will provide the cash for your war machine.
So, basicaly in the first turns you'll take those 3 rebel settlements so we'll consider these are the core provinces of your starting empire : 1 castle and 3 cities (the rebel castle in the north must be changed to a town).
South of Hamburg, the HRE will come and see you from time to time.
To the East, the Poles might come too, but usually its much later as for some reason they dont seem interested in the northern regions.
To the West, Bruges and Antwerpen, two rich rebel cities will stay untouched for years as their garnison is quite powerfull.
- Diplomacy :
As we all know diplomacy is kinda broken in the current Vanillia game.
Anyway, trade rights are always a good addition to your income. I recommend not to look for alliances with nations you could go into war with that is : Poland, HRE, Scotland and England as these will be your primary ennemies or primary targets.
On the long run, Byzantium, Venice, the Moors, Sicily and Egypt could become ennemies, with Spain and Portugal an option even later.
That make a few factions that you can safely ally with : France, Hungary, the Turks, Milan and the Papal States. Securing an alliance with these factions isnt necessary, see it as a bonus.
In fact, if you follow my advices, you dont need any ally with the danes : your borders should always be secured or a frontline : dont get tempted to overexpand and thus be backstabed.
- The Army :
The Danes have an interesting unit roster, mainly Infantry, but including some realy nice cavalry options.
They will particulary shine with early units and late units, but will lag behind with the High ones.
My adivce is to skip the High units, because when you'll face AI High units, your early ones will have a lot of experience and you'll be able to match them almost toe to toe.
What units do the danes have at their disposal ?
City units :
At first, just stay with basic militia (not the spear ones) as they will just be kept for maintaing order. Once yo'ull reach higher tier units, you'll have access to milita crossbowmen, the swordstaff milita and the dreaded Norse War Clerics.
When you'll have the cash, keep 3 units of both xbow and swordstaff milita to garison your cities (as they'll be free of upkeep) but dont bother building some to go in the field : you are the danes, true warriors, not some pesky italian militia.
The Norse War Clerics, are in my humble opinion, just some eye candy. Dont get me wrong, they are awesome, but they need higher tier city buildings to recruit (and to retrain) and apart for some "honour" raids into the HRE or Poland, you wont be using any in your classical armies.
Castle Units :
Now on to the real stuff
These units will be divided between, core troops that will be the backbone of your armies, support troops, that will complement your core troops adding or reinforcing some key elements, special troops, that are basicaly elite troops that provide good eye candy, and lastly trash troops, that you should buy ...
The Core troops :
In my opinion (and actually in my experience too) you can win a grand campaign with the 3 troops i'll call Core :
Vikings, Norse Archers and Scouts.
The Vikings are probably the best infantry in the game, surpassing the uber italian spear militia. I mean by best not the most powerfull, but the best in relation to its price and building requirements.
First they are armour piercing, meaning that you can lock an unit and crush it nicely with those little vikings (they are as cheap as seargent spearmen but will take them on anytime.)
They are light infantry, meaning they'll move allmost twice as fast as spearmen or heavy infantry. This mobility is priceless if you play like i advise you to play.
They are also as numerous as peasant or spear units, so you wont be outnumebered but will outnumber classical infantry in one on one.
Laslty, you'll be able to recruit and train them very easyly in any castle.
The Norse Archers are in my opinion the best archers in the game (if you dont abuse of the passive AI bug). They are just a bit better than basic archers in firefights, but they are awesome melee fighters.
With these you'll have a mobile range fighting force, that will also provide good second line fighters or first wave sacrifice.
They are cheap(125 to maintain), need the second level of archery building, again you'll be able to train and retrain easyly.
The Scouts are you basic cavalry. They suck.
But they are sooo cheap.
Oh and need no building to build.
And they are fast.
And like all cavalry they can just roll over anything.
Ok i know you'll say i smoked crack, but believe me they rock.
150 to maintain and they are armour piercing in melee ...
Now you believe me ?
They are vikings on horses
I'll explain how to use these.
So now that we have our Vikings, our vikings with bows and arrows, and our vikings on horses, we are ready to roll over all the world.
Lets see our bonus units with the support units :
Huscarls and Dismounted Huscarls will be available quite early.
In my first campaing i skiped the vikings and scouts and only used these huscarls.
They are really better units, for just a slightly higher cost and buildable just a bit later.
The price isnt really an issue, but the requirement will really slow you down in your expansions. But more importantly the dismounted are less numerous than the vikings, and both huscarls are really a lot less mobile.
When i face a huge army with higher tier units, then i'll take a quater or a third of my army comprised of huscarls.
See them as Vikings on steroïds(or mounted Vikings on Steroïds).
Special Troops :
The Obudshaer are probably the second best melee infantry unit in the game in terms of raw power.
They can crush anything save the Swiss Guard from the pope.
Their use is limited as you'll need the highest tier barracks.
But THEY rock.
Seem them as Vikings on steroïds, unhorsed and in full plate ... (ill stop crack).
These could form the core of your elite home defense troop.
Chivalric Knights are awesome cavalry, but require high level stables.
Same as for the Obudshaer, dont use these for expansion, they cost too much and cant be reinforced.
Trash Troops :
All the troops i havent mentioned : the norse swordsmen suck and you can build dismounted feudal knighs that are better, norse axemen require the 2hander fix, and the feudal knights dont fit in your main army and you can have better cavalry (or cheaper).
- Basic Strategy :
Before going on the battlefield, you must fix yourself some objectives, this is where this section will hopfully help you.
The goal with the Danish campaign is to expand quickly whenever you can, but always securing your borders to prevent counter-attacks.
To this end, you dont have a lot of options.
Once you have secured the initial starting position described earlier, your goal will be to take all the british islands as soon as possible.
This should be quite easy as the scots and the brits usualy take their time taking Dublin and Inverness. Dublin will add some cash, while Inverness will be your starting point for the complete invasion.
Start with the scots, as they usually are very weak and hold 1 or 2 cities but no castles.
Do it quick to avoid the pope's fury. DO NOT BECOME EXCOMUNIATED.
Anyway once you can build norse archers, scouts and vikings in Inverness, build roads farms churches and logistical buildings in inverness : you dont need much up there, and later you'll transform the castle in a city.
For now you should have as troops your garrisons and the starting troops.
Build 2 vikings 2 norse archers and 2 scouts.
These plus a general is your army ^^
Crush england sneaky style : harrass them and once nothingham is lowly protected rush it. Take that castle first, because from now you'll be on the defensive while you build more troops.
Anyway once nothingham in your hands, its a matter of turns to secure all the island.
During this conquest, you'll develop your cities and hambourg as economic farms. Hambourg will need to be able to build vikings, norse archers and scouts for now. If the HRE attacks, you'll crush them easyly since they wont attack en masse.
The next step will be to secure the Mediterranean islands.
Its far, but worth it : cities for cash easyly defended.
Take Cagliari and Ajaccio first and turn them to cities.
Take Rhodes, it will be your forward base to attack the middle east.
Once you have a good fleet, attack Chyprus and Crete, but be prepared for a long term naval war with Venise and Byzantium, usually the biggest naval powers.
Take Tunis to have a foothold in Africa, and from now on you can start conquering the world.
The ideal is to secure the Mediterranean sea with a good fleet. Try to make peace but wipe any ennemy fleet. Dont overbuild your fleet as it will drain your cash badly.
The next move is to conquer all of north africa save Egypt. Tripoli will be your eastern border and should not be threatened by Egypt.
From this point you should be able to deal with the whole world.
You can make rush attacks from Rhodes to Jerusalem, Antioche or Acre.
You can lauch attacks on Spain (good option as you'll have only pampelona that borders France.)
You can take the whole northern world, in this case i recommand to keep the castles as they'll be easyly defendable and you'll be able to lauch multiple raids on the HRE or the poles at the same time.
Dont expand to quick but dont rely on defense either : if your ennemy comes to you dont wait for him : attack his settlement and attack his troops even in lower numbers. In attrition wars you'll always win as your troops are designed to kill and are cheap.
- Battle Tactics :
My basic army is comprised of 2 vikings, 2 norse archers, 2 scouts, 1 general.
With training and veteran troops you can take low tech full stack armies.
Most of the times, the AI use half stacks armies, so it wont be much of a problem.
You have the advantage of mobility, surprise and attack power.
Rush your ennemy.
If he charges with cavalry, retreat, intercept with the scouts and charge with the vikings.
If he charges en masse, move your archers one way, the vikings the other, keep your cavalry in place. At that point, if he chases the vikings make them run while you shower them with the archers. If its the opposite, keep running with the archers, charge the last units with the vikings.
The goal is to split his troops and to take advantage of your mobility.
Once it splits, stand ground with the group that will have the lesser challenge, and rush in your cavalry, while the other group runs.
The general here will be with the scouts, but sometimes provide a good decoy.
Once the first group is dead just crush them with your troops as you should have superior numbers.
If the ennemy rushes your cavalry, retreat the cavalry, while flanking with both archers and vikings, and charge back with your cavalry.
If he doesnt move, weaken him with your archers, send your scouts at the rear flanks, keep your general with your foot troops.
If your ennemy is very numerous(3 times your numbers), charge his center with your vikings, back up with the archers charging his troops that will encircle the vikings, and flank with the scouts (not a rear charge, you need to apply your strength everywhere or you're doomed.) Use your general as support if you see your troops crumbling.
If he has just like twice your numbers, rush in with the vikings, flank with the archers and rear attack with the scouts, help with the general.
These are the "winning" tactics : those that you'll use when you know you can win.
Now on to the "loosing" tactics, when you'll sacrifice 6 units of crap to kill loads of uber units.
These are my favourite, because it made be love loosing battles
So lets say your ennemy is Sicyly and send you 6 units of norman knights, 5 Pavise Xbows, 2 generals, 4 foot knights 2 spears and 1 ballista.
You have those 6 troops + general army at your disposal ...
Hmm ... its getting late, so i'll finish this post later
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Originally Posted by Uniema
