Pikemen ineffective

[vtbrandon]

Ok so I started a grand campaign playing as Spain. My initial strategy was to wipe out Portugal and the Moors and consolidate the Iberian Penisula then sail 3 heavily armed, professional armies across the Med, 1 Army to Antioch (take and hold, defend against enemies coming from North), 1 to Alexandria (take and hold, defend against armies coming from Tunis) and the third army I sent to Gaza (slow campaign taking every city from Gaza to Damascas). I thought it was a good strategy, but it all fell apart when all 3 of my armies were anihilated by the Mongols, who had already been consolidating that area. All 3 armies were identical each had, 6 units of Sword and Buckler, 6 units of Pavise Crossbowmen, 2 Generals Bodyguard, 3 Chivalric Knights and 3 Jinetes. The Mongols destroyed them all without even flinching. I think the best battle I had lost 79% of my army and managed to kill about 50% of the Mongol army, but I still lost. So, I decided to change my strategy, I converted all my castles to cities and began new armies, this time each army had 6 Tercio Pikemen (fully armored from armor factories), 6 Musketeers, 2 Generals Bodyguard and 6 Gendarmes (also fully armored). So I figured these armies should take care of the Mongols and their damn cavalry. My first battle was a disaster. It was fought near Acre so the land was hilly, I placed the Musketeers on a high hill overlooking a valley and the Pikemen I set up with spear wall and guard mode and placed them at the bottom of the hill. The cavalry was behind my Musketeers. The Mongols just flat out charged the spear wall with heavy horse archers, heavy lancers and generals bodyguard and just about slaughtered every last one of my pikemen. While they were advancing up the hill I sent my cavalry down to attack and they ended up slaughtering most of the Mongol army. I won the battle, but obviously at a little too high of a cost, since the army that was left had Musketeers, Heavy Cavalry and no infantry. I guess I have 2 questions really: 1) what the hell do I use to defeat the Mongols? 2) Why did Tercio Pikemen, with fully upgraded armor and weapons and 2 experience points each, and set up in a spear wall, end up being massacred by heavy cavalry? Now granted the Mongol army was lead by a General with full command rating and each unit had 3 silver chevrons each, but still, Pikemen vs. Cavalry, theres no way the cavalry should have won! Any help is appriciated.

Oh and also, I just got attacked by Denmark in Touslouse and they're loaded with those Obudshaer things, what Spanish unit is the most effective for taking those out?

Thanks guys and sorry for the long post

[notoriousRED]

unless ur army has horse archers DONT face them in open bettle. u wil be crushed. Rather, stay in ur settlements and waith for them 2 come 2 u, as they suck at seige warfare

[big_feef]

One thing: don't fight the Mongols in the open field unless you're willing (and able) to field horse archers and heavy cavalry that's comparable to (and posibbly better than) theirs. In this respect; only England (needs a mod to enable their horse archers), France, Poland, Hungary, Egypt, The Turks, The Moors (Camel Gunners are deadly mounted missile troops), Russia, and the Byzantines (who arguably have the best horse archers in game with the Vardariotai) would stand a chance against them like this and not take horrendous losses. Secondly, you have to be willing to take a lot of casualties; even with a good army, they will still hammer you.

Pikemen against horse archers will always lose. Your pikemen were probably being gutted with missiles before being charged by the Mongol heavy cavalry; this means their morale was being lowered by being shot at constantly; and probably broke right after making contact with the cavalry charge... I've seen it happen so often because it's a tactic I love to employ in multiplayer battles; and I have it employed very often against me too.

Best way to deal with the Mongols is to force them to siege you; you will slaughter them because horse archers, quite frankly, don't make good siege units.

About the Obudshaer: they are slow-moving, but heavily-armoured infantry. As Spain, you have the perfect weapon against them: Jinetes. They are missile cavalry and their missiles have the armour-piercing trait; this means they will decimate those Obudshaer...

[Jackster]

Yes, you probably take casualties due to shooting, which cause disorder in your formation, so their cavalry can charge through.
If the other guy has lots of missile troops (English, late French, Mongol and such) dont field pikemen against them.
If you have musketeers, Obudshaers would be no problem, you ll kill a bunch of them before they reach you, then they will probably flee.

[vtbrandon]

Sieges won't work. When they besiege me they bring Trebuchets and Rocket Launchers and they use them to destroy all the walls and towers. They are by far the smartest AI I have ever encountered. In open battle they employ heavy flanking movements (2 or 3 heavy archers usually far to the left and right flanks and main army in the center) and in sieges they sit back and pound my defenses and troops until their ammo is exhausted then they charge in and its basically open battle since I have no walls or towers. Its almost like playing another person. Oh well, the good thing about my empire is that I know I will win the war because even if they do defeat all of my armies I send, they can't get to Spain itself, its just the length of time it takes is starting to aggrivate me, plus all this fighting has given the Turks (my allies) time to take all of the Byzantines out and they have massive armies approaching from the north now, just hope they dont get over excited and break the alliance. Thanks for the tips though.

PS - oh I found that armies of Gendarmes seems to work well but the only problem is that each army costs about 10,000 in upkeep each turn. But it does crush the Mongol armies, even the ones with all silver chevrons. And usually the battle stats are around (Me) 641 deployed, 500 casualties and (Mongols) 841 deployed, 800 casualties. So its basically suicide but it works wonders for taking out those damn experienced armies they start off with.

[CtrlAltDe1337]

If you are playing a faction like HRE that has very strong heavy cavalry, just spam them out against the Mongols. Teutonic/Gothic Knights can crush any horse archer and even the Mongol heavy cavalry fairly easily. Maybe take a few archers and spear infantry along too if your cavalry aren't cutting it.

[big_feef]

In sieges against the Mongols as Spain: yes, they will bring up artillery to pound your walls; but they can't engage you all at once or flank you unless you're careless. When they attack you, have your pavise crossbowmen or arquebusiers/musketeers pepper them as they approach; remember that they outrange the Mongol horse archers and only the musketeers outrange their foot archers (who are very good).

As the Mongols enter your walls; make them pay by running into a wall of pikes. Because they're strung out while attemting to enter your walls; they'll be easy pickings for your pikes. Just make sure you have some light cavalry outside occupying their horse archers (Gendarmes are good for that); because if you don't, they'll pepper your defenders and weaken their morale.

If you create bottlenecks for them as they head towards your town center; you'll deal some serious damage to them. Remember, the goal of the first couple of sieges against the Mongols is not to crush their armies; but more to make their phyrric victory so costly that it would have been better if they lost. If you do beat them, then that's even better...

[big_feef]

Edit: Double post due to forum error.

[Kesxex]

As others said, Jinetes are your friend against the Mongols. In addition you should include a few units of Feudal Knights or (if you have) Knights of Santiago.
Musketeers are good, but as sacrificial units I would go for handgunners. These guys have a better armor value (they will still take horrendous losses) but they have a shot themselves against charging units which can lead to some hard losses (as it is close range) which will make it easier to crush the heavy cavalry later.

Jinetes have another advantage that they can keep at the pace of the Mongol horse archers as they are light cavalry.

If you have the money and the time then have a look in the Jedda region where you might find some elephants which you can use to scare horses.

[vtbrandon]

I took Jedda and recruited some elephant artillery but I got carried away and clicked the wrong button during the battle screen. Instead of hitting the take command button I hit the auto calc button by accident and that was the end of that army. oh well. will the timurids be this hard to defeat? right now im thinking of just abandoning my hopes of the east and concentrating on denmark (who controls everything from bordeaux to prague) and sicily (which controls all of italy and north africa). these eastern campaigns already cost the HRE and England their empires. they both sent crusdaes to jerusalem and i guess got caught up in eastern fighting and when the mongols crushed their eastern provinces they were bankrupt and thats when denmark took the HRE and scotland finished off england. im starting to feel the same effects with my treasury constantly in the low 1,000s