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The Byzantines attacked my Crusader Army Without A Crusade based in Adana with three stacks totalling almost 3,000 men. I utterly crushed them. And executed the lot for good measure. I just can't bring myself to ransom the troops back or release them- I don't want to be fighting the same troops all over again.

I'm a fool; spent around 20,000 Florins buttering up Denmark so my flank'd be secure for a big push into France, keeping a reasonable army on the border so they'd not be tempted to try anything, and the fuckers just charged on in anyway, changing our relations from outstanding to abysmal. A few pitched battles later and I was besieging Bruges; taking it reduced my ~2400ish men to just over 800, and resulted in the death of the enemy faction leader.

On that note, five turns previously I'd got a mission from the Danish heir asking me to assassinate his father. As my chances were in the single digit percentile, I decided to kill him through outright battle. After the siege, I get a message telling me the mission has been discarded because his father had "expired" in the meantime, the bloody cheek.

I've agreed a ceasefire with the French, so next up is Antwerp, where I'll stick the head of King Ulf the Fucking Ungrateful on a pike.

I really do hate the Pope AI. It's all well and good for him to tell me to stop killing fellow Christians, but why the fuck should he be threatening to excommunicate me for attacking an army that is besieging one of my cities? Am I supposed to just let him capture the city? Why should my relations with the Papal States sour to "abysmal" for defending myself?

PS. It really does piss me off that the wall defenses are so shitty now. Enemy units waltz around the outer perimeter without being attacked by the so-called "defenses", and the game designers even went to the trouble of modeling and drawing little ports for the burning oil to come out of when the battering rams reach the gates, but nothing ever comes out. I guess they're actually rose-petal ducts, for showering invited guests with flowers and confetti.

Darth Wong wrote:I really do hate the Pope AI. It's all well and good for him to tell me to stop killing fellow Christians, but why the fuck should he be threatening to excommunicate me for attacking an army that is besieging one of my cities? Am I supposed to just let him capture the city? Why should my relations with the Papal States sour to "abysmal" for defending myself?

PS. It really does piss me off that the wall defenses are so shitty now. Enemy units waltz around the outer perimeter without being attacked by the so-called "defenses", and the game designers even went to the trouble of modeling and drawing little ports for the burning oil to come out of when the battering rams reach the gates, but nothing ever comes out. I guess they're actually rose-petal ducts, for showering invited guests with flowers and confetti.

Essh, that sounds retarded. I can only hope it's fixed in a patch because that is the kind of 'cheating' AI that turns me right off MTW style games. One rule for one, one for an other is not the way fun games should be.

He's exaggerating. Your enemies will be excommunicated just as, if not more often.

He's exaggerating. Your enemies will be excommunicated just as, if not more often.

I don't think that's Mike's problem- the problem- and I agree- is that it's absurd to be excommunicated for defending your cities from siege. Having them potentially sack a city you left slighty less well defended than it should have been and then being excommunicated is really no consolation-you have to take that city back now.

The boiling oil ducts non-functionality must be a bug that will be fixed in a patch- you can't have Medieval sieges with boiling oil, that's just insane.

That said, the defences on the walls have been somewhat toned down in effectiveness, but they do fire at enemies close to the walls, in my experience. It's still my standard practice to destroy any towers that might be within range of my toops on approach to the gates or holes in the wall- you can lose more than a few men on the way unnecessarily otherwise.

All up, sieges are better in M2TW though- firstly, because the AI is now huge on siege weapons- I've yet to allow them to get siege weapons within range of my walls, but they fill their armies with them and can cause serious hurt in normal field battles if you're not careful. Second, castles having a second ring of defences is awesome.

That happened in my last field battle against Denmark, who only had one city left- their siege engines bombarded my army at the start and I lost a lot of Yeomen Longbowmen that would've otherwise been fine. Luckily my Hobilars destroyed them before they caused serious casualties.

I've now destroyed:

- Portugal (Assassination of the Royal Family + Conquest of one of their three territories)
- France (Conquest of all their territories but one + Assassination of the Royal Family- the coolest thing about this was that I got 5,000 florins from the heir to the throne when I killed the King, then I killed him too)
- Scotland (Conquest of all their territories)
- Denmark (Conquest of all their territories)

I've attacked Milan because they're an enemy of my ally-through-marriage, the Holy Roman Empire, they only had two territores, Djon and Bern (ie. Switzerland). Bern is about to fall, being under siege by my King's mighty army in what will be the first use of Bombards to destroy city walls in history.

Sicily- who control all the Italian peninsula except the Papal States (Venice is elsewhere, their capital is Antioch, for god's sake) attacked my city of Marseilles, but they quickly turned and ran when they saw one of my armies coming. They've now given me casus belli to seize the Italian penninsula from them.

I'm still at war with the Eastern Roman Empire, I have no idea when I'm going to deal with them.

I'm somewhat worried about Spain- they took Portugal's turned-Rebel territories after I killed Portugal's last King. Hopefully they'll focus on the Moors, I don't want to deal with them quite yet.

I do however have an Army within striking distance of every border, so I'm quite well defended. I'm building up yet another elite stack in Nottingham, with a view to sending it and a massive fleet of Gun-Holks to the Holy Land to take Jerusalem and deal with the infidels.

I've also gotten a few Knights Hospitaller Chapter Houses, which is quite cool.

All up I'm doing pretty well- my forces are quite advanced, I've got English Knights and Dismounted English Knights, and I'm still in the 13th century.

My world map hasn't been updated- which is a worry. The Mongols are the number one military power, and that can only mean they defeated most of the Russians. I'll have to deal with them eventually.

I have no plans to attack the HRE, unles they attack me first. I want to honour that Alliance.

In other news, the Pope died and my Cardinal got elected to replace him again. Ownage.

EDIT: one thing I still haven't figured into my plans is the Black Plague. When does is strike? It may well send me broke and force me to disband armies. I'll still be in the best position after it's over, due to all my territory and cities, but ...

DOUBLE EDIT: Ah, Wikipedia. 1347-1351. Bugger.

I must say, the 1 turn = 2 years thing is lame, but for unlocking the factions you want to play, it's good. I'll turn the timescale down to the proper 1 turn = 1/2 year after I finish this game.

I agree that castle defence seems a little nerfed. I remember in RTW that using a battering ram against a fortification with stone walls was suicide - the ram just gets blown up. But in MTW2 I can't figure out a way to stop them getting through the gate.

GuppyShark wrote:I agree that castle defence seems a little nerfed. I remember in RTW that using a battering ram against a fortification with stone walls was suicide - the ram just gets blown up. But in MTW2 I can't figure out a way to stop them getting through the gate.

Really? In my game, rams gets lighten on fire about half the time on bigger settlements. Maybe it's because I'm playing on Medium.

I have no problem with rams, so long as I have archers at the walls- just switch to fire arrows and pepper it till it burns.

Yeah, tried that. It stays on 0% damage.

The Milanese sent two full stack armies against my army invading Italy. My forces consisted of 4 units of dismounted knights, 2 of billmen, 4 of longbowmen, a bombard, a generals bodyguard and 4 units of English Knights. Due to a battle against the Danes a few turns prior the dismounted knights were all around 50%-70% of full strength and the billmen were at 75% strength, with all other units bar the bombard having taken some losses. So I'm figuring I could be in a bit of trouble.

The Milanese armies were identical, 1 unit of catapults and the rest were crossbowmen. My cavalry had a fun time butchering those poor sods.

No Armored Swordsmen? No Army can be without them, IMO. They've fully replaced my Dismounted Feudal Knights forces.

My "ideal" army (which doesn't fully exist, yet, but are almost ready across most of my armies) consists of:

1x General's Bodyguard
4x English Knights
2x Dismounted English Knights (rendering Billmen obsolete)
3x Armored Swordsmen (the main shock arm of my army)
4x Yeomen Longbowmen (to be replaced by Retinue Longbowmen)
2x Sherwood Archers (never to be replaced)
2x Bombard (to be replaced by more advanced cannon)
2x Hobilars (for the usual light cavalry duties- to be replaced by Demi Lancers shortly)

The only thing missing from my lineup is competent spearmen. I'm considering reducing my longbow forces accordingly, to make room for a unit or two of spearmen or an extra cannon.

GuppyShark wrote:Yeah, tried that. It stays on 0% damage.

They're somewhat more resistant to fire than in Rome (in real life, I think such rams were treated with something to reduce their tendency to catch fire) than in Rome, but I've burnt a few rams with fire arrows. It's a matter of luck I think.

Siege Towers go up like a match too, I find.

Vympel wrote:No Armored Swordsmen? No Army can be without them, IMO. They've fully replaced my Dismounted Feudal Knights forces.

My "ideal" army (which doesn't fully exist, yet, but are almost ready across most of my armies) consists of:

1x General's Bodyguard
4x English Knights
2x Dismounted English Knights (rendering Billmen obsolete)
3x Armored Swordsmen (the main shock arm of my army)
4x Yeomen Longbowmen (to be replaced by Retinue Longbowmen)
2x Sherwood Archers (never to be replaced)
2x Bombard (to be replaced by more advanced cannon)
2x Hobilars (for the usual light cavalry duties- to be replaced by Demi Lancers shortly)

The only thing missing from my lineup is competent spearmen. I'm considering reducing my longbow forces accordingly, to make room for a unit or two of spearmen or an extra cannon.

The infantry I was using in that army were left-overs from other armies. I diverted the Armoured Swordsmen destined for that army to Germany where Denmark is putting up a much greater fight.

The armies I generaly try to build consist of:
1x General
4x English Knights
2x Hobilars
4x Dismounted English Knights/Armoured Swordsmen
2x Billmen/Dismounted English Knights
4x Yeoman Longbowmen
2x Bombards (or Catapults in a pinch)

This leaves a slot free for whatever unit I feel like chucking in.

I decided to restart my game, and this time I took care of Scotland rather quickly, pissing off His Holiness in the process. Instead of excommunication, the bastard has my best diplomat burnt at the stake. Fucker.

Vympel wrote:They're somewhat more resistant to fire than in Rome (in real life, I think such rams were treated with something to reduce their tendency to catch fire), but I've burnt a few rams with fire arrows. It's a matter of luck I think.

Siege Towers go up like a match too, I find.

I accidentally caught one of my own Siege Towers in the back with a flaming catapult shot once.

Damage: 20%.

It probably doesn't help that I've yet to find better archers than standard Peasant Archers for Spain. Their accuracy and damage are both utterly abysmal.

Master of Cards wrote:

GuppyShark wrote:Man, is Spain easy mode or what?

France is the easiest

I have to disagree. So far I find my hard/hard Englisch campaign easier than when I played with France on medium. France has pretty weak starting units and will get gangbanged from every direction, while England can easely kill of the Scots and secure their main island.

So far I'm holding all of the Brittisch islands, all but one province of France and both Flemisch cities. Scots and French are destroyed and now only fighting the HRE (they started it). My king will be sent on a glorious crusade next turn.

France has the best cavalry in the game at the end, though, that's got to be worth something

Just played a game as France, started out awesomely, isolated the Brits to Caen, seized one Flemish city and then the fucking Danes took Antwerp. I decided to take it right from them.

Starts a little war with the Danes. SHouldn't be a problem, right? Well now I must have been feelin a bit bloodthirsty because before I know it the Pope is calling on me to halt all hostilities against the Danes or else.

Well I figure I have this nice siege on Hamburg all set up, let me finish them off and then make nice. I obviously didn't read the warning closely enough and by seizing Hamburg I get excommunicated.

Now, I figure I can reload. But curiosity made me play the game out as excommunicated France.

It was NOT fun. I had every faction wanting a piece of me (is it me or are the Milanese way over powered in this game, I've played it out twice and they end up gobbling 2/3rds of France.) and then a Crusade gets called against Toulouse.

I send my nearest general with a stack of doom meant to seize Caen and stand them in front of Tolouse in a "You shall not pass attempt."

A Milanese Crusading Army shows up. I decimate them, and I mean decimate them (something like 890 dead to my 178) I retrain my wounded units, consolidate my veterans and suddenly a Viennese Crusading army shows up. Slaughter them too. My experiuence in these fights is that while the Crusading armies are large their morale seems pretty brittle. Womp on them hard enough and you will get a cascade effect routing. The Holy Roman Empire shows up only to get ass raped. I imagine what the contemporaries of the time would have said, some no named general from Heretic France utterly crushes 4 Crusading armies. Suddenly the Pope dies and calls off the Crusade, but just in time for a Crusading army from the Danes shows up.

His ranks deserting him, the faction heir meets my Armored Sargeants and we kill him too. That no name general became one of those many starred wonder generals we all know and love from Rome thanks to those series of lop sided victories. Then, of course he died a few turns later of natural causes. Yuck.

Now you would think I learned my lesson but I get excommunicated again and now everyone really piles on. Even though I am the most powerful force in Europe its like death by a thousand stings. Every battle costs and every settlement does a roundrobin of "I am under Siege - Help"

I stopped after it got to be too damned tedious. I'm pretty sure I could have endured and waited out for the next Pope or until my faction leader died but what the hell, I play these games for fun not sadomasichistic endurance sessions of endless sieges and siege breaking all along my border.

Long term effects of Excommunication? My economy went right to shit within a few turns, my morale was none the better, Paris kept rioting, and you end up fighting on your home soil against the hordes of profiteering Chrsitians wanting a piece of you. And you get Crusades called agaisnt you. If you figure you can gut it out just wonder if that one city is worth it. I played as England and played it slow, methodical and patient. Eventually every faction gets in trouble and you can swoop in and profit from this. How else do you think my English Empire included all of Northern Italy?

My views on the whole Papal States thing is that yeah, its really frustrating but pretty accurate in how the Pope could muck up even the most powerful lords and steam rolling over them is just not an option (if my experience as an excommunicated super power showed) so just work with them, play the game. Recruit preists as often as you can, hunt down heretics and send them to Iberia to get those piety ratings up and next thing you know you will end up electing a Pope from your faction and war at will (within reason)

Every faction screws up at one point and some are just trouble children (Milan and Venice usually end up getting excommunicated at least once in the games I've played.) Take advantage of that weakness and move in.

The one thing that does annoy more than anything else about the papal states is the damned Inquisition. I had a Crusading army on the way to Jerusalem when suddenly some Inquisition dude shows up, swipes his book at my stack and my leader dies. Just like that. Crusade over. Thanks for playing. One would imagine if you take up the cross you're pretty much immune to that shit. I've seen the computer player get screwed like this several times as well. They need to nerf that a bit because I can see where it can be more than frustrating. I spent a few turns as England running my unpious and of course best general, away from an Inquisitor. That's not fun. That's just annoying game mechanics.

Still have to say an awesome awesome game.

Vympel wrote:France has the best cavalry in the game at the end, though, that's got to be worth something

Word.

Although, when used correctly, even basic mailed knights cavalry can be devastating. I love it the pound a marching enemy army again and again in the back/flanks before they even reached my line of troops.
Well, I just got longbow men and dismounted feudal knights, meaning i can play the camping game now.


PS. The circle formation of spear units is fantastic. I was moving an army of 5 spear militia, 1 ballista, 20 mailed knights and my general bodyguard (13 left) towards the last french city when I got ambushed by their main army (2 armored spearmen, 2 or 3 crossbow peasants and a shitload (7 or of heavy cav.
No worries, I'm on a hill and make my lines thick enough to withstand a full charge. But when I start the battle, the enemy is coming from behind me and coming in fast. Oops, no time to adjust formations so I let them all stand in circkles, making them hard as nails against cavalry, while my own cavalry is doing their best to stay the fuck away from theirs. A long and tense battle followed but managed to get a clear victory still.

Stravo wrote:The one thing that does annoy more than anything else about the papal states is the damned Inquisition. I had a Crusading army on the way to Jerusalem when suddenly some Inquisition dude shows up, swipes his book at my stack and my leader dies. Just like that. Crusade over. Thanks for playing. One would imagine if you take up the cross you're pretty much immune to that shit. I've seen the computer player get screwed like this several times as well. They need to nerf that a bit because I can see where it can be more than frustrating. I spent a few turns as England running my unpious and of course best general, away from an Inquisitor. That's not fun. That's just annoying game mechanics.

Not to mention they are usually a bitch to assassinate

I can think of several methods to ameliorate some of your problems.

Stravo wrote: The one thing that does annoy more than anything else about the papal states is the damned Inquisition. I had a Crusading army on the way to Jerusalem when suddenly some Inquisition dude shows up, swipes his book at my stack and my leader dies. Just like that. Crusade over. Thanks for playing. One would imagine if you take up the cross you're pretty much immune to that shit. I've seen the computer player get screwed like this several times as well. They need to nerf that a bit because I can see where it can be more than frustrating. I spent a few turns as England running my unpious and of course best general, away from an Inquisitor. That's not fun. That's just annoying game mechanics.

Assasins are your friend. Train up some excellent assassins by killing people willy-nilly. I have two elite, full-skill assassins, and the headquarters of every Assassin in the world is in London. They take care of Inquisitors on me right quick- I learned my lesson after two of my generals were denounced.

I guess this means Coglistromo trumps a Torquemunda?

Has anyone noticed that your catapults miss city walls about half the time, and that in every situation (esp. on the field) the AIs catapults seem to be 5 or 6 times more accurate?

That reminds me of an incident in the first MTW. I had a huge, 6,000 man Crusade heading for the holy lands. Some assmunch inquisitor tries the leader for heresy, and the crusade fizzles away to nothing.