Into the Renaissance: How to take Constantinople

Hey guys,

i've got a small problem with the Scenario Into the Renaissance. I want to conquer Constantinople as Austria but i don't know how. Normally i'm ahead in tech at this stage of the game, so i don't have any experience, how to deal with this situation.

A few infos:
I'm playing Austria at difficult 7. In this scenario, Austria got 2 UU, the Hussar and Landknecht. Christianity has Holy Warrior and +15 Influence as Founder-Belief.
I started with 2 Social Policies in Patronage (Opener plus Aesthetics) and completed Liberty at turn 56. Used the free Great Person (Engineer) to rush Alhambra. My Techs are Civil Service, Guilds, Chivalry and in 4 turns Machines.

I got lucky at the beginning and mangaged to get a lot of Influence for free (discover the land of civ X and barbarians) and could grab the Vatican around turn 30.

Click to expand...

My thoughts are:
a) take all 6 Composite Bowmen, upgrade them and attack with Landknecht-units in front
b) build/buy Trieme and try to combat at least 5 Dromon i've spotted earlier
c) build/buy Catapults (but i don't think they would be good enough there)
d) take 3/4 of my stuff, embark and "liberate" all other cities of Theodora first, before i do a dual pronged attack at Constantinople

My question: Do i miss something? Is there a better way to deal with this?

you've got a decent sized army
definitely wait for crossbows
get some triremes, and with the help of crossbows or comp. bowman, take out dromons
get some catapults, embark, set them up on the hills on the other side of Constantinople, of course with some other melee units
all your points are good, not many other ways you can handle it :\

I can't attack Constantinople from behind right away, because there are two other cities and a lot of mountains.

What is the reason you want to do this? It won't help you in the game very much.

To be honest, i don't know. Maybe because i feel the need for a crusade. Or maybe its just to eliminate my biggest competition.

It will help tremendously. It will net 275 VP for taking a size 11 city of a different faith, and it will deprive Theodora of her holy city (and decrease the VP she is currently getting every turn).

As for how to take it...I would recommend attacking from the sea. Plant two archers in the forest tiles to shoot at the city. Fortify a melee unit outside the city to save for the killing blow. Suicide several melee units (or melee boats if you have some to sail over) in an amphibious assault after lowering defenses with the archers for a few turns.

I'm not an immortal player, but I would wait for the X-bows. Constantinople's deffense is way to high for composites (I know this by personal experience, having this game where I'm trying to take a 27-deffended Babylon with some composites, it is open terrain and it is being quite harsh).

Some catapults would be nice to be set in the hills SW from Constantinople, although there might be some dromons there to prevent embarked units. Some trirremes could help.