Start with Byzantium

Hey, I just played to the year 700 on Emperor (SVN-version), where I made peace with Bulgaria. So I thought I'd share my experiences with you, in case you are having trouble with Byzantium.
First things:
- a large part of your game will be on the defensive, so building walls and units is very important.
- if you manage to keep your empire you will win the UHVs almost as a byproduct.
- not all cities are important and most will rejoin you when conquered by barbs
- differences between Monarch/Emperor and SVN/download exist but just change the difficulty of the existing challenges and don't add new ones.

(@developers: I think Byzantium is really okay on Emperor, challenging but possible. If you decide to flip more cities to Bulgaria/Arabia then there might be changes required)

Then:
This is the north-western or "European" part of your empire. None of the cities in Greece is necessary for your UHVs but they are all useful, so I'd recommend guarding them


There will be lots of barbs coming from the north-west, but mainly axemen + spearmen. so archers, axemen and swordsmen should be able to fend them of without any trouble.
Hadrianopolis (the one west of Constantinople) will later flip to the Ottomans, so don't build any wonders here and I also don't recommend settling Great Generals here. Unlike Thessaloniki and Constantinople it doesn't have any walls so that should be amoing the first things you fix. Because around 680 the Bulgarians will attack with mounted units from the north-east (the area north of Hadrianopolis and Constantinople).
I recommend building a worker in Athens & Hadrianopolis and a work boat in Thessaloniki first before switching to archers in Athens & Thessaloniki and walls in Hadrianopolis (move the citizen manually into the hills to get some real production instead of having them work on 2food-tiles until you have that).
The barbs will make it almost impossible for you to have much in terms of infrastructure but you should try nevertheless.
I always build culture buildings/wonders in Constantinople, but it also is a great source of defensive units. My recommendation: Spearman, Hippodrome (happyness + culture), Archer, National Epic (culture + great persons), defensive units against Bulgaria.
Smyrna and basically all cities in the center of your empire should start with spearmen to protect against the mounted barbs in the east and the Arab horsearchers later on. On the lower difficulty levels starting with a worker is also a good option.

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This is the eastern part of your empire, everything south of it will belong to Arabia from 630 on, so prepare to defend yourself against them then. More importantly this will be the main area for the sassanid barbarians (mounted str 7 barbs) to spawn that will make life hard for you for the first 200 years.
Later you will get the Seljuks (str 10 mounted barbs) here around 1050 if I remember correctly and then even some Mongols (str 12 light cavalry barbs) around 1250.



Fortunately, Antioch already has walls so I'd recommend building spearmen here and in Tarsus. Edessa can either build spearmen or try to get some walls up. Same is true for caesarea. On lower difficulty levels also a worker first is a viable option.
Around the time of the Arabian start there will be a plague. I usually station a worker in each city around that time, so when the plague hits I don't lose a valuable military unit but only a "cheap" worker. Also having a healer (spearman usually) is quite useful by then.

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The northeast. Weak cities, barbs. You have to own it for UHV2 plus settle 1-2 cities east of here. (different in the download-version, there's only sinope there I think)


I recommend starting a spearman in Sinope as well. Amastris can try to build some walls.
I usually station some of the starting units from Constantinople in Sinope to fend of the first barbs. But you'll lose some cities eventually. (Sinope, Edessa, Caesarea usually) Don't worry. If they're not burned down, they'll flip back to you after a few turns with a fresh archer but no buildings inside.
Just make sure you own Edessa (and Antioch) when the Arabs start, so that they can't "go around" your empire and settle north of their starting area. also Iconium should be guarded by 2 units at all times since sometimes barbs appear close to it and it is quite an important city for logistics.
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"Arabia". Both cities will flip to the Arabs.

So move ALL the defending units north to help your eastern cities defend against the barbs. I usually build workers/spearmen/archers here until the Arabs take over both cities. If you're "lucky" the barbs will raze Tyre, leaving the Arabs even weaker.
Don't bother improving the land or building anything besides units here.
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Cyrene (northern Africa):

This city has low production, low growth, is far from the rest of your empire and most of all it is not needed for a UHV-victory.
So I treat this city always like a "flip-city" meaning I build units here and move them all towards Alexandria (where you'll have to defend against the Arabs but with the starting units, units from Cyrene and maybe even mercs that shouldn't be a problem.
If the barbs don't take this city I recommend gifting it to France as soon as you meet them. If barbs take it and it wants to join your empire, decline.
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You have 2 war galleys and 2 galleys near Constantinople, I usually send 1 war galley towards Gibraltar (in the download-version you should pass Tangier before it flips to the Cordobans in order to pass through peacefully) and 1 galley towards Marseille to meet and greet the other civs.
The other 2 should defend against barb ships coming every once in a while from the mediterranean.
I usually set my research so that I don't have a deficit of more than -20 gold per turn until the appearance of Bulgaria. (by then you should have lost 3 cities - Jerusalem, Tyre and Cyrene - and will have a better research modifier, also techs become cheaper over time and you don't immediately need any new ones, so don't hurry research.

Focus on defending your cities. Spearmen in the forested hills in the eastern part of your empire can also be a good idea.
In the east you'll only have to deal with mounted enemies (barbs/arabs), so spearmen are everything you need. In the west you should also keep some archers, swordsmen and/or axemen (you start with a couple of them so it shouldn't be too difficult if you produce some more archers).
I recommend making peace with both Bulgaria and Arabia as soon as possible, but depending on your situation you might want to battle Bulgaria into submission for a vasall but thats not really needed.
I'd also refrain from settling any new cities (except for the 2 you need in eastern Turkey for the UHV).

Everything else should be quite straight forward. just expect the Seljuks and Mongols later on. And the Ottomans. But by the time they appear you should be strong enough to deal with them/it should be too late for them to stop you from winning your UHV. If you move your Palace to Hadrianapolis/Smyrna before they appear you can prevent that city from flipping, if you think you need the help.

So yeah, move all starting spearmen and 1-2 archers you don't need to defend the western part of your empire towards the east at the beginning but make sure you have some to fend of 5-6 of Bulgarias mounted attackers.
(Hint: pillaging the road on the iron just outside Hadrianopolis' BFC might give you 1 more turn before the Bulgarians reach your cities, 1 turn that you might need depending on the plague.)

After handling Bulgaria and Arabia, the game is only "halfway" won. Barbs will continue to harass the east and the threat of attacks from both neighbouring civs looms.
Still, until the Seljuks appear you should focus on improving your infrastructure and once the mongols appear...prepare a strategy for the Ottomans

As a huge empire with lots of gold: you can afford lots of mercs, and Constantinople gets quite a lot of them. Buy them before the Seljuks/Mongols appear. They're worth their gold.

When I played it, I spammed Spearmen in all of my eastern cities, except Constantinople and Smyrna who started with workers and workboats.

I guess plague is the biggest problem in early game. In theory, health resources should reduce the severity of plague. A couple of workboats built in Constantinople might be a good idea and some workers as well who could then improve the salt resource near Iconium. In my game, plague hit mostly the western cities in Europe and as a result, Athens got razed by barbs.

Constantinople should be quite safe from barb attacks, so it could afford building workers and workboats and culture buildings. Military units built in Constantinople would take a lot of turns to move to eastern border areas anyway. But still, there might be a strong need for additional units for the western front.

On Monarch, it's possible to research Blast Furnace long before the Seljuks appear and mass-produce Cataphracts in all cities. Stables and Barracks are certainly a must for them. When I played it on Monarch, I also built Blacksmiths before I queued Cataphracts, but I'm not sure if it was worth of the effort. However, Heroic Epic would be a great idea. I stupididly built it in Caesarea, a food-poor city. Should have placed it in Amastris instead. Or even better - Amorium (a hill-rich city that you can settle near the Pigs resource near Constantinople).

Once you have dealt with the Seljuks, the Mongols should be very easy. That's because your empire has gotten highly militarized and it's possible to have Knights by the Mongol era.

Not sure if all of this works on Emperor though.

I thought things should be easy enough from here on. But if you guys want it I'll keep playing at least untill the Seljuks appear and are dealt with.

The Plague..well, in my more developed games (Austria, Venice, Germany...) I station a Healer1-unit in every city to keep the other stationed units healthy.
Having +health-res helps, yes. But usually thats not too much of an issue with Byzantium. It is important that you have a worker (or other dispensable unit) in each city that is endangered when the plague hits. (e.g. having one in Smyrna or Athens is not really necessary). (keep a galley in Thessaloniki to carry an archer to Athens if any barbs spread there)
That unit dies when the plague spreads here, all other get their health reduced. If you have a healer here they even recover while the plague is there. If you don't...well dont move them and tell your units to heal, so usually you won't lose them.
Usually you have some units that gain experience by fighting barbs, so I always promote at least one unit to healer on each the eastern and the western front. The plague can be really devastating if it hits the wrong cities at the wrong time, but usually you can avoid any greater trouble by following these steps.

Actually it would be interesting to see how many Seljuks will spawn on Emperor and how large are their stacks. On Viceroy, the standard stack size was 2. On Monarch 3 and the Seljuks were accompanied by Crossbows and Guisarmiers. So, stack size 4 on Emperor?

I have to say my game is probably exceptionally good/lucky.
After I gifted Cyrene to the French they wanted to be my vasall

DO: Invest all spy points in Arabia and steal their techs!

Since they have Orthodoxy in their cities (at least until they manage to remove it) and you produce a lot more points than they do, you can steal quite a few of the early techs (and between 700 and 950 AD you don't have that much to build anyway).
Also: the barbs razed Sinope, which probably is a good thing since it increases my research speed. Just have to remember to rebuild it in time.

These 3 factors allowed me to have ~15 Cataphracts in 1050 and I even started building castles in most of my cities.

And well...it seems like I need the boon:

5 seljuks + 1 longbowman + 2 archers + 2 crossbowmen appear on the first turn.

I added my saves of turn 50, 100 and 150 (just before the Seljuks).

edit: oookay....20 Seljuk units on this screen:


yeah, it is going to be interesting. Fortunately I just finished Pressburg Castle. Too bad Barbs don't give GG-points (that would be an awesome UP for Byzantium!!)

I played untill 1113, I think the last Seljuk units appeared 1-3 turns ago.

Pro:
- it feels fair. The barbs rarely appear somewhere inside your empire but try to find ways inside, coming from the east. Very nice.
- Focus of the invasion on Caesarea but with a couple of units along the entire border helps when defending.
- Tagmata-mercs are great against Seljuks (69% even unpromoted)
- It feels like a proper invasion. Lots and lots of units. I think I killed an average of 8-10 units per turn.
- challenging
- Exp from barbs not capped -> elite Guisarmiers and Cataphracts possible.

Contra:
- Too many Guisarmiers attacking. Your only real counter-unit against the Seljuks are Cataphracts. But there were at least as many Guisarmiers attacking as there were mounted Seljuks. On the defense I had the impression that my Guisarmiers protected worse than Cataphracts. Even on forested-hill-tiles with the forest-promotion they often fell to the first attacking Seljuk -> focus on Cataphracts -> enemy Guis are annoying (since you hardly have the time to build any longswordmen as well...and even if you did, once they occupy the same tile as a mounted Seljuk you can't attack)
- Seljuks seemed to have the Mongol ability to ignore terrain costs (even though nothing was displayed), they often moved on a hill tile and pillaged the mine on the same turn.
- Stability decrease from lost resources due to pillaging is annoying/too high. (General stability was great at +28 before the invasion, but then dropped to +13 without me having lost a single city :/ )


Conclusio:
Nice. I liked it. Still, I want to repeat my plea for a warning (although that is less important on Emperor than on Viceroy/Monarch) 5-10 turns before the invasion starts. Maybe even earlier.
I had a great game until the Seljuks appeared (lots of Cataphracts prepared, castles in most cities, Guis' protecting them, Pressburg Castle built... It might be, that the invasion usually is a little (or maybe even a lot) harder than that. I would recommend not increasing the difficulty and if Byzantium gets nerfed (Alexandria flips, lower general stability...) then the number of Seljuks should also be amended. But at the moment I quite like it the way it is.

My Byz strategy:

Build working boats in Greece and Constantinopel. Build extra work boat in Const for Sinope. Build hippodrome in Const for UHV1. After just build barracks and spearmen in these cities to prepare for the Bulgarian spawn. Add some axes for barbs that fortify in forests around city areas.

Central Anatolia builds workers for all those unimproved tiles. You´ll need a lot.

Eastern part of Anatolia builds walls. Southern part of the empire builds spearmen for the Arabian spawn. Place them near the spawning point.

Research manorialism. Then head for Siege Engines, you will need castles (and Guisarmiers on the way).

When the plague hits. Move out all military units from the city areas and try to engage barbs before they get close.

When Arabs spawn. Kill all the horse archers with your spearmen. But do not destroy the starting stack. Tyre/Jerusalem will still flip and if you destroyed the starting stack a new stack of horse archers are created. You just want them crippled, not destroyed. I do not retake the flipped cities since I want to minimize the >10 cities research penalty. Put some units on the hill bordering to Egypt to prevent settlements there.

Buy mercs if possible. As Bulgaria spawns, try to destroy the starting stack with spearmen. No flips and no problems. After Bulgaria focus on stability buildings like Manor houses and courthouses. No civic changes until now. Get Hanseatic if possible.

For the Seljuks you just need Guisarmiers and castles. They wont even hurt you. There will be some pillaging but the stability decrease is only temporary. Build castles in all eastern and central cities. Chopping trees make sure you finish in time.

For the Keshiks you should have knights. Kill them off. When the Ottomans spawn, make sure you have a Stack of Doom on the square outside Constantinopel with knights. Wipe them on spawn and get out of flip area. Raze or recapture cities after ten turns.

yeah, I played similarly on Monarch.

However Cataphracts > Guisarmiers in my opinion.
Also: Seljuks can kill fortified Guisarmiers (and the upgrade Spearman -> Guisarmier is really expensive with 170gold/unit - still, for experienced veterans it is useful). Of course you won't be able to keep any tile improvements around Caesarea, Edessa and Sinope.

Also the workers in the centre of the empire are needed, and I already recommended building some there
Your plague-strategy works too, but I find it better to sacrifice a worker and keep all units in the cities. As the plague "poisons" units within your city's BFC you would have to move them very far away and will probably lose 1-2 cities to barbs. Also: your units regenerate faster in the cities.
And as the plague kills only the "weakest" unit (aka the one furthest on the right) when spreading, a worker is enough to survive the spread. After that you just have to let them heal.
Mercs are awesome, especially Tagmata.
Concerning the Bulgarians/Arabs: Just let them try to hit you behind your walls and when they run out of units to attack with, make peace with them. I don't "cripple" them any further, I want the Bulgarians as a defense against the Mongols from the north and Arabia as a source of cheap techs.

For the Ottomans I though it might be fun to create a huge "mounted army" to attack with and then just disband any unit that survives so it doesn't desert. But yeah, basically just try to destroy them with overwhelming force when they appear.

But as it is obvious to see: in all central points our strategies are basically the same

Cataprachts are really expensive and they give you 10 strength and with two promotions +20%. That is 12 with 2 first strikes against the Seljuks 13 strength. Bad trade off.

Guisarmiers are 6 with two promotions +20%. +75% against heavy cavalry. +25% fortified. Sometimes river, +25%, sometimes hills, +25%. And then +150% with walls and castles. Another +25% if you have Pressburg castle. That gives you about 6 strength + 270% (or about +300% with Pressburg). Much better odds! And cheaper!

The real advantage with Cataprachts are mobility and offense. You can strike no matter where they spawn. You dont have to wait for the attack.

advantage Catas:
- Thessaloniki, Hadrianapolis, Athens, Smyrna and Constantinople have good infrastructure due to the fact that there are less barbs there, thus they had stables as well.
-> they built me ~1 cataphract/turn (all 5 of them together, more with Heroic Epic)
yes, Guis' are cheaper and get a better modifier, but if you can go on the offensive from time to time (I usually give half of my Catas flanking2 and the others get combat2 + eventually +25%against heavy cavalry) you can choose which cities the barbs can attack.
And since the western part of the empire is far away and the Catas move faster the difference these cities make if the build Guis' or Catas is really low.
In the east and centre of course one has to build Guisarmiers.
- and promoted Catas are better against the Mongols and Ottomans later. Of course if you have knights even better, but promoted Catas also are strong enough

I usually build roughly 1 Cata per 2 Guis'.
Here I think I got lucky with early Catas and had 20 when the Seljuks appeared.


PS: its 50% (walls) + 75% (castle) + 25% (Pressburg) so 25% less than you said, not that it changes anything

Chep said:

Contra:
- Too many Guisarmiers attacking. Your only real counter-unit against the Seljuks are Cataphracts. But there were at least as many Guisarmiers attacking as there were mounted Seljuks. On the defense I had the impression that my Guisarmiers protected worse than Cataphracts. Even on forested-hill-tiles with the forest-promotion they often fell to the first attacking Seljuk -> focus on Cataphracts -> enemy Guis are annoying (since you hardly have the time to build any longswordmen as well...and even if you did, once they occupy the same tile as a mounted Seljuk you can't attack)
- Seljuks seemed to have the Mongol ability to ignore terrain costs (even though nothing was displayed), they often moved on a hill tile and pillaged the mine on the same turn.
- Stability decrease from lost resources due to pillaging is annoying/too high. (General stability was great at +28 before the invasion, but then dropped to +13 without me having lost a single city :/ )

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1, Guisarms might be too much for Emperor, you are right
On monarch there are more seljuks than guis though
Ideally I would like to keep it around a 2:1 ratio

2, If they ignore terrain cost than it's a bug
Will look into it

3, Stability losses from pillaging are only temporary
There is a direct loss from the actual pillaging, and an indirect one because your economy is worsening and because the area near your cities are less developed
Both type should go back to zero after the situation is totally consolidated

Conclusio:
Nice. I liked it. Still, I want to repeat my plea for a warning (although that is less important on Emperor than on Viceroy/Monarch) 5-10 turns before the invasion starts. Maybe even earlier.
I had a great game until the Seljuks appeared (lots of Cataphracts prepared, castles in most cities, Guis' protecting them, Pressburg Castle built... It might be, that the invasion usually is a little (or maybe even a lot) harder than that. I would recommend not increasing the difficulty and if Byzantium gets nerfed (Alexandria flips, lower general stability...) then the number of Seljuks should also be amended. But at the moment I quite like it the way it is.

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Glad you like it!
I also think Byz is very fun to play the way it is, at least up until 1100
Sometimes not totally easy, but that's a good thing IMO
Having said that, I don't plan to make them harder
If Byz is nerfed, the barbs will be nerfed too

Cataphracts represent active defense and Guisarmiers passive defense. IMO, in this mod active defense is always better than passive, because the barbs have a nasty habit of pillaging improvements before attacking cities. The stability loss is temporary, but a pillaged improvement often means crippled production which would take several worker turns to overcome.

Emperor guide to Byzantium:

You can keep all your cities with this strategy. The key is to build Swordsmen in all of your cities instead of spearmen/archer. Also hire all the mercenaries.

Walled and fortified swordsman have strength of 6 + 75% while spearmen only 4 + 125% vs. light cavalry. Hence during the first few 100 years all cities should just build swords mostly.

Tech: You can even drop research to 0% at the beginning to support your army. Then beeline to Blast Furnace and trade techs as you can. Then the only tech you need till endgame is Chivalry. I got Blast Furnace in 1008 and Chivalry in 1242 (no rush, u can upgrade all the Cataphracts to Kinghts just before the mongols arrive).

Arabs: 12 swordsmen will humiliate them. Just make sure to empty the cities before flip.

Bulgaria: 5 spear and 10 sword were waiting for their starting units on forested hills and killed them all 1 turn after their spawn.

Seljuks: Passive defence in Cesarea, Aleppo and Synope with longswords (hills or strength promoted) + cataphracts + mercs (huge help!). Do not build tile improvements in Cesarea, Synope and north of Aleppo! Avoid growth, mass production and build walls + military.

Mid-game: Just build knights. You don't even need all the tech/commerce buildings. I felt like not building any new cities, but Domyat, a city in Morea and one in Arberia (barley) are probably worth it. In 1200 I had 58 units lost (mostly archers and swords in the early game and some vs Arabs), while I have killed 58 seljuks, 179 HA, 77 axe, 65 lancer etc.

Mongols: You will need huge knight stacks near Constantinople and Cesarea.

Ottomans: Empty flipping cities. Build roads to spawning tile. Upon spawn kill all their units, then if more appear kill them as well. 20-30 knights will be more than enough, and you'll have your veterans from the Mongol wars.

Endgame: Keep building those knights cause the Keshiks will keep coming! I killed 170 of them by the end with a total of 54 knights lost.

UHV1: Keep an eye on Rome's culture for the first UHV but with Round Church, Nat.Epic, belfry and hippodrome it will be fine even if you only build military in the first few 100 years.

UHV2: Don't forget to pre-build settlers for the empty provinces, those guys are quite expensive for Justinian.

UHV3: Switch to 100% commerce and you'll beat the Pope in a few turns.

Stability shouldn't be an issue as you won't lose cities or tile improvements. But it is always a good idea to keep 2 (different) GPs ready to start a golden age if your stability is at a dangerous level.

Andrrew said:

Walled and fortified swordsman have strength of 6 + 75% while spearmen only 4 + 125% vs. light cavalry. Hence during the first few 100 years all cities should just build swords mostly.

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I disagree. The Sassanids have Lancers, the Bulgarians have Konniks and the Seljuks have... Seljuks. All are Heavy Cavalry, not light cavalry. So with walls and fortified, they get 4 + 175%, not 125%.
So unpromoted spearman are slightly stronger vs. Heavy cavalry than Swordsman. (10.5 vs. 11) Even with Combat I & II promotion the Spearman are still a tiny bit stronger. And Spearman are also cheaper.

You probably only need a few for the Arabians. But Spearman will also do the job well, as Horse Archers aren't very strong.

Yes, the strategy doesnt seem "correct".

Swordsman vs light cavalry: 6
Swordsman vs heavy cavalry: 6

Spearman vs light cavalry: 4+50%=6
Spearman vs heavy cavalry: 4+100%=8

And since they are cheaper, why not all out on spearmen? They can also be upgraded to Guisarmiers which are good against the seljuks.

According to your strategy you lose no cities but the description says that the Arab cities flip. Do you mean to reject the flip? If initial starting stack is destroyed a new stack of Horse archers spawn. If you then attack you are in the spawn zone and units will desert. And what about the Ottoman flip?

For the Byzantines the real challenge is: early plague, Arab spawn with flips and Bulgar spawn. After that your army is strong.

Yes, the Sassanid Lancers and Bulgarian Konniks are heavy cavalry indeed. Thus, I agree that spears are a much better choice against them than swords.

The eastern part of the empire should focus on Spearmen in very early game. The European part will need to prioritize Swordsmen, because the Southern Slav barbs are attacking with our old friends familiar from France gameplay - Axemen.

Later on, approximately starting from 750-800, the eastern part will need Swordsmen as well, because there will be an unnamed barbarian tribe spawning all sorts of troops - Axemen, Spearmen, Horse Archers - in Armeniakon and Colonea.

OK I will elaborate my strategy in response to merijn_v1 and ezzlar.

Again this is for Emperor, I don't remember exactly what is different in Monarch.

4 things in favour of swordsmen:

- The decisive argument is Technology. On Emperor you will most likely not get to Blast Furnace and Aristocracy in time! Hence you build swordsmen mostly, and then upgrade them to longswords once you have Blast.

- Upgrade cost: swordsmen to longswords is 118, spears to guisarmiers 154 if i'm correct.

- Enemies pre Seljuk era: 162 Horse archer (light cav.) vs 65 Lancer. Against such masses of HA swords are better (walled, upgraded, fortified etc).

- Most of the enemies come to Cesarea. If you add the hill bonus of +25% (and then the hill promotions), the swords will prove to be better against lancers as well.

I agree about the main pro of spears being cheaper (an not to mention Seljuk's bonus vs. heavy infantry ) but by Seljuk era you will have nice mercs + cats as well. In Emperor I did not manage to get Blast Furnace + Aristocracy + get cash for mercs + get cash for promotions by 1070, which is the decisive argument in favour of swords. I might try it next time, but my swords + mercs strategy turned out quite well in my game.

About spawns:

Always agree to flip. I meant that I did not lose any city in combat, sorry for not being straightforward.

Arabs: In emperor you are at war by default. As you agree to flip there wont be any deserters. Empty flipping cities. They spawn with 6 HA and 2 archers, those will be no match for swords (u can either wait on a forested hill for the HAs to kill themselves or kill them straight, your numbers will be superior). Attack Dimasq after the flip. Wait with a sword 2 tiles SW of Jerusalem, he will capture the empty Jerusalem.

Turn 648: They get 4 HAs and 2swords (and 1 settler). I capture Jerusalem and Dimasq in this turn.
Turn 652: HAs move to Sur, settler and swords move to Az-Zarqa spot east of Jerusalem and then found a city.

Then just move your army towards Sur from Dimasq and capture it, 4 HAs will be no match for CR swords. I captured Sur in 660 and decided to not go after Az-Zarqa hence made peace. The one-city Arabia was never a threat after that.

Plague: The first plague luckily did not hit me in this game. I think theres about 50% chance that it will remain in Western Europe. I avoided growth for most of the cities in the beginning hence I had healthy cities, maybe thats the reason.

Ottomans: Kill all units when spawn, before they found a capital. Agree to flip and then quickly reconquer the 3 flipped empty cities with mounted sergeants. If they get extra troops SE of Constantinople kill those as well. As a said I big stack of knights in your capital is required.

well if you keep all cities yes, then you'll tech much slower than if you just give away Cyrene to the French (they usually want to take it, crippling their economy) and Sinope to the barbarians.
(both cities add almost nothing to your economy, research, etc...they just slow you down, though you'll need to reclaim or rebuild Sinope for UHV2).

If you want to keep them for score resons: well, just take over/found some cities in closer to Constantinople, the land there is much better.

Also: if you let the Arabs alive to steal their techs...you tech much faster once again.

Still, there are many ways to win with Byzantium, even on Emperor, which seems fine to me.

PS: I thought about it, too. but I prefer spearmen as they can also get on the offensive from time to time. And if you don't overexpand while you still have to research you can easily get to Guisarmiers by the time you need them.

Chep said:

well if you keep all cities yes, then you'll tech much slower than if you just give away Cyrene to the French (they usually want to take it, crippling their economy) and Sinope to the barbarians.
(both cities add almost nothing to your economy, research, etc...they just slow you down, though you'll need to reclaim or rebuild Sinope for UHV2).

If you want to keep them for score resons: well, just take over/found some cities in closer to Constantinople, the land there is much better.

Also: if you let the Arabs alive to steal their techs...you tech much faster once again.

Still, there are many ways to win with Byzantium, even on Emperor, which seems fine to me.

PS: I thought about it, too. but I prefer spearmen as they can also get on the offensive from time to time. And if you don't overexpand while you still have to research you can easily get to Guisarmiers by the time you need them.

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I agree, those 2 are useless, good idea to gift/abandon them. I just wanted to try a game where I keep all my cities