Crusade

[Heffalump]

the road to Jerusalem is littered with the bones of my knights

Playing as Burgendy I launched 2 efforts, or crusades, to get my Shroud of Turin into Jerusalem.

The first crusade, launched around 1285, was a mix of spearmen and swordsmen accompanied by a vanguard of 10 knights. About 22 units in all. I negotiated passage through Bulgar and Byzantine without a problem. Then came my invasion. It was brutal. From day one I was set upon by hordes of invisible units (assassins?) and various mounted units. My knights were all dead by the time i reached the chain of hills north of Jerusalem. And by the time I reached Jerusalem itself I was too weak to attack . So we fortified and waited for reinforcements. But those being long in coming I had to sue for peace ...... and escaped with a battered spearman, and one swordsman.

The second crusade, launched 40 or 50 years later, was an all knight affair. My reasoning being that we could move much quicker if the units were knights. The sole exception being one of my kings (2 mvt pts), who was sent along (for the fun of it) to lend a little aristocratic weight. I had about 18 knights in all.

Again we were attacked each bit of the way and slowly wiped out. I reached the outskirts of Jerusalem with 4 damaged knights. My reinforcements being tied up for over 10 turns by a roadblack around the Constantinople area (the Byz's fortified a unit on the land bridge) I had no hope of relieving my forces.

A turn or two later I again sued for peace but this time they would have none of it and my forces were wiped out to the man, including the king, and my relic was lost.

Wow. I can see I've vastly underestimated what's needed.

My question being, how many strong units are needed to carry this quest out??

 

[Xen]

well, its not really a question of how many, but its a question of when- which there are only a few civs in a very good position to do- and, ironically, none of them have relics to bother with, except, mabey germany, but they are a stretch at best...

IMO, the only real civ set up to deal with the arabs, abnd take jerusalem is the Byzantines, and only after all the bulgar cities have been taken- if you make a beeline to horsemen, and start pumping out them, combined with swordsman, you have an army early enough to wipe them off the map, and taske jerusalem- or, if you want to wait, and get cataphract, its even more fun, but a little harder, as by the time you have cartaphract, assasins arnt too far off- but, take it from me, its possible to go an entire invasion without seeing anyof them (actually, the only game I ever played and "saw" assasins in I was always lucky enough to have my cataphracts run into them

 

[Heffalump]

I agree. Playing as the Byz would be easier. Just wait for the AI to drop a relic into your hand and off you go. And no long lines of reinforcement to worry about.

But the challenge of one of the 3 relic nations appeals to me. Surely some people out there are managing this....

 

[JazzToucan]

I don't necessarily think timing is the key. However, your task would be a lot easier with armies rather than individual units.

I've played as the Byzantines, Cordovans, and Ottomans on Monarch level and had little trouble.

I took Jerusalem with both the Cordovans and Ottomans without much trouble using armies of Ansar warriors and Siphai. Although I didn't bother taking Jerusalem as the Byzantines, I controlled pretty much all of Greece, Italy, and a large portion of France taking out the Bulgars, Burgundians, and Franks in the process.

The real key, I think, is to first set up your core cities for optimal output of offensive units, pick a fight with a relatively weak civ next or close to you and trigger your GA with your UU (is it the knight for the Christian civs?) and use it to pump out lots of knights. Then finish off the civ while uprgrading your knights and getting one or two great leaders to make an army.

Playing as Burgundy, going after the Bulgars or Magyrs makes the most sense.

 

[BadAndy]

i m playing as one of the viking civ (denmark) and am easily wiping out the civ on the mainland with them berserkers, and then i got those treasures so easily, now all i have to do is clear off the other civ and maybe send all 3 of them to jersualem at once =)

 

[Cuivienen]

Playing as Burgundy, I found the most effective way to conquer Jerusalem was via the sea. Get a big army onto Galleys in Rome, Venice, Genoa or a newer city in southern Italy, then set out for Jerusalem by sea. The Byzantines are the only threat by sea, but, if you strike first, you can take out their Dromons fairly easily -- or you can avoid war with them entirely with an RoP. Land about 8 or 9 Knights and your Shroud just outide Jerusalem and take it. Continue to bring reinforcements, and sue for peace with the Abbassids (taking Antioch first can't hurt). Then, attack France or Germany, steal their relic, bring it to Jerusalem and you should have enough VP to win, since you fought a war with the Abbassids and another with the French/Germans already.

EDIT: Be sure to attack early on. The Abbassids tend to become stronger as time goes on as they usually conquer a lot of Byzantine territory. A full alliance with the Byzantines to distract the Abbassids can't hurt.

Nonetheless, I found the Abbassids to be the easiest Civ to get relics to Jerusalem (for some reason...). That Shroud is exceptionally vulnerable where it starts in Rome.

 

[Hygro]

First time I played as the Germans. I had 11 galleys filled with crusadors and knights and assassins (yes I went down that research path). Needless to say Jerusalem was easy. So was Byzantium. I won before I took out othe Bulgars (worked my way backward I guess).

Second time playing as france, I simply took over the Spanish and Burgundians, giving me 2 MGLs. With two knight armies and ROPs with all the civs in the way, taking Jerusalem was pretty easy. First time I played on Warlord, second time on Monarch.

 

[Enkidu Warrior]

I played as England, spent the early parts of the game uniting Britain and Ireland at the expense of the Celts and one of the Viking civs. Then just bunkered up and ammassed my armada and set sail for Jerusalem. I negotiated my way through France, Iberia and North Africa then launched my pathetic, ill-considered and hopelessly underpowered invasion. I managed to hold Jerusalem though with severe losses and won on victory points at game finish by the narrowest of margins as the Byzantines had earned masses of VP's by wiping out the remaining Abbasids.

 

[Xen]

see, further proof that the Byzantines kick all ass in this scenario

 

[cgannon64]

Just like the real crusades...

 

[Xen]

Originally posted by cgannon64
Just like the real crusades...

if the thematic system of military hdnt been screwed over by the ever present in society, the greedy nobles, thenthere would have been no need for the crusade sin the first place- unless you want to get technical, then the first crusade was alunced by the Byzantine emperor Heraclius II, to recapture the cross... and was a grand success I might add for him

 

[Snetsinger]

I've beaten this conquest twice on regent, first with germany, i built temples in most of my cities and culturally flipped a bunch of burgundy cities. and used my capital and one other city to pump out settlers,to expand as quickly as possible into were poland and norway try to expand. Then i spent my time, researching up the tech tree as fast as possible and building my empires infrastucture. I started my crusade only after i had all of the best units and sent a stack of 50 plus unis of trebuchets, knights, crusaders(for building a fortress during the seige) and the top spear units and 2 inquition people. the seige went well i used RoP agreement to get through all the other civs, and after taking jerusalem i conquered a few other cities. then burgundy started a war with me and in that war i gained enough vp to win. but it was close with assabides because they took out most of the byzantine.

my second try at this conquest was with norway. from the first turn i loaded up a longboat with 3 bezerkers and set sail straight for jerusalem, capture it by i think turn 16, i also started a war right away with germany wiped them out and took their land and relic, and quickly returned it. and then burgundy started a was with me. i was able to get their relic and return it, and that war pushed me over the edge vp, but i was a damn messy war, both of us were torching each others cities, we weren't left with much when the game ended.

 

[aaminion00]

Stupid question: How the hell do you move a relic ?

 

[lbhhh]

You have to pick it up with another unit.
Just move your unit onto the relic, there is a button to press,
and the relic is picked up.
The unit picking it up will now have !!! in its name

 

[aaminion00]

ah great, thanks

Well, here's how my game on warlord is going.

I'm the Germans, and I started off building barracks and temples. With some settelrs I settled real life holland and Northern Germany. As soon as I hooked up to iron, I started churning out swordsman from my stronghold North of the Alps. I positioned them in key areas neighboring Burgundian cities, and then I attacked. Since this was my first war, I didn't lose anything in my relationships with the other civs. In a short 5 turn war I gained Venice, 2 key cities directly to the West of me, the Shroud of Turin (2 holy relics ), and killed of all 3 Burgundian kings. The only bad part is that it destroyed all their cities (including Rome ), and now I have to rush to resettle them. I'm already too late at getting the city near present day Milan, as the Castileans have already built Barcelona there.

And I forgot to mention, I got two great leaders from all of this; Barbarossa and Conrad.

So what now?

I plan to take over as much of former Burgundy as I can. In the meanwhile, I'll complete the "Holy Roman Empire" wonder in my capital, while the rest of my swordsman-factories keep increasing my army. Then I'll do with France the same as I did with Burgundy, and BAM, I controll all 3 holy relics. From there I'll fortify my outer regions, while producing hordes of knights and such powerful units in the interior. I then plan to launch a crusade, in which I'll conquer Jerusalem, and fortify it as heavily as I can. As I keep it fortified and hold off Abassid counter-attacks, I'll send my "armada" with the holy relics to the shores of Israel, and then quickly send the relics into the holy city, winning the game.

 

[Cuivienen]

In case you want to really overkill, England has a Holy Relic, too

 

[aaminion00]

Originally posted by Cuivienen
In case you want to really overkill, England has a Holy Relic, too

lol, i could always use insurance...

 

[Heffalump]

Well thanks for the input.

After the failure of my second crusade both the Byz and Bulgars cancelled my ROPs (due to my aggressions against the Abbassids). I had a line of knights still strung out in their territory and when the AI evicted me from their lands a turn later they ended up all over the map.

Most of them I got back together and we launched a 3rd Crusade. Amazingly I "recovered" my relic by some odd chance. The Abbassids strangely brought it to their border and when I killed their Assassin all the sudden it pops up out of nowhere. Very strange.

Anyway I marched a force of 8 knights and 1 crusader south. I had some luck as the Byz assisted by a timely delclaration of war on them a few turns prior. The Abbassids seemed a lot weaker than before and I made it to Jerusalem mostly intact. There we slew no fewer than 5 pikemen in Jerusalem before, alas, running out of knights and again loosing the relic. It was close. Very close. They were down to 2 damaged defenders.

Oh well.

Next game I'll unite western europe go in with a stack of 50.

 

[Padmewan]

I won, admittedly on Regent, as Denmark -- wiping out the English and Celts in the first few turns with my starting Bezerks, then slowly taking over most of Western Europe, and then returning the captured relics. A bit of a bizarre way to run a Crusade, if you ask me.

Jerusalem was a lot tougher than I expected! It took two Crusades to take it -- there's no amphibious assault, alas.

 

[mitsho]

In my present game, I launched the arab attack of cordoba (playing as them), swepped Castilia away soon and attacking southern France, Bordeaux and Ampurias. Luckily, I got their relic in Ampurias and wondered what to do. I decided to bring it to Jerusalem. So I made Peace with France, took Marseille (they would've taken Ampurias bsack by culture, which I do not want) and am building a navy at the moment.
My problem is at the moment, tat the burgundians don't want to make peace again (and are getting allies... ). And I'm too weak for a two-front-war. Anyway it will use some time to get the navy built up, and till then, burgund will made peace. (I have to play like this, because the abbasids are before in victory points. )

How big shall the assaulting army be?

mfG mitsho