Not doing so well in battles

[Theryman]

I just got M2TW, and I am having problems with battles (among other things). Mainly, I almost always get my butt kicked when we have evenly matched armies, and even when I outnumber them, I take very heavy losses.

Here are a few problems I am having- first of all, I don't really know how to use my archers effectively. Should I leave them behind my spearmen and fire at the enemy as they charge? Should I move them out towards the enemy and run like hell when they charge?

My spearmen always seem to route. Does the deepness of the line have anything to do with their strength? Because I tend to put them pretty thin, so as to not get flanked.

Also, what should I do with my cavalry? Should I use them to engage their horses to keep from getting hit? Should I send them at their archers to eliminate them? Should I just hold them in reserves? On top of that, their charges, well, suck. Do early horsemen have lances, because mine sure as hell do not use theirs. They go charging in full speed and as soon as they hit the enemy, they just... stop. And then get slaughtered.

Should I use my general to fight? I do not want to lose my faction leader or heir because I was being dumb. When is a good time to send him into the fray?

I will think of more as they occur. But help would be nice. Especially with the whole lance issue.

 

[Ajidica]

Here is a rough guideline I use for my army. This is how I lay my army out:
Horse archers in front
Infantry (No less that three ranks deep unless pressed)
Archers
Siege Engines (Field battles only, siege battles in front)
General
Heavy cavalry goes on the wings. Put light cavalry up with horse archers, they are good at routing weak infantryt and skirmish troops.
Never use unsupported heavy cavalry below civalraic knights against half decent infantry. (sergeant spearman). They will take heavy losses.
Only use your general if your battle line breaks, or for wiping out those fleeing rebel spear militias.
Hope this helps.

 

[germanicus12]

I never place my cavalry in front, not worth the risk for me as I am always busy keeping my front line organized and ready to meet the charge.

Also, it is best to wait until the enemy is approximately a few hundred yards from you, 1-200, then order your own line to charge, this will surprise your enemy and cause them to go on the defensive, quickly. This helps you in the earlier stages of the battle as your men will rack up kills. But eventually the enemy line will firm up and hold the line. Even pushing you at some places.

This is when your cavalry comes in. Using half of your cavalry force to keep the enemy cavalry occupied, the remaining half, preferably the heavy cavalry will head to the rear, if possible, the flanks will work and charge.

If you time this right, the flank will collapse and the line will roll and you have won yourself a victory worthy of Christiandom.


Note, you must bunch the cavalry flanking manevre on one flank, it will not succeed if you attack both flanks as the enemy will repel them.

 

[Theryman]

So when you 'roll' the line, you hit one flank hard and then, as they begin to rout, you move onto the next group?

Also, do early cavalry have lances, or just swords? Is it limited to just light cavalry or dark cavalry and such?

 

[germanicus12]

Rolling the line usually means that when the first unit routs, the rest generally fall in line and begin retreating. But like I said, you have to time it right, if you miss it your cavalry gets bogged down fighting every unit on the line.

If you are too late, the flank will have time to prepare and repulse the cavalry charge.


As for the other question:
I have only played England and Venice, so I wouldn't know much about this.

I do know that Knights in Venice use swords and are dismountable and can fight on foot if your line is breaking and you would rather have heavy infantry reinforce the line instead of cavalry.
But cavalry in England... I do not really know, I abandoned it early when France some how conquered London and put my entire army on the run. Which pissed me off, as I had more men than he did, but I did lack in cavalry....

 

[Ajidica]

I almost always play as byzantium, so I get Skythikon and Vardarotai. Since theyre fast moving, heavy knights can't catch them. I never charge with my infantry because they tend to get cut down by dismounted feudals, but good archers own them. Lance armed cavalry are better becasue they cause more damage in the charge, and also have swords for close fighting.

The reason I place my horse archers ahead of my infantry is because when I put them on the flanks, they use too many arrows against the cavalry. (This is probably just a peculiarity fighting venice and hungaria. I am not good as any of the european nations.)

 

[Elta]

Here are a few major sticking points for me. (this generally for western european units)

! Remember it's not about killing them all, it's about losing only a few men and getting them all to route.

For foot archers start out in from of the rest of your men because they are more accurate in front.

Never have javelin-men attack men on walls, they are useless in that capacity. They won't kill hardly anyone.

Put your horse archers or javelin men on the far left and right of your formations. Keep them out of trouble. Have them pepper the enemy and keep them out of trouble.

The PC sucks at handling javelin men, control yours manually - swoop in hit em hard, pull out, do it again etc etc

Mounted crossbowmen are great too! But, here is the thing, their attacks are not as strong. But, they have more armor penetrating capability and much more ammo!.

Attack strong units with little armor first when using your horse archers to get the most bang for your buck, a armor-less unit that carries a big axe for example.

Remember defense is separated in to 3 areas, skill, armor and shield.
in an attack from the front you have to factor in all of them. From the sides just skill and armor. (so like 9 instead of let's say 12) From the back only armor (so lets says 60)

This is why attacking from the back is the thing to do. (when possible, especially with ranged cavalry units)

Charge bonus: It's simple 6 attack + 4 charge = 10 attack when you first charge.

2 handed units have a powerful charge but, attack slow (1.25 speed to be exact (higher being worse) ) in a prolonged battle they are not as good as their stats show - like 25 worse than their attack.

Never attack spearmen with knights (mounted knights that is), they may win, but they will take an unneeded amount of damage.

What you should do is move your knights around slowly even creep towards the enemy and pull our if you must.

Like lets say their archers are out in front - you charge them, they run and hide behind their spears - turn around!!! - this is not a loss, the archers are in back now and much less accurate, mission accomplished.

Like I said with the archers, lets say you're attacking a unit with your knights ( some axemen) and the axemen move back and to the left, all the while some spearmen move forward and to the right - your men are going to hit spearman - pull them out!


Elephants are afraid of fire and javelins - use these to scare them and cause them to attack their own men!!

I generally have my infantry like this
And here is why!!!!
It's not about just sheer elite units, it's about the best bang for your buck. 1 elite stack is not as good as 2 well rounded stacks of elite-mercenary-milita-pesants.

I like to put my elite infantry in front (usually dismounted knights) Lets say I have 2 of them down in front

To the diagonal left and right some sort of "slam" group as I like to call them - cheap armor-less units with a strong charge.

To left and right of all of them spearmen.

Here is why, you use your elites to absorb arrows and engage enemy infantry, once they are in the battle you can use your slam units to slam against the enemy - with their powerful charge their is a good chance that they might route.

The spearmen are there in case a knight tries to rush you, if they do, move the spearmen in to protect the other 4 units.

The computer likes to abuse artillery - they use it way to much, there is an easy way around this thou.

Use a very fast unit (remember there are like 4 horse speeds General's unit - Knights - Pony - Fast pony. is possible use fast ponies) such as border horse, alan light cavalry, Hobilars etc

and go WAYYYYY out to behind and to the left or right of their formation, after the battle gets hot they will more more men away from their artillery and you can swoop in and make quick work of them.

Trust me it works like a charm.

Recruit Alan light Calvary when you are in their area, they are one of the fastest unit in the game and no unit with their speed has such a strong attack or charge.


The way to take out a enemy horse archer is simple - since they are usually moving around and not near any friendly units (other than other horse archers) Simply take a fast units such as border horse, alan light cavalry, Hobilars, or even a slightly slower cheap fast unit such as merchant Calvary militia or mounted sergeants.

Point at the enemy archers with these units and charge!
They will usually run away for a while, if not the entirety of the battle, eventually they will engage in hand to hand and chances are you will only lose a few of your men before they decide to attack, then you will slaughter them

Bring about 1 siege artillery unit to every field battle for every 5 to 10 regular units - according to your taste. Leave a fast-strong cavalry unit back their to protect them. Like a mounted sergeant

Sometimes you will try to charge a distracted unit with your knights and then they notice! turn around and run away, they will chase you for a bit and not catch you since they are infantry - when they give up, turn around and charge them fast! you can usually get them




That's all I got for now, I'll add more if I think of some.

 

[Theryman]

Alright, I am getting much better. I just fought a big battle where it was me (spain) with about 900 men fighting france, who had around 800.

Well, they had a lot of infantry, but very little cavalry, just a damaged heavy cavalry group. I had a lot of feudal cavalry as well as dismounted fuedal knights and two groups of jinentes.. Crossbowmen and the javilen dudes where there as well.

I put the ranged people in front, and behind them the dismounted fuedal knights, and behind them my cavalry. When the battle started, I sent the cavalry running around the sides, hoping the get behind them. My bowmen engaged their crossbowmen, and then I had my javelins charge in and throw, which caused the bowmen to route. I had hoped to kill their captain early (he was in the cavalry group) but then, as soon as I got my horsemen to their rear they began to charge, chasing away my archers.

But their horses where going to slaughter my javelin if I did not think fast. So I had the javelins stop just short of my infantry and throw at the horses while three units of feudal knights rushed in to pin them down. After a few seconds, success! I captured their captain!

But now I had to reform for the armored seargents than were coming in. They had more infantry than me, but I had cavalry behind them. So I ordered my dismounted fuedal knights to charge into the front of them at the same time I ordered the mounted fuedal knights to hit the back. They routed almost immediately, and then it was just a matter of cleaning them up.

Final score? I killed 350 of them and captured all the rest. I killed all of those, too. I lost just around fifty men, which meant I was more than capable to continue the march of Mersaille, which i could take without fear because the pope had just excommunicated france.

 

[Stuck in Pi]

Okay, early Spain strategy: Kill portugal and Moors. Have fun with France.
Overall strategy: crossbows in front, infantry behind, cav on flanks. Let them come, the x-bows will hurt a lot. If enemy charges, let them engage like two of the archers (the individual guys, not the group), then have spearmen charge for the easy kill. Then have fun prisoner hunting. As for the general, I almost always will use (esp if he is horrible) in a side charge.

Don't know if this was covered, was to lazy to read thread.