Medieval 2 Total War Strategy Guide
What is a good strategy for making. Stack Exchange Network. Stack Exchange network consists of 175 Q&A communities including Stack Overflow. How to make lots of money in Medieval 2: Total War. Ask Question 7. With all these tips I have gotten Stockholm to make 10,000 florins per turn, as a huge city of course.
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- I will discuss here several formations created for the campaign. Their use is not necessary, I even recommend coming up your own ranks and using them.
Medieval II: Total War can be daunting at first. With dozens of factions, a large-scale map and events such as the Black Plague and Mongol invasions, starting out is certainly a challenge. This guide is provided to help new (or somewhat experienced) players learn how to establish themselves while playing as two of the most popular factions: England and Venice. The guide is based off of my own in-game experiences, and input from other players who know the strategy and tactics of M2:TW well is welcome.This section will be split into two parts: the first forty or so turns for Venice, and the first thirty for England. This should be enough time to get your faction on its feet and make it a formidable force in the game's world. This guide is going to assume that you are already familiar with the formula and the controls of the Total War series. Medieval II is similar to both its predecessor and successor, Rome and Empire respectively.
If you are not familiar with either of these, or have not played Total War at all, I would suggest completing the tutorial for Medieval II and playing a skirmish battle (or two) to familiarize yourself with the units, movements and basic controls.Venice begins the game with two cities and a castle-the objective of a short game is to wipe out your hated enemies, Milan and the Byzantines, and hold 15 provinces. The objective of a long game is to eliminate the Byzantines, hold Constantinople, and hold 45 provinces simultaneously. If this is your first time playing Medieval II, go for the short campaign. I will detail the short campaign, which can also help with the beginning of the longer, more arduous campaign.The faction's capital, a city, is Venice, a minor city in the north of Italy situated on the western coast of the Adriatic Sea. The second city is more of a town-Iraklion, situated on the northern edge of the Mediterranean island of Crete.
The only castle is a small wooden castle called Ragusa, situated on the eastern coast of the Adriatic Sea, virtually directly across the waters from Venice. Towns in the game are used for commerce and culture development; castles are used more for military development, the opposite of cities. A healthy balance of castles and cities is good for future success.For starters, one must have a good balance of diplomatic and military strength.
War is imminent; whether you want to fan the flames of war, or put them out, is up to you. However, in order to succeed in the game, you must fight, and building up both your military strength and your economy is important for winning.The two realms of focus for the early Venetian campaign are Northern Italy and the Bosporus. Northern Italy is a hotbed of production, for both money and military might.
War will flare up here quickly, as you are faced with both the Holy Roman Empire, which holds the city of Bologna, and your archenemy Milan, which holds the cities of Genoa and Milan. The very first thing you want to do is to garrison Venice with a moderate amount of soldiers and archers. The only units really available to you will be Italian Militia, Peasant Archers and Peasants. These are weak early-game units; the only exception is the Italian Militia (and their heavier Spear variant), whose defense attributes are on par with that of Armoured Sergeants and will often send other militia and low-level units routing if used correctly. Use these unique spearmen to your advantage, especially against the Holy Roman Empire-their early spearmen have a disadvantage against yours.Territory is important in Total War-the more cities and castles you have, the more you can produce. After you've garrisoned Venice, build up a small army at Ragusa (if necessary, take units from Venice and send them to Ragusa-Venice's high walls should protect from any attacks, although they are unlikely). The town of Zagreb should be northeast of Ragusa, located close to where the actualy city is (look at a map, maybe?).
With your small army, seize the rebel city of Ragusa-this shouldn't be a huge challenge-and keep it as a town. Keep a small garrison in Zagreb and take this army south down the coastline of the Adriatic, until you reach a small castle by the name of Durazzo. This should be owned by rebels as well-the Byzantines are slow to act in the early campaign, and will most likely not have seized it.
It will be more challenging to take Durazzo because it is a castle; if you are able to, wait out the siege until the fort surrenders. If not, plan your tactics carefully; i.e., use archers to your advantage, take the walls early, don't throw away troops pointlessly. Taking a castle can be a lot harder than taking a town, but the benefits are great later on.Now you should have three cities and two castles-Venice, Iraklion, Zagreb, Ragusa, and Durazzo. You are now in a good position to build up your economy so that you can support an actual army, not the pitiful force that you used to seize the rebel settlements. First off, double-click on each of your cities and examine them.
Medieval Total War 2 France Guide
The scroll that comes up when you double-click on a city (not a castle) should give you details about building construction, unit construction, population, growth and income (if you want to learn more about this, have your advisors set on high advice level-they really help if you're new, trust me). You can set the tax rates for each city to 'high' levels, since happiness should be high enough early on. Make sure that squalor is taken care of by building health facilities, and built markets and ports to provide extra income for trade. Ports, for Venice, are especially important-they pull in a lot of money, as both Venice and Iraklion are situated by the sea and on major trade routes. Follow all of this, delete some units if you need to (they cost money each turn), and you should have a good, positive income.Now, with a steady economy and a good flow of gold (hopefully), you can build up an actual army. If you deleted units earlier, you may have some work to do-i.e. Upgrading ports and markets, increasing tax rates in some places-but at this point you should have enough money to field a significant fighting force.
Make sure that your new army is balanced-some Italian militia units should provide the backbone of your force, supported by weaker spearmen, a few Armoured Sergeants, and ranged units. Besides the strong Italian militia, Venice also has access to a well-rounded, powerful early-game ranged unit: the Pavise Crossbow militia unit.
Whereas other factions have to rely on their own shortbow-armed archers or weaker Peasant Crossbowmen, Pavise Crossbow Militia have better armor, good damage output, and an impressive armor penetration ability. Although they cost more than regular peasant archers, they are more accurate, more damaging, and can hold their own in a melee fight. At least one of these units is a must-have for your early Venetian army.With that said, you've gone through about fifteen turns so far-and it's time to go to war. Have your army ready, and if possible, have a family member lead them. Your advisors in-game can tell you a lot about your faction's family.
In the last section of our Venice guide, we left off with a stable economy, five settlements, and an army rarin' to kill its neighbors. Your neighbors?
They're the city state known colloquially as Milan, located almost due west of Venice. The other close city, Bologna, is controlled by the Holy Roman Empire; whether or not you want to seize it, is up to you. But be prepared for the full onslaught of the HRE, whose cavalry far outmatches yours and whose infantry grows powerful very quickly in the game.So, our target is now Milan, and its port of Genoa. The faction of Milan is, in fact, the goal of the short campaign, which requires you to wipe them out. Although the long campagin doesn't necessarily state this as a goal, it is definitely a good way to stabilize the production center that is Northern Italy, and from there launch attacks into France, Spain, Germany, or wherever the hell you want.Our target is, again, Milan.
Medieval 2 Total War Strategy Guide
Every playthrough of the Venetian campaign will be slightly different, so they may or may not have fielded armies that are guarding their homeland. If so, you will need to engage and defeat these armies in the open field; if they are able to garrison in Milanese cities, then the fight will be much harder.
So, with your new army (and perhaps some smaller raiding forces), take on any Milanese family members or armies out in plain sight. The strategy you will need to use is below:You job is to kill them softly, not smash them into a bloody pulp with a massive charge. Venice, early on, is more defensive-oriented; your units are much better at holding a line than charging one, and throwing them at an enemy formation will result in nothing but bitter defeat.
Instead of charging at your enemy in battle, find a hill or cliff to set up a battle line, with your spearmen in front and your archers protected behind. Let your enemies come to you; if they seem hesitant to do so, torment them with archers or cavalry to draw them out into battle.
If they do charge you, hold your spearmen steady, and have reserves ready to reinforces weakening points. In a pitched fight, Italian militia vs. Italian militia, the defenders will win; Milan's units are almost the same as yours, except they field the powerful Genoese Crossbow Militia, who are slightly better than your Pavise Crossbow Militia. Keep that in mind; if you can take them out, do so, as their infantry will be weak without archer support. When the enemy infantry begin to break, pursue them without mercy with every unit you can spare. If you let them go, they may rally and attack again, or escape the battlefield and rejoin their comrades, safe behind the stone walls of Milan.With the fields clear, you should be good to begin a siege of Milan.
These early battles on the plains of Northern Italy shouldn't provide much of a challenge; if you stay on the defensive, you'll win every time, because your enemy has the same units as you (and those units are weaker when attacking). Now, with the open country clear, send your main army in towards Milan, with a couple of units detached to protect it on the flanks in case Milanese raiding parties attempt to attack you.If at all possible, avoid attacking the city itself, since Milan's defenses will certainly be stone walls with arrow towers. These can prove to be a sizeable obstacle, and an assault on these defenses will be a bloody endeavor. Instead, try to wait the siege out, while keeping any aggressive Milanese field commanders at bay with additional units. (Note: if you create so many units now that your income is negative, don't worry yet; if you seize victory quickly, you can disband most of these units and return to a positive income. With that in mind, create as many units as you think necessary). During these next few turns, have your siege army construct towers and ladders for assailing the walls.
Forget the battering ram; I find that it is a costly, and ineffective way of taking a city. You'll only lose more men by attempting it.If you are forced to fight for the walls, do so in an orderly fashion. Have towers try to take them; your men will push their siege tower up to the wall, ascend it, and use the tower's top drawbridge to attack their portion of the wall. You can send more units in after them; however, be aware that while pushing the tower up to the wall your soldiers will most likely be exposed to enemy fire, both from towers and archery units. If possible, target these archery units (or send your men on the walls to attack them) and kill them as quickly as possible. Once you seize the walls (by sending plenty of men up), you'll be ready for phase two.
Just keep in mind that you will suffer casualties; losing a fourth of your army in a siege is not unheard of. Just stay calm and don't throw lives away.
If you have ballistas, use them wisely; you can take down enemy archer towers, or even take down segments of the wall and allow your troops to flow in. Ballistas, however are relatively weak, and have difficulty bringing walls down.
If you have catapults, they will do the job much more thoroughly.The enemy forces, or what remains of them, should be holed up in the town center, a large plaza (not surprisingly) at the center of town. Here, enemy units will NOT rout or run away; they will fight to the death, and often a siege can turn against you here since your units WILL run away. So bring plenty of men-all of them, if you need to-and have you archers support them. The walls are too far away for archers to stand on them and fire on the plaza, so bring your ranged units up behind your infantry as you attack the town square.Here, the only thing you can do is watch the brutal melee.
There will be death, carnage, and suffering; have your units support each other and make sure none of them are surrounded by enemy forces. If you play your hand right, and keep the archer fire up, you will kill all of your enemies eventually. The cost may be great to your army, but it will be worth it. Milan should be yours.After this, create a new army.
Rinse and repeat-have this new army take the city of Genoa. Delete any units that are a drain on your gold, choose the settings you want for both Milan and Genoa, and congratulate yourself-you've successfully set yourself up for, well, success.Picture: Venetian units attacking the town center of Milan. Most town centers are on a hill, so be prepared for a long, grueling uphill fight against enemy spearmen.
Picture: Spearmen are obviously very effective against cavalry. Only a fool sends his horsemen at a line of sharpened spears.With Northern Italy subdued (except for maybe Bologna, which may still be under HRE control depending on what course of action you took), your attention must now turn to the east, for that is where your next enemy lies in wait.
Before you take any military action, you'll need to work on a little diplomacy.Try to keep the peace with your neighbors-France, the HRE, Hungary, and the Papal States. The Papal States can prove to be a good ally-if you're in good faith with the Church you can convince the Pope to call a Crusade on a target city of your choice or you can even convince him to excommunicate other European leaders.for your own benefit, of course.
Hey, Catholicism wasn't very pretty-use the power of the church to your advantage, and use a bit of gold to keep your neighbors in line with you. Trade agreements never hurt, either-they'll boost your income and pave the way to a possible alliance.Now with diplomatic affairs hopefully out of the way, and your economy growing, it's time to turn your attention to the Byzantine Empire, a strong power in the East surrounded by enemies. You'll need at least one full army led by a family member-preferably two, as the Byzantines will have a sizeable force at their disposal, and their infantry will match yours. Their cavalry can also be a problem-depending on how advanced they are, they might possess Latinkon or similar heavy cavalry that will certainly outmatch yours.So, your first move? Take them by surprise-if Constantinople is weak, attack by sea and drive a stake through the Empire. If you're not willing to risk such a bold invasion, take the campaign a step at a time. Start in Greece, seizing Corinth and Thessalonica as bases-you'll suffer casualties that you'll need to replace, but with your castles of Ragusa and Durazzo nearby replacing dead units shouldn't be a problem.
Make sure that Byzantine forces don't sever your connections to either castle-and keep pushing your family member forces forward.If you'd like, enlist Hungary to assist you in the fray. It may be easy if they are already at war-they can distract Byzantine field forces, which leaves their cities and castles more open to assault.
Either way, you'll have to fight hard to seize each Byzantine settlement-how the battles go will differ with each campaign. Follow the advice I gave you for the Milanese campaign, and you should be good.A few other tips of advice:1) Continue to stay on the defensive. Byzantine armies are often supported by the powerful Byzantine Infantry, which make good early-game swordsmen.
They also have their own special archery units, and if they've upgraded their castles enough, the powerful Latinkon cavalry. Use your spearmen, both the Italian Spear Militia and Armoured Sergeants, to your defensive advantage.2) Use your Pavise Crossbowmen to your advantage. The Byzantines lack crossbow units, which give your archers a distinct edge in ranged combat. Keep the Pavise safe, and use them to hammer enemy archers and infantry from behind lines of spear-wielding militiamen and sergeants.3) Garrison your cities well.
If you don't, unrest will cause rebellion and you'll have to take the cities again-more money and blood wasted. A few units, archers and spearmen, should take care of the problem.With time, strategy and following my advice, Constantinople should be yours for the taking. Defeat the Byzantines, and the short campaign is yours to win.And now, for the English campaign.an entirely different affair. In the far North, across the Channel from France, England sits high above the struggles in Northern Italy, faced with their own issues. You start out with, like Venice, two cities and a castle-London, Nottingham, and Caen, respectively.
Although England is less separated than Venice is initially, they still suffer from problems related from a lack of together-ness (strange way of saying it). Caen, the castle, lies on the southern shore of the English Channel, in France, and is certainly isolated if war should break out. Therefore, the English campaign must be approached carefully.Diplomatic channels with France and the Holy Roman Empire are critical to early survival. The infantry and cavalry of these nations are far superior to the English-although their archers are lacking-and in pitched battles they will smash through your forces. So, play it safe initially, until you can get stronger infantry and cavalry.The two enemies you will face are the Scottish and the rebels. The rebels aren't a big deal-they're poorly organized, poorly equipped, and don't strike out at you. So they can be taken care of first-in two distinct places in the British Isles.But first things first, after diplomatic channels are opened and trade routes secured to both France and the HRE, get your economy running.
Unlike Venice, England's economy is more lacking-they're not situated on major trade routes, and their cities are relatively isolated. Therefore, markets are key to producing income, as well as mines if possible-which can produce quite a lot from gold and silver deposits in the Isles.After this is completed, and your economy is stable, pull an army together and have one of your family members take the town of York, to the north, and the castle of Caernarvon, to the west of Nottingham.
Both are held by rebels, and should be relatively easy to take-again, follow the advice given in the Venetian sections. The same rules apply to sieges-take your time, take the walls, use archers to your advantage, and use siege weapons if you've got them. Say no to battering rams.And with the rebels and French taken care of, it's time to turn your attention farther north, to the Scottish. The Scottish, in my experience, are mediocre-not pathetic, but mediocre at combat. They certainly have high morale and spirit, but it's not much good when steel meets flesh. And indeed, steel will meet flesh-if England wishes to survive in their campaign, they must bring the British Isles under their rule before turning their attention south. I will not be covering the conquest of France in this guide-it is a journey too long for me to discuss-but taking Scotland will certainly give you an edge in terms of economy and military force.The Scottish armies conist mostly of highland rabble, pikemen and low-level archers.
Scottish forces are superb at defense, especially early on, so do not charge that line of shiny pikes. Instead, harass them with archers-English archers are excellent, especially longbowmen, and Scottish ranged units are particularly lacking. Blood will be spilt, but you can avoid spilling too much if you weaken that Highland pike line with arrows before going in with light troops. Scottish cavalry is no better than yours, either-skirmish your cavalry and just make sure they don't rout.So, with that in mind, there are two cities in Scotland to take-Inverness, the southernmost one, and Edinburgh, the capital. Both should be easy to sweep if you draw the Scots out into the field-if they're in their cities, prepare for a strong fight.Some advice from the Venetian campaign applies here. Try to starve the defenders out-so that no blood is shed-and if you cannot, take the walls.
Pikemen and their defensive attributes are negated somewhat on walls-they depend on their organization and formation to hold back attackers. Individually, they are relatively weak, and English spearmen can take care of them. Archers can be taken care of with infantry as well-light infantry, like sergeant spearmen, should suffice for the job.If you back the enemy into their city plaza, hail them with arrows before going in.
A Scottish pike line fighting to the death will throw back almost anything-and waste many lives. So, expend your ammunition on them-armor can only do so much, and English longbowmen specialize in piercing armor. When you've weakened them, go in with infantry (not cavalry) and finish them off.Rinse and repeat for the second city. The Scottish should fall rather easily-after that, you can choose whether or not to take Dublin, in Ireland. Whether or not you do doesn't really matter-the Isles are yours, and Europe is now ready for a long, brutal campaign. Hopefully this brief, early-game walkthrough helps. I'd like to provide some military hints for those who continue with the long campaign, which gets you later into the game.
I'm not too good at diplomacy, so I don't have much for you there.but in terms of military:1) Crusades will put you into a nightmare of blood and fire. The Holy Land is wracked with warfare-Turks, Egyptians, Mongols and Timurids will all fight you for the few cities in the Levant. If you must take them, garrison those cities heavily, and prepare for long sieges. Repair walls quickly, upgrade walls and military buildings, and don't plan on allies reinforcing you-the AI doesn't understand what the meaning of 'help' is.2) Use late game infantry for England and Venice to your advantage. England gets very strong dismounted knights, and Venice gets their own unique armored battering rams, the Venetian Heavy Infantry, who can smash through most mid-game infantry with ease. Use them as the brunt of your attack force, supported by dismounted knights.3) Gunpowder units: GET THEM AS EARLY AS POSSIBLE.
Even Hand Gunners can make a difference in a pitched battle-the smoke and noise demoralizes enemies. Later on, when you get actual musketeers, they can devastate a body of knights or pikemen with ease-unlike arrows, musket balls are better firing straight foward, and punch through armor like paper.4) The New World, in the 1400s, is full of opportunity. Sending merchants to sell tobacco, gold and cocoa will provide a hearty income that will often pay for your expeditions, and then some. Send merchants along with your invasion force, and don't expect the locals to take kindly to your presence.My New World invasion force?
Knights Hospitaller, Pavise Crossbowmen, Musketeers, mercenary Cannon Elephants, mercenary Crusaders, mercenary Pikemen, Feudal Knights, Venetian Heavy Infantry, mercenary Highlanders, ribaults and cannons. Sound fun?Keep all of this in mind. I hope it definitely helps. Thanks for the new strat to try out for when I want to play Venice, oddly enough our strategies for England are nearly identical, but I personally like to go after the Scottish in a more aggresive manner (Because if I don't kill them off as soon as possible I swear I get impaled by a tsunami of pikes). I like to check out walkthroughs for different factions and see other's ideas for how to play them even though i'm more than capable at Medieval 2. And when I went for Milan (The city) I swear all they had was a General's Bodyguard and 1 unit of Italian Spear Militia.
I thought to myself 'The hell is their armies?' Then I put in 'togglefow' and found that they were all in France XD. Damn that was a longer comment than I expected.