i been watching legend videos wrong....... i should watch them from old to new.... I like the one with the exploits for med 2 "Psudeo Random Chance Manipulation" EXPLOIT...one of the best
Vanilla M2TW Campain: 1. Scotland - I disagree with bad rooster. Against superior cav Scots' pikes are ridiculously lethal cure. Moreover light troops are better in some king of terrains, gets tired later than heavy troops - that's their tactical adventage. Scots' expanding routes are Benelux, Breton and Ireland. They can quickly jump to Africa and East Iberia. I rate them as adequate. 2. Danes - I feel them as adequate. After catching Hamburg you can expand north and wait for excommunication of HRE. Rooster is infantry based. It's bad, but not the worst. A lot of killing potential (Obudshaer, Axemen), but lack of defensive units (just militias). 3. Moors - Bad. Later in the game they are lacking of heavy and modern units so badly...
And if you win a few crusades, you can start building the Templar or Hospitalars buildings in your cities to be able to recruit some of the best knight units.
Turks too can do that. Turkish cities provide Saracen militia which is basically Eastern Armoured Sergeant aka fancy spearman, Janissary Inf which is just as strong in melee as DFK, even better against mounted. Both Sipahi and Turkoman (archer cav) can be recruited from the racing track building. No melee cav but transferring cav from a distant castle is fast and easy, and expendable family members or merc. can serve as heavy melee cav. Late game there are options such Gun Janissary, Archer Janissary as well.
Rome 1 Advisor was the best. "These treacherous ingrates declared their independance, it's time for the iron fist of the state to crush this rebellion."
I know of two cases in Medieval 2 when the AI keeps their alliance and don't attack. 1. The Pope. Due to having a less expansionist AI (I think), he doesn't attack you even if he has no other potential enemies. In my campaign as Milan I conquered the entire map, except for Rome and the New World and the Pope was never hostile. 2. Crusader states. When playing the crusades campaign as Jerusalem or Antioch, the other one tends to stay friendly towards you and focuses on fighting the Muslims. But that's pretty much it, I've never ever found a reliable ally except for these two circumstances.
Portugal kept their alliance with me (spain) for a long time, even when they had nowhere to expand and their priority in the diplomatic window read "War" I don't know whether they would've declared war on me eventually, I couldn't weather the France-Sicily-Milan-England onslaught Man, F vanilla
Gotta love Scotland's ranged options, or lack thereof No natural access to long ranged archers, and although their archers are listed as anti armour, it's not because of their arrows, but because their melee weapon is an axe
I looove using them in multiplayer, set up pikes and have the archers defend from the front, they can hold their own pretty well and are great in melee. If you need a unit to rout simply have them shoot a volley or teo of fire arrows
I've found that in base Medieval 2, as a European/Catholic nation, I always send my diplomat towards Rome and buy an alliance with the Papal States. Do that before they ally with anyone, and they're in your pocket for the rest of the game. Give them 100 florins a turn and they'll love you, and you can declare Crusades on almost anyone as they'll excommunicate anyone who attacks you.
Instead of paying them 100/turn, give them territory between you and your enemies. Pope is happy and you can make one of your borders safe with power of all christendom!
@@cyrylkowalczyk9392 I'm currently using this strategy for my France campaign in SSHIP: I've got a complete Papal barrier between the HRE while biding my time and focusing elsewhere.
@@snowisthebestweather Conquering pope is a hassle, they respawn big armies to reconquer Rome every couple of rounds. Tried to "move" papal states to Jerusalem once, but sadly they never let me buy Rome from them.
I still remember when Medieval 2 was out I was rocking 19 Szlachta doomstacks as Poland like nobody's business and just obliterating everything. The polish roster also is amazing because the really good units are accessible very early on, while France or HRE need to build up for the awesome stuff to come online.
I disagree. Their spearmen only have 60 in a unit while other armored sergeants have 75. Their dismounted knights need a citadel while other factions only need a fortress. Other catholic factions are stronger and come online earlier.
My point is you can recruit szlachta in *any* fort (and they have good replenishment) and you have basically no need for any other unit early on while you take care of the HRE - at least that was how I played it.
I think you mean strzelcy. Cav is slightly overrated imo, so many offensive sieges in this game and they really struggle in those. Much of the time they just stand around doing nothing.
@@windblownleaf6450 Cavalry is the rightful king of Medieval 2, it lets you kill enemy armies with ease and capture barely defended settlements afterwards. General's bodyguards and mailed knights are the best, most cost-effective Catholic units. Just hire mercenary crossbowmen and whatever trash infantry to support them and take empty settlements. You can easily finish VH/VH grand campaign in 35-40 turns that way. Most late game units are really overrated.
The fact you have the Byzantines as bad in Grand Campaign and Super Power in Crusades tracks, and it explains why I love them so much. Their army roster is so good and so fun to use, but its their brutal start position in Grand Campaign sandwhiched between both aggressive Catholic and Muslim factions that make them so challenging and so rewarding to play. You call their lack of a Crusade/Jihad mechanic a major drawback of them and I agree, but I also think those mechanics are a bit TOO strong in Med2 to the point they make the game too easy. Putting the Byzantines in the thick of everything with no Crusade mechanic to bail them out just puts more emphasis on the player managing their economy and armies well. They're my favorite faction in Medieval 2. Strong but still with some challenge to play, with a campaign that can vary wildly depending on which direction you expand in first. Also just as a small sidenote. I think England is a Super Power too. You're right about them not being able to take over Rome as fast, but I don't consider that to be enough of a drawback to make up for their absolutely broken army roster. England's army roster is simply overpowered in the Med2 Grand Campaign. Longbowmen are by far the most cost effective easy mode spammable unit in the game. The AI has no idea how to handle them and you can stomp everything with them, and they can be mass produced so quickly.
Not sure about that. HE's playstyle tends to be ruthlessly expansionist through land war with the mainland feeding the colonies, while the British Empire was cautiously expansionist through naval supremacy with the colonies feeding the mainland.
You can get very powerful with Sicily, but I always found its resources in the early game very limited. You start losing money on turn 1, the rebel settlements around you are very poor. In addition, Milan, Venice, Byzantium and possibly the Pope will pound on you simultaneously, if you're not proactive. If you overcome the challenging start however, you are most likely the Pope and an absolute powerhouse. One of my favorite campaigns but in no way beginner friendly.
most of the time i will just make a good army and call crusade to cairo then migrate completely there set capital in cairo, selling settlement back home to papal state and faction around for good relation lol. And since you are in muslim territory your priest will have skyrocket piety , even more with theologian guild = ez cardinal or even pope position later on. easily have st john chapter house for hospitaller knight - extremely strong unit in the game. the Muslim have no match for you since you have really good infantry, pavise crossbow millitia can rip those horse archer to shred
The thing about Sicily is that you NEED to invest in a navy if you want to be able to dominate with them. Navies aren't cheap. So while you absolutely can dominate with them, the fact you need to spend a portion of what you earn to keep control of the waves, while most other factions don't does slow them down a bit.
I think Sicily is the great middle ground between Italian Militia units, and Norman Knight units. I focus on being the pope's best friend, and eventually dominating the Papacy with my army of converting priests in Muslim lands. Venice and Milan are free eats, I want their land. Those five cities in Northern Italy are some of the richest and concentrated on the map. I take Florence early, and try to buy Bologne off of the HRE. I love Sicily as a crusading, trading, Papal Empire.
Honestly to put Sicily above France is absurd. France has the much better roster, much better economy, much larger starting territory and a lot more rebel territory in the near vicinity to take for free. Sicily has what, slightly shorter travel time to the holy land, and thats it? I love playing Sicily, dont get me wrong Norman Knights are super fun, but France is objectivly much better.
In the base game, Scotland also manages to suffer from the two handed bug and pikes switching to thier swords - so thier key units completely underperform
Yep, their roster is actually one of the best in the game IF you fix the two hander bug and pike swapping. Pikes go from worthless to one of the most brutally cost efficient unit types if you remove their secondary weapon.
@@JurzGarz Two handed units had their attack animation speed set too low so other units constantly force them to parry, interrupting their attacks. Outside of an initial charge they were near useless, even peasants could stun-lock Varangian Guards to death. Their animation set also struggled against cavalry models and would just fail to trigger iirc, which is why halberdiers were hilariously bad against cavalry.
@@garak55 The two handed bug was fixed by the Kingdoms expansion, but only in those new campaigns. The grand campaign still has it. Most mods build off the Kingdoms patch so should be fine. The pike bug is still in vanilla and kingdoms but is a simple fix, just edit export_descr_unit and for any unit with long_pike, replace the stat_sec line with one from a unit without a secondary weapon. Almost every mod with pikes I've played does this (and usually nerfs their primary attack to make up for how OP pikes get!)
@soulz1999 You need to unlock it manually. I haven't played in a while, but just type "Medieval II how to unlock Papal States" and you should get your answer
@@soulz1999 Look for \Medieval II Total War\data\world\maps\campaign\imperial_campaign\descr_strat.txt Move "papel_states" from nonplayable to playable.
Holy Roman Empire is my favorite in the base game. Super dynamic from the start all the way through the campaign. And personally, I love playing as Wales in Britannia. It's definitely possible to invade England and crush them if you're persistent and don't give them room to breathe.
I believe you forgot to mention that the Apaches have the mechanic of warpath, which is incredibly powerful. Also, their extremely low troop upkeep cost makes them one of the richest factions. That said I believe they are definitely the second most powerful faction after spain
I'd promote France to Superpower because of the cavalry. Cavalry is everything in Med2 and France, while not having the best cavalry (I think Hungary does if I'm not mistaken), has the most cavalry. They have a huge variety of heavy cav to choose from, more than their Catholic neighbours. And remember, in Med2 you can't recruit whatever you want, because you are capped by a levy system. Having access to good variety means you can bypass this problem by recruiting more units that are more varied.
Yeah I agree. To put Sicily above France is kinda absurd. France has the much better roster (especially late-game), much better economy, much larger starting territory and a lot more rebel territory in the near vicinity to take for free. Sicily has what, slightly shorter travel time to the holy land, and thats it? I love playing Sicily, dont get me wrong Norman Knights are super fun, but France is objectivly better.
I don't think hungary has the best knights, I think it should be one of those factions whose top tier knight has stats along the line of 13 attack 17 defense, with armor piercing side arm.
France has the strongest late game army and the best cannons. They don't really have the best unit of anything else but they good everything. For this reason they're very strong in battles and online too.
Scots Guard can outshoot English archers. Although, they _are_ limited to huge cities only...but they're also available from huge cities, meaning you can have a silly economy and still field powerful armies. And the French horse archers are insane (armour piercing horse archers? Yes please!)
24:30 "what was I thinking" You forgot that Apaches are the only ones in the Americas campaign with a Crusade mechanic that's what bumps them from "adequate" to "super power" imo
I loved playing as Lithuania. My only friend was Novgorod and fighting off everyone else’s heavy stacks was fun. Also the crusading noble mechanic was interesting. Some random Englishman thinks he’s gonna have a crusade vacation in Lithuania? Nah he’s gonna get Teutoburged.
You managed to keep your allience? When I played as Novgorod Lithuania betrayed me mid-game and allied woth the teutonic order. Don’t worry, I made them payed in blood.
@@florians9949 Thats a funky alliance. I thought i remembered outlasting one another as one of the victory conditions. I dont think I had any territory that Novgorod wanted. I was friendly with the Mongols for a but, but they betrayed me. They didnt seem to have their hearts in it though.
I'd love to see a Shogun 2 faction tierlist, despite playing that game a bunch, I think that'd be the total war game I'd struggle the most on deciding which factions are good and which are bad.
Superpowers: - Otomo - Terceros, Donderbuss Cavalry and Nanban ship are terrifyingly good, early nanban port and early gunpowder is such a massive advantage for securing foreign trade. Downsides are the religious penalties to diplomacy and honor, public order is always a big deal, and unlike converted factions their jesuit missionaries are not as good at spreading Christianity. Minus this though they are easily the strongest faction, even fighting the AI Otomo is a bloody nightmare if they survive the early game. Their naval dominance will easily put the Mori to shame, and their foreign legions are extremely strong gunpowder units that don't require a lot of tech to access. - Ikko Ikki - One could argue their roster is kind of bad but I heavily disagree. Ashigaru are very cost effective for their size, and the bonuses the Ikko get with them are great. Your religion is extremely easy to spread, and the rebellion mechanics that the Ikko offer make them incredibly fun to wipe the floor with. You're pretty much the only faction that can so easily wage war on both the battlefield and in the hearts and minds of your enemies, and if you play your cards well then your lack of samurai won't be a problem, especially considering their warrior monks. - Takeda - Slow start in poor regions for Takeda, but if you can get money they can field cavalry cheaper than equivalent infantry. Fire cavalry and Yari cavalry makes them pretty much broken and nearly impossible to win against in a field battle. An aggressive Takeda general can just wipe the map with superior mobility, but it takes a while to get to that point. Definitely a slow burn. - Shimazu - Although their better katana samurai is great, Shimazu's main strength is having the easiest starting position in Kyushu, and probably the second easiest in the game. The Ito are not a threat (unless you're the AI apparently). Massive wealth from the trade nodes in Kyushu that you can contest very early, and you have no worries of being flanked during Realm Divide. Biggest downside is the distance to Kyoto, but otherwise this is a very easy campaign. Starting with all their wealth and a weaponsmith, easily getting access to horses and multiple other strategic resources is great for them. Their heavy gunners are also pretty impressive, and their ability to mix both tradition and new warfare makes them very powerful - Oda - Kind of a rough starting position, but buffs to Ashigaru are insanely good. Oda Ashigaru + spearwall is good enough to even fend off Katana Samurai if you focus your generals on morale. The lack of an upgraded Samurai option is a bit lackluster but the ability to field massive, cheap armies of surprisingly good troops is great. Although their start is rough, being put in the bottleneck between Kansai and Chuubu is very good for Realm Divide. There is definitely a reason that Oda historically "won." Adequate: - Chosokabe - Best starting position in the game on Shikoku Island. Getting early access to quality stone is good for players looking to play tall, and Chosokabe are great for playing tall. You can really take your time with the Chosokabe, and build up good archers. I rate them slightly lower because while archers are great in sieges, it's the pitched field battles where the Chosokabe can falter. I would say they're borderline superpower, and I just like the Oda a little bit more than them. - Uesugi - Probably one of the best late game buffs in the form of improved warrior monks, and generally better options for religion than other Shinto-Buddhists means a late-game Uesugi can be a true force to reckon with. However they have a really obnoxious start in a position that is not great to defend, and you will sort of be forced to overextend in some direction and risk being attacked from any number of directions. Really the only plus of their start is being able to take out the Honma early game so that they stop being such a nuissance. They're in a similar boat to Takeda in being a late burn faction with a bad start, but I think their position is a lot worse than Takeda's and beefy warrior monks can't compare to the most powerful charge attack in the game. - Tokugawa - Such an interesting and weird faction, you're the only one who starts as a vassal to another faction. Your bonuses to Metsuke and diplomacy makes them a very good passive faction to play as, and you kind of get the feeling of pulling strings behind the scenes to get an advantage. The kisho ninja stuff isn't my favorite, but you can definitely make good use of them. I think it's always worth a try to play Tokugawa, and their mounted gunners are a nice bonus, but overall they're just kind of meh to me having little to differentiate them in combat. Sadly the Tokugawa AI never survives. - Date - I love and hate this faction so much. They have such a cool bonus with a focus on charge-based infantry, allowing them to be a lot like Takeda for cheap and smashing through Ashigaru and defensive forces is so fun. I would have even more fun with them if it didn't take me 3-5 business days of playing the game to get my forces in enemy territory! Easily the worst starting position in the game just because of the sheer remoteness the Date have. And unlike Shimazu, you don't have access to resources to basically form your own mini-kingdom to rival the wealth of the Shogunate. Sure it's easy to defend, the chokepoint in Fukushima basically means no one can ever dislodge you in Realm Divide, but good luck not falling asleep playing this faction when your armies march for a year and are still in the same province. Bad: - Hojo - I don't know why but I just can't understand the Hojo. They have by far the most awkward starting position in the game (PLEASE JUST LET ME HAVE ACCESS TO THAT ONE PIECE OF ROAD, IMAGAWA, YOU AREN'T EVEN _USING IT!!!)._ Sure the ability to build cheaper castles is good for playing tall, but Hojo is not in nearly a safe enough position to play tall. Buffs to siege weapons are mixed in my opinion. Fire rockets are very funny, and you can probably clip some people with any number of firebombs or manogels or whatever, but in my experience they're not nearly reliable enough to offset their cost or space. Their start is just awkward, pretty much only having one direction to expand in without taking massive diplo penalties, yet the land pushing into Kanto is sparse with few strategic resources near Hojo's position, with the closest stone province being an awkward stretch away deep in South Shinano. Not to mention their capital is on a weirdly disconnected peninsula with gold, instead of the far more advantageous province with a blacksmith, preventing them from having the buff to recruit tons of soldiers like the Shimazu with theirs. My first victory was with the Hojo, and I genuinely can't figure out how I did it because I just usually get overrun by Uesugi, Date, or Takeda nowadays. - Mori - Oh how they did the Mori dirty in this game. Granted, their starting position is not _bad,_ but it is not great. Pushing through Chuugoku requires you to split your forces in half basically. They have very good resources near them but it takes a bit of work to get to, and their position means that one half of the Mori will be cut off from the other half. Your allies in Ouchi will always fail, and whatever nightmare exists in Kyushu will be coming to bite you in your ass first (just pray it isn't a Christian nation or else you'll be fighting two fronts on one front). Their naval bonus has always felt poor to me, naval combat in Shogun is a lot less fine-tuned than infantry, and even the best heavy bune known to man will get demolished by a cannon bune or a nanban ship without contest. They're just far enough away from the Kyushu nodes to contest them easily, and their naval bonus is not going to be a help for them in their cutthroat position. And to try and help their position, they get basically Loan Sword Ashigaru but without pants and about half the unit size... Crap: - Hattori - I don't think I need to explain this one. The permanent ability for all generals to initiate night attacks is going to be the sole thing that makes them viable. If you try to fight a defensive war you will just outright lose. Your units are completely inferior to everyone else's with the only upside being you have a wider deployment box, so you can watch your soldiers run away from new and unique parts of the map! Better ninja also does not matter much when you can't hold onto a city long enough to recruit them. Unplayable: The vast majority of factions are unplayable without mods, but a quick note of some of the high notes: - Ashikaga - Basically the SPQR or Papal States of this game, but starting with the Kyoto Citadel makes you unstoppable. If you can secure some wealth for yourself, then you will win every war by sheer attrition. Just keep in mind the game does not intend for you to play this faction, so things like Realm Divide don't work how you would think. - Shoni - I don't know why but they always seem to get really strong if the Otomo fail. - Honma - The memiest faction in the game, sending armies of yari ashigaru to your backlines since 1441 - Hatakeyama - Probably the worst faction in the game if you excluse the 1-province minors that don't have enough time to exist. Being spread out and separated over so much land means you're just a sitting duck slowly bleeding money. God help you if your last province is Noto. You have to play aggressively to secure a foothold somewhere and abandon parts of your starting lands, which is a big early-game hamper.
(This is just a tip for those who don't know): If you want to expand quickly as england, or any other catholic faction, make sure you plant a diplomat next to the pope as soon as possible and give about 1k-3k florins to him in various intervals to keep high relations with the pope. This way you can keep attacking other christians and if he starts bleating about it just keep bribing him and you'll be fine as long as you keep bankrolling him. Note: this works best if you only fight 1 or 2 christian factions at a time.
I've been playing some campains with france trying to not get excummunicated. As long as you keep attacking and back off when the pope asks you can elliminate England, Scotland and HRE without excommunication. Its just a 5 turn ceasefire every time as soon as its over you can cap another settlement.
Yep. That's how you can play the Pope game without necessarily winning _curia_ elections. Just toss that 1k florins or so every other turn will keep you in the good books. Kinda historical as well, though only at times.
Even better if you are a mediterannean power and an alliance with him makes sense to him, since the Pope will almost never break an alliance while keeping high opinion of you, lessens the bribery costs to a few hundred florin every few turns and a church here and there
The other strategy is to wait until your faction leader is in his 60s then "go for it" and get ex-communicated, taking a dozen or so territories over the few turns it takes for your faction leader to die to old age. Then your new faction leader will automatically be reconciled and any crusades against you will be called off. If those crusading forces are now in another catholic faction's lands... well it sucks to be the owner of those lands doesn't it?
Which is why I love to choose them for the difficulty scale. I've won the grand campaign twice with Scotland, including my favorite battle of all time, just north of Antioch against the Timurids, something I recorded and rewatch from time to time just for the epicness of it.
To be fair I watched this video and then immediately went and started a Scotland campaign and it's been good fun so far, not too far in but have finally captured Britain and Ireland after a bit of a struggle and now successfully invading Europe.@@rikk319
My only real problem with this tier list would be putting Byzantine Empire at the same tier as Denmark,especially since you can get rid of Turks and Hungary in less than 10 turns and essentially just be rapidly expanding in any direction with Mongol invasion being the only speedbump if you are not prepared for it.Great video though
I think the fact that they don’t have access to Jihad/crusade is what lost them many points, since Legned LOVE that mechanic. Personaly I don’t like that mechanic because I always gets absolutly demolish by desertion, which heavily outweight the benefits.
@@florians9949What do you mean by desertion bro😂 ? Afak crusader Army never goes rogue even with low loyalty general The maim problem is After capturing the crusade Target city due masive public order
@@GitsmasherIf you take too long to get to the target city of the crusade your men start to desert. They don't go rogue and become rebel units, they just disappear from your army.
Legend, do a playthrough of M2TW with Poland using Shooter (Strzelcy) spam xD That was my go-to way of trolling in M2TW. - You are faster than anything that can beat you in a fair fight, can fire on the move and shoot backwards (iirc) - You can decimate even heavily armored enemies with the AP crossbow, despite it's apparently low damage - you can charge down or evade anything with better ranged attack than you have, - shield helps mitigate ranged damage (makes shooters better than mounted crossbowmen) Pretty OP unit :)
The main thing about the italian factions is that they can spam italian spear militia, which are armored sergeants but count as militia so you can spam good units that also get free upkeep from cities (which usually have bad units). Even the more basic italian militia are pretty good in the early game. In the Americas campaign, spanish units have 2-3 hit points! It's crazy!
Legend, I would bump up Denmark a bit due to your own criteria: potential for early game expansion. While they start small, they can access Huscarls, dismounted Huscarls, Norse Swordsmen and Viking Raiders. These early infantry units carve up the early militia and peasant units most of their neighbors are stuck with in the early game. Huscarls work great at killing generals bodyguards early on. Even past the early game their ease of access makes them worthwhile and Huscarls and dismounted Huscarls work well in tandem with feudal knights and dismounted feudal knights thanks to their armor piercing. And dont sleep on Stockholm being easy to get. A developed Stockholm is an economic powerhouse.
My thoughts on Poland in the Teutonic campaign- tough start but you have the tools to get quite powerful early on. Their mounted crossbowmen are arguably the best early game unit- essentially armour piercing horse archers. Their other heavy cavalry are also very strong, and their archers can deploy stakes
Ultimately, it seems to depend on your playstyle, like you said. Your top factions in each tier list are the ones that can expand quickly. However, the purpose of the campaign is not necessarily to win quickly (unless you want to, like you do). Since my playstyle is to play slowly and build up, my experience is quite different. Here are some examples: 1) I'd say vanilla England is the easiest (and therefore strongest) faction in the game, because they are isolated. Once you defeat Scotland, you can turtle and get so rich that you steamroll the entire map with barely any effort. On the contrary, if you try to play a faction like HRE or the Turks this way, you'll probably get beaten pretty bad. Same thing goes for Danes in vanilla; if you just take Scandinavia and Hamburg and then turtle, it's smooth sailing from then on. Hamburg can be a recruitment hub, while Stockholm is ridiculously rich (richest settlement on the map). 2) The Mayans actually seem to be the long-term strongest faction in the Americas, for the same reason. They face no threats and therefore they can build up and steamroll everything. Interestingly, this is what happens almost every time if you just let the AI factions duke it out; AI Mayans just take most of the map. 3) In the Teutonic campaign I've played as TO, Lithuania and Poland and I'd say Poland is much, much easier than the other two (which interestingly is the opposite of what you said). Again, the reason is the same: take rebel territory, on one around you attacks you (TO fights Lithuania, HRE fights Denmark) and you can wait to get rich and then attack whichever faction around you is the weakest. This is much easier to pull off than e.g. playing as Lithuania and having to face strong armies from turn 1. 4) Interestingly, I'd also say that Norway is the easiest Britannia faction, while you rated it as the weakest. I've won a VH/VH Norway campaign with autoresolve only without breaking a sweat. The good thing about Norway is precisely that your territories are obscure trash; no one cares to attack you. The Scots will only attack Wick (which is easy to defend) and the Welsh might attack Castle Town but that's not really a problem. Sit around and wait for the reinforcements you get and then attack Scotland from every corner. They'll easily collapse. Then move your capital to the mainland, wait for culture to convert to Norwegian and then when you're ready you can invade England (or Wales) and they'll not really be much of a challenge because at this point you are bigger and probably richer. So, my point is that the factions you rate as weak are actually the factions that require a patient/defensive strategy. Ultimately though, these factions seem to have the easiest campaigns, meaning that they don't really need to win any tough battles or pull off some clever strategy. They kind of win just by sitting around and waiting.
I don't have problems with the excommunications thing usually. As you say the AI is very random and hostile so there will always be a neighbour attacking you early on and getting excommunicated after a few battles. And then it's open season. The only thing to be aware of is to keep the king alive long enough.
This video is Super Power tier itself. Looking for a similar one for Rome and Barbarian Invasion. Edit: also in defence of Byzantium in Grand Campaign, it starts with the richest settlement which is also the only large city in game, allowing you to produce Byz infantry, so they are the only faction to have access from turn 1 to medium sword infantry, extremely useful to take walls and settlements by storming them, and also horse archers for open field battles.
Interesting. I've always felt like Scotland was the second easiest faction (second to England) because they start in a corner and wont deal with multi-front wars early on.
If you jump on York and Caernarvon quickly, Dublin and Inverness can be taken when convenient, and England is on the back foot. Use spies or ballista to open the gates and if you play your cards right, you can take Nottingham and London in a single turn (before the Pope calls for ceasefire).
Great content Legend, always been in love with this wonderful game. You actually made me play Rome 1 again thanks to your lives. I went through the two 7 hours lives, absolutely amazing mate, hope you'll cary on with these live, I love long videos I can pause, eat, drink my coffee, I had such a great time.
I bought a manscaped kit on your suggestion a year or so back. and I really love mine. I got the limited-edition purple cancer awareness kit since I like purple. But this thing works really really well. I just wanted to say thanks and that I appreciate it when adverts lead to actual value. thanks bro.
One problem with the HRE is how its in the middle of europe, so it has a lot of potential enemies on all sides. At least from my experience, HRE is always hectic to play as a result, but that’s why its my fav faction too
Only beef I had with the game was how Turks suffer from a lack of money, even though Turkomans are supposedly be very cheap according to the historical sense.
would disagree about Denmark tbh, on the cavalry front yeah they have less options but what they do have is really solid, Huscarls are pretty cost effective and AP focused melee cav, and Norse War Clerics may be the hands down best melee cav in the game. you can also get a pretty solid setup going if you can snag the low countries quick (Antwerp and Brussels iirc).
I agree with pretty much everything you said about the Byzantine Empire. They're my favorite to play broadly but I do agree they're very challenging due to their position.
My personal favourite is Poland, by far. Their cav is bonkers, especially in the early game. Even their 'knights' have javelins, so they can easily obliterate any early game army
Ah Medieval 2. Not as polished and balanced as Shogun 2, or as flashy and awesome as Warhammer. But it feels like home. Its like this old pair of shoes that looks bad bad its comfortable af.
I think there should be a tier between 'adequate' and 'super power' - seems odd that so many factions can be considered S tier and it almost makes said tier lose its meaning.
HRE is such a fun playthrough, can grow so quickly. Poland has always been enjoyable, if you love a cav faction. Portugal is my favourite, for the Aventuros and choices in where you go and what you do, but the most campaigns I have ever finished have been with Spain, that is a fun long term campaign, once you get tercios backed up by ten thousand knights of Santiago. And played Hungary for years, so agree with you there.
I have fond memories of HRE. I started by blitzing Denmark and Milan first, took part in a Crusade against Aegypt, created a colony there and send my Merchants there to collect gold from the rare desert resources. First game where I just sat around clicking on next turn waiting for the Mongols, because I already owned the entire map like 10-20 turns before they arrived.
Mongols and Timurids invasion one of the best event in the game and Turks facing them sooner than others . While fighting in west and also for America , you also fight 2 different nations giant armies is a lot more fun than others 🎉
I personally think you underrated scotland but that might be because I'm overvaluing its roster. Scotland's army of stereotypes can be pretty damn strong and packs some of the best anti-cavalry in the game.
Nah as a Scottish person it sucks to say it but Scotland really does suck in Med 2, even in the British campaign they could have given them some cooler stuff but they have such a small roster it’s not worth using them.
I like Scotland. It's a little rough at the beginning with few strong units, but if you can take the whole of Great Britain, it's a solid base of operations from which you make money and project your power. Also, almost no one attacks into GB save for Portugal and Denmark. Large cities soon also allow you to build the heavy pike militia, one of the best militias in the game. They're great for taking other large/huge cities and rebuilding the army. Eventually you'll also be able to build the noble swordsmen which, with their high power and low upkeep cost makes the center of multiple, powerful armies. Combining heavy pike militia with noble swordsmen makes for a powerful force which can take and be partially replenished with each settlement taken. The only detriments are the distance from Jerusalem and the difficulty in spreading out.
Watching your Warhammer TW videos were how I knew the game wasnt for me. My brain turns off everytime Loving the older tw content much more Playing as france MTW2 and they are even more difficult than England. Would put them lower down in tier list. Anti player bias means HRE, Portugal Spain, Milan are just turns away from turning on you. I even have Moors and Sicily invading southern france for seemingly no reason
Denmark deserves a better shout because you can turn 90% of your settlements into cities and spam Norse War Clerics very early on with a really good economy, spread lots of Christianity and get a good foothold with it when going on Crusades. The pope will love you, lots of public order and you can churn out heavy cavalry and the other units from one or two castles. It's quite overpowered.
Yes but they're slow to get your hands on. They're good against armour but their charge isn't impressive so solid alongside normal knights to pin and kill generals etc
They aren't against fast missile cavalry, but this guy completely overrated cavalry, it's not that good at all and Denmark is arguably the best faction because of their infantry. You can conquer so much land early on and build the strongest safest economy that nobody can compete with you.
I finished Scotland campaign at very hard / very hard difficulty 66 turns before end. It wasn't really challenging because game plays too weak during counter attacking. I immediately sold my boats and skipped ship building, concentrated solely on ground invasions. Crusades are proffitable due to zero upkeep. Now I have built Carracks and Gun Holks to secure sea trading routes. I had several successes attacking Mongols and Timurids with one failed attempt. Timurid elephants are tough unit to destroy. They smash infantry walking over them and route cavalry with mounted cannons. I attack elephants with ranged units while distracting them by hidding some unit behind the unbreakable obstacle like joint section of a wall. Scotland is fun because it starts with only one region and two armies. First I conquered neighbouring villages, then joined Crusade. On the path to Cairo, as crusading target, I conquered dosen rebbel and Arab regions. I built Cathedral already in first 50 turns and made tens of Bishops. When they became Cardinals I had majority for Papal elections. Scottish Pope is a constant from then on. I propose Crusading targets and my Pope agrees every time. I selected Marrakesh to defeat Moors and afterwards Turks owned Iconium due to the nearby Timurid force which I plan to attack with Crusaders. Game offers a lot of laugh. You can hit enemy with Monster Bombard, medieval version of Rocket Launcher. Longbowmen can plant sticks in the ground. When opposing cavalry comes it literally get sticked. Cavalry and heavy infantry units have powerful charge. You can see enemy soldiers being toss in the air when horses hit them. Battle mechanics is good, all moves are authentical. Walls crushing with cannons is fun to observe especially with enemy defense standing on. People fall together with rocks. Burning troops with flaming balista and catapult missilles is very effective against numerous armies filling tight spaces. Crossbowmen and ribault are effective against armour. One crossbowmen unit if having enough time to shot can route two-three heavy units. Monster bombard projectile sometimes rolls over ground, bounces and hit several enemy troops. With better A.I. game would be challenging. This is overly predictable. I have generation 5 processor with integrated graphics. I need to play at low graphics settings otherwise game frozes when defending siege against multiple armies.
I feel like because the Byzantine Archers are fairly decent in melee (they can beat dismounted knights 1 v 1) you can make really good armies of mostly spears and archers with some back up cavalry and really dominate everyone else no problem.
I think Spain should also be included in the Adequate tier because of its location that far to the west. If not, France could go up a place because they have access to the Mediterranean sea and could easily start campaigns versus the Arabs, and they aren't that far away from the Pope either.
Doing a Scotland campaign right now and not offended you put them in crap tier, just shows me I must be playing really well since I'm only two provinces away from victory conditions I will say this about the roster however, Scottish pikemen are absolutely my favourite unit in the entire game, you can get heavily armoured pikemen very early on and I make use of them extensively. That's not to say there aren't drawbacks however, pikemen are an absolute glass cannon and are super vulnerable to arrows, they also need to be babied way too much since they switch from their pikes to swords whenever they break formation (also sometimes for seemingly no reason at all), which is really bad since they suck at melee but let me tell you, when you get them in formation and engaging the enemy there is no better feeling because they absolutely DOMINATE. I even remember the exact moment they became my favourite unit while I was sieging a town and my pikemen moved into the town square and slowly marched in formation against an enemy unit and I kid you not it was like watching a lawnmower go over an overgrown field, I don't even think my men stopped marching they just kept going forward at a steady pace and the enemy infantry was just dropping like flies as soon as they touched the tips of the pikes, it was very very satisfying to watch, just recently one of these units killed over a hundred enemies while only sustaining ~10 casualties
In the grand campaign, I find Spain kind of frustrating given that their arguably best unit is spawned in a location where they’re basically fighting trash instead of on the continent.
I found Portugal to be absolutely bonkers good. Yeah the start isn't great, but once you control the peninsula, which you can do in a few turns (20 maybe) you're basically unassailable and can expand naturally down the african coast. In addition to that you have the best gunpowder units, good ranged and knight options and skirmishers that can go toe to toe with dismounted knights in melee
Portugal has a slightly worse start than Spain (split territories, generally less developed) but their rooster is insanely strong. It's very similar to Spain (which itself has one of the strongest roosters) but in the few differences they have, it's imo better: -Superior Pikemen -Earlier Gunpowder -More cost-effective cav -Armor piercing infantry Spain on the other hand has superior light infantry. Nevertheless, i still find Spain to be a stronger faction because they have an easier start, and they unlock their superior light infantry before Portugal gets access to their superior units. Meaning they can use their early advantages to either take out Portugal immediately or snowball faster.
To be fair, in the case of the Byzantine empire, they're in the middle of everyone, and so i dont think they really need all of the crusader benefit besides free units
Ireland in the Brittania campaign was always my favorite. Once you take over the island, you can generate vast wealth, pick an enemy, and just play Viking raider with them at your leisure. After you get a few coastal towns as beachheads, just sweep it up.
One thing you missed about Apache tribes. They can call on Warpath, something like Cruasades and Jihads. They spawn a numerous huge armies near your city very quickly.
About the Byzantines, the Mongols aren't much of a problem as by the time they reach Anatolia they have already lost quite a bit of steam, plus the mountainous terrain allows severely delaying them by putting forts with barely any trash militia unit in it. Instead, they keep the entire eastern flank distracted, provided you keep strong enough defences. Their lack of good late-game units also helps balancing the snowball effect that is seen in most factions. If you play well you have a big empire, but the enemies will have an advantage when it comes to quality.
Venice, Sicily and Milan are the strongest due to the units they can recruit out of their cities Milan has OP units out of their cities Sicily gets their Norman Knights super early
I just finished picking back up the game and playing as england, and I guess I got incredibly lucky because Scotland put their entire Army onto a boat so I was able to wipe out their faction in two turns before the pope could threaten to excommunicate me, and I married two princesses of spain, so I kept them as an ally for the entire campaign
Another issue with the Apachean and Chichimec Tribes is their factions leaders. Every time I’ve played as either of these factions, one of my characters, be it a random general or my faction heir, will suddenly turn traitor, simply because the faction leader has absolutely no Authority to keep the other generals in line, which basically means your going to have one army for a long duration for the early stages of the campaign simply because your leader is shit at leading.
I remember playing a Teutonic Campaign as the Teutonic Knights and had no idea the Mongols were in the scenario (my medieval history timelines aren't all that solid) and I and the mongols basically spent half the campaign conquering half of the map before discovering the other existed. Which led to some rather memorable campaigning as it's pretty rare in late game Total War to be in a peer level conflict - the late game is usually you just snowballing through a bunch of middling factions (aside from the classic Roman civil war in Rome Total War's Imperial Campaign.
I find alliances much easier to keep when you don't give them map information. Map information kind of allows the factions to attack you since you basically show them your settlements.
I love Scotland, but that is because i do a different playstyle compared to legends. I am going with passive gameplay, BUT i make trade agreements with all factions on the map. Then i develop all the infrastructure and take all the rebels on the isles. It makes england to REALLY develop a grudge after you. So once they start the war, you take the rest of the isles and pope forces peace onto you. Weirdly, spanish sometimes cosplay normandy in Wales. By late game though. Speaking of late game: you accumulate 200-500k by late game and then you can start just spamming endless hordes onto the known world. Momgols when they show up, find themselves on receiving end of invasion super fast xD
what really breaks scotland is the "pikeman bug" of medieval 2 where the pikemen just dont fight proper and immediately switch to swords xD. In some mods scotland might be better if pikemen are fixed. You can actually see the effect of the pikeman bug when watching Pilps scotland experience video where he plays a modded game with scotland and uses pikemen as city assault force!
One thing about playing the Pope, when people declare war on you and get excommunicated you can offer them reconciliation as a trade item. AI prioritizes it very highly and you can usually take most of their treasury for it. So them declaring war on you constantly is honestly a benefit!
I know you don't typically play mods, but do you have any M2 mods you'd want to make tier lists for? I'd enjoy seeing a Broken Crescent list or Stainless Steel list.
I dunno, I think Apaches should be a superpower - they can do one thing that no one else can and stack native morale debuffs with gunpowder and cavalry charges. Spearmen frontline that frightens enemy units, shamans with warcry behind and either gunners or mounted gunners for gunpowder debuff, followed by a cav charge in the back can instantly route... pretty much everything in the game. Even Spain will go down because you can spam mounted gunners far faster and in greater numbers than they can. The only issue is that to do that, you need to win several battles against European factions without all those goodies.
One thing about the apacheas, they also have a jihad/crusades mechanic called the "war path" which can be used if your medicine man is at an adequate level. Definitly superpower level because you can send a stack to spain to kill cav or guns and get access to cav and guns.
