I'm playing a Seljuk -> Persia game right now and am getting attacked by the horde. I can't fight them back since they put all of their troops into a single 114K stack. Is there some trick or something to get them to break up the stack or are they designed to expand to a certain size or something?
How am I supposed to stop the Mongols?
- Thread starter maccyb
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Your best bet.
wait for the north horde to fight the southern one. They will eliminate each others doom-stacks.
Or as the saying goes.
if you cant fight them.... join them.
wait for the north horde to fight the southern one. They will eliminate each others doom-stacks.
Or as the saying goes.
if you cant fight them.... join them.
I don't think you're meant to stop the mongols. You're meant to try to survive them if you can, which often means surrendering chunks of your realm.
I tend to use my troops to clean up after the deathstack and retake holdings rather than meet them in battle. But losing ground to them is part of the strategy. You wait for them to either exhaust themselves, or at least for the deathstack to be far away, and then you retake your land by getting occupation score up high enough before the deathstack arrives.
I tend to use my troops to clean up after the deathstack and retake holdings rather than meet them in battle. But losing ground to them is part of the strategy. You wait for them to either exhaust themselves, or at least for the deathstack to be far away, and then you retake your land by getting occupation score up high enough before the deathstack arrives.
I've fought mongols, but I was a Christian mongol so I have enough horse archers to fight their doomstack. My advice might be that if you're playing on the eastern side of the map, you have to expand to the west quickly & ferociously enough so that you can afford losing lands in the east. The travel time to mobilize the army in the east is just too unfriendly to fight a 100k doomstack. Until you can lure their army to the shore, there's nothing much you can do. And never fight them on defense position; their horse archer gets +100% morale boost on offensive battles (battles where the mongols are the attacker).
I just think of a strategy which might be useful; basically your aim is to exhaust their doomstack, so I suggest you make sure your vassals in Khiva, Persia & Mesopotamia have traits zealous & ambitious. Now that will start massive independence faction wars after the mongols conquer them and sooner or later the mongol will keep losing their doomstack from reconquests. Then you sweep in back with your claims / offer vassalization if you still have the kingdom title. Assassinating a mongol leader right after the invasion is successful is also a good strategy; it eliminates the +75 subjugated opinion from the vassals they conquered
I just think of a strategy which might be useful; basically your aim is to exhaust their doomstack, so I suggest you make sure your vassals in Khiva, Persia & Mesopotamia have traits zealous & ambitious. Now that will start massive independence faction wars after the mongols conquer them and sooner or later the mongol will keep losing their doomstack from reconquests. Then you sweep in back with your claims / offer vassalization if you still have the kingdom title. Assassinating a mongol leader right after the invasion is successful is also a good strategy; it eliminates the +75 subjugated opinion from the vassals they conquered
I saw em' split their stick when they came after me... not completely, the just de-attached some to spread the sieges. I promptly crushed as many stacks as I could on my way to a white peace.
So... hope for that? Seems utterly random if they ever split or not, and a true pain if they don't.
So... hope for that? Seems utterly random if they ever split or not, and a true pain if they don't.
There is some a bit tricky way. After you lose first war declare war on them. You shurely lose, but they lose some troops on sieges. Then One more and one more... After some time they lose enough for you to beat them.
The 100k attrition-proof doomstack is ridiculous. There must be a way to make Mongolian hordes challenging, even devastating, without them fielding armies that exceed the population of the provinces they're invading.
Upgrade to 1.08 when it becomes available. Then their horse archers won't have 10 times the bonus they're supposed to have 
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Well, it is hard to model in the CK2 Engine. Historically their armies did not win fights by massively outnumbering their enemies; quite the contrary. Most of their battles were while at a numerical disadvantage yet they still wiped entire european armies. So the only way would be to massively overpower their cultural units or give them very good generals (but in the game any opposing army will also have a nearly maxed general, so this doesn't really work).
Just now playing my first game as the Byzantines, after watching the carnage in previous games from safety in either England or France. (With France I'd actually taken a significant amount of land from the Golden Horde after their invasion petered out by using two 20K man retinue units, but I digress.)
Today I defeated a 161K doomstack, but it took a lot of planning. Knowing I'd have to face the hordes at some point, I formed as many cataphract retinues as I could, built cataphract training grounds in all my holdings, and expanded west to grow my retinue size and give me fallback territory. Also, once the Muslim kingdoms in Mesopotamia started to fall apart I made a push in there so that I could capture Mesopotamia and counties like Baghdad that could supply 40-50K troops.
The Ilkhanate invaded and in the 9-12 months between war being declared and their doomstack showing up, I was able to get 170-180K retinues, mercs and nearby levies into Baghdad and the surrounding counties. They came after the central stack of 48K in Baghdad, but I had all the surrounding units flood in, plus they took a river crossing penalty on attack. After this one giant battle, I made sure to chase down the doomstack to wipe it out so it couldn't regenerate.
So, while it is probably more straightforward to fight them on a coast, it is possible to win on land if you can get the right county to pivot around.
Golden Horde invaded Volga Bulgaria while I was doing all of this, so hopefully they'll stay north for a while, at least.
Today I defeated a 161K doomstack, but it took a lot of planning. Knowing I'd have to face the hordes at some point, I formed as many cataphract retinues as I could, built cataphract training grounds in all my holdings, and expanded west to grow my retinue size and give me fallback territory. Also, once the Muslim kingdoms in Mesopotamia started to fall apart I made a push in there so that I could capture Mesopotamia and counties like Baghdad that could supply 40-50K troops.
The Ilkhanate invaded and in the 9-12 months between war being declared and their doomstack showing up, I was able to get 170-180K retinues, mercs and nearby levies into Baghdad and the surrounding counties. They came after the central stack of 48K in Baghdad, but I had all the surrounding units flood in, plus they took a river crossing penalty on attack. After this one giant battle, I made sure to chase down the doomstack to wipe it out so it couldn't regenerate.
So, while it is probably more straightforward to fight them on a coast, it is possible to win on land if you can get the right county to pivot around.
Golden Horde invaded Volga Bulgaria while I was doing all of this, so hopefully they'll stay north for a while, at least.
I continue my challenge as muslim - Sultan of Khwarizm, Georgia, Khiva, ruler in part of Cumania and Alania and ruler in Emirate of Merv. My family is also rulling in half of Anatolia (independent Sultan). I just faced The Ilkhanate and for now I am going well I think. For now, cause GH didn't appear yet, and probably this will be more serious problem. Here what happened so far. At 1216 Ilkhanate arrived. One year before I've had a warning, so I gathered all my forces and moved East. Ilkhanate arrived with 200.000 soldiers and declared war against Persian Empire, which was defeated fast. Due to this Ilkhanate gained 5 provinces, 2 of Khiva and few neighbour one (this suprised me cause that was war for Khiva, not Persia). After they won, they declared war against me for my part of Khiva. I've had only 50.000 soldiers (I don't have Legacy of Rome so I didn't have any retinues) so I only menaged to defeat one stack and then moved away with 28.000 left (22.000 I lost due to battle and attrition). They captured my holdings in Khiva and war was lost. After this they started moving West, they defeat Persia again, destroyed small Kingdom of Mesopotamia and started attacking smaller realms, even Egyptian Caliph (for Syria). But I didn't forget about Khiva and their expansion was my chance. While they were attacking small Tabriz I've gathered mercenaries and declared holy war for Bukhara, sending all my armies there too. War was fast - Ilkhanate tried to move back from Tabriz, but before they appeared in my Merv I've gathered 100% warscore. So they started moving Tabriz again - I broke the truce and attacked them again, this time holy war for Emirate of Khiva. Again I won before doomstack came. Now Ilkhanate is defending against Jihad (they got -60% warscore, so they'll win soon), but I am affraid of GH, which I guess can appear in any moment (year 1233)...
Ok, I wrote a bit, so guess now I will write down my conclusion:
1. There is no chance to defend if You aren't a blob. But at least worth is to try to kill as many enemies as possible.
2. It is good to have different de jure area. You will loose less (that'w why I am a bit angry on myself that I have incorporateD 2 Eastern Emirates from Khumans to Khwarizm - I should stop it, cause loosing it to GH will be more painfull now). Also it may be Your chance to start besieging faster - same as I had when Ilkhanate skipped my Emirate of Merv.
3. Their expansion is also Your chance. When they are far from You, strike them and make a border territory for Yourself. Force them to waste time and soldiers on it again if they will decide to retake it.
That's my suggestion. I am also thinking about... causing faction to revolt in a territory they plan to invade, but I didn't try it yet... But to be honest, I hope that free troops that faction will get may cause more harm to hordes...
Ok, I wrote a bit, so guess now I will write down my conclusion:
1. There is no chance to defend if You aren't a blob. But at least worth is to try to kill as many enemies as possible.
2. It is good to have different de jure area. You will loose less (that'w why I am a bit angry on myself that I have incorporateD 2 Eastern Emirates from Khumans to Khwarizm - I should stop it, cause loosing it to GH will be more painfull now). Also it may be Your chance to start besieging faster - same as I had when Ilkhanate skipped my Emirate of Merv.
3. Their expansion is also Your chance. When they are far from You, strike them and make a border territory for Yourself. Force them to waste time and soldiers on it again if they will decide to retake it.
That's my suggestion. I am also thinking about... causing faction to revolt in a territory they plan to invade, but I didn't try it yet... But to be honest, I hope that free troops that faction will get may cause more harm to hordes...
Worst part of the game is that combat is so poorly modeled, it can hardly be called part of the game. Numerical advantage is all that matters in CKII.
CK II is not war-game. It is medieval dynasties political simulator that fighting is only one part of it. Developing medieval diplomacy and political modeling is focus in CK II development.
Surely every game ever done could be done better but you have to make compromises if you want game getting released. If you make complex chances in warfare modeling it don’t automatically make game better because it could arise serious balance issues or open new ways to exploit system that cannot be seen in testing because of complexity.
Just look games like civilization series that have fairly simple warfare system still game is fun. When Civilization 5 was released and they started make warfare system more complex it opened tons of new ways to exploit AI that could not cope with more complex warfare system anymore.
Complex is not same as better or more balanced or less bugs or even less ways to exploit. Complex could also mean less balanced, more bugs, and more ways to exploit. This is reason why game developers have to find balance between complexity, balanced, bugs and possible ways of exploitation.