Optimal retinues vs "Optimal levies"

[Ragingnorman]

It's well known that Schiltron (Scottish) and Pike (Italian) are the best power/cap retinues currently, followed by cultural pure Heavy Infantry retinues. I know some people prefer high numbers over power optimization (Somali, Ethiopian or the good old Light Skirmish) but that's not what this thread is about.

My point is: considering the cost of retinue recruitment, the fact that HI retinues are still pretty good and that your levies will probably be composed of more Heavy Infantry than Pikemen AND Light Infantry together, wouldn't it be a smarter strategy to go for a Heavy Infantry cultural retinue and organize your doomstack in three flanks that mainly consist of HI in order for the right tactics to fire more often instead of 2 flanks made of disorganized levies and one godly pikemen central flank?.

I'm figuring: Left (HI 80%), Center (HI 80%), Right (HI 80%)

Instead of: Left (Levy mess), Center (Pike 100%), Right (Levy mess)

% = efficiency

I admit that I didn't do the math, but I wouldn't be shocked if 3 flanks of Druzhina/Levy mix, with max cultural buildings, barracks and training grounds (bonus: reformed Zunist) managed to overpower the current 3 flanks of Levy - Schiltron - Levy "meta". Am I missing something?

 

[nkibilko]

wouldn't it be a smarter strategy to go for a Heavy Infantry cultural retinue and organize your doomstack in three flanks that mainly consist of HI in order for the right tactics to fire more often instead of 2 flanks made of disorganized levies and one godly pikemen central flank?.

You're better off always keeping your retinue as it's own separate unit with 100% heavy infantry... Mixed unit types will taint your tactics and just mess things up.

100% heavy infantry and 100% heavy cavalry are serious assbeaters. Those units can be outnumbered and still win.

 

[Ragingnorman]

I can't see how it's possible to have 100% HC, they are always tied with LC (that hinders the performance of heavy cavalry with Raid).

With around 80% Heavy Infantry I'd have the occasional Slow Advance (cause of at least 1% pikemen), the rest would pretty much be the same, below 1% HC and below 20% Archers would keep the tactics consistent. It would obviously perform worse against one 99% Pike + 1% Archers (for shieldwall) flank, but the three flanks together should peform much better than 1 pure retinue + 2 pure levies, no?

 

[nkibilko]

I can't see how it's possible to have 100% HC, they are always tied with LC (that hinders the performance of heavy cavalry with Raid).

With around 80% Heavy Infantry I'd have the occasional Slow Advance (cause of at least 1% pikemen), the rest would pretty much be the same, below 1% HC and below 20% Archers would keep the tactics consistent. It would obviously perform worse against one 99% Pike + 1% Archers (for shieldwall) flank, but the three flanks together should peform much better than 1 pure retinue + 2 pure levies, no?

Nomads are the only way to have full HC, unless you mod.

No idea why the knight retinue has light cav in it, it should just be 150 HC.

 

[Kumicho]

You're better off always keeping your retinue as it's own separate unit with 100% heavy infantry... Mixed unit types will taint your tactics and just mess things up.

100% heavy infantry and 100% heavy cavalry are serious assbeaters. Those units can be outnumbered and still win.

Sorry, with the new tactics many of the "pure 100% retinue" tactics aren't as good. For example, 100% HI doesn't get you Shieldwall anymore, and 100% LC gets you Disorganized Harass. Plus, with the nerf to retinue costs/numbers, by the time you can field 3 full flanks (or hell, even one full flank) of retinues, you've already "won" the game anyway...

My current strategy is just to go cultural retinue and use them (and the cultural buildings) to augment levies instead of trying to have them win solely on their own. The extra ~600-1000 HI you might have from a Scandinavian retinue aren't going to cut it on their own, but when added to your levies they provide a nice extra punch.

If I have one of the better cultural retinues (LC, HI, etc), I will also tailor my levies accordingly, though. So when I have LC retinues, I don't build Militia Training Grounds because I don't want the Archers/LI screwing with my tactics. As a result, my combined armies are very heavy on LC, but have enough HI and LC to give them the better tactics. So when I'm in a desperate battle, I'll specifically put all my retinues in the center with *only* castle levies, so they're not diluted with vassal levies (which are usually much more mixed), or city levies (which are heavier on lighter foot troops).

 

[Ragingnorman]

I'm planning to do something very close from what you just described.

Start Jain (for demesne), gather holdings inside the silk route, develop my barracks and training grounds (the ones that give more retinue and morale, not the militia training grounds), change culture after I form an empire and develop the HI cultural building, after that I'll mix cultural HI retinues with personal levies (and vassal levies to some extent). Max gold from vassals and cities in order to don't screw up my composition and have more than enough income for my retinue and improvements

 

[Dragatus]

It's well known that Schiltron (Scottish) and Pike (Italian) are the best power/cap retinues currently, followed by cultural pure Heavy Infantry retinues. I know some people prefer high numbers over power optimization (Somali, Ethiopian or the good old Light Skirmish) but that's not what this thread is about.

My point is: considering the cost of retinue recruitment, the fact that HI retinues are still pretty good and that your levies will probably be composed of more Heavy Infantry than Pikemen AND Light Infantry together, wouldn't it be a smarter strategy to go for a Heavy Infantry cultural retinue and organize your doomstack in three flanks that mainly consist of HI in order for the right tactics to fire more often instead of 2 flanks made of disorganized levies and one godly pikemen central flank?.

I'm figuring: Left (HI 80%), Center (HI 80%), Right (HI 80%)

Instead of: Left (Levy mess), Center (Pike 100%), Right (Levy mess)

% = efficiency

I admit that I didn't do the math, but I wouldn't be shocked if 3 flanks of Druzhina/Levy mix, with max cultural buildings, barracks and training grounds (bonus: reformed Zunist) managed to overpower the current 3 flanks of Levy - Schiltron - Levy "meta". Am I missing something?

This is certainly a viable aproach, especially given how retinues generally don't represent more than 10%-20% of your entire army (at least if you don't want to go broke after every battle). In fact I'd say it's probably superior and it's roughly what I've been doing in my Russian Carphatia game.

Sorry, with the new tactics many of the "pure 100% retinue" tactics aren't as good. For example, 100% HI doesn't get you Shieldwall anymore, and 100% LC gets you Disorganized Harass. Plus, with the nerf to retinue costs/numbers, by the time you can field 3 full flanks (or hell, even one full flank) of retinues, you've already "won" the game anyway...

Actually in the previous patch Shieldwall required 20% archers, so it's now more easily available than before (only requires 1% archers in 2.5). You just need to mix in one or two Shock/Defense retinues with your pure HI/Pike retinues and you're set.

 

[Kumicho]

Not sure about the immediately previous patch, but it used to be zero Archers were required for Shieldwall...