Those nasty Mongolians!

[unmerged(70654)]

The first time I encountered the Mongols I had played a game as Armenia Cilicia and conquered most of the Middle East besides the fringe of Persia. The Mongols arrived and instantly destroyed the remnant Persian muslim kingdoms which I had yet to conquer then marched on to me. I was unable to stop them and it ruined the game.

Second time I played as Aragon from the start date, spent the game conquering until I had reached Crimea, I controlled from Portugal to Crimea, including Germany, parts of Russia, Africa and most of the Middle East. This time the Mongols invaded from Central Asia instead of Persia and I immediately mobilized 200,000+ troops and crushed them. Heres a tip about fighting the mongols... the more you let them conquer, the bigger their army gets. It is only one stack of 40,000 starting off, and it only becomes impossible to beat by the very tactics the noobs in the previous posts have suggested - i.e. letting them conquer things and letting other nations deal with them.
The "Reconquista" is not possible in DV, as you get badboy points for everything, so you can't let them win at all from the getgo. My suggestion would be to immediately declare war on the Mongols as soon as they appear, even if you are relatively far away, and smash them. OF course, if you are a regional power rather than an Empire, I don't know what to tell you, you are probably doomed. I think the minimum size force needed to kill the mongols would be that of Germany's size realm.


Think of the mongols as Mordor, if you let them mass you will get owned, but if you deal with them when they are small, you won't have to do a suicide mission to mount doom.

 

[saskganesh]

My usual rule of thumb is that if your realm can mass 200K men, you have a good chance of beating an uber-horde. otherwise, it's very hard slogging. If they break into Germany, and still show no signs of breaking up, it is probably too late.

 

[Chipawah]

Well I just realized that the main problem I had with mongols comes from starting in the hundred years war campaign.

At the start of this campaign the golden horde is already broken up and has one province and a whole bunch of vassals (and is also ruled by a Turkish ruler). What then happens is that these vassals start to declare independence and goes to war against their liege, but they don't stand a chance because they don't declare war all at once but only one or two at a time and they get stomped by the Sultan who then adds the province to his demesne (and he has the mongol no-demesne-limit so he doesn't need to distribute any new vassals). After a while the Sultan has swallowed up all of those 60 or so vassals into one big demesne from which he can now draft attritionless armies and re-start the conquest of the europe as a mongol horde infinitely stronger than they are in the other campaigns.

I won't be playing any more games using that campaing...

 

[jamhaw]

I won't be playing any more games using that campaing...

What difficulty/aggressiveness level were you at? I played that campaign hoping for a super Mongolia but it didn't happen.

 

[johnbecool]

Jamhaw, so am i !!! The golden horde don't move at all.... Il khanat didn't survive to the succession...

 

[Chipawah]

What difficulty/aggressiveness level were you at? I played that campaign hoping for a super Mongolia but it didn't happen.

DV - Normal/Normal

 

[Chipawah]

Jamhaw, so am i !!! The golden horde don't move at all.... Il khanat didn't survive to the succession...

The mongols seem to act very unpredictably.

I've seen them come in and launch a 80000 men strong army against a neighbour only to accept a peace treaty in exchange for some gold before the siege is over (why the mongol with a monthly income of -2049 would bother with 31 gold is beyond me...), and while their main stack is idly wandering around collecting indemnities instead of provinces the mongol territory is slowly being eaten up by other enemies...

It seems rare that the mongol events strike that proper balance of challenge where they shake things up a lot without completely dominating.

 

[unmerged(31881)]

Could the events be tweaked so that after set capitals fall (e.g. Byzantium, Warsaw, Alexandria) - then a Realm Duress trait is added to the ruler? That might impede the unstoppability.

Not sure how to stop them accepting tiny offerings for peace.

Plus i wish there was a way to apply for Vassal status (using CK rather than DV) instead of either beating or losing to the Horde. i, for one, would rather welcome the new Mongol overlords.


(Assuming by that point i haven't unified all the Russian lands.)

 

[jordarkelf]

Could the events be tweaked so that after set capitals fall (e.g. Byzantium, Warsaw, Alexandria) - then a Realm Duress trait is added to the ruler? That might impede the unstoppability.

You mean, add realm duress to the holder of the ILKH or GOLD title if they own certain provinces? I think this is writable, but it will not help much as long as they have no demesne limit. While conquering they usually have no vassals.

 

[yourworstnightm]

Weird, in my games the Mongols just screw up ,however in my games there's usually already some kind of badass in Eastern Europe fully capable of kicking their ass, once it was me as Russia, and once some weird pagans from Don unified all Eastern Europe and serioulsy kicked Mongol ass, me (Denmark) was preparing to face the Mongols, but realized there was no need to panic.

 

[unmerged(75409)]

In the one game that I played up to 1300, the Mongols were pretty evil. The Golden Horde never appeared, but the Il Khanate did. They totally stomped the Seljuks and were romping across Mesopotamia when I noticed them.

I was playing as Italy and had already set up strong catholic kingdoms in Jerusalem and Anatolia. The two attacked the Mongols, together with the Byzzies (by then lords of Russia and the southern Balkans). They were barely holding the line, pinning the Mongols down in Mesopotamia and the Caucasus, it was really interesting to see three strong AI kingdoms fight the Mongols. They would occasionally peace out and later re-declare war, but one or two of them would always be in the fight so the Mongols were kept at bay.

I mobilized some left over vassals that I had acquired in southern Persia, maybe 20,000 men, and took a whole buch of provinces from the Mongols while their horde was battling the AI kingdoms. I probably tipped the scales, the AI kingdoms were fighting with regiments of 200-800 mean each at this point, so I guess they would have crumbled and eventually fallen. But with the diversion in their rear they were disrupted and the four of us (Jerusalem+Nicaea+Byzantines+me) chased them around Persia for some time and they only owned the provinces where they had their unbeatable stacks as everything else was rapidly sieged and reconquered. I withdrew after some time and the AI kingdoms eventually defeated the Mongols (after they got breakup events). Persia ended up divided between the three of them, converting the area slowly and ruling it through Italian and Greek counts.

Very fun game, and I think the Mongols were actually pretty well balanced because there was only one realm of them. Had the Golden Horde also appeared they would probably have destroyed Byzantium's lands in Russia and thus helped their Ilkhanate brothers. As it is the Mongols were defeated solely with troops from the Balkans, southern Russia and the middle east. Had the GH appeared I would have had to mobilize my mediterranean empire (300-400,000 men) in order to stop them.

 

[unmerged(102959)]

I've played a few 1066 games now, but haven't made it past 1300.
In none of these games did the Mongols ever do anything! They were
always squashed within a few years by a mid-level regional power.

I wish I could see the Mongols really do some damage sometime.

Playing vanilla DV with latest patch and no mods.

 

[DarthJF]

I've played a few 1066 games now, but haven't made it past 1300.
In none of these games did the Mongols ever do anything! They were
always squashed within a few years by a mid-level regional power.

I wish I could see the Mongols really do some damage sometime.

Same here. In my games they always seem to waste their starting forces by having them running circle when their neighbours take their lands.

For once I'd wish to see huge Mongol empire pouring from the east that I could just barely stop at the gates of Constantinople.

 

[unmerged(75409)]

Same here. In my games they always seem to waste their starting forces by having them running circle when their neighbours take their lands.

For once I'd wish to see huge Mongol empire pouring from the east that I could just barely stop at the gates of Constantinople.

That's easy to obtain. Just smash the Muslims in Persia and the Cumans in Russia... and establish some weak bishoprics in their place that give 100% power to clergy and get province revolts for 50 years. Once the Mongols come they will cut through them like a knife cuts through butter.

If you feel particularly nasty you can declare war on the neighbours of the Mongol spawn province right when the Mongols appear, before they have declared war on anyone. DoWing them will cause them to levy their troops and give them march orders, and the AI will not cancel those march orders until the troops arrive at their destination. If the destination is your own demesne province in Constantinople, i.e. if they send their troops off before the Mongols DoW them and cause them to reconsider their strategic priorities, then this means the Cumans or Seljuks will keep marching their troops across Anatolia and the Black Sea while the Mongols romp through their lands. Instant win for the Mongol horde.

After the Mongols have etablished themselves in 8-12 provinces they become very hard to defeat since they are usually done massacring their neighbours before the neighbours are done sieging the Mongol provinces. Blobbing becomes likely, with time the Mongols will get access to sizable provincial levies along with their event-created starting regiments, and then your Byzzie emperor will have a job to do

 

[unmerged(102959)]

Thanks for the nifty advice. I'm thinking that even if I'm playing a Western European king, I might send a few regiments to do damage to the Cumans as you suggest.

Christian kings helping the Mongols before they show their true (bloodthirsty)colors actually makes historical sense, too. Many Christians hoped that the Mongol Khans were the mythical Christian King of the East, Prester John, who was supposed to come and smash the Muslims and the Pagans.

 

[unmerged(82381)]

I just put my Wales DVIP campaign on hold a little before 1300 and my impression of the Mongols is that they were incredibly weak that time. The Golden Horde captured about 20 provinces and got into a fight with most of Russia. Their problem was that they would settle for peace with all the little vassals of the big kings for some trivial amount of gold. They stopped conquering countries and became the conquered.