BTW, is the navy going to be waiting on the Venice side of the Italian peninsula or the Milan side?
It'll be a lot faster if you go on the Venitian side.

Good old Hunthjofson takes the pain to Antwerp.



I think this is the largest army we've fielded so far.



The seething manflesh of the charge...



...and the sweet win.



Well, glad we're not there. Thanks for letting us know, game!




The Great Crusading Army steps off the boat and arrives neatly at the gates of a poorly defended Jerusalem. The pride, the glory and the looted gold will soon be ours.



Our crown prince charges theirs in a cataclysm of princely might. You'd better hope he doesn't die, Dustbuster, or you're stuck with the other prince, who sucks.



Thankfully he does not, and kills Mumbarak as a fucking afterthought while also cutting down five other riders and taking the city.



I really didn't need that army for the taking of Jerusalem, but I may well need the spare men to hold it and the surrounding area should they, y'know, want it back.



What self-respecting Catholic wouldn't slaughter 2000 Muslims for a nice chunk of gold? Certainly not any I know.



ONWARD CHRISTIAN SOOOLDIIIERRSSS



Heh.



He also got a Hospitaller Knight consort and a Templar Knight. And is now known as Charles the Crusader. Our C.Prince is getting seriously bad-ass. Not like his old useless dad.

I just wanted to say this LP is extremely entertaining and making me quite jealous.  My rig is over 4 years old and can't run Medieval: TWII.  But hey, hopefully in the Spring that will change; that's what tax rebates are for, yes?  Keep the fun times rolling!

I would be all in for this but...

A) My computer that I play it on doesn't currently have internet.
B) I suck so, horribly, horribly badly at the Overview, I only can play battles.
C) Then, in shame, I would send the king on a suicide mission so I wouldn't play anymore.

Great Job, Reverend. I really enjoy it. Especially the, "WHAT IS THIS FUTURE SCIENCE?" part.

Don't you feel great for disbanding those peasants?

On another note, anyone else notice how much ass the Sicilians can kick? 

I had Italian Militia, ITALIAN FUCKING MILITIA! The 2nd worst infantry unit in the faction! BEAT THE SHIT OUT OF THOSE PIECE OF SHIT MOORS AND THEIR PIECE OF SHIT 2 UNITS OF FUCKING ARAB CALVARY! FUCKING OWNED! (I'm so sorry, smite me.) THEN THEM CRUSADER SERGEANTS CAME AND CHARGED THEIR ASS! FUCKING PISS OFF YOU DAMN MUSLIMS! I'll teach you to mess with me, because Sicily is the purest state in all of Christendom and Muslimend - WHO GIVES A FUCK!

Great job, Reverend.   And Dustbuster? Do try to be as entertaining. 

Updatertron: The Defender and the Defendee, pt. 1



The game calculations are sometimes a bit thick. We've got the predicted advantage because we have two general's bodyguards taking part in this fight, and they have some awesome stats. Thing is, we're defending a castle against invading spearmen with only two infantry units ourselves. So even though our total defensive/offensive stats may be higher, since their force is a mix of archer/spearmen/cavalry, we are somewhat on the back foot.



The ladders advance.

If you look at the map (bottom left), you'll see the green star representing King Knud's reinforcements (read: just him and his riders) coming in on the OPPOSITE SIDE OF THE BATTLEFIELD. The plan for this battle is to desperately defend the front gate while he gallops to our aid, and then use him to charge-retreat-charge-retreat the back of the enemy in an attempt to make them rout.



The enemy ram is at our gates! Look at those steely Danes. This battle isn't over yet.



The gate collapses under the relentless battering, and we bring in Skapti to stand with the men. This is a very bad way to use heavy cavalry, who prefer the open field and hard charges, but if they get in and scatter that tiny force before Knud arrives we're fucked. They're just gonna have to stand there and take it.



The enemy runs from the walls, their ladder-attack being successfully repulsed by our warriors.



I thought this was a cool picture, the walls slightly obscured by mist. All those bodies are German, the men who fell to our arrow-towers as they advanced towards the castle.

"SCHNAPPSEL! The gates are down! PUSH FORWARD!"

"Yes sir". Schnappsel reared up on his horse and prepared to lead the valiant spears of the Emperor through the broken gate. He was the last of his cavalry unit, the rest cut down before even getting to the walls by the invisible men firing from the slits in the defender's towers. He would avenge all of them.

"SPEARS! To me! For the Holy Emperor!"

He took his place at the head of the column as they formed before the gate. He nudged his horse, Schnitzel, to a trot. He gazed unflinchingly at the line of warriors as he approched. He nudged his way past fallen Germans and broken gate struts alike. When he was within ten feet of the solid defending line he intoned a silent prayer to God and kicked Schnitzel into a gallop, hearing the footfalls of his men increase as they too began to run.



THE WRONG FUCKING WAY.

The men had broken just as he had begun to charge. Their increasing footfalls were fading rather than gaining impetus behind him, their cries those of terror rather than vitriol. But by now it was too late, he was at the defending line. He slashed left and right as he was enveloped by the jeering fighters. As his horse's legs were cut from under him he looked up to see the sneering face of Skapti of Lokken, sitting idly on his horse, clearly unperturbed by the lone horseman. His vision faded as he was lost in a pile of slashing axes.



A Fallen Hero.



The King arrives! Smashing into another enemy cavalry unit.



After Schnappsel's failure, the AI was clearly too depressed to do much of anything. Their archers just stood there right outside the gate getting mowed down, and one remaining spearmen unit inexplicably retreated 20 metres and stood still in formation. So we charged them.



Partly in thanks to some nice defending and the King arriving faster than expected, but more due to the AI doing some truly stupid things, we win. I am surprised but buoyed.

It's always amusing when the AI tards out. In Medieval 1, I don't know how many battles I've won simply by killing the enemy general (who is almost always in a cavalry unit) after his unit advanced to about 5 paces from my line of battle with no other reinforcements nearby, allowing it to become totally engulfed in a sea of manflesh.


Argh, now I want to play video games but I know I don't have time!

If you know any in particular (for Medieval 1 - I don't have 2), I'd like to be pointed in that direction. It just doesn't ring true that every single battle can be won by just turtling up with some spearmen, sticking archers in the middle to hinder their advance, and then sending cavalry after the ones that run away.

Though it is amusing when the after action report shows 12 casualties on my side, and 743 on the other side.

HappyKitty- I haven't played since getting my new computer several months ago, so I don't know about the most current mods. That said, the TWC Twiki can give you a lot of help. I believe that the Darth Mod was the one I used the longest. They had some other mini mods that bring back features from the first MTW, like Dukedoms.

Honestly, I think a lot of the mods turned this game from a "play a few months and stop" to a "reinstall and play every few months" type of game. The only thing keeping this game (or one of its mods) from being an all time classic with me is the crappy, limited strategic interface. Oh well.

The Next Great Chapter of Our Chronicle; The Defender and the Defendee, pt.2

Also, something to bear in mind as you read this one; how useful/interesting are the battle screens? There are more of them than usual in this update for reasons you'll see, but in general is what I mean. I can't really judge. I think they add a certain something, but on the other hand I feel a little like I'm saying HEY GUYS WATCH ME PLAY THIS BATTLE OH MAN I AM WICKED and it might just be hella boring. If people reckon they don't add all that much, I'll switch to one or two screens just for the bigger more momentous battles.



Now, I know it wasn't their fault, these men were just following orders. But we need to make an example.




Skapti of Lokken, the Hero of Hamburg, gathers a force to show the Holy Roman Empire Denmark isn't an ass that likes to bend over barrels.





Then we go take Acre with a small force, because we need heathen cities to loot to pay for this coming campaign back in Europe.



Options options options... Which force to take on?




It seems the commander had drunk too much foul Danish wine that day (read; I was very drunk) and decided the best option was to fight 'as many of them as possible at the same time.' We steel ourselves as our 1131 hardy Danes prepare to take on 2783 of the Emperor's finest.




We start facing only the initial army we chose to fight, which is just Dietrich von Saxony and his retinue. Since General's Bodyguard units are hard bastards, we decide to try to finish him quickly before the massive reinforcement armies arrive and give him a chance to be a pain while we're distracted. We march forward slightly and unleash volleys.



After weakining von Saxony with arrows, we send in two cavalry units to finish him off while we wheel the rest of the army round to face the oncoming forces, pulling back slightly and onto the higher ground. One enemy army is still way off in the directly-ahead distance and the other is approaching us quickly. You can just about see their banners in the upper-right quarter of the screen. Those yellow dots are showing our units' positions when they arrive where I've told them to go.



von Saxony was plenty weakened and falls easily to our charging lances.





As the enemy closes we swiftly reform the line and use our cavalry to repeatedly charge the unprepared advancing infantry of the enemy.



This is the enemy's first army in full retreat. They thickly did not wait for the second to arrive before advancing, even though we were just standing on a hill waiting patiently for them. The second one is even bigger, though, and closing fast.



Our scout unit finally breaks, after doing an absolutely sterling job charging the rear of enemy infantry. Let them go, they deserve to leave the field.



Their other General, Lukas von Schwaben, advancing towards our line.



He is greeted by a ridiculous volley of arrows.




Our General and a spearmen unit charge him from two sides as he reaches the line, and he goes down.



This makes them all break like little girls and we chase them down. We take 1283 prisoners by the end of the battle.





Those scouts did bloody well. Skapti is becoming quite the general.