Mercenaries and War...Cant seem to win.

[ian]

if i just pick on a small kingdom, its no big deal but when i go for the holy wars or crusades, i get destroyed. any tips? if i hire mercenaries i usually need them for long term, which costs money, and my vassles get mad if i have their levees up too long (we all know that story) so how do i win these things?

[mzy]

~cash

[Angel]

cash is everything. Do not go to war you cannot win. especially if you are a small kingdom. Small fries should think to become bigger first. do the research in your caslt , cities. Start with the ones that gives money first and go for the ones that give manpower.
When you get big enough to have at least thousands of men, you can worry about holy wars.

[Kogak]

Also note that, if you are catholic, crusaders will kill heretics for cheap. They cost piety to raise and money to maintain, but are much stronger than just a 7,000 strong army due to their high heavy cavalry ratio.

[ian]

thank you :) im sure that will help!

[Feasel The Feasible]

If you go on a crusade as a small kingdom you want to back cap the uncontested areas (ex: crusade for kingdom of jerusalem you back cap the areas of the kingdom that holds jerusalem thats not part of the dejure) because the main armys of the defenders will be rushing to the prime warscore places allowing you to farm up dat warscore and get a free kingdom

[Lizz]

wait till your target is busy with another war. give their troops some time to leave their homeland and then start your attack. if you're fast, then it's an easy strategy to expand fast (with at least the 75g mercenaries to avoid years of siege. in the beginning you can simply attack the bunch of 200-300 men defenses (of course, depends on starting location. but if they started a war themselves, than they raised their own levies and you fight smaller garrisions)). if attacking isn't an option cause of strong forts, then it's maybe possible to split the wholy army up to siege as much forts as you can simultaneously and then reassamble for attacking the weaker cities & temples.

use some of your kids (or yourself -> divorce) for 1-2 reliable alliances with neighbours.

i personally use mercenaries in nearly every war in the first 50-100 years (depends on my own size) and only build something, if i've more money than i need for mercenaries.

for money - if you imprison someone and don't need to do something else, than let them pay for freedom. if they own land, then they have a value. 25g/70g/145g/250g and whatever an emperor is worth. especially nice after won civil wars.

crusades? if they're for jerusalem, then look who's attacking. the first crusade usually fails cause of the cheap and strong fatimid/seljuk mercenaries. after that some holy orders should be found and everything is easier, but without at least one of HRE/france or a bunch of other kings chances of failure are quite high if the defenders have good support. but i have to say, i never really played a catholic ruler or joined any holy war for jerusalem. this is my experience from watching the KI vs KI holy wars. if the player joins it's maybe realtively simple cause of later mentioned bad KI shipfighting. and yes, the in the post obove mentioned conquering of other land is a possibility. if fatimid holds jerusalem - conquer kairo & alexandria :D

i played as muslim (fatimid) myself and my impression is: thank the KI that even one crusade for jerusalem is won by catholics. it's unbelievable easy to destroy the incoming forces if you use ships for fast travel and a strong army built from levies, mercenaries and hashashin (muslim holy order). the first crusade i killed the mainforce and then disbanded my own army, the other muslims did the rest. the 2nd crusade jerusalem was my own county and after i got bored cause of the weak attackers i simply conquered rome and ended the crusade. every following crusade i conquered rome with fast assembled +40.000 men within a month or two. i was preparing to fight the ilkhanat main force, no time for childplay with the catholics. but okay.. this requires, that you can handle decadence. i usually was <10%. made me quite a murderer, cause of my huge dynasty, but the empire was strong.

on the other side: as catholic use ships to destroy incoming reinforcements before they reach their main force. you can also place single ships over the whole coast as scouts. for example between kairo and sinai they have to pass the coast. or place decoys. a small army on land - if possible with mountains - and the main force on ships unloaded right into battle to avoid the "attack from sea" weakness.

ship-assisted-fights are a HUGE weakness of the KI, cause die KI hardly ever uses ships. byzantinum civil wars are painful in the beginning, but if you get enough ships to load about 10k troops (in the beginning, later a bit more) you'll win with sailing around and destroying the bunch of small armies before they assemble to a strong main force and have some space to defend revolting counties from other conquerors - which are lost otherwise even if you win the civil war.

[Arkeangel]

If you are a small Kingdom try to avoid Holy Wars as these can lead to you getting out of your depth very quickly as other leaders of the target's religion will join.

As above wait until your target is distracted in other wars. Look at the realm tree to find out how many troops people have in total and at this moment in time.

Ally with the HRE or Byzantium.

Again as above use navies the AI is rubbish at using them. Drop troops on the weakness holdings. Usually if you are attacking Jerusalem the 3 coastal provinces near the top of the kingdom will have been conquorered recently and will be weakness.

Also look for mosques/churches as they are weaker than castles in several ways.
1) Smaller garrisions/levies.
2) Lower fort levels.
3) quicker time before you can assault.

[Italian Albania]

Originally posted by TadMechers:

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As above wait until your target is distracted in other wars. Look at the realm tree to find out how many troops people have in total and at this moment in time.

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i haved played ck2 for a while know but where can i find the realm tree? i have never noticed it.

[Cosmik Debris]

i haved played ck2 for a while know but where can i find the realm tree? i have never noticed it.

You can get to the realm tree from the character menu. It is in the top right corner of the menu next to the dynasty name and crest.

It is a very usful tool, I use it very often to see who in my realm has the most military power.