The franks army tips

[Squall.]

Hey guys. Im having some problems finding a good army mix setup. Im playing on hard. I like to get some tips on what units to use and what units to unlock first. The secondary objective states to recruit 10 units of freemen but they are quite worthless imo. how fo you guys play with the franks?

[alation13]

Get your second tier axemen pretty quickly, they can carve through most guys but may have issues against missiles so I usually have four units of archers and six units of freemen in my army to deal with missiles.

I am only at about turn 50 so still early days. But I have taken almost all of britain and some of the mainland. I am playing on normal level if that makes a difference.

[Squall.]

Okay thanks. Should i use the axemen to flank and hold the line with my spearmem. Are just use the axes as line infantry?

[Mortikhan]

Been playing them last 2 days. What has worked for me so far:

Cavalry: 4 (used for flanking/getting to seige engines/slingers/bowman in the open field)
Infantry: 6-8 (mix of melee and spear to hold the line and counter when you have the advantage)
Siege: 4 ( they have very little ammo in the early going and can only outrange towers but towers are tough as nuts in this to take if you take heavy losses in Spearman)
Bowman: 4-6 (much more affective than R2EE if you keep them out of harms way use cavalry to protect their flanks and they should chew up enough to make it easy work for you infantry.)

I would count your leader in with your melee and keep them behind the main line of spearman. Form your shield wall and keep an eye out for flanking forces. You can use your seige engines to pound on archers if need be but I would reserve them for towers. Also very important thing to remember is your faction bonus...as you lose more soldiers in a squad they get stronger so dont play hit and run with infantry just get in there and stay in there, especially with your spearman.

[alation13]

Actually I was checking out the freemen and I think I will just swap them out for axes. my axemen are actually not second tier but first tier upgraded if you know what I mean, same with archers. I am not currently using any spearmen as most enemy armies I am going against only have 2-4 units of light horses, but that tactic will most likely change when fighting the huns or another horse culture. I like to be a bit flexible which is why I probably kept the freemen so long.

Another thing about axes is they have that frenzy ability and also throwing weapons as they approach the enemy. That frenzy ability can be very effective for doing massive damage quickly and routing an enemy army or at least starting a rout that you can capitalize on.