Ireland

[Lockdown]

I've played this game tons as a kid but I never recall actually beating Ireland (The 3rd level) of the campaign.

Just beat the first 2 maps rather easily but I remember the difficulty skyrockets for this one. Any strategies for any seasoned players?

[RALPHIE]

dont take that small county at the bottom of the map. collect stone and build up your castle to royal. load it with archers but dont put them on the edge of the towers; the attacking armies cant fire past the edges of the towers. Feed your people, double down on winter and triple while sick. the key is stockpiling and taking it slow. Take a county and build it up just like your first county

[hasards05]

Also, beware of the Bishop. Do not trust him, do not take your eyes off him, and for petes sake do NOT ally with him. That shifty bastard will turn on you faster than you can blink.

[Lockdown]

Going to take a crack at this today or tomorrow, will let you guys know how it went

[Trigger Loaded]

Ahh, Ireland. Years ago when I played the campaign, Ireland was one of my best defeat-to-victory stories.

I believe I had defeated the Baron, but the Bishop and the Knight were both enemies at this point. Despite how the Bishop had most of Ireland, with the Knight having a few territories, both set aside their differences and dedicated themselves to taking me and my lone county down.

Fortunately, I had a Royal Castle fully filled with archers. As suggested, I just bided my time and waited, building up an army that hid far enough away while the Bishop had my castle under near-permanent siege, but never able to cost me more than a few archers before I sent him scurrying.

Finally, I had enough and struck. I forget the specific reigon, but one neighbouring region was a keystone of the Bishop's lands, meaning I cut his lands in half with a single blow. And from there, my lone county expanded and I was able to take the two of them out.

[takingoutangerafterwork!]

Originally posted by Lockdown:

Going to take a crack at this today or tomorrow, will let you guys know how it went

Years later, I am having the same questions as you did and I stumbled across this thread. Did you ever win? If so, did the above strategies work? Do you remember all these years later? LOL

[SympliKrazi]

Originally posted by takingoutangerafterwork!:

Originally posted by Lockdown:

Going to take a crack at this today or tomorrow, will let you guys know how it went

Years later, I am having the same questions as you did and I stumbled across this thread. Did you ever win? If so, did the above strategies work? Do you remember all these years later? LOL

This is how I usually play... Enable climate in options, sell most cows, buy grain. Use serfs to reclaim all your fields. Let the fields grow to excellent fertility by having more fallow fields. Maximize grain growth with 2 grain field to 1 fallow field ratio. Winter - Summer allot your manpower to resource and weapon production. In the fall, harvest as much grain as possible, while leaving at least 1 person in each production camp to keep efficiency high.

Build and fill your castle with archers, let your opponents attack it and let the computer handle the battle. The odds are something like 4:1 in castle's favor, so chances are you will win with few casualties. Start upgrading the castle soon as you have enough resources.
Don't let marauding parties to destroy your fields.
Build your army up until you have enough to take over the next county.
rinse an repeat.
When you're laying siege to an opponent's castle, it's generally best to take control your army and provoke the oil cauldrons to spill on only over 2-3 of your faster units and have them run away. I often change game speed and pause the game to make sure things don't get out of hand.

[ShadowFox]

Turtle then explode, sell cows buy grain, repair fields max happiness build a strong castle with good defenders. Make lots of bows to sell for mercenaries and for warriors. Then when you are ready buy a 200 pack of mercs add 300 archers of your own and conquer a province or two :)

[mrpopoo]

I don't remember Ireland being that hard.

BRB

[mrpopoo]

Currently playing it, Impossible difficulty, 5 starting nobles, no troops, no weapons, 2500gp no starting castle, weak starting status, advanced farming on. County started with mine and forest.

Allied with Countess, bishop closest to me. knight sandwiched between bishop and countess, baron off on his own like me. Countess knocked him out quick, fighting back and forth between her and knight, I took bishops lands, built a keep and royal on the 2 he had. Now its just me and the Countess. Not too hard. ill just be building up and smashing

[takingoutangerafterwork!]

So I ended up beating both it and Italy - but had to start Italy over. I definitely went with grain over cattle although I kept some cattle (50 or so). I just stayed patient and slowly built up my armies. The strategy that helped the most was taking a county that made an opponent no longer contiguous. That also worked in Italy for me. If you can ever do that, go for it. It's a huge blow to any opponent.

[Colonel Sanders Lite]

Originally posted by takingoutangerafterwork!:

The strategy that helped the most was taking a county that made an opponent no longer contiguous. That also worked in Italy for me. If you can ever do that, go for it. It's a huge blow to any opponent.

Yeah, generally speaking this is a pretty powerful strategy in lords 2. I just want to point out that there is a downside though -

When you cut off a county like that, as a general rule, you'll probably want to come in with another army and just grab the loose neutral county. That means you'll have to attack the town center which means that the county will raise an army from it's population and you'll have to kill them.

If you just took the castle instead, you would have claimed the county as it stands with no population damage.

Of course, how much this fine difference actually matters is very situational.

[mrpopoo]

Depending on how well you're established, taking the neutral counties aren't necessary. Sometimes its better to hamstring the AI with out spreading yourself thin.

[Colonel Sanders Lite]

That's true, yes. The game is a wargame first with a very clearly defined victory condition - no other lord has any counties or armies. It's not worthwhile to hold a county that doesn't advance you towards that goal.