Medieval 2 Factions Tier List
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- Опубліковано 20 тра 2024
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Tier List explaining the strength of every faction in Medieval 2 and the Kingdoms Expansion campaigns. 5 Tier Lists.
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thanks for the content
i been watching legend videos wrong....... i should watch them from old to new....
I like the one with the exploits for med 2 "Psudeo Random Chance Manipulation" EXPLOIT...one of the best
Worst new TW features tier list?
Vanilla M2TW Campain:
1. Scotland - I disagree with bad rooster. Against superior cav Scots' pikes are ridiculously lethal cure. Moreover light troops are better in some king of terrains, gets tired later than heavy troops - that's their tactical adventage. Scots' expanding routes are Benelux, Breton and Ireland. They can quickly jump to Africa and East Iberia. I rate them as adequate.
2. Danes - I feel them as adequate. After catching Hamburg you can expand north and wait for excommunication of HRE. Rooster is infantry based. It's bad, but not the worst. A lot of killing potential (Obudshaer, Axemen), but lack of defensive units (just militias).
3. Moors - Bad. Later in the game they are lacking of heavy and modern units so badly...
Americas Campain:
Apaches and Chichimecs are a lil above Aztecs.
Total War Advisors tier list. From more annoying to more iconic
Shogun 2 advisor S tier for sure
@@mehdimalek6147 S for Shamfur Dispray!
Rome 1 Advisor was the best.
"These treacherous ingrates declared their independance, it's time for the iron fist of the state to crush this rebellion."
AAALLLLL ROOME WILL BE AMAAZED AT SUCH A VICTREE! THE DAAaaaAAaaY IS OOOOuuuUUURS!!
OGRES MY LORD!
17:30 "I love Poland, but its start position sucks". Mate, I am from Poland, and I couldn't agree more😅
Historical accuracy
RealLifeLore did even a video on it, adequately called "Why Poland's Geography is the Worst"
"Rich territory, surrounded by people who hate you" yep, pretty much sums it up lol
Same with Romania(Wallachia/Moldova/Transylvania). Don't know how we even survived throughout the centuries
@@JB-xl2jcdefinitely needed kings like Prussia had to somehow fend off invaders from everywhere
What makes Milan so insane to me is that they can recruit everything they need out of cities and fill cav with mercs, whenever a crusade rolls around
And if you win a few crusades, you can start building the Templar or Hospitalars buildings in your cities to be able to recruit some of the best knight units.
Italian Spear Militia is op.
Turks too can do that. Turkish cities provide Saracen militia which is basically Eastern Armoured Sergeant aka fancy spearman, Janissary Inf which is just as strong in melee as DFK, even better against mounted. Both Sipahi and Turkoman (archer cav) can be recruited from the racing track building. No melee cav but transferring cav from a distant castle is fast and easy, and expendable family members or merc. can serve as heavy melee cav.
Late game there are options such Gun Janissary, Archer Janissary as well.
Any faction can be good if you play to their strengths.
@@mageem06Not really. factions are not created equal in this or any other total war game. Sure you can win with any faction, doesnt make them strong
I know of two cases in Medieval 2 when the AI keeps their alliance and don't attack.
1. The Pope. Due to having a less expansionist AI (I think), he doesn't attack you even if he has no other potential enemies. In my campaign as Milan I conquered the entire map, except for Rome and the New World and the Pope was never hostile.
2. Crusader states. When playing the crusades campaign as Jerusalem or Antioch, the other one tends to stay friendly towards you and focuses on fighting the Muslims.
But that's pretty much it, I've never ever found a reliable ally except for these two circumstances.
Having allies in Rome, Medieval 2 and Shogun 2 is fairly pointless, sadly
@@Dianblerin shogun 2 even vassals will backstab you lol
Portugal kept their alliance with me (spain) for a long time, even when they had nowhere to expand and their priority in the diplomatic window read "War"
I don't know whether they would've declared war on me eventually, I couldn't weather the France-Sicily-Milan-England onslaught
Man, F vanilla
Try mods
I played HRE and pope went straight for me even after alliance, I guess because he thinks I want Rome for my victory condition.
Gotta love Scotland's ranged options, or lack thereof
No natural access to long ranged archers, and although their archers are listed as anti armour, it's not because of their arrows, but because their melee weapon is an axe
I've found that in base Medieval 2, as a European/Catholic nation, I always send my diplomat towards Rome and buy an alliance with the Papal States. Do that before they ally with anyone, and they're in your pocket for the rest of the game. Give them 100 florins a turn and they'll love you, and you can declare Crusades on almost anyone as they'll excommunicate anyone who attacks you.
Agreed, always do this. Even with an orthodox or Muslim faction this can work
Instead of paying them 100/turn, give them territory between you and your enemies. Pope is happy and you can make one of your borders safe with power of all christendom!
@@cyrylkowalczyk9392 I'm currently using this strategy for my France campaign in SSHIP: I've got a complete Papal barrier between the HRE while biding my time and focusing elsewhere.
@@cyrylkowalczyk9392 Or you can just push on every front and conquer everyone, including the Pope. >:D
@@snowisthebestweather Conquering pope is a hassle, they respawn big armies to reconquer Rome every couple of rounds. Tried to "move" papal states to Jerusalem once, but sadly they never let me buy Rome from them.
I still remember when Medieval 2 was out I was rocking 19 Szlachta doomstacks as Poland like nobody's business and just obliterating everything. The polish roster also is amazing because the really good units are accessible very early on, while France or HRE need to build up for the awesome stuff to come online.
I disagree. Their spearmen only have 60 in a unit while other armored sergeants have 75. Their dismounted knights need a citadel while other factions only need a fortress. Other catholic factions are stronger and come online earlier.
My point is you can recruit szlachta in *any* fort (and they have good replenishment) and you have basically no need for any other unit early on while you take care of the HRE - at least that was how I played it.
I think you mean strzelcy. Cav is slightly overrated imo, so many offensive sieges in this game and they really struggle in those. Much of the time they just stand around doing nothing.
@@windblownleaf6450 Cavalry is the rightful king of Medieval 2, it lets you kill enemy armies with ease and capture barely defended settlements afterwards. General's bodyguards and mailed knights are the best, most cost-effective Catholic units. Just hire mercenary crossbowmen and whatever trash infantry to support them and take empty settlements. You can easily finish VH/VH grand campaign in 35-40 turns that way. Most late game units are really overrated.
@@st.gallenthegreat4027 How do you use cavalry in an offensive siege
The fact you have the Byzantines as bad in Grand Campaign and Super Power in Crusades tracks, and it explains why I love them so much. Their army roster is so good and so fun to use, but its their brutal start position in Grand Campaign sandwhiched between both aggressive Catholic and Muslim factions that make them so challenging and so rewarding to play. You call their lack of a Crusade/Jihad mechanic a major drawback of them and I agree, but I also think those mechanics are a bit TOO strong in Med2 to the point they make the game too easy. Putting the Byzantines in the thick of everything with no Crusade mechanic to bail them out just puts more emphasis on the player managing their economy and armies well.
They're my favorite faction in Medieval 2. Strong but still with some challenge to play, with a campaign that can vary wildly depending on which direction you expand in first.
Also just as a small sidenote. I think England is a Super Power too. You're right about them not being able to take over Rome as fast, but I don't consider that to be enough of a drawback to make up for their absolutely broken army roster. England's army roster is simply overpowered in the Med2 Grand Campaign. Longbowmen are by far the most cost effective easy mode spammable unit in the game. The AI has no idea how to handle them and you can stomp everything with them, and they can be mass produced so quickly.
Massive agree on the Byzantines. It also has the added fun of restoring them to glory as a little over arching story for yourself.
He actually mentioned Byzantine stacks being the strongest in vanilla, but others can conquer and replenish forces quickly due to Jihad/crusade.
I completely agree. Byz and Eng are my favourite factions
Byzantine appreciation! Easily one of the best campaign experiences around, and a very fun unit roster
Lore accurate England. Well until gunpowder came through and suddenly stacks of longbowmen were being blown up by a tiny bit of powder.
The Tlaxcalans allied with the spanish after fighting them tooth and nail, there was a tlaxcalan warrior who was the first to kill a horseman by cutting off the horses head and thereby showing all the natives that they werent in fact supernatural beings as they first believed.
The conquest of Mexico is in my opinion one of the most amazing stories in human history
The best thing about England is that you can sit in your island, play tall and easily fend off any invasion. Like High Elves but with better cavalry.
Not sure about that. HE's playstyle tends to be ruthlessly expansionist through land war with the mainland feeding the colonies, while the British Empire was cautiously expansionist through naval supremacy with the colonies feeding the mainland.
Portugal and Spain are absolutely sending stacks your way for no reason
@@aisir3725 yeah, famous Portuguese/Spanish Dublin or Caernarvon.
Yeah I wrecked the mongols with England.
@Count.Saruman HE are a slow expander. You want trade partners to powerhouse the economy
You can get very powerful with Sicily, but I always found its resources in the early game very limited. You start losing money on turn 1, the rebel settlements around you are very poor. In addition, Milan, Venice, Byzantium and possibly the Pope will pound on you simultaneously, if you're not proactive. If you overcome the challenging start however, you are most likely the Pope and an absolute powerhouse. One of my favorite campaigns but in no way beginner friendly.
You can get a lot of money by going around selling trade rights and alliances. Within 10 turns I'm usually set.
most of the time i will just make a good army and call crusade to cairo then migrate completely there set capital in cairo, selling settlement back home to papal state and faction around for good relation lol. And since you are in muslim territory your priest will have skyrocket piety , even more with theologian guild = ez cardinal or even pope position later on. easily have st john chapter house for hospitaller knight - extremely strong unit in the game. the Muslim have no match for you since you have really good infantry, pavise crossbow millitia can rip those horse archer to shred
The thing about Sicily is that you NEED to invest in a navy if you want to be able to dominate with them. Navies aren't cheap. So while you absolutely can dominate with them, the fact you need to spend a portion of what you earn to keep control of the waves, while most other factions don't does slow them down a bit.
I think Sicily is the great middle ground between Italian Militia units, and Norman Knight units. I focus on being the pope's best friend, and eventually dominating the Papacy with my army of converting priests in Muslim lands.
Venice and Milan are free eats, I want their land. Those five cities in Northern Italy are some of the richest and concentrated on the map. I take Florence early, and try to buy Bologne off of the HRE.
I love Sicily as a crusading, trading, Papal Empire.
Honestly to put Sicily above France is absurd. France has the much better roster, much better economy, much larger starting territory and a lot more rebel territory in the near vicinity to take for free.
Sicily has what, slightly shorter travel time to the holy land, and thats it? I love playing Sicily, dont get me wrong Norman Knights are super fun, but France is objectivly much better.
Loving these medieval 2 videos. Takes me back to when I could afford total war games 😂
Try flight sims!
lol "me no can afford dragon and dwarf game"
@@77LUCKYNUMBER77pretty much, even on sale each warhammer game starts at £40-£60 and with dlcs it gets easily to £100+ per game
In the base game, Scotland also manages to suffer from the two handed bug and pikes switching to thier swords - so thier key units completely underperform
Yep, their roster is actually one of the best in the game IF you fix the two hander bug and pike swapping. Pikes go from worthless to one of the most brutally cost efficient unit types if you remove their secondary weapon.
I’m aware of the pikemen bug in Medieval 2, but what’s the two-hander bug?
@@JurzGarz Two handed units had their attack animation speed set too low so other units constantly force them to parry, interrupting their attacks. Outside of an initial charge they were near useless, even peasants could stun-lock Varangian Guards to death.
Their animation set also struggled against cavalry models and would just fail to trigger iirc, which is why halberdiers were hilariously bad against cavalry.
@@MouseyCommander were these bugs ever corrected? Or are there mods for it?
@@garak55 The two handed bug was fixed by the Kingdoms expansion, but only in those new campaigns. The grand campaign still has it. Most mods build off the Kingdoms patch so should be fine.
The pike bug is still in vanilla and kingdoms but is a simple fix, just edit export_descr_unit and for any unit with long_pike, replace the stat_sec line with one from a unit without a secondary weapon. Almost every mod with pikes I've played does this (and usually nerfs their primary attack to make up for how OP pikes get!)
Fun side mechanic of the Papal States, their settlements don't rebel, ever.
If you play as them you benefit from this too.
Now that you mentioned it, think you are right
How do you play as the papal states?
@soulz1999 You need to unlock it manually. I haven't played in a while, but just type "Medieval II how to unlock Papal States" and you should get your answer
@@soulz1999 Look for \Medieval II Total War\data\world\maps\campaign\imperial_campaign\descr_strat.txt
Move "papel_states" from nonplayable to playable.
@@soulz1999 you unlock them in the desc_strat file or install a mod.
Holy Roman Empire is my favorite in the base game. Super dynamic from the start all the way through the campaign. And personally, I love playing as Wales in Britannia. It's definitely possible to invade England and crush them if you're persistent and don't give them room to breathe.
u mean scotland? you cant play as wales it's a rebel town?
edit: ah right the kingdoms DLC
ja mein Keiser!
24:30 "what was I thinking"
You forgot that Apaches are the only ones in the Americas campaign with a Crusade mechanic that's what bumps them from "adequate" to "super power" imo
I'd promote France to Superpower because of the cavalry. Cavalry is everything in Med2 and France, while not having the best cavalry (I think Hungary does if I'm not mistaken), has the most cavalry. They have a huge variety of heavy cav to choose from, more than their Catholic neighbours. And remember, in Med2 you can't recruit whatever you want, because you are capped by a levy system. Having access to good variety means you can bypass this problem by recruiting more units that are more varied.
Yeah I agree. To put Sicily above France is kinda absurd. France has the much better roster (especially late-game), much better economy, much larger starting territory and a lot more rebel territory in the near vicinity to take for free.
Sicily has what, slightly shorter travel time to the holy land, and thats it? I love playing Sicily, dont get me wrong Norman Knights are super fun, but France is objectivly better.
I don't think hungary has the best knights, I think it should be one of those factions whose top tier knight has stats along the line of 13 attack 17 defense, with armor piercing side arm.
Hre has the best cav in teutonic knights
France has the strongest late game army and the best cannons. They don't really have the best unit of anything else but they good everything. For this reason they're very strong in battles and online too.
I just like seeing you have fun with total war stuff again. Thanks for the content.
Great content Legend, always been in love with this wonderful game. You actually made me play Rome 1 again thanks to your lives. I went through the two 7 hours lives, absolutely amazing mate, hope you'll cary on with these live, I love long videos I can pause, eat, drink my coffee, I had such a great time.
I'd love to see a Shogun 2 faction tierlist, despite playing that game a bunch, I think that'd be the total war game I'd struggle the most on deciding which factions are good and which are bad.
S tier would easily be Oda or Shimanzu, Crap tier would be Hattori, everything else could kinda go anywhere
That would be nice!
OTOMO!
My only real problem with this tier list would be putting Byzantine Empire at the same tier as Denmark,especially since you can get rid of Turks and Hungary in less than 10 turns and essentially just be rapidly expanding in any direction with Mongol invasion being the only speedbump if you are not prepared for it.Great video though
I think the fact that they don’t have access to Jihad/crusade is what lost them many points, since Legned LOVE that mechanic. Personaly I don’t like that mechanic because I always gets absolutly demolish by desertion, which heavily outweight the benefits.
@@florians9949you can leave and join the crusade/jihad every 1/2 turns to avoid desertions
Denmark has better gunpowder units thou in the serpentine where Byz is stock with the bombard
@@florians9949What do you mean by desertion bro😂 ?
Afak crusader Army never goes rogue even with low loyalty general
The maim problem is After capturing the crusade Target city due masive public order
@@GitsmasherIf you take too long to get to the target city of the crusade your men start to desert. They don't go rogue and become rebel units, they just disappear from your army.
Awesome! love a good tierlist, please more of them!
(This is just a tip for those who don't know): If you want to expand quickly as england, or any other catholic faction, make sure you plant a diplomat next to the pope as soon as possible and give about 1k-3k florins to him in various intervals to keep high relations with the pope. This way you can keep attacking other christians and if he starts bleating about it just keep bribing him and you'll be fine as long as you keep bankrolling him. Note: this works best if you only fight 1 or 2 christian factions at a time.
I've been playing some campains with france trying to not get excummunicated. As long as you keep attacking and back off when the pope asks you can elliminate England, Scotland and HRE without excommunication. Its just a 5 turn ceasefire every time as soon as its over you can cap another settlement.
realistic
Yep. That's how you can play the Pope game without necessarily winning _curia_ elections. Just toss that 1k florins or so every other turn will keep you in the good books. Kinda historical as well, though only at times.
Even better if you are a mediterannean power and an alliance with him makes sense to him, since the Pope will almost never break an alliance while keeping high opinion of you, lessens the bribery costs to a few hundred florin every few turns and a church here and there
The other strategy is to wait until your faction leader is in his 60s then "go for it" and get ex-communicated, taking a dozen or so territories over the few turns it takes for your faction leader to die to old age. Then your new faction leader will automatically be reconciled and any crusades against you will be called off. If those crusading forces are now in another catholic faction's lands... well it sucks to be the owner of those lands doesn't it?
The main thing about the italian factions is that they can spam italian spear militia, which are armored sergeants but count as militia so you can spam good units that also get free upkeep from cities (which usually have bad units). Even the more basic italian militia are pretty good in the early game.
In the Americas campaign, spanish units have 2-3 hit points! It's crazy!
I simply love that you make more tier lists
My thoughts on Poland in the Teutonic campaign- tough start but you have the tools to get quite powerful early on. Their mounted crossbowmen are arguably the best early game unit- essentially armour piercing horse archers.
Their other heavy cavalry are also very strong, and their archers can deploy stakes
I believe you forgot to mention that the Apaches have the mechanic of warpath, which is incredibly powerful. Also, their extremely low troop upkeep cost makes them one of the richest factions. That said I believe they are definitely the second most powerful faction after spain
Was looking for this comment, definitely puts them in super power tier!
Spain doesn’t even last past turn 30 in my game as Apache they always die off because they only have two people on their family tree
I loved playing as Lithuania. My only friend was Novgorod and fighting off everyone else’s heavy stacks was fun. Also the crusading noble mechanic was interesting. Some random Englishman thinks he’s gonna have a crusade vacation in Lithuania? Nah he’s gonna get Teutoburged.
You managed to keep your allience? When I played as Novgorod Lithuania betrayed me mid-game and allied woth the teutonic order. Don’t worry, I made them payed in blood.
@@florians9949 Thats a funky alliance. I thought i remembered outlasting one another as one of the victory conditions. I dont think I had any territory that Novgorod wanted. I was friendly with the Mongols for a but, but they betrayed me. They didnt seem to have their hearts in it though.
@@breaden4381well this is medieval 2 diplomacy for you.
Legend, do a playthrough of M2TW with Poland using Shooter (Strzelcy) spam xD
That was my go-to way of trolling in M2TW.
- You are faster than anything that can beat you in a fair fight, can fire on the move and shoot backwards (iirc)
- You can decimate even heavily armored enemies with the AP crossbow, despite it's apparently low damage
- you can charge down or evade anything with better ranged attack than you have,
- shield helps mitigate ranged damage (makes shooters better than mounted crossbowmen)
Pretty OP unit :)
heyk yeh man, keep that sweet sweet historical goodness coming. Been loving every minute of it.
Ultimately, it seems to depend on your playstyle, like you said. Your top factions in each tier list are the ones that can expand quickly. However, the purpose of the campaign is not necessarily to win quickly (unless you want to, like you do). Since my playstyle is to play slowly and build up, my experience is quite different. Here are some examples:
1) I'd say vanilla England is the easiest (and therefore strongest) faction in the game, because they are isolated. Once you defeat Scotland, you can turtle and get so rich that you steamroll the entire map with barely any effort. On the contrary, if you try to play a faction like HRE or the Turks this way, you'll probably get beaten pretty bad. Same thing goes for Danes in vanilla; if you just take Scandinavia and Hamburg and then turtle, it's smooth sailing from then on. Hamburg can be a recruitment hub, while Stockholm is ridiculously rich (richest settlement on the map).
2) The Mayans actually seem to be the long-term strongest faction in the Americas, for the same reason. They face no threats and therefore they can build up and steamroll everything. Interestingly, this is what happens almost every time if you just let the AI factions duke it out; AI Mayans just take most of the map.
3) In the Teutonic campaign I've played as TO, Lithuania and Poland and I'd say Poland is much, much easier than the other two (which interestingly is the opposite of what you said). Again, the reason is the same: take rebel territory, on one around you attacks you (TO fights Lithuania, HRE fights Denmark) and you can wait to get rich and then attack whichever faction around you is the weakest. This is much easier to pull off than e.g. playing as Lithuania and having to face strong armies from turn 1.
4) Interestingly, I'd also say that Norway is the easiest Britannia faction, while you rated it as the weakest. I've won a VH/VH Norway campaign with autoresolve only without breaking a sweat. The good thing about Norway is precisely that your territories are obscure trash; no one cares to attack you. The Scots will only attack Wick (which is easy to defend) and the Welsh might attack Castle Town but that's not really a problem. Sit around and wait for the reinforcements you get and then attack Scotland from every corner. They'll easily collapse. Then move your capital to the mainland, wait for culture to convert to Norwegian and then when you're ready you can invade England (or Wales) and they'll not really be much of a challenge because at this point you are bigger and probably richer.
So, my point is that the factions you rate as weak are actually the factions that require a patient/defensive strategy. Ultimately though, these factions seem to have the easiest campaigns, meaning that they don't really need to win any tough battles or pull off some clever strategy. They kind of win just by sitting around and waiting.
Wow nice timing! I just bought Med 2 and started playing it last week. Can't wait to see your list
I bought a manscaped kit on your suggestion a year or so back. and I really love mine. I got the limited-edition purple cancer awareness kit since I like purple. But this thing works really really well. I just wanted to say thanks and that I appreciate it when adverts lead to actual value. thanks bro.
Awesome video. I can't wait for him to make a Shogun tier list
As always great opinions and good explanations.
I would like to see a similar tier list for stainless Steel
You just sound much better as well, it sounds like you are enjoying yourself much more which makes the videos more enjoyable as well
*Total War Hills ranked by sex appeal*
love seeing hungary getting some love, such a powerful faction. them and sicily are my 2 favourites in the base game
"Everything about Scotland sucks" - the man knows his universal truths.
Which is why I love to choose them for the difficulty scale. I've won the grand campaign twice with Scotland, including my favorite battle of all time, just north of Antioch against the Timurids, something I recorded and rewatch from time to time just for the epicness of it.
To be fair I watched this video and then immediately went and started a Scotland campaign and it's been good fun so far, not too far in but have finally captured Britain and Ireland after a bit of a struggle and now successfully invading Europe.@@rikk319
I know who's on top. You guys know too if you remember the top 5 videos Legend used to make. Good times.
I assume turks but I'm immediately outraged that it's not byzzies
I assume turks but I'm immediately outraged that it's not byzzies
Been waiting for this one for years
Legend, I would bump up Denmark a bit due to your own criteria: potential for early game expansion. While they start small, they can access Huscarls, dismounted Huscarls, Norse Swordsmen and Viking Raiders. These early infantry units carve up the early militia and peasant units most of their neighbors are stuck with in the early game. Huscarls work great at killing generals bodyguards early on. Even past the early game their ease of access makes them worthwhile and Huscarls and dismounted Huscarls work well in tandem with feudal knights and dismounted feudal knights thanks to their armor piercing. And dont sleep on Stockholm being easy to get. A developed Stockholm is an economic powerhouse.
It is also has a strong navy and good naval position: you can easily bottleneck the HRE and just spread across the North and Baltic Seas
Literally was looking for this vid yesterday before it came out
Loving the historical content Legend 👍 Attila total war faction tier list would be good
This video is Super Power tier itself. Looking for a similar one for Rome and Barbarian Invasion.
Edit: also in defence of Byzantium in Grand Campaign, it starts with the richest settlement which is also the only large city in game, allowing you to produce Byz infantry, so they are the only faction to have access from turn 1 to medium sword infantry, extremely useful to take walls and settlements by storming them, and also horse archers for open field battles.
GOD YES ! More historical Tierlist please !!
would disagree about Denmark tbh, on the cavalry front yeah they have less options but what they do have is really solid, Huscarls are pretty cost effective and AP focused melee cav, and Norse War Clerics may be the hands down best melee cav in the game. you can also get a pretty solid setup going if you can snag the low countries quick (Antwerp and Brussels iirc).
Followers/traits (every single TW game) tier list next PLEASE!!! We need this in our lives, seriously :D
This is the content we crave! Thanks LoTW!
love your tierlists
Medieval 2 - the pinacle of Total War games when it comes to being "fun".
I always liked playing as England (or Scotland or Denmark for an extra challenge) and taking out the North-Western corner of the map. The income you get from this and the number of troop producing territories you have behind your front line makes it a great option for getting your faction leader excommunicated and saying "come at me bro" to the rest of the world. I also found the bow + spear strategy (with a couple of heavy cavalry units for a hammer-and-anvil option) a lot more effective than you seem to have especially when you have long range bowmen to handle horse archers.
I agree with pretty much everything you said about the Byzantine Empire. They're my favorite to play broadly but I do agree they're very challenging due to their position.
I dont know much about medieval 2 but i love watching your tier lists lol
These tier lists are what we have been secretly needing. I hope the viewers will enjoy it as much I enjoy the Total War tier lists. There seems to be a lack of them altogether.
In the grand campaign Spain and Portugal also get access to the best ships in the end game
Would love more tierlist videos like this for other Total War games.
Doing a Scotland campaign right now and not offended you put them in crap tier, just shows me I must be playing really well since I'm only two provinces away from victory conditions
I will say this about the roster however, Scottish pikemen are absolutely my favourite unit in the entire game, you can get heavily armoured pikemen very early on and I make use of them extensively. That's not to say there aren't drawbacks however, pikemen are an absolute glass cannon and are super vulnerable to arrows, they also need to be babied way too much since they switch from their pikes to swords whenever they break formation (also sometimes for seemingly no reason at all), which is really bad since they suck at melee but let me tell you, when you get them in formation and engaging the enemy there is no better feeling because they absolutely DOMINATE.
I even remember the exact moment they became my favourite unit while I was sieging a town and my pikemen moved into the town square and slowly marched in formation against an enemy unit and I kid you not it was like watching a lawnmower go over an overgrown field, I don't even think my men stopped marching they just kept going forward at a steady pace and the enemy infantry was just dropping like flies as soon as they touched the tips of the pikes, it was very very satisfying to watch, just recently one of these units killed over a hundred enemies while only sustaining ~10 casualties
HRE is such a fun playthrough, can grow so quickly. Poland has always been enjoyable, if you love a cav faction. Portugal is my favourite, for the Aventuros and choices in where you go and what you do, but the most campaigns I have ever finished have been with Spain, that is a fun long term campaign, once you get tercios backed up by ten thousand knights of Santiago.
And played Hungary for years, so agree with you there.
great vid legend
Love your channel mate
Ah Medieval 2. Not as polished and balanced as Shogun 2, or as flashy and awesome as Warhammer. But it feels like home. Its like this old pair of shoes that looks bad bad its comfortable af.
I always found getting an early excommunication as England no big deal, since William is due to die pretty early anyways.
More medieval 2 videos please!!
Nice! I'd like to see a tier list for Shogun II too
I'd personally rate Milan and Scily slightly lower and France higher. Milan can easily get boxed in by France, Venice and the HRE, and you need to capture a castle to have access to cavalry, either Bern which has a big army, or Corsica which is underdeveloped. Sciliy feels very isolated and you have to travel far to conquer anything, and the sorrounding settlements are quite poor. France has a big starting army, developed inital castles and the ability to capture both castles and rich towns easily early on, so is kinda similar to HRE's start.
You just turned me on to start a new M2TW campaign thx !
I think Spain should also be included in the Adequate tier because of its location that far to the west. If not, France could go up a place because they have access to the Mediterranean sea and could easily start campaigns versus the Arabs, and they aren't that far away from the Pope either.
I think you mean position in the west and not east.
@@jessiemeisenheimer8675 ups.. yes. you're right. thanks for the correction
Yeah, I’d say France > Spain
@@totalwar1793 In the beginning yes, afterwards, forget about it, specially when you can purchase Tercios
About the Byzantines, the Mongols aren't much of a problem as by the time they reach Anatolia they have already lost quite a bit of steam, plus the mountainous terrain allows severely delaying them by putting forts with barely any trash militia unit in it. Instead, they keep the entire eastern flank distracted, provided you keep strong enough defences.
Their lack of good late-game units also helps balancing the snowball effect that is seen in most factions. If you play well you have a big empire, but the enemies will have an advantage when it comes to quality.
Hope you do this to all total war games gj nice viedo
I used to have fun with the Moors as a teen playing this. I got it installed again, due to your videos that reminded me of the game. Gonna do my favorite struggle on hardest possible difficulty.
They are fun but it's kinda bs how the ai works. Italians, english and scottish gunning straight for you. Like mate, unify your area first wtf
Can't believe you've never done this tier list until now!
would love to see you do a similar list for rome total war + Barbarian
9:13
''You just made an enemy for life''
My personal Favorites are Byzantine Empire and France
I would love to see a tier list for the playable historical battles in the games. So how they feel if they are challenging or fun or accurate enough.
I don't have problems with the excommunications thing usually. As you say the AI is very random and hostile so there will always be a neighbour attacking you early on and getting excommunicated after a few battles. And then it's open season. The only thing to be aware of is to keep the king alive long enough.
Especially if you gobble up all rebel Settlements, and they all want at least one of them.
Just a heads up Legend. I don't know why but I didn't get a notification about this video. I only knew to check because you've been uploading daily and I noticed it was missing. It's possible this video just isn't getting pushed like it should. no idea why. Great vid tho. Love all the stuff you've been doing.
I, subjectively, really like playing the Danes. The challenges of the start add to the experience and they have some really fun units (including the two handed swordsmen).
I thought for a moment this was video from 2015, welcome back to Medieval 2 Content!
Also super agreed with Hungary. Noble javelin cavalry are glass cannon who melts generals, also early Poland alliance can be hold for ~60 years
would much appreciate if you could add a tier list for the Stainless Steel too please, we would then be able to compare with Vanilla and have a truly complete list, thx!
I feel like because the Byzantine Archers are fairly decent in melee (they can beat dismounted knights 1 v 1) you can make really good armies of mostly spears and archers with some back up cavalry and really dominate everyone else no problem.
I remember playing a Teutonic Campaign as the Teutonic Knights and had no idea the Mongols were in the scenario (my medieval history timelines aren't all that solid) and I and the mongols basically spent half the campaign conquering half of the map before discovering the other existed. Which led to some rather memorable campaigning as it's pretty rare in late game Total War to be in a peer level conflict - the late game is usually you just snowballing through a bunch of middling factions (aside from the classic Roman civil war in Rome Total War's Imperial Campaign.
One problem with the HRE is how its in the middle of europe, so it has a lot of potential enemies on all sides. At least from my experience, HRE is always hectic to play as a result, but that’s why its my fav faction too
I remember even as a 10 year old I would doom stack mongol heavy archers in custom battle.
I love Scotland, but that is because i do a different playstyle compared to legends. I am going with passive gameplay, BUT i make trade agreements with all factions on the map. Then i develop all the infrastructure and take all the rebels on the isles. It makes england to REALLY develop a grudge after you. So once they start the war, you take the rest of the isles and pope forces peace onto you.
Weirdly, spanish sometimes cosplay normandy in Wales. By late game though.
Speaking of late game: you accumulate 200-500k by late game and then you can start just spamming endless hordes onto the known world. Momgols when they show up, find themselves on receiving end of invasion super fast xD
Good list! And agree on Turkey even tho they have the issue/challenge of Mongols and later Timurids entering the game essentially in your lands.
Mongols and Timurids invasion one of the best event in the game and Turks facing them sooner than others . While fighting in west and also for America , you also fight 2 different nations giant armies is a lot more fun than others 🎉
The coolest thing about these tier lists is that for the most part, it’s accurate to how powerful these nations were in real life.
Only beef I had with the game was how Turks suffer from a lack of money, even though Turkomans are supposedly be very cheap according to the historical sense.
good one, you love to see it
Ah man I’ve played stainless steel for so long, forgot normal vanilla and kingdoms stuff. Should def do one on those factions!
Interesting. I've always felt like Scotland was the second easiest faction (second to England) because they start in a corner and wont deal with multi-front wars early on.
Same, and I love me a pike wall.
They were cheated in the end game for the base campaign if you ask me.
If you jump on York and Caernarvon quickly, Dublin and Inverness can be taken when convenient, and England is on the back foot. Use spies or ballista to open the gates and if you play your cards right, you can take Nottingham and London in a single turn (before the Pope calls for ceasefire).
Long time fan. I know your favorite mod is Stainless and I think it would be really cool if you ranked the factions like in this one. Byzantium of course is the top but it would be great to see your opinion!
Ireland in the Brittania campaign was always my favorite. Once you take over the island, you can generate vast wealth, pick an enemy, and just play Viking raider with them at your leisure. After you get a few coastal towns as beachheads, just sweep it up.
Tiers of restricted cameras and small unit scales in Total War games next please.
Watching your Warhammer TW videos were how I knew the game wasnt for me. My brain turns off everytime
Loving the older tw content much more
Playing as france MTW2 and they are even more difficult than England. Would put them lower down in tier list. Anti player bias means HRE, Portugal Spain, Milan are just turns away from turning on you. I even have Moors and Sicily invading southern france for seemingly no reason
Byzantines bad and Moors adequate? ok...
Need a tier list of every faction from every total war game
37:20 "Novgorod has access to the Adriatic" lol Legend the good zaza.
Think Apacheans definitely fill the superpower role next to or above Spain simply because their super low unit upkeep and their Warpath mechanic.
Yes they can't go beyond villages but their unit upkeep is 20 on average per unit, which is the lowest of any faction in any Medieval 2 campaign.
Also, they are the only ones who have access to the Warpath mechanic, which functions to same as the Crusade mechanic in vanilla.
This helps them a lot in the early game to expand rapidly and conquer all the rebel settlements.
In the late game it helps them to overwhelm factions like New Spain in an instant with the armies they can constantly pump out then due to their low upkeep.
Chichimecs get the same sort of advantages from fighting Europeans as Apacheans and yes they can upgrade their settlements beyond villages but their upkeep is like that of other factions, plus they don't have a Warpath mechanic so I'd definitely put them below Apacheans.