Teutonic troops & questions

[thrakkemarn]

So I'm in LOVE with the Teutonic faction in this mod, seriously. I love the troop tree, I love the entire flavor of the faction. They taste delicious!

Spoiler

(I'm roleplaying an Arabian lordling who set out to see the world, but while he was travelling and setting up enterprises throughout eastern Europe the woman he loved and courted was married to another lord by her brother, so the my character fled to Europe, spent a lot of time in Rome, met the Pope, and eventually converted to Christianity and took up arms in a Crusade. Along the way he met up with some Teutonic crusaders and became fascinated with them. Now he fights alongside them trying to pacify the Lithuanians, although recently the Polish have decided to enter the fray so things are getting hot. It's a ton of fun and just kind of evolved as I was playing. =)

Also I found the awesome bishop armor coat of plates, and reskinned it to be black to fit the Teutonic theme =)

Erm, anyways ... I am curious about one thing (which I haven't been able to find a concrete answer to anywhere): from what I understand, you can only recruit their units so long as you are part of the faction correct? I was able to recruit them after several days spent as a mercenary for the faction, which I'm not sure is working as intended - but if it IS, is it simply based on your relationship with the faction that lets you recruit them?

I realize from a pure gaming perspective there's no reason for me to try to play with Teutonic troops, but I am trying to for roleplaying reasons.

For example, if I started my own kingdom and kept a very high relation with Teutonic lords and holdings, could I still recruit them? Or is there any way to recruit them within my own kingdom?

Also, somewhat off topic, I was also curious about what kind of army composition and tactics they might have historically used. They seem to have access to almost every kind of troop except archers or horse archers (they have spearmen, 1h/shield, 2h, crossbowmen, skirmishers on foot and horse, and of course light and heavy cavalry). So what should/would a somewhat accurate Tuetonic army look like? And what is their great strength? In the mod is seems to be their ability to train knights from infantry, but other than that their troops aren't anything special.

Sorry if these have been answered but the only posts I could find were old or inconclusive.

 

[arslanbeg]

Sorry to be off topic..but is that a katana your character is carrying? Where can you buy it in the game? I know in the native you can find it from the chest of some cities (don't remember which ones exactly), but in 1257AD it would be really cool to have a katana or a set of "strange armor"

 

[thrakkemarn]

No, it's a studded club I use for causing brain damage capturing prisoners 

 

[kuauik]

Sorry to be off topic..but is that a katana your character is carrying? Where can you buy it in the game? I know in the native you can find it from the chest of some cities (don't remember which ones exactly), but in 1257AD it would be really cool to have a katana or a set of "strange armor"

you are obviousůy history geek

 

[Othienka]

Sorry to be off topic..but is that a katana your character is carrying? Where can you buy it in the game? I know in the native you can find it from the chest of some cities (don't remember which ones exactly), but in 1257AD it would be really cool to have a katana or a set of "strange armor"

Katanas made in 1257ad
Katanas in Europe

 

[Keep]

Yes of course, because of their platearmor-slicing capability 

Imo teutonic troops are also really fast to upgrade into good fighters. Just 2 Upgrades and you either have a decent Shield+1H Wpn Fighter or a 2H Wpn Slaughterer... Other Troops take far longer to have the same stats.

 

[Dr_stein85]

Katanas made in 1257ad
Katanas in Europe

 

[thrakkemarn]

Yes of course, because of their platearmor-slicing capability 

Imo teutonic troops are also really fast to upgrade into good fighters. Just 2 Upgrades and you either have a decent Shield+1H Wpn Fighter or a 2H Wpn Slaughterer... Other Troops take far longer to have the same stats.

Thank you for at least addressing my original post. It'd be nice if people would not derail a legitimate question with another "omgwtfbbq you want nonhistoricalness go away!" topic.

I see, so in general it does seem like the strength of the Teutonic faction is the way their troop tree develops. Quickly developing great infantry, and having troops that aren't stuck to a single upgrade path. (The 2h infantry can develop into spearmen who can develop into cavalry).

From what I understand they relied mostly on heavy cavalry and heavy infantry historically. Would they have used a lot of spearmen or crossbows, or gone into battle with a bunch of baltic troops?

 

[DrTomas]

Thank you for at least addressing my original post. It'd be nice if people would not derail a legitimate question with another "omgwtfbbq you want nonhistoricalness go away!" topic.

Well people like to reply to it becouse:
1. Spam/flame is a lot more fun!
2. If you don't know the anwser you can still join in the bashing "disscusion".

From what I understand they relied mostly on heavy cavalry and heavy infantry historically. Would they have used a lot of spearmen or crossbows, or gone into battle with a bunch of baltic troops?

At this age I don't believe they had that many foreign crusading troops helping them out (like they did in XIV century). So I guess the amont of cavalary would not be so much diffrent from any other nations(but that's my speculation, feel free to correct me). Baltic troops would also make a great number of there forces for several reasons:
1. The balts that were under order as vasals were raided by the balts that were hostile to the order.
2. Raiding was one of the main source of income for the baltic nobility, so many were eager to join the orders organised raids, even tho alot of balts were still more or less pagan(ironicly order supposedly did not put that much effort to convert the peasents. Nobles were a slightly diffrent thing).

 

[thrakkemarn]

Very interesting, thanks doc 

 

[Skot the Sanguine]

Thought this topic was about historical issues regarding the Teutonic Knights, which it is not.  I see my services are not needed here. 

 

[thrakkemarn]

Oh, it actually IS. I was asking about both the in-game troop trre AND the historical composition of Teutonic armies.