I wish that Medieval 2 had an Antipope mechanic where excommunicated catholic factions can elect their own pope from their highest ranking priest. Then the excommunicated faction can go to war with the Papal States. If the excommunicated faction captures Rome and then their Antipope becomes the legitimate Pope and lose their excommunicated status.

As far as I am concerned, the best campaign-faction in the game. Excellent starting position, good army roster (god damn Reiters) and the best voices. Also probably most historically inaccurat faction in the game. If it was more like the actual HRE, you couldn't build a fricking marketplace without three generals going rogue, two cities starting a private war against each other and the pope randomly excommunicating you.

Hail mein Kaiser! The HRE is one of my favourite factions to play. Cracking Milanese, Danish and Venetian skulls with the dismounted Imperial knights is so satisfying.

As far as I know: In real life forlorn hope were used in breaches or on ladders in sieges. They could be promoted if they survived and they usually were criminals with death sentences or exiles etc. They had nothing to lose. So they fought very hard and if they survived it was a bonus lol. Like you said, good in situations.

I feel you really underrate pike militia for the HRE. every campaign I've played, they become the bulk of my army in late campaign. By the time I get them, they're getting lvl 3 upgraded armor. Every time I use them, they are GREAT against cavalry. Pikemen will murder cavalry charges en masse. Even against infantry, they will kill enemies before they have to swap to swords. Support them with halberdiers, zweihanders, and/or imperial knights (preferably the first two) while arquebusiers shoot at range. Best of all the pike militia (along with the halberd militia) are cheap, allowing you to field a larger number of troops in your armies. Arquebusiers are close and medium range. If the Handgunners are really the short range guys. Also, dismounted gothic knights are exclusively custom and multiplayer battles. Not available in campaign.

Danes attacked me and took Hamburg, Pope got his jimmies rustled when I tried to take it back a couple turns later wtf

Take as much rebel territory as possible, ally with all your neighbors, let them attack you You must take Florence as soon as possible as well

What about when the peasents beat the seargents in Antwerp in Jon's canpaign

Don't get distracted by the campaign goal in the early game. As HRE, your main objective is to avoid being surrounded. Develop the settlements you have, capture weak rebel settlements and tempt the AI to attack you by leaving barely any men to defend. If someone gets excommunicated, go after them and keep joining Crusades. Be BFFs with the Pope until your knife is in his back. Also, don't be afraid to temporarily get rid of Bologna, which is unlikely to be worth the resources you need to invest to keep it, at least in the early game. Another reason why going south early isn't ideal is that it shifts the battlefield from the easily defensible Alpine passes to Northern Italy, where you need to maintain larger armies to fend off the Italian factions AND worry about France flanking you. If you have to go aggressively, go north first. Take out Denmark and you close one potential front immediately.

"They hit hard cos they wanna kill people in the name of God. Because that is how God works apparently." Love this little commentary. And a nice video overall, thanks!

Capture Hamburg, that's a no brainer I then sell Bologna to either Venice or Milan. Sell it for an income rather than a flat out fee, you'll be able to get more money out of them Move your army from Hamburg to Arhus, beef it up with some mercenaries (shouldn't wreck your economy with the income coming in from selling Bologna) and then take the settlement Move your Emperor to Vienna and construct the mines there. Keep a decent garrison there and protect the city from Venice. Rush in re-enforcements from Innsbruck if necessary Basically you'll be playing a defensive game down South whilst using Arhus as a launching pad to capture Scandinavia (Oslo and Stockholm). Occupy these settlements rather than sack or raze as you need to build them up quickly. Turn Oslo into a city, but keep some cavalry stationed up there to help put down any rebel armies Meanwhile after you've got Arhus send a diplomat West to secure trade with France and the British Isles As for Alliances, France is very unreliable, ditto hungary. These are factions you need to keep in check anyway. The Italians are your main threat though. England/Spain can be a good option to help keep France in check. Byzantines are another one, you won't be encroaching on their territory for a while and they will conflict with Venice. Sicily can be another option. Could look at allying with milan against venice but again they are really not reliable

Beautiful guide! just finished my billionth ME:2 playthrough after all these years and decided its time to try HRE properly. These guides still hold up even in 2024.

You don't play that much with Pike and Halberd it seems. As soon as those units are in a spearwall, multiply their attack by 3 and then you got their real stats. You are severly underestimating their uses. Their only shortcoming is their defense. But if you let you Pikes and Halberds be flanked, what business would you have playing Total War?

9:03 The bane of the British education system, compulsory language classes. I know how you feel brother.

Are you suggesting for Germans to not wage a war on two fronts? What other kind of war is there for the Reich?

Do Not get excommunicated because I was playing a Sicily campaign and I owned Cairo and a Crusade and a Jihad was called on me and it was terrible

Really helpful thanks love your content keep doing what your doing

yay my fav faction

Congrats dude, you’ve earned yourself a sub

Wonder if Medieval 3 should use a mechanic similar to Europa Universalis 4 Holy Roman Empire mechanic. That way the HRE can be properly portrayed as a collection of semi independent duchies and city states.

The best looking Knights. Two words, Gothic Knights.

Make a marriage alliance with hungary so we can build Austria-Hungary in the 11th century! Or just conquer them and form the Austrian Empire... The HRE is cool, because it has those nice german troops. But I don't like it that much due to it's position. Egypt is next as promised in the last faction guide, right? Btw, here some german lessions for you ^^: "Zweihänder" literaly means two-hander and "Reiter" means horseman. "Landsknecht" would be something like country serveant (again, literaly translated), but there is no direct translation for it, I think.

I disagree i believe that as HRE you have to be as aggressive as possible till turn 4 or 5 per say.With so many settlements around even if you overextend the passive income of the settlements are enough to raise armies an ddominate balkan

Love it! Great faction, Great guide. Still cant wait for my viking bros though!

Great faction, always an interesting game. Played three campaigns in the last week.

Reviewing HRE units without mentioning vanila two handed glitch? Seriously?

Welcome back!

Here is a reason Holy Roman is the most difficult faction. faction_standings england, -0.2 france, scotland faction_standings england, -1.0 slave faction_standings scotland, -0.2 england faction_standings scotland, 0.2 france faction_standings scotland, -1.0 slave faction_standings france, -0.2 england faction_standings france, 0.2 scotland faction_standings france, -1.0 slave faction_standings venice, -0.2 byzantium faction_standings venice, -0.45 milan, hre faction_standings venice, -1.0 slave faction_standings milan, -0.4 venice, hre faction_standings milan, -1.0 slave faction_standings hre, -0.2 poland faction_standings hre, -0.45 venice, milan faction_standings hre, -1.0 slave faction_standings poland, -0.2 russia, hre faction_standings poland, 0.2 hungary faction_standings poland, -1.0 slave faction_standings hungary, -0.2 byzantium faction_standings hungary, 0.2 poland faction_standings hungary, -1.0 slave faction_standings spain, 0.2 portugal faction_standings spain, -0.85 moors faction_standings spain, -1.0 slave faction_standings sicily, -0.2 moors faction_standings sicily, -0.45 byzantium faction_standings sicily, -1.0 slave faction_standings denmark, -1.0 slave faction_standings portugal, 0.2 spain faction_standings portugal, -0.85 moors faction_standings portugal, -1.0 slave faction_standings papal_states, -0.45 hre faction_standings papal_states, 0.2 england, portugal, poland, hungary faction_standings papal_states, -1.0 slave faction_standings moors, -0.2 sicily faction_standings moors, -0.85 spain, portugal faction_standings moors, -1.0 slave faction_standings byzantium, -0.2 hungary, venice faction_standings byzantium, -0.45 sicily faction_standings byzantium, -0.85 turks faction_standings byzantium, -1.0 slave faction_standings turks, -0.65 egypt faction_standings turks, -0.8 byzantium faction_standings egypt, -0.6 turks faction_standings egypt, -0.6 slave Everyone hate Roman and Pope hates them so much.

FINALLLY thanks man ✊

Hi Lugo I started a HRE campaign and I recommend blitz in the beggining if you know where the rebels cities are. By turn 5-6 you will have 15 regions in you control and make 6000 to 8000 florins by turn. Be friend wity the pope giving gift of money or territories you dont use until you have the strong enough economy/army to take Rome and all western Europe. About army composition I will recommend all around types infantry-archers-cavalry dont make one class stack because it will be no so effective in battle and always keep a family member leading the army.

8:00 The forlorn hope were the guys who went thru breaches in walls first during assaults. They were not expected to live, just grab a foothold. Thus the name.

I’m doing a coop campaign with my friend as the Holy Roman Empire (basically we discuss what to do) and he wants to attack France... I’m not gonna tell him how bad an idea it is. I’ll just let it play out XD

Already won that campaign and it was the most fun ive ever had! I love the kinda Endsieg situation u are stuck in well all declare war on u because otherwise they cant expand anymore! =D take hamburg, flozenz, prague, magdeburg, stettin,breslau, antwerpen and bern if u want a kinda historical look + they are all rebell settlements, then boost your eco with farms, and then prepare to HOLD THE LINE!!! =D

Definetly my favourite faction, imo the key to win is to build a lot of fields cause they give you money somehow and being extremely agressive, however I find it kinda slow when you have like 40+ provinces to conquer even more, maybe I retrain too much at this point idk

Gothic knights are disopting

It's not that difficult to get other factions to attack you. Simple example: take metz from the rebels, leave a small garnision and france should attack you. As defender, you're less likely to be excommunicated. Personally I go a diffrent road from you. Ignore Hamburg - will only lead to war with denmark anyway. Combined with the troops from frankfurt(and a general) it's a nice little army to use east(magdeburg) or west(metz). The real price however is in northern italy, milan and venice. You can take the rebel city (Florence) and there should be an opportunity to take venice when their army is away. With Venice, Florence and Bolonga alone you're in a pretty decent situation - and you've an empire to get troops from. Conquered northern italy becomes the economic heart of the empire, right next to rome.Therefore the name rome tends to be not that misleading in my campaigns.

My advices as a main HRE player: -Be aggressive with rebels and passive with other factions. You are placed in the center of the map, so if you play passive, you'll get surrounded by lots of hostile factions with more momentum than you, but do not attack them to avoid excommunication as far as you can. - Your first target must be Hamburg. Rush to take it. It's a well-developed castle and will deny Denmark to get heavy cavalry (they start only with one settlement which is large town, so no heavy cavalry units). At the same time, try to take as soon as possible Metz and Prague. Then, north-east Germany and the Netherlands. - Rise your taxes as far as you can until you take those settlements. Then, lower them. - Forget about Florence. Sounds cool on paper, but it is a common target for the Papal States, Milan and sometimes even Sicily. Let it stay rebel, so those factions can waste their time trying to take it. - Keep Germany at all costs. It is a really defensible region and the core of your empire. Never let other factions to take Vienna, Insbruck, Metz or Hamburg, those are the gates where you can bottleneck most of your enemies in case of need. - Bologna is not interesting for you. Sell it to Venice or Milan in order to avoid problems with them. If you chose to keep it, move your generals and most of your garrison. Italy is rich, but also open flatlands which need big armies to be defended, and Italian spear militia of Italian factions are stronger than your early units. - Eliminate Denmark as soon as possible before all your neighbours declare war on you. - Your best alliance option is, by far, Byzantium (usual enemy of Hungary, Sicily and Venice, also non catholic so not upset by your constant excommunication). Other interesting allies are England, Spain and, maybe, Russia. Poland will betray you. - When you have stronger units like sergeant spearmen, armored sergeants and feudal knights, wait until an attack came from Milan and destroy it. They will attack or betray you almost every time. - Never use peasants or town militia except in extreme circumstances. Rely on spear militia until you get something better. Dismounted imperial knights are worse than most of your enemies' knights, so do not rely on them so much. - VERY IMPORTANT: build as much economic stuff as you can (ports, roads, farms) for the first 10-15 turns. The AI is not as aggressive as in Rome Total War, and usually give you a truce of at least 10 turns. Use them to build your economy. If you have some extra cash, build churches.

Zwei-Händer is pronounced tz-why Hendaer 9:24 close, but it means two handed 18:59 Reiter is pronounced write-heirs

Do the rebels in Med 2 (even if you do it before the rebels in Rome)...also is there any way I can help you when you eventually do a overview?

23:34 Yeah, i'm new to the game and i've ben at war with Veince and all of a souden Denmark attacked me. Now i had truble setting 2 big armied to acutaly go there as they alredy took Frankfurt (they had Hamburg too), my capital. I took it back and got all Denmark, now they only have 1 city in France with they too from the rebels

I didn't understand why the forlond hope are just 30. Are they disciplined or smt? According to exp_descr_units they have low discipline. And why do they cost 250 to maintain... it is like a unit CA forgot to balance or smt And the dismounted gothic knoghts cant be recruited in campaign for some misterious reason

The first campaign I did in Medieval 2. Had 13 or 14 settlements before attacking another faction. I don't think the Medieval 2 AI is really aggressive enough to make over-expansion that big of a problem. Avoiding Excommunication isn't too hard as long as you have artillery or good spies. Wait until the Pope doesn't have a mission to "cease hostilities with X faction," attack a settlement and then immediately assault that settlement. The Pope will hate you and will probably issue another "cease hostilities with X faction" mission, but he won't excommunicate you. I would personally avoid attacking Poland and Hungary until you can field a lot of cavalry or some pavise crossbows. They both like to spam missile cavalry, and Polish Nobles in particular have nasty armor-piercing javelins while still being pretty solid melee cav. Teutonic and Imperial knights were my bread and butter, especially with armor-piercing secondary weapons. Halberd militia were surprisingly effective defending cities. Their formation does a good job of keeping them alive, even longer than crusader sergeants (which are identical to armoured sergeants), as long as they're not taking missile fire and their enemy stays in front of them. Was massively disappointed by the Forlorn Hope (trainable from cities, which is why I was a bit excited about them initially) mostly because of the price. 250 upkeep for a half-strength unit that doesn't even have double hitpoints. Was similarly disappointed by Reiters. They have horribly short range, and they don't fire very often, so dealing damage quickly is pretty much impossible. They were really only good for pinpoint application of morale penalties. Didn't really mean to make a comment this long.

Rush small nearby factions like Denmark and Milan, then consolidate and push out from there

The starting position is in my opinion by far the worst because the HRE is in the centre of the map and thus surrounded by enemies only. My strategy when playing HRE is: take Hamburg, Metz, Florence and (very important) Zagreb (with the army thats garrisoned in Vienna) immediately. Create an alliance with Hungary (all within the first 5 turns). Ignore Prague and Magdeburg but make sure to capture Stettin and Breslau instead (using the garrisons from Nürnberg and Innsbruck) within turn 5-10. Capture Aarhus (thats it for the Danes) as well as Thorn and Krakau (thats pretty much it for The Polish - they wont be a thread anymore) within turn 10-15 Next on the list is Stettin, Magdeburg and Prague (by the end of turn 20 the latest) From there on, life is pretty easy for the HRE :)

Fond memories, HRE was the first time I conquered the entire map in a total war game. I conquered everything before the Mongols arrived and build up the highest level of fortresses in all areas they arrive in. (An early crusade on Cairo gave me an Egyptian colony, which then bank rolled my Blitzkrieg)

Holy Roman and Byzantine are likely hamburger. They are delicious meat between 2 sandwiches.

I just went with a good old fashion blitzkrieg. I took out Milan and Venice early on. After that took out Denmark then Poland. Currently at war with Hungary and Byzantine who was my ally. I lost Ragusa to the Byzantines. It's a shame because I had a realy good general there.

If I am correct, the holy roman empire was ruled by german some german king and the papacy of rome tried to keep controlling influence over the king if not actual control. Some kings were just spiteful and ruled regardless.

Use the cry bully tactic when playing HRE. Take a rival Catholic settlement and the Pope will order you BOTH to stop hostiles. From there leave a small settlement unguarded or send a single unit of peasants into enemy territory. The AI can't help but attack and get themselves excommunicated.

There is no such thing as overextent, only Lebensraum.

Also, I wonder why you never mentioned the strong anti-armor the HRE has with the Imperial Knights and Reiters in the late Game

I'm currently on tur n 60-70. Allied with Hungary and Milan. Milan backstabbed immediately and drew every Italian state into war.... now I have over extended and have to fend off Denmark, France (excommed) , Poland, Byzantinium, Sicily, Milan and Venice..... wish me luck!

Would be better if not for the two handed glitch

schildtrom is nothing like a phalanx

You don't really know what you're talking about the dismounted gothic Knights are online only and all 2 handed sword units are bugged they're stats are great but thanks to a bug there animation is slower so even shit tier units can damage them alot.

I would disagree as far as the Holy Roman Empire not really being Roman. It was a successor state to Rome, crowned by the pope in Rome, drew on the traditions of Rome, and held lands in far more than just Germany. It wasn't as Roman as the Byzantines, but still plenty Roman.

2 handed weapons are bugged in vanilla Medieval II.

This guy has the same voice as Docks🧐.

Poland is a ballache , late game

I kinda love this game but, in actual campaigns everything looks... irrelevant. I mean, the AI will have like 2 or 3 armies, and when you just smash them the cities are usually poorly defended. I wish this game offered a tougher challenge in campaign

You dont know what a schiltrom is do you lol

Pixxelated appollo's review is so much better😅

The most disappointing faction in the game. Where are my dismounted gothic knights, CA?