Kingdom of Jerusalem: Faction Overview

In the harsh & unforgiving environment of Outremer, Christian Franks fight & die to preserve their “holy land” against the Muslim hordes who themselves considered Jerusalem to be a holy city. Being a kingdom founded by Frankish crusaders, the Kingdom of Jerusalem shows many similarities with western European military norms. Mounted knights are the awe-inspiring anvil which the crusaders use to smash their enemies. The Knights of Jerusalem are available early in the game and are relatively easy to retrain but the same cannot be said for the more powerful cavalry units. A fortress will be required before Templar Knights or Knights of Tripoli can be recruited. Templar Confrere Knights are merely a cheaper but harder to retrain version of Knights of Jerusalem. Templar Knights are also a small amount cheaper than Knights of Tripoli but slightly harder to retrain.

You also get unique units like the very powerful Constable of Jerusalem, which is a “double strength” knightly unit. It can be retrained at any castle but if you lose it completely, it is awkward to recruit again. If you do lose the Constable of Jerusalem unit or wish to recruit a new one, change any castle to a military-focused auto-build policy. You will eventually get it again. The unit can only be recruited by the AI and more to the point, the AI can recruit more than one of this unit so do please be careful before you decide to go to war against either of the crusader kingdoms. It is entirely possible that you might face more than one of the unique units within a single army. The Marshall of the Templars unique unit is the same as the Constable of Jerusalem except that it has the usual number of men in the unit and has 2 hit points per man.

Turkopoles are useful missile cavalry and the only missile cavalry available to the Kingdom of Jerusalem. If you wish to have a speedy response force, you could do worse than a combined army of knights & Turkopoles. Turkopoles have a better attack than Sodeer Archers and can run down routers so I used them instead of foot archers. The missile infantry available to Jerusalem is average until you acquire the Templar Crossbowmen which have a missile attack of 15 and it is armour piercing. They are difficult to retrain however. Templar Gunners are not worth the money.

The melee infantry options available to the Kingdom of Jerusalem are very attractive. Squires of Tripoli are cheap cannon fodder units which are quite capable for their cost. The Templar Sergeants are very easily recruited and will provide the bedrock of your armies until you gain Dismounted Knights of Jerusalem. All these units are cheap and very effective.

Later in the game, the third crusade comes calling by and Richard Coeur de Lion is your to command and he comes with a special “hero” ability which immediately rallies all routing units. Sadly he is only a general and can never be made part of your family tree as princesses are not agent-type characters in this campaign. Talking of family members, you will find it difficult to maintain field armies with family members commanding as family members are difficult to come by. Adoptions will be very necessary to ensure that you have enough generals.

Table of Contents

• Campaign Overview
• Recruitable Units
• Constructable Buildings
• Back to Faction Information Page

Campaign Overview

The Kingdom of Jerusalem starts off in a good position with scope for expanding into the far east of the map. Antioch begin as your allies and effectively guard your northern frontiers. The Turks are not a particularly dangerous adversary but Egypt to your south is a different matter altogether. expect to face waves of attacks. Ascalon must be guarded at all costs because if that falls, Jerusalem will be next. Another difficulty will be the lack of family members & generals. Egypt will send full stacks against you but this has a side benefit in that you can get great experience for your troops. Saladin himself might attack and he is very dangerous. His troops will fight to the last man unless you kill him. Luckily Baldwin your starting king is a very good general as is Richard the Lionheart, who you acquire later in the campaign. Once you take Cairo & Alexandra, the force of Egypt should be spent and you can concentrate on eliminating the Turks. Antioch will be expanding as well and if you let them expand too much, you may have to conquer lands in Asia Minor to make up your total. In the long campaign, Cyprus must be taken. It is a feature of this island that you need a fleet to move units from one end of the island to the other. The Emperor is a somewhat unreliable ally and needs to be watched with care if you sign any alliance with him.

It is important to note that many of your best units can not be constructed without Jerusalem – defend the capital at all costs.

Recruitable Units

The following table contains all of the units that the Kingdom of Jerusalem can recruit in Multiplayer and Custom Battles. For the Grand Campaign, use the “All” period with the following corrections:

• Units in (Brackets) are mercenaries and therefore cannot be trained in campaign, although any general can recruit them in the field if he has space in his army and there are some available.
• Units in [Square Brackets] cannot be recruited in campaign, they are for Multiplayer and Custom Battles only.
• Units in Italics can only be recruited in certain regions (eg. The New World) or after a certain event (eg. The discovery of gunpowder).

Constructable Buildings

Cities

Castles