French units are chasing, but realistically you can never chase the HRE military. They're moving too fast for you, even the spears.

HRE most likely in this matchup will go for a dark age opening, getting spearmen up across the map to harass and annoy the French, just delay that early timing on the pro scout.

The Burgrave has been changed: you now do 50% bonus damage when charging with infantry. That means Castle Age men-at-arms with the upgrades completely shred knights.

The HRE would typically start off with faster spearmen just in order to react to a knight, because the risk of not having spearman when that knight arrives is too high. As French, you can take advantage by not making the knight immediately and instead getting a much faster professional scouts timing.

In an ideal situation, you age up with like 20 plus knights and go for royal institute and then kill the HR out with bloodlines. The guild hall does feel a little bit safer in a scenario such as this.