Sassanids (BI faction)

[frogbeastegg]

Guide.

[Garvanko]

Ahh... the Sassanid Empire.

After testing the waters with the WRE (disaster zone), the Franks (Nice units) and the Vandals (Hording away), I decided to begin a proper campaign with these Persian aristocrats. Needless you say you start off rich, and stay rich. Two or three of your frontier garrisons are on the brink of rebelling, but mainky because they are Pagan states. Demolish their shrines and build your own zoroastrian temples, and you should see public order jump almost 60%..

But that's obvious.

The Sassanids come up against the ERE, and just to make sure you attack them and not go wondering off up north, your goals for domination are to hold 20 settlements plus Constantinople, Jerusalem and Alexandria. Tough assignment, but one that can be accomplished with an initial three pronged strategic assault on Antioch (ERE's second city), Sinope, and Petra (rebel stronghold near Alexandra and Jerusalem). Attack using choke points.. Take Antioch then Jerusalem, then Philadelphia, then the city below Sinope... Then take Alexandria.

At Alexandria, the WRE, who'd just been kicked off Carthage by the Berbers, had an army waiting near Alexandria. I quickly took Alexandria, then allied with WRE. Interesting thing was, when the ERE attacked me again, by bockading my port at Antioch, the WRE remained neutral. A positive development. By now I had control of the East, and am ready to push on towards Constantinople..


The key to playing the Sassanids on the battlemap (I play on VH/M) is to master the horsemen, particlualry your Horse Archers, as most of your Cav (Clibinarii, Catapracts), as well as the unbelievably expensive mercenary units will be HA. Training Generals (Clibinarii Immortals) takes four turns. Most importantly, train lots of specialist archers.

Sassanids are fun. A good balanced intro to BI.

[PseRamesses]

Playing Sass on M/M.

The Sass are rich and have IMO one of the best line-ups BI can muster. This is my appoach:
1. Gather a 1st army around 8*Melchior from your three northern provinces and take Kotais (reb).
2. Gather a 2nd army around 2*Ardashir on the border-bridge between Assyria and Coele-Syria. WRE will attack you there and you can alomost wipe out all of their main force in one or two battles here before moving on Antioch.

1st army will move on Sinope, Caesarea, Ancyra, Ephesus and Kydonia, maybee swing back to take Salamis. 2nd army takes Antioch, Tarsus, Sidon, Jerusalem, Philadelphia and Alexandria, maybee Cyrene or Salamis. Pay no attention to Petra and Dumatha for now.
I exterminated Antioch, Jerusalem and Alexandria. Ensalved Caesarea, Sinope, Ephesus and Sidon thus redirecting population back to smaller settlements. A-J-A has highly developed infrastructure so here I just raised its religious buildings, for now.
Your empire is now firmly set above 20 regions with borders at Kaukasus and Libya so you can end the game by taking the last objective: Constantinople, which I did in 275 AD in my first game, or do something else. To centralize government I moved my capitol to Antioch in the same year.

When it comes to units BI lacks depth so a spear line, archers and Clibniarii will do fine. At your capitol you can later train some good swordsmen so I added them (2/army) for flanking and wall ops.
The Sass are by far the easiest faction to play and with only one enemy, WRE, it´s a walk in the park.

[TosaInu]

test

[The_Emperor]

I started off as the Sassanids as well after playing a few test runs as other factions.

The biggest problem you have as the Sassinids is always going to be religious. Nearly every town I conquered wound up as having a large percentage of the population being christian and causing unrest... Eventually I moved onto a "let god sort em out" massacre and rebuild strategy, whenever I left it too late to destroy those churches it has always cost me.

Ultimately the Sassinids are in a nice spot on the map and can expect very little trouble from anyone except the Eastern Empire. The bulk of Barbarians on the Steppes are more interested in going West than heading directly south into your lands, so you only have to worry about the direct threat posed by the Eastern Empire.

As always taking Antioch is the key, it is a rich city and well placed to cut off the eastern empire from their holdings in the south.

In my campaign I did progress too slowly with all the large garrissons to prevent religious unrest and the Eastern Empire built up some resistance around Jerusalem and Petra as well as taking that profitless settlement Dumatha in Arabia.

Fortunately now the Eastern Empire is having major loyalty problems and the Eastern Rebels have taken that worthless province. I am now on good terms with the rebels with trading rights and so forth so i will leave them there while I deal with the bulk of the Empire to the south and then roll them back westwards.

[Garvanko]

Ultimately the Sassinids are in a nice spot on the map and can expect very little trouble from anyone except the Eastern Empire. The bulk of Barbarians on the Steppes are more interested in going West than heading directly south into your lands, so you only have to worry about the direct threat posed by the Eastern Empire.

.
This is true. More so if you get an Alliance or trade rights with any and all of them. You could however decide to attack them and see if they retaliate. Should spice things up a bit on that front.

Are Sughadan Warriors as good as First Cohorts in RTW?

[Unregistered]

I played the Sassanids for about 20 years on hard/hard and I consider the game won. The ERE lies in shambles before me. Byzantium is under the hun. The east is mine.

I started a 2-pronged attack. I took all the troops I had from my nothern cities and the chief of the army to go for Sinope and a younger general to go for Antioch. "In war, we need to be speedy" has always been my maxim, especially with factions I don't have experience with. Building up a nice powerbase asap is important. I did not go for any rebel cities, as the real enemy is ERE, so weaken them fast.

As Sassanids hate christians, I mostly wiped them out, sometimes enslaved. This makes your life easier, as you can convert them faster.

Next target was Tarsus. Antioch and Tarsus are very near of each other and can support themselves if necessary with troops.

In the north, my offensive stalled as the ERE sent about 3 stacks, one after the other to besiege it. The sieges were quite close affairs, but fun.

Antioch/Tarsus got attacked from the South. Caesarea is a nice target, as it can support Sinope and straightens your frontline.

Then I went south, down the coast, conquering and pillaging as I went. Build ports here, and money rolls in.


I tried to be fast, and even ignored ERE stacks wandering around. I went straight to Alexandria. This is a very very large city. I enslaved them and the brought me quite some trouble, as I always skirted on the edge of rebellion. But I couldn't put that Basilica down! My young governor has some fun with christian harassing and hunting (traits).

Siege weapons are essential imo to deal with the strong defenses of these large cities. Some even have epic walls! In my experience the AI takes its time to repair damages to the walls, so its possible to break the walls/towers on one attack, and then withdraw to attack again in the next turn. I had 4 onagers in my main army. Try to destroy all towers that might be shooting at you as you march through the city to the square. It's surgical strikes! ~:)

Units-wise, I find armored horsemen to storm a city is very effective and fast. Spearmen are sufficient in large numbers. They take heavy casualties against the comita...whatever but suppored by cats they do well. And they can be retrained EVERYWHERE. Archers, as always, a must.

[cunobelinus]

my first campaign was these guys and i am at war with the huns and the vandals are coming .These have some nice units and i am enjoying it but u have 2 strong and factions around u and this is ganna be a fun but challenging campaign .I will say more when i play more.

[cunobelinus]

IUltimately the Sassinids are in a nice spot on the map and can expect very little trouble from anyone except the Eastern Empire. The bulk of Barbarians on the Steppes are more interested in going West than heading directly south into your lands, so you only have to worry about the direct threat posed by the Eastern Empire.


not 100% true i have had problems with the huns and vandals they came my way and now i am holding them back .but the eastern roman empire do pose a threat.

[darklite]

Great money churner. I'm using diplomats to bribe any enemy armies wandering around, gaining some nice new officers. troops bribed tend to come over as peasents, which i route to villages.

My main invasion force is a stack of cavalry. Mounted archers, with light camels. Send in three spies, and attack the city. The spys are gaining exp fast, as are all the cavalry. I have a small stack of 8 spearmen which I use for garrison duty once the city is taken. Rebuild, retrain, and off to another city. The cav attack stack is good because the infantry you're given are rubbish against the better roman inf types.

Had a huge problem with religion, since i didn't convert from christianity, but in the end I let the populations build up, rebel, and the massacred. Gained 20-30k per city, and brought the populations all down to abt 10k. Perfect.

Only problem so far is with Roman Navies, but I'm building two armada's of 2nd gen ships which will go prowling. As with RTW take cyprus. Its a huge money earner.

[Trithemius]

I seem to have followed what appears to be the main Sassanid strategy. I bribed/cajoled the Huns into an alliance and was able to leave my Caucasian front pretty weakly garrisoned. I then pushed across against Antioch, defeated a few ERE forces in the field and then had an interminable siege and some fairly large sally-battles before I exterminated Antioch (I -really- need to get a siege train going, but I want to bring along a bunch of Sughdians as well and its costly).

At present, I've sent my cavalry field-force south to exterminate its way to Alexandria, but I'm having some doubts...

I'd thought that by removing the southern cities (they are the shorter and simpler "arm" of the ERE after you take Antioch) I'd divide them nicely and cause them to ineffectually recruit for their armies, while securing for myself a nice pile of wealth and one of my flanks. However, the ERE seem to be napping or, I dread, building a decent field force in Anatolia.

Should I have hit Anatolia first and conquered all the way to the Hellespont before mucking around in Palestine?

[Trithemius]

Oh, I also notice that recruitment of Sughdian infantry seems to be limited to the original Sassanid provinces, and nothing I can do can alter this (I thought it might be based on the "culture" of the Government building, but it appears that is not the case). Is this a bug or a "feature"?

[Conqueror]

My Sassanid campaign on H/H setting turned out to be positively challenging. The ERE were very lucky as all of the barbarians happily left them alone and it took a long time for the eastern rebels to pop up. Thus they were able to concentrate all their military might against me, their sole enemy. I was also playing on self-imposed rules of not recruiting/retraining units (other than peasants) in a city untill it has been converted to Zoroastrianism, and not training units in foreign culture's barracks.

The ERE attacked me early and was very aggressive. I could hold them off but going on the offensive was difficult without leaving my cities vulnerable (and the Romans sent armies against those cities every time I did). The main problem was that my economy didn't allow for much units, despite the fact that I focused on constructing trade buildings in all of my non-frontier cities. I was just barely able to afford to upkeep my defensive forces and retrain my losses after ERE attacks.

I solved my lack of funds by assaulting and exterminating ERE cities when they were left lightly defended. I had no chance of keeping those cities as the unrest was crazy despite extermination and I couldn't spare troops to set up strong enough garrisons to fend off the very numerous ERE armies. But I got plenty of money by raiding cities, and weakened the ERE because I destroyed their buildings.

Then the Eastern Roman Rebels finally appeared, and ERE finally had an enemy other than me. That gave me the opportunity to actually start expanding, and now I also had enough denarii to set up strong garrisons. I conquered territory from Sidon to Dumatha and I trained spies and assassins to cause unrest in ERE cities, greatly strenghtening the Eastern Rebel faction through revolts. Even more importantly, my economy actually started flourishing with trade from the coastal cities.

But just as I was prepared to attack the weakened ERE, my allies the Eastern Rebels backstabbed me and besieged many of my cities. I had to spend quite some time fighting them off, and ERE used this time to build up their forces in Asia Minor (they STILL hadn't been attacked by any of the barbarians, and now they didn't have to worry so much about the rebels either). By the time I had driven all the Eastern Roman Rebels out of my lands and conquered Alexandria and Tarsus, the ERE resumed it's offensive against me. This time my economy was so good though, that it was no trouble to fight them off and launch my own offensive.

I used my vast treasury to quickly raise two mighty armies of mostly mercenaries and handful of native Sassanid troops, led by good generals. My forces crushed the ERE on the field and poured into the Asia Minor like a tidal wave. I was capturing city after city in quick succession. Maintaining public order was troublesome, but I had so many family members and spies promoting Zoroastrianism in the area that the cities converted quickly. Soon enough I marched an army to the gates of Constantinople and the campaign was finished.

Based on my experiences i can give the following advice:
- Having good economy is extremely important. The ERE starts out much larger and wealthier than you, so avoid getting into a stalemate; time will be on the Roman's side.
- Always exterminate non-Zoroastrian cities.
- The Eastern Rebels are a useful tool but don't let them grow too powerful. They are traitorous scum and will bite the hand that feeds them.
- Don't underestimate the usefulness of family members, spies and diplomats with the religious traits. Concentrating them into a single province can work wonders on the religious setup there.
- If you capture a city but can't hold on to it, be sure to burn the pagan/christian buildings and build Zoroastrian shrine (completed in 1 turn, even if the city revolts that same turn). The shrine will remain there even after the city has been taken/revolted and slowly turns the population to Zoroastrianism, causing unrest for the other faction and making it much easier for you to pacify once you conquer it again.
- The basic horse archer unit (Nomad Archer Cavalry) is very cost-effective, so recruit plenty of them in the beginning of the game.
- Clibinarii are very versatile, able to double as horse archers and serious heavy cavalry.
- You general's bodyguard are extremely powerful. Don't be afraid to use them, they alone can often turn the tide of a battle to your favour.

[Brutus]

Oh, I also notice that recruitment of Sughdian infantry seems to be limited to the original Sassanid provinces, and nothing I can do can alter this (I thought it might be based on the "culture" of the Government building, but it appears that is not the case). Is this a bug or a "feature"?
A feature. The Sughdians are meant to be recruitable only in a limited number of provinces, just like the Greeks in vanilla could only recruit Spartans in Sparta and Syracuse.

[Trithemius]

A feature. The Sughdians are meant to be recruitable only in a limited number of provinces, just like the Greeks in vanilla could only recruit Spartans in Sparta and Syracuse.

What a pain, I guess I'll have to rely on mercenary veteranii once I start to run low on Sughdian Infantry wall-stormers. ~:mecry:

[Bullethead]

The Sassanids seem fairly easy compared to some of the other factions, especially the Sarmatians. Unless you just have bad luck with the hordes, you should essentially have a war on 1 front (although with northern and southern sectors), although you might have 2 enemies there at different times (ERE and ERE rebels). IOW, you can orient your whole military-industrial complex to face west.

Your first objective is to seize the strategic initiative so the war is fought on your terms. Otherwise, the richer and bigger ERE will grind you down. To do this, you must destroy the ERE field forces ASAP, which prevents the ERE from taking the offensive to you. While the ERE will still have way more troops than you after this, they're required to garrison the big, unruly cities, so most of them can't move. If they try to move anyway, the ERE rebels will probably appear, so they'll then have to deal with them instead of you. Thus, you will be able to start taking ERE cities without having to worry about a counteroffensive, and can do so at your own pace, leaving your main armies in new cities long enough to pacify them before moving on to the next city. This means you really only need 2 main armies, 1 for the Anatolian and 1 for the Middle Eastern sectors. The ERE will, of course, be pumping out individual troop units here and there, and rushing them to the front, but you can pick these off with small stacks of several horse archer units for the most part, so they're basically like suppressing brigands.

At this point in the game, your armies will consist of mostly of levy spearmen, desert archers, and nomad horse archers, with whatever supporting mountain slingers, Kurdish javelinmen, and camel raiders you decide to build, and your starting few units of clibinarii. You really need several horse archers, several desert archers, a couple of slingers, and a couple of camel units in both your stacks, so you can fight different types of battles depending on what the ERE brings. You can build neither clibinarii nor sugdians to start with, you really need some economic upgrades before you can support many of them, and they take 2 turns to build anyway. Thus, your early armies will be light and rather unreliable infantry with fairly heavy missile and light cav support, with a sprinkling of heavy cav. Not to mention you're outnumbered. You therefore need to fight with a terrain advantage.

To destroy the ERE field armies, I've found that bridge battles work pretty well, but aren't guarantees. On the 1st turn, move whoever you can to the bridges NW and SW of Hatra, and reinforce these tiny stacks as rapidly as possible. These stacks will later grow into your 2 main offensive armies under your 2 non-leader generals, but for now they're on the defensive, protecting your cities and killing ERE. The ERE watchtowers along the Euphrates will see your stacks on the bridges, and the ERE field armies will promptly attack you. And if you do well, they'll keep attacking until the ERE runs out of mobile forces.

Attacking ERE stacks will be 2/3 to 7/8 full and will contain about 1/2 to 2/3 infantry, most of the rest foot archers, and 1 or 2 cav or hippo-toxi units. In the 1st wave, the infantry will mostly be limitanei, which your rather shaky forces can deal with in the conventional bridge-slaughter manner. The limitanei take serious losses from your arrows and usually break as soon as they reach your waiting spears. Then you can chase them back across with your cav and pretty much kill every ERE soldier. :charge:

Comitatenses and legio lancieri, which will be the bulk of the 2nd and later waves, however, are MUCH harder to handle. These guys take their time calmly forming up in a neat column at their end, all the while totally ignoring massed volleys from your horse archers and flaming arrows from your desert archers. They seem completely impervious to arrows of all kinds. Slingers and javelinmen can hurt them, but due to the flat trajectory of slings, and the short range of javelins, you don't get off enough shots to do decisive damage before they get across. Then they charge across the bridge faster than you can blink, all the while maintaining impecable formation, and rout your waiting spearmen on contact, even those with bronze weapons and 3 bronze chevrons. Then things get desperate. ~:eek:

Clibinarii are the only things you've got that can go toe-to-toe with ERE heavy grunts, but even these have their limits. They kill slowly, due to a low attack rating, and this isn't really helped by their charge bonus, because these tincans can't manage more than a brisk trot. However, they have a very strong defense, so they don't die quickly, they have high morale so they can take serious losses before routing, and they have so much mass that even 10 of them can push 500-600 ERE heavy grunts backwards along the bridge in a prolonged melee. So what you do is use them as a stopper in the bottle while your missile troops run back a couple hundred yards and spread out with your light cav on the flanks. Then pull the remaining clibinarii back, let the ERE fan out after your missile units, and you can get flank shots with arrows that will hurt them, and flank charges with your spearmen and camels that will rout them. The ERE heavy grunts, having been fighting hard while being pushed back 1/2way across the bridge by the clibinarii, will now be exhausted and will rout quickly. Then pursue them back across the bridge and kill them all.

All in all, it's best to avoid being attacked on a bridge by comitatenses and legio lancieri. It's too expensive in scarce clibinarii and experienced spearmen. Plan B is to have spies across the river so you can see what's coming. Then, when attacked by a heavy infantry stack, you choose withdraw. This backs you up a couple spaces, the ERE pursues and attacks again, and this time you've got a different type of terrain advantage: high ground and open fields, either in the foothills by the NW bridge or in the sand dunes by the SW bridge. The ERE heavy grunts take forever to climb the hill, so your slingers have more time to hurt them, and they get tired so your arrows have at least a better morale effect. Plus you can use the open ground to get your horse archers around behind them, where they can do actual damage. Of course, the ERE will have some hippo-toxi, and maybe a general's heavy cav. Use your clibinarii and especially your camels on these. Camels really seem to rout horse units quickly, so always have some with you. :duel:

Bridge battles are enlivened sometimes by the ERE trying to swim some units across, either peasants or horse archers. However, it's not very smart about this, sending them right next to the bridge instead of way off to the side somewhere. Thus, you can deal with them from your initial deployment. Swimming units do a lot of dying from prolonged exposure to point-blank missile fire, and the few units that make it across without routing don't last long trying to fight up the steep bank. An interesting thing is that slingers can swim faster than horse archers, and fight more effectively in the water, so send them in after routing horse archers--it's like a feeding frenzy ~:cool:

After several battles at each bridge, the ERE will be immobilized by the need for garrisons and probably by the appearance of the ERE rebels. Now you fully top up your 2 main stacks, merge and replace units as needed, and go on the offensive. Take Antioch and Tarsus simultaneously to cut the ERE in half, then gradually work each army through the rest of its sector. While this is going on at a comfortable pace, put together a 3rd army on the northern flank to take Colchis and/or some of the NE steppes. But I'd as soon leave the steppes to the barbarians, and better they take them from rebels than go to war with me over them. Colchis is worth taking, however. While the bridge battles are going on, you might want your 2* general to go by there and build a fort blocking the path along the Black Sea coast from the ERE to there, to keep the ERE out of it while you kill them at the bridges. And always have several small horse archer stacks scattered about your interior to suppress brigands.

The only trouble I've had as the Sassanids, and that was pretty minor, was the plague. If you keep your infected cities quarantined, the plague goes away in several turns and no harm done. In fact, it's often a positive, because it reduces population that's becoming restive due to the slow pace of your expansion against the ERE.

[Majikos]

The Sassanids

When playing as the Sassanids i set myself a goal: to create the Ottoman
empire, 1000 years earlier. I first started on bringing asia minor under the Sassanid banner. This ensured that the ERE was effectively cut in half economically and they could not come to the rescue unless they wanted around 30 elephants stomping on them. I quickly took antioch as it was badly defended (after a few turns on civil revolts for the ERE) and immediately took to zoroastrianising the province. After a few unsuccessful attempts to reclaim syria, and thus their armies weakened, it was a walkover for my elephant/catapracht/clibinarii armies to claim more turkish lands. I then took Constantinople. These lands were create money generators. After that i started to move south from antioch (which after building a foundry was churning out levy spearmen and cataprachts) and captured sidon and Jerusalem. This was my empire just after capturing constantinople, as you can see my faction is under the tryannical OAP emperor: Melchior the Butcher.
http://storage.msn.com/x1pbglk-vqL4BskRY5N8g4R73WzQVcIJwpBs3w7iqcAA1m0GoWDeg6cHqqmUHf4AFoIgotmWMEr21bkcJqrDrM17q3ncTTGwoR_GfeHut-oZxJD2jPqwqSZdBPRNEluanTtQR9S83FQ4qeUodSbwXRKwE35ZVqQ8xmt
As i see it there are a few things you must do to succeed:
On capturing a city that is predominantly christian or pagan, exterminate the population. This is to quell religious riots and easily convert the people. This the main reason my leader is 'the butcher'.

After exterminating a population it is time to zorastrianise the people. Destroy the existing temple/church and replace it with a zoroastrian one. It is a good idea to bring characters with the 'light of zoroaster' trait and/or a zoroastrian ancillary to aid conversion.

Make use of elephants, i always use two units of elephants in my purely 'military' armies, backed up by some cataprachts and horse archers.

Trade rights are not required. After taking the rich turkish lands i was pretty much self sufficient. As long has you build economy-enhancing buildings and exterminate with each conquest you should have a large treasury. If you look at my picture you see what i mean. I normally make about 7-10k a time, but i am generally building buildings all the time.

[Ordani]

Sassanids have to be the easiest faction I've played so far.

1. Recruit Clibinarii
2. Flank Romans while shooting them with arrows
3. Charge Romans from multiple angles
4. Get coffe, come back 5 minutes later when their entire army is dead and you've lost 3 Clibinarii, which is apparently Latin for "impossibly difficult to kill."

Sieges can be a little rough against Comitatenses in the early/mid years but you essentially can not lose battles in the open field. You can have armies of peasants, but as long as they're backed by Clibinarii or Immortals all they have to do is hold the melee line long enough for your HEAVY cavalry to waddle around the flanks. Opposing cavalry functionally doesn't matter since it'll bounce off the Clibwall.

Did I mention Clibinarii are really good? Best record was a C and CI (yes, that's 2 units, alone) versus about 700 roman infantry and light cavalry. Persia represent.

[Garvanko]

Clibinarii rock, but I also like the Levy Spearmen as flanking units. Their bonus against Cav makes them an excellent support force for Sughadans and Clibinarii.

Best way to kill of the ERE. Cause internal disorder and destroy their military structures through use of assassins - especially in Antioch which will be training alot of Comitatenses. Wait a few years, while defending the bridge between Hatra and Antioch. When they are weak and you are ready (and when your economy needs a boost), take Antioch.

Best army composition so far..

1 Clibinarii Immortal (or 2)
3 Clibinarii
4 Sughadans
4 Levy Spearmen
4 Horse Archers
2 missile units/javelins etc

[stabularasa]

Sassanids have to be the easiest faction I've played so far.

1. Recruit Clibinarii
2. Flank Romans while shooting them with arrows
3. Charge Romans from multiple angles
4. Get coffe, come back 5 minutes later when their entire army is dead and you've lost 3 Clibinarii, which is apparently Latin for "impossibly difficult to kill."

Sieges can be a little rough against Comitatenses in the early/mid years but you essentially can not lose battles in the open field. You can have armies of peasants, but as long as they're backed by Clibinarii or Immortals all they have to do is hold the melee line long enough for your HEAVY cavalry to waddle around the flanks. Opposing cavalry functionally doesn't matter since it'll bounce off the Clibwall.

Did I mention Clibinarii are really good? Best record was a C and CI (yes, that's 2 units, alone) versus about 700 roman infantry and light cavalry. Persia represent.


Ordani, at what difficulty setting did you play?

[Ordani]

I always play on Hard/Hard since VeryHard has been reported to weird out, and didn't actually seem any more difficult except with low experience infantry at the very beginning of the game anyway. If it's anything like Shogun it's just an another bonus experience level for AI troops.

Clibinarii Immortals are just insanely good. I didn't even have a chance to get major Cataphract armies to the front since a few C/CI units per army bulldozed anything in their path. The only challenge at all was seizing gates with levy spearmen, though that got much easier when you forced farther into Roman lands and could recruit Merc Veternarii. You will only lose hugely lopsided field battles as the Sassanids, and unless you take a hundred years wandering lost in the desert the ERE will never field a significant enough force. By significant force I mean like 10x First Cohorts.

[Watchman]

Playing as the ERE, I actually found Legio Lanciarii to be among the better clib-counters. Ergo, when I tried the Sassanids, Lanciariis were singled out for every tactical nastiness I could dream up starting with massive archery saturation and converging attacks.

Commies usually just crumbled when charged.

[Ordani]

Legio Lanciarii are the best anti-cavalry unit the ERE has, but a flanking charge from CI will likely disrupt them to the point of routing without extensive extenuating circumstances. They also aren't good enough against infantry to run off Levy Spearman, and thus easy to pin and annihilate.

My fundamental gripe with the Sassanids is that CI can get away with charging spearmen unless you happen to be fighting the Roman A-Team 3-silver chevron max weapon/armor Legio Lanciari of Doom straight outta Compton.

[Watchman]

Well, let's be honest here - the Romans *did* have a Hell of a time with the Persian tanks under various flags. And they did *not* have pikes...

That said, BI FamiCav can usually roll up even spearmen without too much trouble assuming they're not green as newly risen grass. I've hunted bandit Saxon Keels with Paladin Bodyguards without excessive issues, although I'll admit it got a bit hairy at times.

I'd seriously hesitate about crashing even CIs into something like those Palatine spearmen or high-chevron Boshporans though, but then I tend to be a bit excessively cautious.

[SJRlunchbox]

A quick word on Sassanid soldiers. I was expecting their Levy Infantry to be, in a word, pathetic. However, they have a couple of intense bonus'.

1. (On large settings) 120 soldiers. Count them, one hundred and twenty. How does this help? It means they take longer to rout, usually outnumber opponents and can generally fight longer

2. They have better stats then I expected. As an opening infantry unit in an army tipped towards cavalry war, I was expecting them to be less then mediocre. But they quite surprised me by being acceptable.

3. Even better, when you get higher level barracks (either through building them yourself (which I recommend if you've got nothing else to spend your vast wealth on) or finding them in other cities you've taken) they're trained with an experience bonus. That, coupled with foundries (which are simple enough for the Rich Sassanid's to get their hands on) means you can get Levy Spearmen with three experience and silver weaponry/armour (effectively +5 to defense and attack) simply enough.

4. They can be retrained anywhere. Let me repeat that, ANYWHERE. The enemy city could have anything between the level 1 barracks, and the top-of-the-line-with-go-faster-stripes barracks, and you can retrain your Levy Spearmen. What does that mean? Throw the footsloggers into the grinder! Lose half of your 1,200 men, it doesn't matter, you can retrain them all in less then a turn anyway.

Right, moving on. The Sassanid general is, for lack of a better word, brilliant. He's far tougher then any other general unit (high defense and two hitpoints do wonder for a soldier) and he has the added bonus of being a horse-archer. Tough, strong and capable of ranged combat.

The Clibinarii are VERY effective, being able to hit home with a powerful charge. As well as having an almost obscene defense and the ability to fire arrows, they're effective warriors in any situation. However, they require a mid-range stable to retrain, which isn't always handy, and it takes a whole year to get a single unit of them ready.

Then, the archers. They take longer to get then other archers (The romans get a basic archer unit at the first Practise range), but they're worth the weight. Very effective, and when stuck behind a screen of Levy Spearmen with Clibinarii on their flanks (also firing their bows) invincible death dealing machines.

Finally, the Sassanid elite infantry, (which I unfortunately cannot spell). They are effective, that can't be doubted. Toe to toe I saw them take on two Plumbitarii units and emerge victorious with only half casualties. Unfortunately, they're too hard to come by to really risk. They take two turns to recruit, and at least double that time to march into the trouble areas to reinforce the units you already have. They're best in situations where you need a hard punch to deal with tough units (such as attacking a wall), but unfortunately those very situations are the ones they suffer too many casualities to be useful in your next fight. A pity, since I would use them all the time, otherwise.

[Franconicus]

By mistake I started a Sass campaign with M/M. It was very easy. Although I planned a slow build up I was suddenly in a blitz.

This was the strategy:
I invested money to build up the cities at the northern frontier. They are save, as long as there are no hordes; so let them make money. Build roads!
I also formed a small army there to invade the rebel town in the northwest. I did not assault the town, just waited until it gave up. This was just a side stream operation.

The mainstream was in the mountains north of Tarsus. I had a small army there and an assassin. I made them advance to Tarsus at once. The assassin can kill a Roman diplomat :2thumbsup: After my first turn the Romans did send the garisson from Tarsus to fight my army. With a little luck and a defensive position I won. I advanced further to Tarsus. In the meanwhile my assassin spotted that the garisson was only a FM. I play Sassanids, so why not use assasins? My ass murdered their FM and the town was open. I took it, killed the pop.

The Romans did not like that. They sent an army from Antioch to throw me out again. Now it is time for some help. I could send a new army from my homeland to assault Antioch. This made the Romans recall their army. After I defeated two smaller armies I had to retreat south because this big Roman army attacked me. So I besieged Sidon. Again the Roman army followed and I advanced to lay siege on Jerusalem. Again the Romans followed and I moved to the Egyptian border. There I was ready to fight (side by side with some mercs) and defeated the Romans. The gate to Egypt was open. Note: The Romans have a big army near Antioch; they get reenforcements from Asia Minor. That is all. The other towns (Sidon, Jerusalem, Egypt) are only week, mainly FMs.
So while I took Egypt I had another brand new army set up in the eastern parts (together with my night fighting general). Her attacked and assaulted Antioch. Loosing Antioch and Egypt is too much for the ERE. The rest of Palestine and Asia Minor was easy to take.


Battle Tactic
Sass have some nice range units as well as heavy cav (Clibinarii). Usually I have a lot of archers, slingers and javelins to soften the enemy. Then the heavy cavalry finishes. This can brale the backbone of any Roman army without cav and archers. If they have archers and cav it is good to have some light camels to chase them.

[Garvanko]

Finally, the Sassanid elite infantry, (which I unfortunately cannot spell). They are effective, that can't be doubted. Toe to toe I saw them take on two Plumbitarii units and emerge victorious with only half casualties. Unfortunately, they're too hard to come by to really risk. They take two turns to recruit, and at least double that time to march into the trouble areas to reinforce the units you already have. They're best in situations where you need a hard punch to deal with tough units (such as attacking a wall), but unfortunately those very situations are the ones they suffer too many casualities to be useful in your next fight. A pity, since I would use them all the time, otherwise.Another major problem is retraining. Only a select few provinces (two, i think) can retrain them to full strength and they're deep in Sassanid heartland.

Just makes the cost seem even more unpalatable.

[MerlinusCDXX]

:charge:
Attacking ERE stacks will be 2/3 to 7/8 full and will contain about 1/2 to 2/3 infantry, most of the rest foot archers, and 1 or 2 cav or hippo-toxi units. In the 1st wave, the infantry will mostly be limitanei, which your rather shaky forces can deal with in the conventional bridge-slaughter manner. The limitanei take serious losses from your arrows and usually break as soon as they reach your waiting spears. Then you can chase them back across with your cav and pretty much kill every ERE soldier.
.

I find the ERE even easier, as they tend to bulk up their crappy 1st wave armies with peasants, just shoot them with your archers/nomad cav and they should run by the time they smell your spears coming,thus allowing you to concentrate your entire army on the few decent units they have left.
:charge:

[Severous]

For experienced players and those patient with archery this faction is straight forward. Horse archery and some heavy cavalry makes for a winning combination of mobility and missiles.

Try to avoid the Roman pila/spear throws which can rout your weaker troops in one volley.

Religion makes for an interesting change. As you capture Antioch and other christian cities you spend a few turns working out the conversion process.

I sent a spy north to look out for Hordes. Then two army groups..one south heading around to Egypt and another west through Turkey. Not finished yet. Hoping it will be less than 10 years on vh/vh.

Link to the After Action Report on this campaign:
http://rtw.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=10,2521,,20

[Hasdrubal]

The Sassanids are my favorite BI faction. Why? one word: money. They're rolling in denarii and have the units to spend it on. I love the Clibinarii. They deal death with their bows, then charge in and club the enemy into oblivion! Sweet victory.

The Eastern Roman Empire is tough, but they can be taken down with some good desert tactics.:egypt:

[projectmayhem]

ok so i found the sassanids to be really easy compared to the Byzantines after playing both to victory... the ERE/Byzantines can't really stop your heavy cav to save their life... even fulls legions of roman spearmen fall to 3-4 units of any heavy calvary with few of your units lost (especially immortals ofc). basically the strategy is to charge them all at one line or spears and scare them to death with the arrows and the charging and such, they get a lil paniced and when they start to run, all your guys pull out their bows and shoot them in the soft spot in the back where they don't have armor.


that's pretty much it for the battle strat just one more... your spears are better fighters than almost any horde unit (and also have the full 120 unit size), so if you find yourself up against them train lots of levy spearmen (at advanced exp if at all possible).

For the campaign map strat i found the game is almost too easy if you simply aim for antoch early. take it with everything you can, exterminate, and get to work teaching them about heaven and hell (Zoroastrian) with all of your faction leaders and generals (you get at least 5% conversion for every family or general in the region, so send them all to help initialy, then attack from there)

once anitoch likes you enough, set it to be your capitol (VERY IMPORTANT!!) it is not only close enough to keep your homelands happy, it's also now your biggest city, and the ERE was kind enough to build a hipodrome there so you can train all the cav that are so good at killing romans.

from there just fight a long 1 on 1 with the byz/east romans, making trading and map agreements with everyone else, and try not to war anyone but the rebels and the ERE.

To comment on an earlier post of religious troubles its not that hard: take more generals, or the ones with 25%-30% conversion strengths to new cities, and sometimes you need to use the border conversion strat... which is taking cities that border your unruley target, sit your generals with conversion on the edge of that territory, waiting 5-10 turns then attacking it (it will already be mostly your religion.)

i like them and their horsies so much that i am currently working on taking over the world with them. right now i have killed ERE and ERE rebels and own ALL of their homelands. I eliminated the vandals and am fighting a standoff with the WRE and two horde tribes (the yellow ones [name escapes me] and the huns [who are almost dead]) I took carthage and everything south of the Mediterranean, and i have more money than davey crocket. (the ex ERE cities are goldmines, as are your homecities) The entire east med is full of my trade fleets from alexandria to antoch to carthage to constantinople to jerusalem (each netting over 2k/turn)

[samiosumo]

Playing H/M i started by taking Kotais and turning it into my unit centre. With a couple of armies i took antioch and tarsus(very hard to control they keep rioting) Then moved south and took Sidon and Jerusalem. Fully at war with ERE now they started blockading my ports, with 4 ships i won 15 consecutive sea battles and on land was helped by the arrival of ERE rebels, and the Berbers. Got my king in a ship with elephants (from Pharapsha) and full army and took alexandria. The WRE allied with me so ERE was at peace. THEY offered me traade rights and map info then next turn blockaded my port. My 5 star kng was dead in the ground so i changed my heir to my best general. Next turn my king dies so i gather an army and sail across the black sea to constantinople. it was held by rebels i take it and hold it. I take Philedelphea but keep on being attacked from Petra and the ARab inferia.

Next i plan to take Petra and Dumathra, then try to hold Tarsus.

[Revenant69]

Just started playing as the Sassanids (BI v1.6 Hard / Hard) cuz I love playing factions with nice cavalry :beam:

My strategy was to do a two pronged assault.
1. Collect all armies from Artaxia, Phraaspa, Artaxarta (you should get almost a full stack) under the command of Melchior, the Eran Spahbod - Commander-in-chief of all Sassanid armies, and take Kotais. You'll have to spend a few years there teaching the Armenians about Zoroastra and pacifying the populace. You can then use this army, if your northern mountainous border is secure that is, to march across the mountains to Sinope and Caesarea.

2. Collect all armies from Ctesiphon, Hatra and in between them and quickly occupy the bridge between Hatra and Antioch. Let the Romans waste their forces in bridge attacks. After you have smashed their stacks in bridge battles you can move your army up to take Antioch. You can then use this army, retrained in Antioch, to take Tarsus and to march south into Judea and Aegyptus.

Sassanids have one enemy - the Eastern Roman Empire, so make sure to stay nice with the ERE enemies. The enemy of your enemy is your friend.
Another great thing about Sassanids is that you can use their generals as a solo rebel mop up army. In this way you can train a few generals pretty quick to silver and gold chevrons.

You can use Ctesiphon and Antioch as your army training centers. Note that one of your family members has two nice ancillaries (Decorated Hero and a Mercenary Captain) that help train troops faster and cheaper. For instance, Clibinarii Immortals usually take 4 turns to train. However, you can train them in 3 turns, just see the picture below:

http://www.slavab.com/images/RTW/clibinarii_immortals.jpg

Just transfer these ancillaries to a governor in your troop building city to make training units cheaper and faster. Indeed, 4 turns - 30% = 2.8 turns and I guess the game rounds it up to 3 turns. Although still kinda strange that 30% reduction in troop price actually reduces the training time too. I wonder if there is a way to actually attain a 50% reduction in price (and so in time as well) to train units. This would mean the Sughdians, Clibinarii, War Elephants and Cataphracts would take 1 turn to train. That would just be EVVVVIL =)
Hmm, will have to look at all ancillaries in RTW:BI v1.6. Anyone got a link to the list of all different ancillaries and their effects?

Will write more of my thoughts at a later point, once I advance through the campaign. Cheers.

[Revenant69]

First things first. It seems that I was wrong about the fact that Sassanids start the game with a family member who has a Decorated hero and a Mercenary Captain ancillaries - it's just that I got them realy quick in my campaign.

Secondly, I dug through the ancillary file last night :book: and managed to find some interesting stuff and do some tests as well. What are my results? Well, a picture is worth a thousand words...

http://www.slavab.com/images/RTW/sassanids01.jpg

So, it is possible to halve the training time of elite units (and Sassanids have lots of units which take more than one turn to train). In fact, the ONLY possible (for Sassanids) combination of ancillaries necessary to get the desired effect is the following:
Decorated Hero - 20% reduction;
Drillmaster - 10% reduction;
Master Smith - 10% reduction;
Mercenary Captain - 10% reduction.

A question rises. How would one go about "breeding" these ancillaries? To this end, I compiled a little chart of triggers and condition necessary to get the ancillaries.
http://www.slavab.com/images/RTW/sassanids02.jpg

And now some information from my personal observations.
1. To get a Decorated Hero ancillary just send a lone general unit on some rebel/brigand hunt and make sure that this unit takes enough casualties to be awarded the 20% chance to get a Decorated Hero.
2. Drillmaster is tougher to get as the chances are lower. Just put a general with Command of 4 higher as a governor of a city, any city for that matter, and train infantry units. I got my Drillmaster when I put Melchior, the starting general, to subdue the residents of Ancyra and he was training peasant garrison. So training cheap peasants will suffice, they are infantry after all.
3. To get the Master Smith, your city has to have an Armourer building and have a governor. Then, at the end of each turn, you get a 2% chance to recruit this ancillary. May take a while...
4. Mercenary Captain is one of the easiest one to get, just recruit some mercenaries once in a while and you'll get him.

Once you have all four above mentioned ancillaries, transfer them to the governor of your troop production city and be ready to start the Sassanian Blitzkrieg!!!
Beware, however, the upkeep cost of a unit is not reduced !!!

[Severous]

@Revenant69
Excellent posts. Learnt something there. Thank you.

I will look out for that training effect on recruitment.

[Revenant69]

@Revenant69
Excellent posts. Learnt something there. Thank you.

I will look out for that training effect on recruitment.

Thanks Severous, I tried my best, although, as it turnes out, the information in my previous post is not entirely accurate. I took the information for the table with ancillaries from an old Excel file. As I later found out, this file was for RTW 1.2 or 1.3. To correct this mistake, I actually looked through the export_descr_ancillaries.txt file in BI/Data folder and RTW/Data folder and incorporated the changes.

The full and final description can be found here: Military discounts Ancillaries (http://www.slavab.com/RTW/ancillary.html)

Hope you find it even more useful.

[Severous]

This information is not restricted to this faction. It deserves a place in the research part of this forum.

See if you can find a suitable thread here..or get a new thread going:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/forumdisplay.php?f=88

[Revenant69]

This information is not restricted to this faction. It deserves a place in the research part of this forum.

See if you can find a suitable thread here..or get a new thread going:
https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/forumdisplay.php?f=88


You're right Severous, I'll request to open an appropriate thread in Ludus Magna.
Cheers. :charge:

[Flavius Merobaudes]

If you do that, it would be good to include other ancillaries' adding boni such as the army movement bonus (drillmaster +25%, geographer +15%, quartermaster +15%/ 55% total) or those adding command stars (quite a lot).

Imagine the impact of the movement bonus for factions like the Sassanids that can rely on all-cavalry armies.

When playing as the WRE, I accumulated some command ancillaries and shared them around between my new generals, so they all had the nightfighter trait which helped me a lot against hordes.

Good work until now but it's not complete yet.:yes:

[Hound of Ulster]

Ah, the Sassinsids...my favorite faction in any total war game.

I found out real quick that the Sassinsid infantry (except Sughdians) suck, that you make more money with them with low taxes and small garrisons, and that the Eastern Empire can't stand up to all cav armies.

My best force with Sassinsids was...

6x ClibImmortals
8x horse archers
2x clibnarii (sometimes)
4x cataphracts
+ some Elephants sometimes

You hit the flanks with the horse archers, the center with ClibImmortals and wait with the Cataphracts for any weak spots in the line. You then punch into those weak spots with both the Immortals and the Cataphracts.

I conquered all of Asia minor, the Levant and Egypt (albeit on easy/medium) with only two small cav armies. I would have knocked the Eastern Empire out and won the campaign by about 460 A.D if I hadn't decieded to drop vanilla RTW for various mods.:jumping:

[samiosumo]

although it maqy be frowned upon by many of the more "hardcore" members i find that if you want Immortals and elephants and sugdians quickly i use the add money and finish queue cheats on turn one. First prees th "¬" buuton. Then type "add_money 200000" press enter. then press shift up and press enter. repeat until you have 5 million or whatever (trust me, you'll need it) then go on to one of your cities and fill the queue. then type "process_cq [settlement name, e.g. Hatra]" then press enter. next press shift up nad press enter. repeat until all buildings for that settlement are built. then do the sae for all settlements.

when you take a settlement you should destroy everything there. then build every thing up. even if you take a big christian settlement (90% or more) you can dewstroy everything then build all your zorestrian buildings. The conversion of the population to your religion should take a couple of turns.

*****the "process_cq" cheat dosen't work with settlements with two names*****

[Hound of Ulster]

All I usually did was destroy all of the Christian buildings and then built my Zorastranian stuff to replace. That and low taxes usually kept Asia Minor and the Levant in line.

[Quintus.JC]

The Sassanid shoud be steamrolling once they take Antioch. from there they can train Cataphracts and Climbrii, unlike Parthia their infantry is also worth while. anyhow playing Saassanid was easier than I thought, apart from their inability to build any advanced Plumbing system, which was always a pain in the backside.

[Hound of Ulster]

We Persians don't need plumbing..........

Right now I've got the Byzantines on the run (new campaign with the VBM M/M) with only Alexandria and Constantinople between me and victory.

I love Cataphracts.

The Sassinid infantry are actually really good for defending against sieges.

make an alliance with the ERE rebels. it helps a lot.

Antioch is the key that unlocks the door to Constantinople.

[Hamilcar Barca]

I have a few questions and could use some help if anyone has a minute. :help:

I'm obviously not seeing what some other people here are in regards to the Sassanids. I've seen comments regarding how rich these guys are and how they get richer. I've seen comments on how some of my outlying provinces are on the verge of rebellion. I'm playing this game on the Total War:Eras edition and I've seen neither. When I read these guides it causes confusion.

What exactly is the starting income for the Sassanids in the versions you guys are playing, because in this one I'm starting each campaign (regardless of diff level) with a meager 7000 dinari. That's hardly enough to get the ball rolling without falling into dept. Especially when every other faction in the game starts with atleast twice as much money as that. I've played barbarian factions that all seem to start with about 15,000 yet I'm playing Persia now and they only start with half that?

Am I making too much over the starting income or is this something strictly confined to the version I own? Are you guys seeing that at the start too or what?

Thanks gang.

Oh and P.S.

Long-time reader of the forums here and glad to have finally gotten that first post in. This is a great site. Appreciate any help y'all could offer. Thanks.

[Flavius Merobaudes]

Playing the 1.6 version, my starting money is 7000, too. But I disband some troops which I feel are worthless on turn 1 - slingers, javelin throwers and camel raiders that is. I build what I can afford on turn one, usually sewers in the northern settlements in the mountains and something else in Hatra and Ctesiphon. You need to get that population growing in the mountain towns. You know what buildings to concentrate on for money.
Kotais in the northwest (modern day Georgia) is my first target. I start besieging it with my faction heir on turn 1 to prevent they build a christian shrine. I move in some more troops from Artaxarta on turn 2.

My early field army consists of only the 4 starting clibinarii and two nomad horsearchers for chasing routers, of course commanded by the Eran Spahbad. There is not much that can stand against this small but effective army and those clibs will gain experience fast. Later armies consist of cataphracts and clibinarii at a 1:2 ratio. Edit: A surprise from India might be useful, too.

Tactical: You know how to use that combo, right? ( :smg: :charge: :smg: )
A. Keep your cataphracts back in the beginning and use your horsearchers to disrupt the enemy formation.
B. Now pick single units, isolate them and pinch them between two clibinarii. The one in front of them serves as a bait to keep them in direction, the other in the rear decreases numbers and moral by ,well, shooting them in the back. When their ammo is depleted, decide whether you want to shoot some more - so turn the enemy in opposite direction by pretending a charge from their back - or if you want to save the ammo for other enemy units...
C. Get your cataphracts in position for a good charge. Charge in with lances, then switch to swords (alternative attack) and sandwich with clibs from the other direction. Result:
D. Enemy unit annihilated, no own casualties. Repeat with next unit.
Advice: - Beware of enemy javelins and pila, keep out of their range. If charging, order to run the last meters.
- Enemy archers are targets for early charges before they can do any harm. Just surround the enemy army, isolate them and charge.
- If you are in a melee, something went wrong. If you are in a melee and being charged by legio lanciarii, pull out immediately.:sweatdrop:
- Your clibinarii will get tired by shooting their arrows. Avoid to charge with tired units.
This should help you to preserve your precious army, may they gain a lot of experience and become ever stronger...

[Hamilcar Barca]

Thanks Flavius Flave. ~:pimp:

[Flavius Merobaudes]

BTW, welcome to the hood Ham Bee.:verycool:

[Hound of Ulster]

Its good to see more followers of the Savaran amongst the org.

If you feel that the vanilla campaign is a pushover, try the House of Sassan in both Rio's Flagellum Dei and the Invasio Barborum mods. Its hard. very hard.

[Roslagii Keel]

Faction Overview: Sassanids
Wow, this sure is a popular faction! Good for me I like to write. Don't know if I can provide any new insights, but hopefully this will be some moderately entertaining reading. :bow:

General Overview
The seal is broken. The Parthians overthrown. The spirits of the Immortals stir from their slumber, eager for combat and new glory. The legacy of Alexander is gone, our old enemies conquered by the Romans. But they are a divided people. Ripe. Once more the peoples of asia stand united under the banners of Persia. Once more the armies of the east stand ready to claim their rightful place as rulers of this wretched world. As leader of the known world's oldest empire, you must use every edge at your disposal to crush the Romans, who will stop at nothing to halt your ever-increasing dominion of the east. By bow and mace, dagger and diplomacy, the light of Zoroaster and the world's finest generals, the Sassanids will be victorious!

The Sassanid Army
The key strength of the persian army (and sometimes it's key weakness) has always been it's multi-ethnicity. Together with a core of levy infantry and persian elites, you command the finest warriors from all over asia: Specialized elites who cannot easily be matched by the copycat romans. It's relatively easy to use the sassanid's best units effectively, but to master them, you must learn to use the supporting units as well.

Infantry
Levy Spearmen suffer from a lack of special abilities and are probably the worst of their kind in the game. Their main achievement is the tight formation, unlike the unwieldy and vulnerable "horde formation" utilized by runaway slaves and peasants. This alone make them better fodder units than peasants, and good training (extra experience) also helps. Use them with wild abandon to tie up enemy units and don't be alarmed when they die or run away as there is always plenty more ready for training in the nearest settlement. Unless you have an all-cavalry army, always bring two more levies than you really need and watch the enemy crumble under the sheer weight of numbers. Sughdian Warriors are very badass-looking with their cruel maces and face-covering helmets, and are the terror of roman legionaries! Understand that roman infantry use swords and spears exclusively in hand-to-hand; good weapons against barbarians, but not against disciplined heavy infantry. A skilled mace swing on the other hand can crush a shield and the arm that holds it, and a man wearing chainmail hit by a mace could just as well be naked. If you're not afraid of micro management, you should continue to train sughdians in the cities were they are available and continuosly spread them around the empire. Make sure you have at least two units in every important border town, as such a settlement will be very hard to take. They will typically suffer few casualties, so don't consider sending them back for retraining unless they have lost about 50% of their numbers. A carefully managed unit of sughdians with silver equipment and high experience is a nigh unstoppable force. Also, garrisoned at border towns they are near at hand if you feel they are more needed in your field armies.

Cavalry
Nomad Archers are your standard horse archers and this subject hardly needs to be further elaborated upon. Clibinarii are the awesomeness of the east and make the "equites clibinarii" of the ERE look like mounted, armored bakers (I mean, look at those wooden clubs!) Cataphracts are the usual "finish them" cavalry, and now look even more awesome with the symbol of persia emblazoned upon their shields. Camel Riders are a bit tricky, since they are your only light cavalry and not nearly fast enough to be reliable in that duty. Often you are forced to use nomads instead and while this is an adequate solution it would sometimes be better to have more meleeish light cavalry at your disposal. Still, good when taking the southern provinces from the ERE. Armoured Camel Riders are slow, very slow. They are cavalry-routers of the highest degree but difficult to use offensively. I´ve found them to be a great supporting unit for my infantry, especially when the time comes to wrest Thracia from whatever steppe faction that holds it. Present a line of levy spearmen to the enemy elite cavalry, receive the charge and send in your camels quickly. War Elephants. No one else has them anymore. They are worth bringing to battle just for the sheer fun factor of watching them tear up enemy formations. Send them to tie up one enemy flank, pin the enemy center with your infantry and send all your fast and nasty units against your enemy's other flank.

Missile
I just love Kurdish Javelinmen. "Eat javelins, roman oppressors!" Suprisingly effective in melee, these guys really deserve to see more use by sassanid players. While the "skirmish screen in front of infantry" tactic is oldfashioned, the kurds can run right back into the fight when your spearmen has received the charge and make a good account of themselves. Needless to say, they are also superb ambushers. Mountain Slingers are another unit that is easy to underestimate. They can soften up comitanses and force them to come to you, and can even inflict casualties on equites cataphractii and clibinarii. Remember, even a single casualty on these units is a good achievement becase of their cost and high defense. Slingers can now hide in long grass, and considering the range of slings compared to javelins this can be really useful in striking at the heavy cavalry of the enemy, then forcing them to pursue the slingers out of position, creating a gap for you to exploit. Lastly we come to the persian Desert Archers. They are another cool-looking unit, with shields strapped to their bow arms making them look like the elite skirmishers they are. Persia has always been famed for it's archers and these guys are no exeption. Superior equipment, training, and stamina ensure that they are way above average foot archers.

General's Bodyguard
The Immortals are back and where are the greeks now to oppose them? As every sassanid commander will know, this is the best bodyguard unit available to any army. They should play a more active role in battles than other generals, as they are less fragile and can often steamroll the enemy almost by themselves.

Buildings/Technology
Your main enemy control more provinces and sea trade than you, so make sure to give the building of trade caravans high priority. Being an entirely zoroastrian faction is a great edge over the ERE, as this nullifies any governors religion penalties and zoroastrian temples provide more public order due to law bonuses than any other religion. Combined with some good old eastern law enforcement rioting and revolts should be a rare occurance in your provinces, if indeed they happen at all. Otherwise the Sassanids have access to pretty much the same buildings as earlier eastern factions. They can build level 3 roads and this is really, really nice for trade and distributing sughdians to the far corners of the empire.

Diplomacy
The Eastern Empire Rebels will be your key allies in the early to mid game. They are frequently too weak to do more than annoy the ERE, but this is still desirable. If they manage to get a stable foothold within ERE lands and you have money to spare, consider donating some to your allies. The rebels will frequently invest this money in better walls and more troops, and as long as the ERE and EER stay at war this aids your cause greatly. Other important allies include the Roxolani (unless driven away by the Huns.) Don't let the ERE get an alliance with them before you! If they are not driven west and control Tribus Alanni, they will occasinaly attack your northern provinces unless you're allies. You don't need that annoyance. Encourage them to expand west instead. It is also good to be allied with wathever steppe faction currently causing the most trouble in the ERE's western provinces. Usually this means the Huns, but occasionaly the Sarmatians, Goths, or Slavs. Keep a diplomat in the area if things turn complicated (as they will.)

Campaign Advice
Just some general opinions:
§ Don't bother taking Campus Allanni or Dimmidi. They are poor, far away from your objectives, and not worth the time and effort. Invest your armies elsewhere.
§ Keep track of the Eran Shahbod and the High Priest of Zoroaster(can't remember the titles correctly.) While the bonuses from these positions seem minor, they are frequently your best general and best governor, respectively. Your starting supreme commander, Melchior, is simply amazing. Use him.
§ Choose your battlefields. Many of your units excel in rough terrain, while many ERE units do not.
§ Exploit the AI's tendency to attack cities with captured eagles. Build the best possible walls, train a good garrison and strike hard whith your field armies while the romans smash themselves on your city.

[gollum]

The Sassanids are too easy, almost anti-climactic as once you take Antich from ERE and cut them in two there is no going back for them, and taking Antioch can happen very fast... Unfortunately due to win requirements there is no need to fight the Hordes or the barbarians - however the Sassanid campaign can shine at 34 or more required settlements that include the Italian peninsula, North Africa, and the balkans.

[Callicratidas]

Long ago I had a Sassanid Persian miniatures army. As I recall the "Levy Spearmen" where moral class "D" ( "A" being the best) one article said that in many cases these where slaves or bound men whose morale was so poor that they where in some instances chained together !

I remeber a unit of cataphracts rated as "Super" heavy Cavalry and elephants of course. The meat of the army was an "Extra" heavy Cavalry archer/lancer the rider had chain mail and the horse was armored on the front.