In Love With Pyrrhus

[Brightblade]

Hi all,

I´ve been an avid reader of this forum for some time but never bothered to register... was about time :)

I wondered if anyone had any advice on playing Epeiros... I seem to enjoy the fast paced slaughter in Hellas right off the bat, but it seems Macedon is too weak and the Greeks have 3000 variations of Hoplitai that aren't too exciting....

Firstly, can you recruit more war elephants as Epeiros or those you get from the start are it?

Secondly, green is an oogly color for Epirote shields!

Third... what would be a nice stack considered to be for Epirus? Since they don't get Pheraspidai?

Any tips'strats'opinions are appreciated

[Gazius]

You can only recruit oliphants in Africa and maybe syria? I forget the actual provinces, west of Carthago and maybe Alexandria? Personally I think elephants should have more representation for purchasing, a script that comes up every 10 years or so for you to purchase them if you don't control a province that has them, or maybe every couple years, depending on the faction.

[Brightblade]

Unit lists or example armies that you believe are competent and historically accurate would be great. Thanks for the response by the way... hopefully I can start contributing to these forums as well soon... (began playing EB 2 weeks ago)

[Lord Gruffles]

Any tips'strats'opinions are appreciated
I had a great Epeiros campaign going at one point. IMO you have to sacrafice Taras for Pella. Bum-rush Pella and go from there. If you can hold Taras, great. But I wouldn't count on it. So, I would bring your family member and a spy back from Italy and then disband your fleet. I also disbanded my elephants as they are just too expensive for you at the start. But that's up to you.

The AI will send some Mak trooops south and then put Pella under seige. You'll then get attacked from the east...fight that off. Then you'll get attacked even harder from the south (the troops that originally left Pella). Win those two battles (which I did on VH battle so you should be fine) and you are set to start heading south.

Evenatually after you take Dem(spelling) (that city between Pella and Athens) you will end up facing several stacks of KH. That's where I ended up getting frustrated as I was on VH battle. But on Med or Hard you should be fine and eventually take all of the Hellas. Then you can turn on Rome and retake your former holdings there and eventually the birth place of Mamma Pyrhos, Sicilia!

Great faction. Love em' :yes:

[MiniMe]

Firstly, can you recruit more war elephants as Epeiros or those you get from the start are it?
Yes, you can recruit both kinds of elephantes in Ambrakia

Third... what would be a nice stack considered to be for Epirus? Since they don't get Pheraspidai?
They have IllyrioriThorakitai(Ambrakia&Epidamnos&Serdica&Dalminion&Segestica) and Agrianikoi Pelekephoroi (Serdica&Pella). Both are much better than Pheraspidai, IllyrioriThorakitai more universal unit, Agrianikoi Pelekephoroi act slightly better on walls, but suffer more casualities against good cavalry


Any tips'strats'opinions are appreciated
Here is mine cheat strategy, ugly, but it works =)
1. The first turn is the most important one =)
1.1 destroy every culture&commerce building in your own provinces, governments included;
1.2 storm, slaughter&sack Pella;
1.3 now you have enough money to
1.3.1. start building a goldmine in Epdamnos;
1.3.2. order 6 slingers in Taras and some phalanx in Ambrakia
1.4. DON'T:
1.4.1 disband your elephants, they are expensive, but it is them who'll stomp almost every single infantryman in greece =)
1.4.2. disband your only boat, it's expensive, but you gonna need it for sending reinforcements to Taras;
1.4.3 start building stone walls in Taras, they won't help you, you'll have to fight outside the citywalls every time Romani besiege them;
1.4.4 waste your firstturn money on mercs, it'd wise and cheaper to start produce your own forces in bigger quantities.
2. Greece:
2.1 Demetrias => Sparte (yes, that means war with KH, whatever, who cares, you have elephants, they don't :laugh4: ) => Korinthos =>Athenai (second goldmine, few more turns and you're RICH) =>Chalkis;
2.2 DON'T:
2.2.1. waste your time on Crete&Rodos, save them for later
2.2.2. storm Korinthos&Athenai, they have stonewalls and you don't have good infantry yet. Instead siege them.
3. Balcans:
3.1 Byzantion (extremely important city to keep whoever controls the East at bay)
3.2 Buridava (if you are playing VH/M, that's all Getai got :laugh4: )
3.3.Don't waste your time on Eleutheroi, save them for later, time is precious
4. Italy
4.1 All the time before you had to saveTaras from constant Romani attacks. I did that with swarms of slingers, provided in good numbers (6-8 per stack) they are the real backbone of every hellenistic army, not phalanx =) They are fastmovers and act best from flanks, protected against enemy' cavalry with your general bodyguards
4.2. destroy Romanis, they are weak
5. Sicilia
Unfortunately, after taking Lillybeum you're in war with Carthadastim (again :laugh4: ). These rich guys contrary to Romani do have some good heavy infantry. Well, by this time so do you :laugh4: In my game they did send against me good amount of their tiny elephants, Tarentinoi elite javelin cavalry is VERY affective against them.
6. You own the best lands in Europa Barbarorum =)

Perhaps I missed something and wasn't very precise, will edit this post later, have to go

[Lord Gruffles]

I give you Pyrrhus, the undisputed King of Makedon.

http://www.montanasentinel.com/gruffles/pics/EB/pyrrhus_makedon.jpg
VH/H

Antiganos (sp?) and his two eldest sons are dead. The rest of the Maks are driven into the Aegian (sp?) or still running scared to the south (where the KH should make short work of them).

For those curious about EB with the BI.exe, well, after pulling back from Taras (my Pella for Taras trade as described above) I made a ceasefire with Rome. Figured I could use the income from trading with them. Anyway, those bastards invaded Epeiros in 270bc! :dizzy2:

Noway that happens with the RTW.exe. Made me pull a small force away from Demetrias. :furious3:

:laugh4:

Did I mention I LOVE THIS GAME!

Thanks EB team! :2thumbsup:

[QwertyMIDX]

The Maks had just been seriously thrashed by the the Celtic invasion, they shouldn't be in much of a postion to stop you. The fact that Pyrrhus didn't conquer Macedon is pretty amazing if you read the situation in 272 BC.

[Lord Gruffles]

Yes, I am aware of Pyrrhuss' untimely demise. Don't try to take away from my fun! :whip:


:laugh4:

[Zim]

Lord Gruffles
Your screenshot looks almost exactly like one from my game. Only I have one angry stack staring across the border into KH territory at their two stacks.
Not sure what to do since the Greeks seem reluctant to attack and I'd prefer to face their huge armies as the defender.

Do you know if Epiros can recruit troops in Illria(sp?). I know some of their regular troops are from the region and their generals can even have Illrian ethnicities, but I conquered the city just to the north of my starting cities and the first level local and regional MIC both don't allow any troops.

[Brightblade]

Yes actually. Illyrioi Thureophoroi and Illyrioi Thorakitai... Illyrian light cavalry and light levies as well.. the Thureo and Thoraks are slightly better than their traditional counterparts in other factions because of their Impetuous barbarian nature and slightly better stats ... very imporrtant to pump these babies out of Dalminion and Epidamnos.

Cheers

[Geoffrey S]

In my game I disbanded enough troops to make a profit, and generally just waited until I could upgrade my economy. I took Pella fairly early on, then left the Makedons and Greeks to fight it out; both a fairly weak now. Since 256 bc I've taken Byzantion, the first town in Asia Minor, and Serdike. Taras has enough troops to defend against regular Roman sieges, but not enough to start conquering. Unfortunately, neither the Romans or the Makedons seem interested in a ceasefire.

[Zim]

Yes actually. Illyrioi Thureophoroi and Illyrioi Thorakitai... Illyrian light cavalry and light levies as well.. the Thureo and Thoraks are slightly better than their traditional counterparts in other factions because of their Impetuous barbarian nature and slightly better stats ... very imporrtant to pump these babies out of Dalminion and Epidamnos.

Cheers

Good to know. Is that from the faction or regional MIC? Heck, I'll just build them both up and figure it out myself. I was just afraid it was one of those cities they couldn't build anything in, like Northern Italy.

[Fondor_Yards]

Recruitment in Illyria is bugged currently. You won't get anything outta there.

[Zim]

Recruitment in Illyria is bugged currently. You won't get anything outta there.

Ah well, I suppose then it's just as well Greece kicked my butt. Shouldn't have let them survive while I tried to build up. Seemed like they were recruiting half a stack of mercanaries every turn. The peninsula was littered with the bodies of thousands upon thousands of Greek and Epiron soldiers. Took me about 4-5 hours playing time to lose. :sweatdrop:

[skuzzy]

Bah, I don't like that route for Epeiros, it insults what they stood for :) I keep my elephants, keep my Italian holdings and expand them while using Makedonia as a buffer between me and KH. I also don't destroy any buildings and play on VH/H

1 Storm Pella (there really is no way around this given the unit placement at the beginning)
2 Follow up by destroying Antigonos' army directly east of Pella
3 I ended up taking Demetrias after Mak was weakened by my elephants of doom (use them wisely, I was able to keep my elephants with 12+ until the siege of Rome where they and Pyrrhus were killed by a huge Roman stack)
4 Move Pyrrhus to Italy along with most of your composed army to allow him to do what he did best
5 use Taras as a base and continue pushing your borders in Italy (after several battles with successful elephant flanks and using cavalry to draw off skirmishers )

That is basically where I am at now and I find it much more difficult and rewarding then cowardly ceding Taras to the Romans. That's just like saying "Have it, you're better than us!" KH eventually retook Demetrias but I was able to build a mine in Pella that gave me the income to successfully build a quasi-army to retake Demetrias and deter KH for a little while. Unfortunately after successfully sacking Rome with Helenos I made peace with Rome and immediately after Carthage sent two stacks to Rome. I could successfully defend if if needed but it seems that they're just standing there aimlessly and also have only militia poeni. I try to split 1:1 Deutorai(sp?) and Greek militia with a couple akon, and a general. If anyone has a better composition to post please tell me so I can alter it.

I'll post a screenshot when I load up again. I am currently in 0.81 and finally got it working with RTW-BI in 258BC I believe.

[Dooz]

Hey skuz, glad to see you got it working with BI. Did you find out what was wrong before?

[skuzzy]

I did a few things and I'm not sure which fixed it but I reinstalled BI, added aerial_maps/tree_models/* to Rome - Total War/Data directly, and played with some other things so whatever, it works.

[Ower]

I don't like giving taras to the romans either.