Campaign speed record

[LegendofTotalWar]

Hey everyone,

I was just wondering if anyone knew what the fastest time in turns that someone has conquered every region in vanilla RTW on Vh/Vh? I intend to give it a try and I want a goal to aim for.

[Myth]

No Idea. But it will really depend on faction choice. If you take your sweet time the scripts for the 3 AI Romans will kick in and you will have to battle endless waves of stacks from them. If you are Roman yourself you will have to do the Civil War thing, though you can at least stunt the growth of your "allies" in the beginning.

I'd take the Britons or Scythia since they have OP units for lead battles whilst also being close enough to Rome to cull the 3 factions before they go in steroids rage war mode.
@ReluctantSamurai can give you details on when exactly they start churning out stacks of plastic men at you.

[LegendofTotalWar]

Hey thanks, Myth. I've already started as Macedonia because they're in the middle of the map and have good early cab. So far I'm on turn 2 and have 10 regions. Very hard though. Much more difficult than my Medieval 2 Blitz.

[ReluctantSamurai]

At one time, there was an AAR for the Greek Cities where the individual conducting the campaign showed how it could be done in 50 yrs., IIRC......

I can't seem to locate it, so if someone knows where to find it, please post a link.

And yes, one has to move quickly to avoid the Roman "toy soldier" factories cranking out endless stacks. I've never actually done hardcore research, but it appears that after "Uncle Marius" makes his appearance, all Roman factions (except one that you might be playing) get a hefty shot of money to pay for all those expensive units. I say this because I've had games where I had every single Roman port blockaded (and port trade with dockyards outstrips all other forms of income combined), and yet each faction showed a significant financial increase (based on the in-game statistical graph) after the Marian Event.

So your task will be much easier if you get it done before that happens.

[Myth]

That's good then. Just deny them Carthage, and they won't get to Huge City soon enough.

[ReluctantSamurai]

Yep...it's almost always Carthage that does it. In a recent Macedonian campaign, when I was approaching Rome for the kill, I noticed it had a population of over 25k but...no Marius event. And yes, they had already built an Imperial Palace so apparently the SPQR cannot trigger it.

[Myth]

That the SPQR had it in the first place is an anomaly on its own. Since Rome starts with no port It's extremely unlikely that the SPQR can beat the Scipii to it.

[Ibn-Khaldun]

IIRC, then the Greek Cities campaign ReluctantSamurai refers to was 38 turns and long campaign victory conditions (that's 50 provinces). It's AAR was hosted in Geocities (but Yahoo! closed that service and thus that AAR is gone).

[ReluctantSamurai]

In very rare instances, the Julii can trigger the Marius Event with Patavium. It's a fast-growing city (in the top three on my list for pain-in-the-a$$ cities to keep under control) and if conditions are right (ie. the Julii actually do something other than turtle after they take Segesta and Caralis) it will reach 24k somewhere around 225-215BC.

Too bad about the GC AAR...it was really an amazing feat to my thinking...if you are simply into finishing as fast as possible...

[phred]

I remember seeing a screenshot showing a speedy Armenia conquest from long ago, but I can't find the thread and can't remember how long it took.
Perhaps someone will remember it and link to it.