Roman: Scipii

[frogbeastegg]

Guide

[Doug-Thompson]

The Scipii have the most clear-cut mission of any of the Roman factions. Their job is to kill the Carthaginians. The also need to solidify their control of Sicily, but that's part and parcel of the overall mission.

Carthiginians are easier to destroy sooner than later. Kick them right off of Sicily and don't be shy about enslaving the Greek city of Syracuse and committing massacre in Lilybaeum. People like to preserve those cities for good troops and income, but that is a mistake. Your true goal is to build up as big an army as you can and get it across the water into North Africa as soon as this can be done. You don't have troops to spare for a big garrison. I've even hired mercenaries after a failed siege, which is a no-no with other Roman factions in the cash-tight early game.

If the Sentate gives you a mission in Greece, take the town, massacre the inhabitants and take your army right back to the war in the central Mediterranean.

A note about Mount Etna, the volcano near Messina. It will erupt. You don't want to have troops or fleets near it when that happens. Bring new troops and leaders from Italy to the point of land behind Messina and disembark them there. Use your full movement allowance next turn to march armies past Mount Etna. If you're besieging, take care that you don't lose a battle and have to retreat to the vicinity of Mount Etna. You will lose troops and you could lose generals if it erupts.

After securing Sicily, it's time for the main event: The invasion of North Africa. Collect your forces in Lilybaeum and invade in one jump. I've even invaded North Africa before the final conquest in Sicily, when the Senate ordered me to take Thapsus.

One thing to notice about moving across the sea against the superior Carthaginian fleet: Don't move beyond horizon range. Move to the limit of your fleet's visibility range when making the all-important invasion crossing. Take another look around, then move some more, avoiding enemy fleets. You want to get across the strait into North Africa in one turn and disembark your troops, a diplomat and your best general without accidentially bumping into anybody.

You will probably have to commit massacre to at least one of either Carthage or Thapsus in order to have enough troops left over from garrison duty to take the other.

Once you take Carthage and Thapsus, you can forget about the Carthaginians in Spain. They're a remnant, at least for now.

By now, the Brutii, Greeks and Macedonians are having a big brawl. Build up your troops and fleets and backstab the Greeks in Sparta. Chances are you'll get at least two of Sparta, Corinth and Athens. You'll now have a new, very nice base in Greece.

Go over to the other Greek cities in Asia Minor. Be on the lookout for Greek armies led by generals that you can bribe to add talent to your faction. It can be very expensive, but notice that you can bribe a general, then often hire a lot of mercenaries, which I assume were his recently disbanded troops.

The Greek provinces in Asia Minor, including Rhodes, have three wonders of the world. Taking them grants enormous prestige. They're also rich provinces in their own right.

By now, you're probably at war with Egypt. Keep it naval. You will need to soften them up a lot, probably, before dealing any knockout blows.

The rest is up to you.

[camulos]

Doug's strategy works extremely well for Scipii but i'd like to add a couple of notes.

1) For me the volcano on Sicily erupted in 261. Don't keep any family members or important units in Messana until after this happens because they can get killed.

2) A good approach to conquering Carthage is this. Don't take Lilybaeum right away. Make 2 armies, with 2 good generals. Send the larger force with the best commander by boat to Carthage. Form your second army on the border between Syracuse and Lilybaeum. (be sure to bribe any remaining greek armies out of the way) Once both armies are in place, attack Carthage and Lilybaeum on the same turn. The reasoning for this is so you don't have to declare war on Carthage before shipping your troops. Early in the game they have a very strong navy which can give you trouble transporting forces. Once Carthage is taken their economy is crippled and you will see most of their ships disappear. After this Thaspus will fall easily and you can mop up any roaming armies.

[metatron]

I recommend a cavalry force of heavy cav if you're fighting the Numidians. Their provinces cover alot of ground, and they have particularly light forces. It has worked for me well.

However, when it comes to the Spanish, be careful.

[Phill Davies]

My Empire is now pretty big, I own all Africa and a good portion of Asia Minor, Greece and Londinium (Hey, I wanted a little piece of home)

I found keeping the citizens happy a problem in the former Egyptian cities of Alexandria and Thebes. I had to transfer my Capital to Athens which is a nice central point on the map.
Solved the problems of unhappy citizens in one go.:)

[Doug-Thompson]

A good approach to conquering Carthage is this. Don't take Lilybaeum right away. Make 2 armies, with 2 good generals. Send the larger force with the best commander by boat to Carthage. Form your second army on the border between Syracuse and Lilybaeum. (be sure to bribe any remaining greek armies out of the way) Once both armies are in place, attack Carthage and Lilybaeum on the same turn. The reasoning for this is so you don't have to declare war on Carthage before shipping your troops. Early in the game they have a very strong navy which can give you trouble transporting forces. Once Carthage is taken their economy is crippled and you will see most of their ships disappear. After this Thaspus will fall easily and you can mop up any roaming armies.

Nice!

[afrit]

Err, this is probably obvious to most, but I missed it: at the beginning of the campaign (at least on VH/VH) you have a nice army sitting in your fleet.

I didn't know about it till about turn 10 or so when I needed my fleet to transport an army to Carthage. I was (pleasantly) surprised to see it contained a bunch of Hastati. Of course, had I known about it, I would have gotten to a much better start!

[Torqemada]

A quick note.

The Samanite Spearmen have the same base stats as Triarii. I've found them incerdibly useful as an early roman spearwall. Alot better than worthless townwatch. Although town watch isn't as worthless as Iberian Infantry.

[Odysseus]

Don't leave Carthage alone in Spain. I have had them expand and nip me in the ass one too many times.

[Herakleitos]

A quick note.

The Samanite Spearmen have the same base stats as Triarii. I've found them incerdibly useful as an early roman spearwall. Alot better than worthless townwatch. Although town watch isn't as worthless as Iberian Infantry.

I always thought they were really crap... Do you know how their morale is?

@Phil, about Egypt; if you have Memphis all the Egyptians love you because you control the pyramids!

[Slon]

Some steps to help you begin:

Move all your troops to your province in Sicily. Leave only a young and able governor on Capua along with some peasants or town watch (if you don't have any, recruit some). Start beseiging Syrcacuse as soon as you can so that you don't run out of turns and become forced to Assault it. Syrcacuse will be your main troop production area, so I recommend setting to be your Capitol and quickly upgrading your unit production buildings. Once you have archers, build a few of them (3-5), some Principes (I recommend 7 units), and maybe 3-4 Equites. As always, make sure you always build your own temple after destroying their temple to decrease cultural penalty(?). Don't bother building the Balista, it sucks since it can't shoot from behind your lines, and will constantly cause you trouble since enemies will tend to cavalry charge it and you usually won't be able to move troops in front of it to intercept quickly enough. Just wait until you get heavy onagers. Now, take the western Carthaginian province in Sicily once you have the troops. Build it up and retrain. At this point, make sure you have a large and well-trained fleet because you will get TONS of blockade missions. Start building a second similar army in Syracuse.

At this point, the Senate may have given you the mission of taking Thermon. If they haven't, they probably will. I recommend sending your second invasion army to take it. Make sure you send a diplomat and spy with them to bribe away armies! Once you take thermon, expand eastward into athens and southward towards Sparta. Once you control the lower lands, head towards Macedonia and take Macedon out of the game. If you don't they will keep pissing you off with small invading forces. Set up garrisons and build the cities up. Make sure you have 1-2 large armies in that Greek area to be sure you don't get invaded. You won't have time to quickly get an army from Syracuse to Greece. It's basically fairly easy from here on out. Just expand into Crete, Rhodes and the mainland provinces north of Rhodes to finish off the Greeks. If you don't, their strong fleets might slow you down and maybe cause you to get angry, but they will be too weakened to do anything at this point. You are done here, for now.

Meanwhile, send your army in Sicily to invade Carthage. Take their capitol (carthage) with the army that you kept in Sicily and expand south-eastward, taking those two settlements. Then, build up Carthage (this will be a MAJOR money make for you) and make two more armies. Leave the current army to guard carthage! Send one army South-east to take Sahara and the other Numidian provinces, all the way to Lybia. Send the other army to attack the south-western Numidian and Spanish provinces. Once done, keep that army there to guard that area to prevent Carthage and Spain from retalitating against you and retaking their southern provinces. Don't worry too much, though. They will be reluctant when attacking across the sea. Next, expand towards Egypt. Memphis, Thebes and Alexandria are all very close and will be easy to guard. Take them and don't expand farther for now. You will have to capture lots of land before you get to any settlements worth taking. Plus, they will be difficult to defend because the settlements east of Memphis and Alexandria are huge and will be very hard to defend. At about this time (or maybe before?) there will be the Marian reforms. This is why stopping the expansion when you have such easy-to-defend borders is important! Build up armies in your good settlements (I recommend using Legionary Cohorts as they are easy to retrain). Stay away from Praetorian and Urban Cohorts. They are a little bit better than Legionary Cohorts, but will be a pain to retrain.

From here, there really isn't anywhere left to go other than expanding north towards Spain and Gaul (assuming Julii didn'y take the settlements already). Once you have your post-Marian armies upgraded, expand that way. Then, you have those huge settlements to the east. Just send armies from Sparta and Rhodes eastward and armies from Memphis/Alexandria north-eastward to box those settlements in. Your main goal will be to expand ALL the way up into that "choke point" in the mid-eastern region. Once you isolate that area, you will be fairly safe from attack in the east and almost completely protected from attack in the west (let Julii handle the other Barbarians).

Some important tips:

- You will mostly be taking coastal provinces, so build up your dockyards/ports to make sure you are getting the maximum trade revenue.

- Temple of Neptune (I think) will pay off by giving you Deceres and another very good ship.

- Don't wait to build your VERY BEST troops (Urban Cohort). They will be difficult to retrain and aren't THAT much better.

- Don't bother destroying the Greek and Egyptian fleets. They are VERY rich and will just create ships faster than you can destroy them. Just take their cities instead and the ships will slowly disappear.

- Build heavy onagers as soon as you can. Unlike infantry, this unit is actually worth waiting for since it won't see much action and won't need regular retraining.

The reason why I think Scipii are the easiest of the Roman factions is because their expansion is almost always (in the beginning to middle, anyway) towards very big and profitable settlements. Plus, they have better ships. Meanwhile, the Brutii have to fight through the small settlements before they get to Macedon and Greece (assuming Scipii haven't taken them yet). The Julii will also seem perpetually poor because their expansion is generally north toward's the Gallic and German small and poor towns/cities. I found the Carthaginians to be extremely weak. They even lost Carthage to the Numidians in my game (I had to attack Numidia despite Senate's orders because of this, ah well, I'm playing short campaign anyway). Basically, once you get to Egypt, you will control the lands of two of the three richest factions (Greece and Egypt). I haven't gotten to the Civil War, but I just don't see how the other two Roman factions will be able to outspend you without having their economies tank.

[m4rt14n]

Have u ever seen all the money Brutii can get with Awesome Temples (or Pantheion) of mercury?? Scipii Carthage holdings are good, but too spread apart on islands. Unless u have an awesome navy, it's really hard to compete with Brutii. (Assuming u dont use the bribe thingy).

[Slon]

Well, as Scipii, it's hard to NOT have a strong navy. From the start, you have to move troops to Sicily and thenl almost immediately, to Greece and Carthage. Meanwhile, you have to blockade ports and fight off enemy ships. Plus, you have the Deceres. You get so much cash you might as well just have a large army guarding each area. No, I haven't played Brutii much. I might try it, since I played Brutii back when I didn't know the game too well (I didn't even know how to change capitol). Also, what bribe thingy?

[randomn00b]

Also, what bribe thingy?

When you get enough cash, you can bribe enemy Roman captains/family members to join your army. Not only do you gain a helluva lot of strength, they lose it too. Made the Roman Civil War much easier than it would have been. I pretty much finished the game using entirely bribed armies.

[BlackStrider]

My Tips for Playing as Scipii (Medium Difficulty)

-The Senate are not so bright and ask you to attack weak but devastating cities. If you go straight ahead and attack Thaspus with your army, The captured city of Syracuse is vunerable to Carthaginian attack with elephants and mass infantry. It helps to control all of Sicily before even thinking of attacking Carthage and Thaspus.

-In order to tackle Carthage straight on, you will need a strong navy. You should build up a strong navy first and control Carthage's Port before building up your forces. If you can capture Thaspus First, that helps even more, as you can build troops from that settlement rather than shipping them across from sicily.

-If you suffer in anyway against Carthage in your attack, I suggest allying with Numidia(This may only seem necessary on a harder difficulty). They have large army in Cirta and if convinced, should help you battle the fearsome Elephant-Riders. You can always backstab them once you have control over carthage

[aw89]

*WARNING!* Be carefull with the Numidians if you dont have lots of cav, 2 units of equites is NOT enough!

[randomn00b]

*WARNING!* Be carefull with the Numidians if you dont have lots of cav, 2 units of equites is NOT enough!

You need to be able to deal with cav Archers. Your Hastati may be one of the best infantry in the world at the time, but they still lose to any and every cav archer.

[aw89]

thats what the "*WARNING!*" was for...

[randomn00b]

thats what the "*WARNING!*" was for...

Just explaining the rationale behind the warning. Cav Archers in this game are real nice...

[Svean]

I was playing my fist game with Scipii. And I think it's pretty easy on medium.
As a first thing I gathered all aviable troops in Mesana including all aviable marcenaries (1 turn). In Capua I left just a family member (and I was producing unit of peasants). So in Mesana and just by mesana on a ship I had really lot of units.
Scipii are poor in the beginning but if you ask other roman fractions (especially SPQR) for money for attacking fractions (first Greek and in the second turn Carthage - they had to gather some money) they will give you just what you need ;) I'ts more than enough for early battles.
In the 2nd turn I killed the Greek army outside the city and after that i took Syracuse in the same turn I think (because of my spy who opened the gates). If you can't take it in one turn in the other one it will belong to you ;) Other possibility is to attack an army standing just by the city and let the garrison help them in the battle - but you cannot let them withdraw from battlefiled - kill as many as you can and rout ALL the units. Syracuse was just enslaved (in about 5 years they became my new capital).
In 3rd turn Cartaginians came in the range of 1 move - so I coudn't let them wait ;) In the meantime greek diplomat asked for casefire - they just lost a city for me and.. is I asked for money they gave me a lot so why not to sign peace treaty and even trade rigths ;) With tah money I was able to hire new mercenary hoplites who just appeard by Syracuse. Cartaginians had elephants but I had much more forces - I think they even retreated in the first move so I got a new star for my general ;) The battle was bloody (because of damn elephants - skirmishers work quite good against them) but of course I smashed them ;)
After that It was a piece of cake - besieging and taking Lybaneum and just after that landing in north africa. Thapsus fall first because there was no walls ;) A smaller army landed in sardinia in the same turn when Julii did it but it was my general who attaked the city. With a free allies support I took the city I think just with the general and 1 unit of hastai ;) And the Julii army was standing there for 20 years after that, till their general died and I birbed the army.
After taking Carthaginian cities in Africa the game became quite easy. Most importand thing is that I had a LOT of money. Next target was Greece and Asia Minor, after that Aegyptus ;) Carthage still have one city in Spain but.. who cares. I just killed all Julii family tree - and took the rebel provinces ;) Brutii leaders have too many stars - I have to wait a bit, but I don't know if I have entough patience. Now I have 46 provinces - SPQR and Brutti will give me another 4 so.. should I wait??
And I started new campaign with Seleucids ;)

[Sir Toma of Spain]

I have played a few games as the Scipii but have only won a single short campaign. Whenever i try to keep going i always run out of money just after i start to conquer greece. Is there any thing i'm doing wrong???

[Claudius Maniacus Sextus]

This guide is for a really easy game and paralization of the brutii.
1)Use the units near and in capua to attack appolonia.
2)Use the sicilian forces wisely because u wont get many reinforcements.
3)attack syracuse,dont delay with siege just assault.
4)take the town S of appolonia.
5)attack Lylybaeum.
6)Next target is thermon
7)Attack sparta
8)leave chartage alone focus after the distruction of Greek's on macedonia.
9)take athens,larrisa and at end thesalonic and bylazora.
10)anihilate Grek C. by taking pergamum,rhodes
11)Get halicarnasus.
12)Assemble 3 armys:
-2 with 12 Inf. 4 Cav. 3Arch. 1Balista
-1 with 5 Inf 3 Cav. 2 Arch. 1Balista
13)the 2 big armies use in an sincronysed attack on alexandria and memphis.
14)the small one thebes.

Buildings:1.Roads
2.Farms
3.Trade Buildings
4.Temples
5.Health
6.Military and Other

Unit Recruiting:-Mostly from capua but some cav. and arch from sicily.
-hire ANY merc's u can,u will need it.

Tactics:Against phalanx it is best u attack them.against egypt it is best u let them attack u because u are much beter in defence against them.

Conclusion:the brutii only have their 2 starting prov. soo their easy money,but they still have 2 big armies just standing around.a quick strike and their done.

PS:i have in an quick 4 armie strike killed pontus because i besieged all their towns,so i cap. the cities before their big(wandering) armies can lift the siege.
then an 3 armie(all bruttii Briebed armies in their homelands) quick strike and captured carthage,thapsus,and lepcis magna.
By now u could have started the civil war but i recomend training 7 armies,2 for brutii 1 for rome and 4 for julii.

This is just a small guide,it really happend much more....but u wil see.
Good Luck!!!

[General Carnage]

I find the best way to take Carthage is to go for the Jugular. As soon as possible, ship everything you have to North Africa, hire mercenaries until your slots are full, and attack Carthage. This will be a bloody battle, you will lost a lot of men and probably a General or two, but you will have taken Carthage. At this stage, you have to rebuild defences and train as many troops as possible to prepare for the counter-attack. Once this is defeated, the rest is quite easy.

[scipio the even younger]

Military: early
1. Attack Syracuse, with army made from the hasti in the ships and messana, family member from messana too.
2. Enslave Syracuse, build army in Capua, and rebuild army in messana, ship family members to be governors of messana and Syracuse. Try to get trade agreement from Carthage.
3. Send spy to libaeum,send diplomat to SPQR asking for money and in return you will attack carthage. Send army,led by family member, from capua north to the Gaul city’s north of Julii.
4. Attack libaeum and hopefully have your spy open city gates.
5. Try to make peace with Carthage, build a strong navy, capture a Gaelic place and try to sell it to either Julii or SPQR for however much.
6. After you sell your Gaelic place, head south and put them in ships. Put your Sicilian army on a boat too.
7. Send your weaker army to Thapsus and your stronger army to Carthage.

Military: middle
1. Make peace with Egyptians and get trade rights with as many country’s as possibl’
2. Wage war on Numidia and don’t stop till they’re completely destroyed.
3. Head north into Spain and hunt down the last remnants of Carthage.
4. Conquer all of Spain except the little town on the north-west side of Spain providing the Spaniards own it. Blockade the entrance and demand regular tribute + become their protectorate. If they refuse ATTACK!
5. Now turn back for the moment and go beat the Egyptians.
6. Do the same to the Egyptians as you did Spaniards except don’t become protectorate and leave a thin line as a buffer between you the selucids.
7. Now go back to Spain and demand huge tribute before you attack and annihilate them. Go north now and attack Gaul(chances are you’re all ready at war with them thanks too the Julii) and keep going north till you either meet the Britons, germainians or the English channel.
8. Now go east and conquer Germainier while building ships in the English Channel.
9. As your armies march back you need to win control of the English channel.
10. Now , after the channel is yours send a army to Ireland and 1 to England . Conquer the British isles.
Military: late
1. Now you’ve got the power to defeat Rome single handedly.
2. As your border in Gaul will most likely be next to the Julii , why not attack them first.
3. Just head south and don’t stop till you reach Rome.
4. Now you have Rome just pursue the Julii till their gone.
5. The only large contender now is the Brutii who, as they have Greece a rich place mark my words, will have pretty large armies and good generals.
6. Once their gone you will win and if you don’t, just keep going,no out there is a challenge any more so happy hunting…
P.S. I used the bribe technique quite a lot but forgot to mention it, it helps a lot against the bruti.

[Beefy]

Heres Beefys guide to the Early stages of the Scipii.

Get your Troops onto Scilliy straight away, yo will be told to take syracuse anyway so do it anyway!
This will now be your Troop Supply city (for the moment) . Build Better barracks, Stables here etc. Then move over to take Lilybaeum. This will be your money maker. Build traders ports and roads here to get the dosh flowing in!

As for you capital build it up gradually and build units there (just in case things go pear shaped)

Prepare for the crossing to North Africa. Get a lot of ships, Pile all your troops on from scilliy (just leave pheasants, townwatch behind in cities you will get no trouble from scilly regarding rebels etc)

THE VOLCANO WILL ERUPT IN 261BC.

Do the leap to NA in one swoop to catch the Carthaginians with their pants down. Take your massive armies (buy Mercs if needed) and (this is what happened to me) Destroy the massive Carth army that was waiting for you.

You are now free to take Carthage and Thaspus (the senate tells you to do this anyway). I slaughted all the people in Carthage and that will become your MASSIVE money maker. Also your new Troop Production city. By now you should be having Principes in your armies with Cav auxillia etc

So what to do now?

Take Carlais (really easy) this will just to nothing this city, dont even leave a general there.

Now Walk West Wards with your massive Blue mean machine and take the coast for your self. These cities wont really offer anything for you before or after you encounter them.

Now if you feel like it hope across to spain finish off the Carthagians and start a campaign in spain. (should be easy against the weak spannish)

And thats as far as ive got so far.

[Craterus]

i've beaten a campaign as Scipii (short not long) so I didn't bother taking Greece, no point is there?

I took all of West Africa - as far as Lepcis Magna and then I went and took most of Spain.. easy.

[cunobelinus]

the romans are one of the strongest infrantry groups i dont find them very exciting they have no challenge really

[Craterus]

the romans are one of the strongest infrantry groups i dont find them very exciting they have no challenge really

There's always a challenge, I bet a long campaign with the Romans would be quite challenging for me. (lack of early decent cavalry)

[dismal]

Just finished Scipii campaign VH/VH on 1.2 patch.

I have one valuable lesson to pass on that contradicts some of what has been posted here:

Carthage has elephants early. There are no early Roman troops that can handle elephants in the open. It's rout city. I lost several stacks and generals trying and ended up way behind my usual growth pace.

So, know where the Elephants are and try to fight them with some walls between you and them. Eventually I caught the elephants inside a city and shot them with arrows from the walls.

[AntiochusIII]

Actually Velites works well against Elephants.

It needs a lot of expertise, but skirmishers works well as they ran across the map, tiring the beasts out - the elephants rout or run amok very easily if they're exhausted. Even if they don't soon, a hail of fire arrows or two ends the trouble.