Maratha taking over the world

[Mongothegreat]

How to stop? I guess I just have to start fighting them, but they're my trade partners so I'd go broke. They just took over Britain and are currently sending several full stacks toward the European mainland. I'm the Dutch, I've taken over all France's lands and all the Americas except for the USA. Is there any way to trick other countries into fighting them for me?

I'm not complaining, I'm up to the challenge, just wondering how to stop them without losing all my trade income.

[antisocialmunky]

Its official, Marathas is so OP it can fight its way into the Napoleonic Wars.

[Martok]

Moved to Parliament.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Depends on the campaign setting. At H or VH the conflict is pretty well a given. At M, you may be able to arrange a proxy, but you will have to conquer territory near another suitable opponent and give it to Maratha. With a little luck this'll channel their full stacks in that direction.

[A Nerd]

I read once that someone said to give money and technology to the Mughals. This would help slow down Maratha. Is this a good technique? Haven't tried it myself. Though I might, in my current Russia campain Maratha has started a war against Persia. I've given several technologies to Persia and made an alliance with Maratha (Muhgals are gone now), hopefully Maratha won't attack me for I am rather weak on that side of the map!

[DisruptorX]

I read once that someone said to give money and technology to the Mughals. This would help slow down Maratha. Is this a good technique? Haven't tried it myself. Though I might, in my current Russia campain Maratha has started a war against Persia. I've given several technologies to Persia and made an alliance with Maratha (Muhgals are gone now), hopefully Maratha won't attack me for I am rather weak on that side of the map!

It works on M campaign difficulty. However, you have to be playing a faction that can actually afford to prop up another faction that early in the game.

[A Nerd]

Yeah, I've only done that as Russia, Great Britian and Sweden. Haven't seen it to fruition though. My Campaigns have always ended before Maratha moves beyond India and Persia. Also, yes I do play on M difficulty. Though technologies are rather inexpensive, I don't often provide much by way of money early in the campaign.

[Megas Methuselah]

I've edited the game files to make the Mughals start as a Cons. Monarchy with more money. There's also some minor mods out there that give certain Europeans some colonies in India; combined, these factors help keep the Maratha down.

[Fisherking]

In the early game make your trade agreements with the Mughals and give them techs. They also now have two schools which helps them. I think CA saw the problem.

By trading with the Mughals and not the Maratha you go a long way in keeping them alive a bit longer.

If it is really bad going to war with Maratha and raiding their trade might work but in the end you are playing one side off against the other and want them both weak and fighting.

Of course a lot depends on your faction but even Prussia and Austria don't need them showing up in Europe.

As far as giving money goes, even a couple of hundred here and there can help.

I know the money goes in increments of a thousand but you know you can type in any amount you wish, don’t you?

[Mongothegreat]

I forgot you could raid their trade routes. Plus, it's my chance to take over the British Isles and India. I have a dominate Navy, with a steam drydock and around fifteen second raters. Plus, the game's called Total War, not Total (anything else).

[DisruptorX]

As far as I can see, money is the deciding factor. Techs help, but the Mughuls have no infantry that can use bayonets, drills, or any of that stuff.

In my campaign a France, Mughuls still controlled half of India in 1720, as I was giving them at least 1,000 a turn. In my campaign as Persia....they got steamrolled and the Maratha allied with the Ottomans to attack me from both sides. I simply didn't have any money to spare as that faction.

[A Nerd]

In my Russian campaign I am currently broke. Fighting a two front war, Sweden to the north and Ottomans to the south. Persia is a nice buffer but I fear the Maratha (I haven't faced them in battle yet but hear they can be quite formidable!), so I've been trying to prop up persia...no money unfortunately though. I've been giving them all the research I can manage, military, economic, intellectual, in the hopes the AI can manage a decent defense when the Maratha move from the India theatre to Europe. I gave all my technologies to the thirteen colonies as GB one campaign such that they wouldn't be absorbed by the natives and the emergant americans, they held their own but didn't develop much economically. At this point in my Russia campaign, hopefully my faith in the Persians isn't unfounded!

[Ratwar]

In my Russian campaign I am currently broke. Fighting a two front war, Sweden to the north and Ottomans to the south. Persia is a nice buffer but I fear the Maratha (I haven't faced them in battle yet but hear they can be quite formidable!), so I've been trying to prop up persia...no money unfortunately though. I've been giving them all the research I can manage, military, economic, intellectual, in the hopes the AI can manage a decent defense when the Maratha move from the India theatre to Europe. I gave all my technologies to the thirteen colonies as GB one campaign such that they wouldn't be absorbed by the natives and the emergant americans, they held their own but didn't develop much economically. At this point in my Russia campaign, hopefully my faith in the Persians isn't unfounded!

I've never had much of a problem with the Marathas in battle. They don't get fire by rank which makes most of their infantry hopeless against a European opponent.

[A Nerd]

That's a relief. The only reason I ask is because the ottoman skirmishers (the sword weilding ones) gave me some difficulty. Though I'm still trying to get the hang of manipulating my units.

[Ratwar]

That's a relief. The only reason I ask is because the ottoman skirmishers (the sword weilding ones) gave me some difficulty. Though I'm still trying to get the hang of manipulating my units.

Are you talking about Cemaat Janissaries (http://totalwar.honga.net/empire_unit.php?f=ottomans&u=janissaries_cemaat)?

You might have a bit of trouble on your hands then. The Marathas have Sikh Warriors (http://totalwar.honga.net/empire_unit.php?f=maratha&u=east_sikh_warriors), which are pretty amazing melee fighters, but I've never seen them deploy them in large numbers.

[DisruptorX]

Are you talking about Cemaat Janissaries (http://totalwar.honga.net/empire_unit.php?f=ottomans&u=janissaries_cemaat)?

You might have a bit of trouble on your hands then. The Marathas have Sikh Warriors (http://totalwar.honga.net/empire_unit.php?f=maratha&u=east_sikh_warriors), which are pretty amazing melee fighters, but I've never seen them deploy them in large numbers.

Never seen armies fielding of 6 units of Ghurkas and 3 of Sikhs? They have loads of them in my current game.

Fortunately Persian Islamic Swordsmen are superior to both.

[A Nerd]

Yes it was Janissaries. They shreaded my line infantry. If it wasn't for so few of them, and a flank by one of my cavalry units, I woulnd't have fared so well.

[Kanamori]

Give their enemies tech and money, if it doesn't stalemate them, it will certainly slow the maratha down and make some hardcore friends for you, if they survive.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Maratha generally does not build a lot of schools and, when run by the AI, generally does not conquer Mysore. This means that they can fall well behind on the tech tree (and seem to fall behind in everything but artillery). Do NOT trade techs with them beyond the minimum needed to secure trade early on. This will not slow them at first because Mughal is so inept againt the AI Maratha with its all raid approach that it will always come up a cropper. The earliest I have seen the Mughals go in 1.5 was in 1718 -- though 1728-35 is more common. You can tech and fund Mughal all you want but they will give you squat in return and it can only delay the inevitable by a few years.

Annoyingly (at least on H/H), Maratha seems to be set to attack you unless you're playing Prussia, Austria, or Poland. Those three may well be targeted also, but are usually so embroiled in the Central Euro mess that you can't develop overseas or other Maratha-accessible territory. Otherwise, they will target (and I've seen them go for) Iceland, Newfoundland, The Guyanas, The Leewards, Hispaniola, Ireland, and Morocco by sea and of course Meso or Dag/Geo if you're fighting with one of the Eastern Euro powers. They will pick their target based on what will force you to fight a three-way war at the greatest disadvantage.

Their first fleets will fall readily to a small (2-4) squadron of relatively powerful hitters (galleons, 5ths and up) and that is the best way to deal with them. If you see a Marathese fleet heading toward one of your sea territories, do not hesitate. They will not continue trading past the end of your move and they will attack regardless of your relationsh with them (alliance, etc. are irrelevant, they MUST hammer you). Just sink them.

The same method can protect your sea-access territories later on, but you will need a largish squadron 6-10 3rd rate and better ships. Late Maratha spams 2nd rates and will often sail with a half dozen PLUS other ships. This will necessitate a squadron in each area you have territory to protect (NA, Carib, Channel, Morocco) and is expensive. If you share a land border with them you have two viable choices: 1) a top quality full stack guarding a "must have" capital that they will not bypass (e.g. Esfahan) or 2) Conquer all of India. Half measures between the two will just get expensive as they can produce a snot-load of troops. It is possible to win 5 battles (their troops are no better and often much weaker) and lose the territory to their 6th stack.

[Olse]

I've edited the game files to make the Mughals start as a Cons. Monarchy with more money. There's also some minor mods out there that give certain Europeans some colonies in India; combined, these factors help keep the Maratha down.

could you tell me where to file game file and how to edit it.

[Iavorios]

Maratha AKA "the oring plague from the east" are evil. On VH/VH they will kill the Muglas, Persia and the Otomans, and around 1750 will dominete the world trade. India is vastly rich, so they realy don't need that see trade that much. That sad you must now that they are capable of building endless fleets of second rates so it is very hard to stop them. O and they build endles staks. For anyone thinking that sinkhs musketears are weak i wish him good luck. He will need it. And by the whay they have a school in Baijapur, Hindustan and Iran, right after 1740. Plus the one they build from sratch. So they will have enough tech to do whatever they whant. They will come for you sooner or later. So i rekomend going after them ASP. Fighting a world war against enemy with 25- 30 sekond rates, 10 armyes and huge economic and military potential is not fun. Espeshially if you have more enemys.Kiling Mysore first will make your life easy. They will fight you enyways. I it is a good idea to go for India with unleast 2 full staks.

[Harold of Philadelphia]

Last night on my campaign, on VH/VH, I caught three Maratha fleets with full stacks and just two naval ships in each fleet trying to make their way to the Americas. I intercepted all three, one by one and sunk them all in the middle of the Atlantic all with full stack armies in them. :skull: A very gratifying experience. :laugh4:

It seems like the Maratha faction isn't building up a strong enough naval fleet to transport full stacked armies across theaters but I'm not complaining about it.

[A Nerd]

Last night on my campaign, on VH/VH, I caught three Maratha fleets with full stacks and just two naval ships in each fleet trying to make their way to the Americas. I intercepted all three, one by one and sunk them all in the middle of the Atlantic all with full stack armies in them. A very gratifying experience.

Ha ha, to the bottom of the sea with them! I did this with Spain once. Though their fleet and stack sat motionless of the coast of France for a few turns (I was Britian) before I noticed and sank it! :P

[ratbarf]

Right now it's about mids 1730's in my Prussia campaign and the Mats have all of India aside from Mysore and are starting to pressure Persia, should I buff the Russians? If I give them enough money/tech they should be able to stop them on land? In my campaign Russia hasn't managed to capture any ports of significance and therefore doesn't have any navy, however I don't have one either as I'm kind of going for a semi-historic campaign. Should I go after the Mats? Leave them to Russia? Or just let the steamroll their way across the world?

[Fisherking]

Right now it's about mids 1730's in my Prussia campaign and the Mats have all of India aside from Mysore and are starting to pressure Persia, should I buff the Russians? If I give them enough money/tech they should be able to stop them on land? In my campaign Russia hasn't managed to capture any ports of significance and therefore doesn't have any navy, however I don't have one either as I'm kind of going for a semi-historic campaign. Should I go after the Mats? Leave them to Russia? Or just let the steamroll their way across the world?

The only way you will stop them is to go to India your self.

Money and tech are usually wasted.

Mysore is their ally, no doubt. Go to India with three stacks and a good navy of strong SOLs.

Take the island of Ceylon and Mysore and go on from there.

Fighting in India is fun. No use waiting for them to get to Vienna before you take them on.

[ratbarf]

Darn, I was hoping for a simply clean european campaign against the usual anti-prussian suspects. And I'll have to walk there, I don't even own a dockyard, though I do have like 7 Commercial basins.

[Fisherking]

The Prussians wanted colonies, they just didn’t start until late. The 1820s.

Some of your commercial basins don’t draw trade, I am sure, so convert one or capture one or more. You have time if they are just going after Persia.

Also, in India you usually can only build company troops, for the most part, so the regular troops you send will be your elite core armies.

To be a real Major Power requires trade and you need a navy to protect that trade.

A quick way to get a major jump start on that is to capture Morocco. The Naval Dockyard and Commercial Basin there are great and closer to all the trade nodes.

[ratbarf]

Thanks for the advice, I'm going to create a secondary save at my current point in the campaign, then continue on as normal and see if I can't simply beat them through (que german accent) "my obvious superiority."

If that doesn't work I'll reload my split save and do what you recommend, I expect to die to the orange tide, but we'll see where this goes first.

[Fisherking]

The won’t beat you.

If it is an overland campaign then you need to just about eliminate them.

If you go to India you can take the high money and trade regions and forget about them for the most part.

Chances are you will win the game before they get to you.

Good Luck!

[Marshall Louis-Nicolas Davout]

Maratha are the best faction in ETW.They're fine!An excelllent choice!

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Maratha are the best faction in ETW.They're fine!An excelllent choice!

They are quite fun to play, and an interesting challenge. Mostly, this thread is bemoaning the amazing power it has under AI control vis-a-vis the Mughals and the Middle East -- and with their penchant for hunting you wherever you are.

[md1453]

The orange mass spreading across the world drives me crazy. I would prefer to fight a different army from time to time; say the mughals, then the persians, and maybe then the marathas. but not always marathas.

I finally modded them; I removed some key units so they had less fighting power, especially infantry and ships of the line. This gave their neighbors a fighting chance.

[xxrulerofswedenxx]

How to stop? I guess I just have to start fighting them, but they're my trade partners so I'd go broke. They just took over Britain and are currently sending several full stacks toward the European mainland. I'm the Dutch, I've taken over all France's lands and all the Americas except for the USA. Is there any way to trick other countries into fighting them for me?

I'm not complaining, I'm up to the challenge, just wondering how to stop them without losing all my trade income.you should have wipped them out from the beginning . there pretty weak then

[Diocletian]

I tried to colonise India as France at 1935 today, and the moment I declare war, about 4 full-stack Marathan armies pop up in the Carribean and take literally everything but the windward and Leeward Isles. I think I can get them out of there fine, but I wanted to know how one could go about making the likes of Great Britain and United Provinces start colonising Maratha? I'm trying to give them one of the provinces I just captured, but until recently I was at war with both Britain and the Provinces, and they just won't accept it, even for free. If about three of the European naval powers started fighting Maratha head on for colonies, do you think they would be able to win, or would the Marathans just kick them out anyway?

As it is, it looks like I'm set to lose my really experienced full stack army, they're just getting swamped by Sikh Swordsmen and they are much stronger than I anticipated. I remember one game I was Austria and I gave the Marathans saxony because I knew the Prussians were about to steamroll me, biggest miscalculation ever XD

Edit: just to clarify, since I never had the commitment to drive a grand campaign till 1800; if Maratha get too strong, will they literally pose a threat to winning the campaign? Or is it just that they are annoying and kill all your favorite enemies ;)

[Fisherking]

They are a royal pain but you should be able to win so long as everyone else doesn’t jump you in the bargain.

It will not be easy and not much fun unless it is for the long term challenges you will face.

You need to beat them at sea first and disrupt all their ports and kill their trade before they do the same to you. Also don’t auto-resolve your battles. You should not have too much trouble beating their doom stacks with good troops if you fight them your self but auto-resolve will flatten you.

[wal_martian]

I think it's because their economy is so amazing. I haven't seen anyone ever get close to their prestige. Declaring war on them is a death sentence they destroyed all of my prussian colonies in a few turns. Now im playing as austria and they are getting closer. These guys seriously piss me off i wish there was a simple way to defeat them. Next time im going to play as the dutch and im going to try to expand into india early on and get rid of this slime.
The problem i had with them is that they were so far away and i had no navy early on. As soon as i sent an army to their side of the world they already had enough soldiers to obliterate it.

If you don't have any strong territories nearby it is impossible to reinforce your armies. I will win a few battles but my units will continue to dwindle down and i have to keep recruiting more and more. Also it helps if you have 2 separate naval fleets maybe even 3 to help you get from point a to point b.
Next time im just going to try to take their capital city with my first or second assault. It would make conquering them a bit easier if i had their best territory working towards my advantage at the start of the war.

Also i wish i could unite the entire continent of europe against them. They just start to pick nations off one by one. I wish you could hold war conferences and discuss strategy with your allies. For example tell britain to attack their ports and attack their coastlines while i focus on moving soldiers through the middle east and fight land battles. It would be so much easier to deal with them if we could coordinate our assaults.

lol never mind yesterday im actually matching them economically
but i don't think it will last long because it has something to do with my countries inventiveness
once india reaches the same level they will be right back on top

[Gengis]

Try to stall the Maratha early game as much as possible by trading and giving tech to the Mughals. Then once you have expanded enough you can attack the Maratha in India by the sea, to stop them at their roots :)

[dge1]

I get tired of every campaign, no matter which faction, winding up with me having to fight the Maratha. I have seen them destroyed four times by a faction other than the one I am playing. It's almost enough to drive me to use a Mod.

[Patricius]

Whoever takes India becomes formidable. No dangerous neighbours, and often none as the Dutch and Portuguese can succumb early in the game. The Ottomans have to contend with Russia and Austria. The Maratha have only a luckless Persia which can an ally of the Mughals. A single front invasion of the Ottomans who can be fighting two neighbours tends to have only one result. Also Anatolia has two colleges. It revolts very frequently, even with an otherwise healthy Ottoman faction, and that's fatal while fighting invasion, although the ai can slow up if a rebel province appears.