Unit Upkeep and Army Running Costs...don't add up.

[Segmentata]

Hi,

I've recently started playing EB as Koinon Hellenon. After a pretty unfortunate start (moved the bulk of my army to take Crete and was stranded there after a weaker Macedon fleet effortlessly destroyed mine) I was prompted to calculate my unit upkeep to find out exactly why I was facing such horrific debt.

By going through the unit scrolls I tallied them all up to reach something like 1,800 mnai. However, the finance scroll puts my army running costs around 5,000 mnai.

Why is this? Isn't unit upkeep the same as army running costs? If not, then why are these extra, invisible costs so high? I'm not bothered that recruitment and upkeep are higher than they were in vanilla R:TW...but this just doesn't make sense to me.

[Basileus_ton_Basileon]

your diplomats are being paid, too; as are your generals and family members. I've yet to hear about an aristocrat that didn't expect himself to be paid when on campaign.

[Ludens]

Diplomats, assassins, spies and family members all cost 200 mnai per turn, but that is listed under "wages" rather than "upkeep".

Did you also check your ships? Fleets are horrendously expensive, even by EB standards.

[d'Arthez]

I think the infantry FM for the Koinon Hellenon could even cost 800 (as an exception to the general rule of 200 / general), but I could be mistaken there.

[Ca Putt]

+1 even your most humble(cheaper than most weaker ships of other factionsbtw) 50rowers cost you 700 mnai a turn.

probably not applying to your situation: afaik Generals(not family members) bodyguards also cost Upkeep rather than wage, which can hit the books with whooping four digits of mnai.

KH also is one of those factions that rely on a good(lucky) start, as otherwise you are whiped out by the Makedonians. My advice would have been to:
1. infiltrate kydonia.
2. use (only)the main army on crete to conquer it.
3. save your fleet in the Cretan harbor and disband all but one "ship"
the rest of your army is duely need on the mainland to take Korinth and defend against the royalists(makedon)
I usually get the cretan army over to the mainland by turn 2 or 3, depending on if I managed to infiltrate kydonia.

edit: OOOOOHHH, now I know, it's the Spartan generals BG, they cost the aforementioned 800 mnai upkeep, thanks for reminding me :)

[Titus Marcellus Scato]

My tips for starting a KH campaign are in this thread:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?124484-A-guide-to-EB-blitzing-for-new-players

Similar to Ca Putt's except I recommend taking Chalkis very quickly as well as Kydonia, and using the ships to fight the Macedonian ships rather than disbanding them.

[Ca Putt]

right, taking Chalkis before Corinth does have it's merits and retaining the ships helps with sea trade(aka macedonians blocking your ports) and reinforceing/evacuateing settlers in asia minor. In any case It's a good idea to get your main army off Crete asap as history showed :D

[Segmentata]

I think the infantry FM for the Koinon Hellenon could even cost 800 (as an exception to the general rule of 200 / general), but I could be mistaken there.

Ah, yes, that would be it. Man those are some brutal BG costs.

Thanks for the tips. I will be forever frustrated by the 'roll of the dice' in R:TW naval battles though.

[Titus Marcellus Scato]

Thanks for the tips. I will be forever frustrated by the 'roll of the dice' in R:TW naval battles though.

Naval battles in EB are handled via auto-resolve. Auto-resolve gets more difficult the higher the campaign difficulty level is.

On Medium campaign difficulty, you can usually win with a 1.5 to 1 numerical advantage in ships over the enemy (assuming equal experience).
On Hard campaign difficulty, you need at least 2 to 1 numerical advantage in ships over the enemy to win. Or an equal number of ships one tier bigger than those of the enemy (e.g. they have Pentekonteroi, you have Triereis).
On Very Hard campaign difficulty, you need at least 3 to 1 numerical advantage in ships over the enemy to win. Or an equal number of ships two tiers bigger than those of the enemy (e.g. they have Pentekonteroi, you have Quadrireme).

This is another reason I play Medium campaign difficulty.

[moonburn]

my experience tells me that using 2 ships to go and grab the units in rhodios and leaving the rhodios dude there is better for the short term

also with the spy opening the gates of kydonia you can have your royal army back on the mainland in 1 turn (or 2 i can´t remember)

chalkis might seem cool but if you can anihalate the corinthian besieged army you can get korinth in 1 turn (very hard to do but not impossible just box up the place where they come into batle beteween some rocks and a patch of forest
ofc you can hardly do that without the athenian suport to besiege korinth and then coming to your aid to distract the other makedonian army wich you must attack with the spartan army

but thats my aproach 2 cities in the 1st turn and since the batle of korinth normally does take a big chunck of your army (if you can call that rag tag hoploi group an army ) you´ll need the 2 units from rhodos to sucefully besiege chalkis and ofc have a bit of luck in the auto resolve i just figured it out that if you attack with pentekaroi you have a greater chance to win if you can armour it a bit even better but the makedonians normally split their navy and you only have to attack 2 pentekaroi of them with 3 of yours (once you rejoin then in turn 2 after you disembark the rhodians in chalkis region )

i normally wait a bit and armour up the navy in athens (getting 15.000 mnai from seulekids and 1750 deom the epirotes helps with that )

[Kralizec]

Naval battles in EB are handled via auto-resolve. Auto-resolve gets more difficult the higher the campaign difficulty level is.

On Medium campaign difficulty, you can usually win with a 1.5 to 1 numerical advantage in ships over the enemy (assuming equal experience).
On Hard campaign difficulty, you need at least 2 to 1 numerical advantage in ships over the enemy to win. Or an equal number of ships one tier bigger than those of the enemy (e.g. they have Pentekonteroi, you have Triereis).
On Very Hard campaign difficulty, you need at least 3 to 1 numerical advantage in ships over the enemy to win. Or an equal number of ships two tiers bigger than those of the enemy (e.g. they have Pentekonteroi, you have Quadrireme).

This is another reason I play Medium campaign difficulty.

I'm not certain about the numbers you've written down, but in general you're right - campaign difficulty has a tremendous impact on naval battles, and you must have clear superiority to win them consistently.

Other than that, I've noticed that quality is better than quantity. Several times I've seen fleets of mine with above-average ships like Tetreres beat HUGE fleets of pirate ships, even though the pre-battle screen indicates that the AI had an advantage.

Command stars also seem to have an imporant effect on auto-calc in general. For this reason it's good strategy to hunt any pirate fleet you see into extinction, even if they're not bothering you personally, because it will give your admirals more stars and therefore better chances in "real" fights.