Biggest AI empire?

[NewJeffCT]

I have played quite a few SP campaigns now in MTW (version 1.1, no VI, no Wes mods) – English 3 times, Italians, Turks & Byzantines twice, as well as Spanish, Egyptians, Holy Roman Empire, Polish and now my current campaign is the Danes. All of my campaigns have started on Early.

What is the biggest empire the AI has put together against you? Until now, I have only seen a few huge empires put together by any of my opponents. The biggest foe I have often faced has been the Byzantines, though I have seen major opponents as the Spanish, HRE, Egyptians, Almohads, and the occasional long lasting Golden Horde in my campaigns…often, the big AI empire will fall into civil war and lose a lot of territory. The biggest Late era challenge for me was when I was on the verge of world conquest and got excommunicated as the Spanish and had at least 18-20 provinces break out in rebellion immediately before I could assassinate the Pope.

However, I think I have finally gotten an opponent that will challenge me through the High era, and hopefully until Late. I am guessing that since I am the Danes, and I generally play that I do not attack fellow Catholics unless I am attacked first and, since the Danes start out small and cannot crusade, it is hard to get around to facing off against the now massive empire of Egypt. The Egyptian Empire currently spreads from Tunisia east through Egypt, Palestine and Arabia, north up through Trebizond, Georgia and Khazar, they have confined the Byzantines to one island, and have now spread all over Asia Minor and have even pushed into central Europe, having gotten as far as Franconia, the Papal States and Tyrolia. They also hold Poland and all the lands at about the same level on south and have beaten the HRE into just Prussia, which, as aggressive as they have been, is only a matter of time before they invade Prussia. Basically, except for a few territories east of Novgorad that are still under control of the people of Novgorad, the whole right side of the map is mustard yellow.

By the way, my Danish empire is not too shabby, either. I hold all of Scandanavia, as well as Novgorad & Livonia, snagged Brittany, Ireland & Scotland in an English civil war, and also launched pseudo Crusades into Granada & Leon against the Almos, which then allowed me to get Morocco, Algeria & Portugal as well. I also managed to snag Saxony to give my original province a buffer.

[Kraxis]

The biggest AI empire I have seen mush have been the Egyptians when I died.

I was down to two German provinces, while the Egyptians held Africa, Russia, Balkans, Asia Minor, Spain, France, Italy, half of Egnalnd and Germany. Basically, there was only about ten provinces it didn't have.
Why didn't I give up earlier? Because I wanted to see it to the end.

[Dhepee]

I was playing as the Germans and I faced a huge French Empire. They took out the English almost immediately, and then the Almos conquered Spain and made the mistake of going after a few French Provinces. The French ended up with all of Spain and Everything from Morrocco through Egypt. Then the buggers when after all the rebel provinces in the baltic. The AI, however, made the mistake of putting the French king in charge of the army that attacked Finland. Suddenly I had several stacks of ships in each sea, and I just cut the sea lanes and isolated the King. I didn't attack him because I didn't want an heir to take over on the mainland. After a couple of battles the French had a civil war and most of their provinces went rebel.

[Vanya]

GAH

Typically for Vanya, it ends up being any of the following usual suspects: The Egyptians, The Spanish, The Byzantines or the French.

On one occasion it was the Polish http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/eek.gif , who managed to become a veritable superpower, owning all the lands from every corner of Russia south to Georgia and west into French lands, including all of the Balkans and Scandinavia plus parts of Italy and Constantinople

And naturally, they had massive armies with 1 or 2 decent chinless wonder units babysitting a horde of bare-chested slav warriors... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/mecry.gif

GAH

[NewJeffCT]

Wow, I've never had the Poles as much of a threat in game... in fact, in my current campaign as the Danes, they degenerated into a minor faction only a few years into the game due to no heir (then respawned a few years later...)

I've actually had more problems with the Hungarians and Sicilians over the campaigns than the Poles.

[monkian]

I'm playing as the Byz Empire at the moment- I 'd say I'm the richest and almost always have the most number of troops.

Its then a tie between the Mongols who have most of the upper right region of the map whilst the Spanish have Spain, some African countries nearly all of Britain and Ireland plus Scandinavia and a few other lesser European countries.

The french are probably next and seem to enjoy launching crusades at me http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/frown.gif

Theres gonna be a reckoning soon as we've just discovered gun powder http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[A.Saturnus]

I`ve seen several really huge empires, but in my current Turkish game, it`s an interesting situation. There are several rather strong empires: mine, the Almos, the French, the Pope (&#33http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif and the Polish. But I think only the French will pose a real thread to my expansion. My alim in Paris informs me that they have an army there that has CFK (modded to be buildable and size 60 men per unit) like others have peasants. They don`t bother with halberdiers any more.

[NewJeffCT]

My current campaign as the Danes is interesting in that I almost always see the French wipe out the English if I don't interfere, and the Byz usually mop up the Egyptians, or at least whittle them down to a province or two... however, this time, the English beat the French with no help from me, and the Egyptians wiped out the Byz, the Poles and the Turks, and helped wiped out the Almos, and have almost wiped out the HRE and the Hungarians, who were previously pretty strong.

[Quokka]

In my Medmod v1.85 game as the Hungarians it the Kievans(Novgorod) that were the biggest, too big in fact. They died in 1093 and re-emerged in the 1130's and didn't stop. They even scared the Mongols who didn't move from Khazar. I had the Hungarian homelands south to Constantinople, Moldavia to the east, Poland, Silesia, Pomerania, Bohemia, Franconia, Austria and Rhodes. The HRE had Bavaria and Swabia and the French had Friesland. The Kievans have everything else and are at war with the French. This was in 1262.

I was letting the AI's play and just teching up with expansion only coming through rebel held lands, except for the initial rush to Constantinople. I wanted a tougher opponent later on so didn't check the Kievans when they started getting large. They were the richest and had the largest armies and fleet, but the game was in a good balance until around 1240. Spain had all of Spain and along Africa to Egypt, France had all of France except Aquitaine, Provence, Burgundy, Lorraine, Friesland, Saxony and Brandenburg, Italy had all of Italy except Rome, Tyrolia, Switzerland, Sicily, Malta and Crete, England had the UK, Ireland and Aquitaine and the Danes Scandinavia.

Spain started a war in the Sinai and the Kievans promptly sank their entire fleet in one turn and invaded over the next 2 years. It took 4 years for all the seiges to finish and that was that. England tried to grab Leon which got them in trouble so the Kievans did the same thing only taking 6 years. They didn't wait with the Italians, French or Papacy. They sank every ship except mine in 1255 and invaded all of Italy and the French coast and brought up troops from Spain. Another 6 years and France is down to Friesland, the Danes are gone after making a bad opportunity grab at Saxony while the Kievans were busy in Brandenburg, no more Spaghetti for the Italians and the Pope is hiding. He re-emerged the next year and lost.

They were just too big. Plus they were my only trading partner and I didn't have that much money. They could and did sink my entire fleet in one turn, after the turn I attacked. I did have better units (+3 Weapon/+3 Armour) but they had a lot of very good units themselves, a much bigger army and bigger income.
My army totaled about 22,000 while theirs was 60,000+ and they had plenty of 9* from all the fighting and none of them are Good Runners.
When I attacked or defended I usually won but I couldn't replace my loses and an attack meant a vacant province so they eventually got in through Moldavia and then Carpathia and Hungary which had been my only interior provinces so didn't have large stacks. Once those provinces and my upgraded units went it was over. I quit when my 2,600 odd in Poland had to face over 11,000 including 5,000+ Horse Archers or Boyars http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/frown.gif

[NewJeffCT]

Wow, good story... I always have trouble with boyars, but didn't realize that could be that bad I remember back once in pre-patch days of 1.0, the People of Novgorad respawned and attacked 13 provinces at once (I think that included rebel provinces aligning with them?) but - I eventually beat them back.

I haven't lost a campaign yet, except to the 1.0 building queue bug when I would quit in frustration.

[motorhead]

A few weeks ago i had a high/turk/expert/VI campaign where the French became the superpower. They held all of western europe, iberia, about half of eastern europe, scandavavia, and north africa right next to egypt. Even though i eventually won the campaign, i didn't get alot of satisfaction out of it. The AI basically seemed to be pulling it's punches on me with the French. They were so dominate (army size & quality, navy size & quality), but completely inept at actually expanding once they became large. During the end-of-turn phase, it wasn't unusal for me to have to wait 1.5 to 2 minutes just for the French turn to end. Given that i was the next largest faction i was secretly hoping i'd have to fight off this powerful foe. However, they left me alone and let me build up a fleet that could actually contend with theirs (at least in the mediterranean). Guess i should have initiated things if i wanted the fight, but it would/should have been suicidal for me to take the offensive against such a juggernaut.

[bighairyman]

draw a line from egypty up to prussia, in my current game as the nglish the egyptains comtroll everything west of that line. the almos got north africa, all of spain and about 5 provinces in german. i habe great britian, france, denmark and norway. sicily and province. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[Alrowan]

HRE in my hungurian campagin, they conquered all of france, some of england, poland, and eventually me, which controlled all of italy, and some of the eatern steppe

[Oaty]

For me it was my first game that I had the biggest challenge. I was the Almahods and decided to make war with Spain, after many years the Iberian peninsula was mine and the last to go was Aragon wich the Spanish had owned. I decided to go after the Egyptians next and defeated them after some time and the Turks went quickly but decided to hold the line with Byzantines who I ran into in western edge of what today is Turkey. I only held off attacking them since I had seen many messages saying they were the strongest richest and most teched up. So I decided to make some French fries and was upgrading farms and making a bit of trade. Well the French were almost gone and decided since I had made quite some good improvements decided to take on the Byzantines since from the messages I was getting led me to believe they were pretty strong. Well I was getting massacred in Turkey and decided my only option was to vacate all the Arid provinces and maintain a hold in the desert it was there I was finally able to turn the tide and slaugtered many heavily armored troops. After a few upsets for the Byzantines I had a 4 to 1 advantage but still was barely enough. After taking some of the provinces in Turkey I had a big surprise come visit me in France. What a ****ing nightmare. The Byzantines decided to knock on my backdoor. The only thing the Byzantines did'nt own was England and all I had was some of France, Spain and northern Africa extending to Turkey. Yes I at least owned a good bit of real estate but considering the quality of Buyzantine troops I was at a great disadvantage. I had to cry when the Byzantine emporer died heirless. The funny thing is there were multiple reapearances but it was so funny that the Byzantine rebels were strong enough to sqash evrey single reapearance

[Brutal DLX]

About the same suspects that Vanya mentioned, sometimes the Pope and the Hungarians get strong too.
Of course, I often interfere when I get the feeling an empire is becoming too big for its own good. Contrary to the game title I prefer a pax romana over any useless and time consuming empirial struggles.
It's distracting when you play GA.

[The Wizard]

The biggest empire I ever saw was in my second campaign as the Byzantines... The Almos held all of North Africa save for Egypt, the Iberian peninsula, France, England, the HRE's lands, North Italy down till Rome (I held the rest), and Scandinavia. I held the rest of the map... So in the end it came down to a huge war with the Almos, which I won in the end by a huge pincer movement, one piece of the pincer moving in south from the Iberian peninsula and another moving in from the East... it left all but England and Scandinavia in Moorish hands, when in 1453 the game ended...

[The_Emperor]

When I was playing as the English in one of my earlier Campaigns (V1.1) I saw the Egyptians roll into Cordoba from across North africa... The next thing I knew I saw Egyptian troops appear in VENICE and PRUSSIA http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/eek.gif

Everything on the Steppes was theirs and the Byzantines, Hungarians, Polish, Almohads and Novgorod were all eliminated by the Egyptian Hordes, and soon enough they invaded Sweden from across the sea... Nasty Egyptians

Needless to say it was an uphill struggle against them as they pushed into the HRE... My only hope lay with the arrival of the Horde behind their lines.

[NewJeffCT]

Oh well, I spoke too soon. I decided to play a bit last night and the mega Empire of the Egyptians, which stretched as far west as Swabia in mainland Europe – straight West and also included Prussia & Pomerania, south to the Papal States, all of Eastern Europe and the steppe lands except Novgorad and Russia, south through Asia Minor and all of the Middle East, across North Africa to Tunisia. The Byzantines were confined to Crete without enough money to even build a fort.

Unfortunately, after finally getting excited about possibly having a worthy opponent in the Late game, they collapsed into civil war. Their huge amount of territories quickly became various shades of rebel gray. A year later, 3 factions eliminated by the Egyptians respawned in one year in Egyptian territory – the Sicilians in Greece, the Almos in Cyrenacia and the Turks in Lesser Armenia & Antioch. Then, the Pope respawns, the HRE and the Poles come back within a few years as well.

So, my dreams of having a worthy foe in Late seem to have been dashed. Maybe I should mod some faction specific units to make them tougher opponents? But, tougher units does not prevent a civil war, and then would make the subsequent rebels tougher as well...

[hrvojej]

I somehow always have enormous Sicilian empires in my games. And they don't even field peasant hordes either. I always attack the nation on a winning streak if possible to prevent them getting the upper hand, but I guess that I can't get to the Sicilians in time to confine them. I don't recall if this was the biggest AI empire I ever seen, but in the only game where I went for the partial victory at one point they had almost entire Europe - nearly all provinces north of Aragon, north of Hungary, and west of Volhynia. I was playing the Turks, and despite my JHI and me owning pretty much everything else, we had a long tug-of-war, beating each other sensless, so by the time I had the minor victory announced, I was so stretched just to garrison the borders that if they managed to concentrate their forces I would be ripped apart. I was kinda tired of that game, as I spent a week or so squabbling with them over the same few provinces, so I gave up and won.

[Cebei]

It was not the biggest empire but when I was playing with Turks in early era, I started a campaign to Muscowy from Rum. When I arrived, I met with Spaniards instead of Russians http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/joker.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/confused.gif Huh?

[The Wizard]

Spanish in Russia.. hehehehe =)

[Bevan of Hertfordshire]

I was playing as the Italians and decide i would be a pacifist http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/shock.gif i didn't bother with crusade or anything just amassed a small fortune.


Imagine my shock when i found out that the whole of christendom had been encompassed by the almohads in the west and the egyptians in the east.
http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/mecry.gif

I launched an all out war against both factions and got thoroughly beaten.

I hope this shows the world that being a pacifist is not beneficial to your health.

OF coure i could have ignored the Islamic hordes but what sort of Christian would i hve been then? eh? http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[The Wizard]

You can be very peaceful with the Italians and build a huge trading empire, but do use all the dough your swimming in to build up an advanced and powerful force.. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif

[jadast]

The Spanish seem to be my biggest foe. I had a decent Turkish empire going. I had all of Africa, crushed the Byzs and expanded into khazar. After taking constantinople I engaged the Hungarians. The Spanish had driven out English and French THEN the Spanish crusade arrived on its way to Syria. They rolled all of my African armies and 2 relief armies. To get worse once I lost Syria they launched one towards constantinople that came though Europe. I don't know how big they got because they crushed me

[Bevan of Hertfordshire]

Quote[/b] (Wizzy @ Oct. 18 2003,12:54)]You can be very peaceful with the Italians and build a huge trading empire, but do use all the dough your swimming in to build up an advanced and powerful force.. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif
Bah Wizzy stop ridiculing me, you're taking the side of my soldiers http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif