Experience of Rebel Armies

Having taken Botavodurum from the Germanians, playing as the Julii, I foolishly did not exterminate the populace. So the place rebelled back to the Germans, with an army of around five Spear Warband's, and three Schreeching Women.

The problem was that all these units had triple gold chevrons, silver attack, and gold armour. This gave the Spear Warband stats of 19/22 IIRC, making Spartan Hoplites look like Town Watch.

I got an army annihilated by this monster-stack, killing only around 25% of it. The army is now camped in Tribus Chattii, the last German province. But its now basically impossible to take.

Why are peasant rebels invincible?

What difficulty are you playing, because when a town rebels from someones rule stacks of imba units will spawn (Rank 5 Peltasts are not unknown)

Playing on VH/M.

I think it may be a bug, although it could not be though. The overpowered rebels issue only has frequently happened to me when playing on harder difficulty levels. This may indicate that it's deliberately implemented to improve the challenge.

Regardless of whether it's a bug or a feature, sadly, beyond defeating them, there's not much you can do to stop such rebels appearing. There is the bright side I suppose though - at least they're not legionaries or berserks.

~:)

I've found a good way to wear them down is to besiege them then retreat with one turn to surrender. Then I just repeat a few times...

That has happened to me too! When playing as the Julii on M/M, Iuvavum had rebelled from me back to the Dacians, with full-experience peasants and naked fanatics. That makes the peasants better in stats than hastati, with more numbers, and better morale too. Furthermore the upkeep is only 100...... That uber stack stalled my expansion in that direction by about five, six years, and even after I had taken Iuvavum, it was a ratty little hovel with barely 400 villagers in it. I recall being very annoyed by that.

My theory is that when a town revolts it gets a certain budget to spend on spawning unit. The units spawned are determined by the troop-production structures. You can make the town spawn nothing but peasants by tearing down barracks, stables, missile range and any temples that can recruit units. The exception is if the rebelling town is designated rebel capital: then it can spawn any unit.

If twenty units are spawned and there is still some of the budget left, the rest of the money will go into upgrades and experience. If it's just peasants, that doesn't really matter for even golden chrevroned peasants are not very useful. However, the German spear warband is a different matter.

I would recommend tackling them with a missile-heavy army. German units are underarmoured, and experience does not protect from arrows.

That makes sense. though gold-chevroned peasants, especially barbarian peasants (with 4 defense instead of the usual 1) still pack quite a punch! D,: (At least, relative to their cost.)

The real nightmare for gold chevron rebellions is when they contain chariot units. Whilst you have a chance, the poor old AI in auto-calc has no chance. I've seen massive armies destroyed by a certain tribe of women charioteers...

Anyway it doesn't matter how much experience a unit has if it's vulnerable to missiles and projectiles. Next time you attack the settlement, bring in the catapults and plenty of archers and just pelt those barbarians with the midas touch from afar. They'll soon start to drop. Sadly the AI defenders love to run back and forth behind the walls and in range of your bowmen so just wait it out and don't attack too soon.

Ultimately, however, I find those crazy rebellions annoying and unrealistic.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Caledonian Rhyfelwyr

I got an army annihilated by this monster-stack, killing only around 25% of it. The army is now camped in Tribus Chattii, the last German province. But its now basically impossible to take. Why are peasant rebels invincible?

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Sometimes; on VH, its down to luck. I once fought a battle as pontus against thrace. I had 8 units of Easter infantry they had a petlast general and two units of flaxmen. My entire army, save about 42 men got anihalited. I few turns later I had four units of bronze shields and a chariot general against 8 units of greek armoured hoplites and four units of archers. I won that battle only losing 12 men by using an outward-square formation.
Its sometimes luck!

I use rebel armies to train my newbie generals.
As for the super cheat code that AI uses, YES IT IS IRRITATING !!! :furious3:
They can just spawn super stacks everywhere when they are losing.