Overwhelmed, with sieges.

Hey guys I am playing as Romani, I have conqured 21 cities.
I have siciliy and the islands surrounding Sicily and The Italian Peninsula. Greeks and Sweboz surround me from the east. Aeudi from the North. and Lusotsanan forces knock on my doors from the West. I have tried to focus on one enemy but they are relentless. Even after I blockaded many ports they seem to have more money then me. I cant keep fighting them off.

Diplomacy doesn't work, I wanted to take Gaul first but the I basically stuck. I cant advance into their territory and I can get the marian reforms even because I dont have enough cities. I am getting frustrated.
What should I do?
should I post a savegame file?

Force Diplomacy: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=80763

Updated version for 1.2:

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Originally Posted by iamphet

I have tweaked the mod to work with EB 1.2. Make backup before applying it!
http://files.filefront.com/ForceDipl...einfo.html/1/1

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What else, I don't want them to just give up because in my game they all have the upper hand on me at the moment.

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Originally Posted by Rule The World

Hey guys I am playing as Romani, I have conqured 21 cities.
I have siciliy and the islands surrounding Sicily and The Italian Peninsula. Greeks and Sweboz surround me from the east. Aeudi from the North. and Lusotsanan forces knock on my doors from the West. I have tried to focus on one enemy but they are relentless. Even after I blockaded many ports they seem to have more money then me. I cant keep fighting them off.

Diplomacy doesn't work, I wanted to take Gaul first but the I basically stuck. I cant advance into their territory and I can get the marian reforms even because I dont have enough cities. I am getting frustrated.
What should I do?
should I post a savegame file?

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If you haven't yet, take a look at the thread "understanding a sally" which I started as an inquiry. I got some useful replies there and should be helpful in thinning down enemy siege troops.

My guess now is that you're playing VH/M, which I tried in the past but found a little too time consuming, with constant sieges and all. This is a personal preference I'm not expecting people to change. But my 2 cents is that at VH the AI gets massive tax revenue bonuses and blockading their ports will hardly make a dent in their economy.

I think it'd be more effective building up your economy and armies and keep pounded at them. Fight them at their turf if you can. Given your enemies, I find the barbarian factions easier to subdue. I'd start with Aedui. Have well-protected cities in the east and hold the line, and meanwhile conquer Western Europe and make that a revenue generator. As you might arleady know, Iberia is full of mines.

As for relentless enemies and lack of Marian reform, I just try having a constant supply of native Romani units be on the front lines (Hastati/Principe/Triarii/Accensi). These work very well against barbarians even though they come in superior numbers. The really cheap Accensi are a great bang for the buck vs those units, imho. And if you don't mind unrealistic levelling (Accensi with silver chevrons), you'll basically have a really cheap version of "slingers from hell".

I know it's a tough situation and easier said then done. But your situation was similar to mine in the v1.1 campaign before some bug made it unplayable by the 100's BC. My greater concern at the time was not so much that I was surrounded, but that Arche Seleukeia was spreading too fast. Another concern was trying to prevent the CTD that tends to happen at round 66 BC, but I never got to that point.

Good luck!

I had a similar situation. I've conquered Italy, islands, Massilia and Emporion in the West and Illiria with core Epirote territories in the East. I've started the war against the Lusos and in a short time all my northern border was a warzone as I was attacked by Aedui and Sweboz. At the beginning it was tough as the Lusos controlled all of Iberia and I had to bring significant forces there, at the same time maintaining defenses everywhere else.

Several times the Aedui were close to capturing Massilia and Epirotes managed to take back one minor town in Illiria, but that's all they've managed to do. The economy was strained at the time, but it didn't matter as I had enough reserves. Now, the Lusos are dead, Aedui lost 3 cities and I've managed to push Sweboz out of Alps.

I used Type IV government in each key region. It was Emporion in Iberia and Aventicos against the Sweboz (Massilia was easy enough to reinforce from Italy). In Emporion I trained Ilergeti soldiers and they fought together with the legions I've brought from Italy. In Aventicos I've trained Alpic phalanx and Helveti phalanx. They were more than capable of pushing the Sweboz back with some Celtic light troops from Mediolanum and a few legion units from Northern Italy.

Yes, please post a savegame :yes::yes:. Do you want for someone to get you out of this situation, or would you be willing to release it so everyone can try it. As for me, I have been waiting quite a bit of time to play a challenging EB game.

BTW, what version of EB are you playing, and what year are you in?

http://www.axifile.com?9031462
that is the savegame.

I am fairly new to Rome Total War and I am playing EB 1.2

I don't want to use Force Diplomacy.

Also if anyone can give me tactics to use on the Greek armies should I use my own Hoplites, or just calvary with roman infantry?

I want to get better at the war part of the game. I find that my slingers do nothing against Phalanx troops. But they move down any light infantry unit. Aren't they supposed to be good against armor?

can someone explain. Also if i used archers against the phalanx with fire arrows would that help me kill or shake their lines?

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Originally Posted by Rule The World

http://www.axifile.com?9031462
that is the savegame.

I am fairly new to Rome Total War and I am playing EB 1.2

I don't want to use Force Diplomacy.

Also if anyone can give me tactics to use on the Greek armies should I use my own Hoplites, or just calvary with roman infantry?

I want to get better at the war part of the game. I find that my slingers do nothing against Phalanx troops. But they move down any light infantry unit. Aren't they supposed to be good against armor?

can someone explain. Also if i used archers against the phalanx with fire arrows would that help me kill or shake their lines?

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You have to hit their sides of their rear with your slingers to do any significant damage to better armored opponents. Use the versatility of your legions against the hoplites. Hoplites move poorly and once they engage an opponent they are easy to flank. Post your hastati to the front with auxiliary (foreign mercs or locally recruited troops) on the wings. Once the hoplites are engaged with your hastati come around behind and smash them with either your mercs or your cavalry. It works even better against Phalanx unit with pikes cause they are so slow to move or disengage. Same basic principal Alexander the Great used. Use the infantry to pin the foe in place and then hit them from behind with your cavalry or another unit if you don't have cav available. Your infantry is the anvil, your cavalry is the hammer.

Phalanxes are invincible from the front. Plain and simple. The only thing that can hurt a phalanx from the front is another phalanx. Don't use your infantry to assault from the front. No point. Use the AI's stupidity against it, and just change direction before you even reach it. Of course, in multiplayer it won't ever happen, but you can just have your infantry run past their flank and then charge. Or, do that with slingers and archers, run past them and then fire as much crap at their backs as you can.

During my grand campaign with Rome I've had my share of overwhelming siege fights, fought back for about 30 years but got sick of the 2-3 long sieges p turn with atleast 1 ending in a ctd(which screws up because then you play a turn wqithout script because in ai turn you can save but not turn on script). After reaching 200 bc I knew I had to change something and made up a little system:

Iff the siege is of such a proportion that I would win it by proper kiting/waiting half an hour on the walls, I (ab)use ''auto_win defender'' which in my experience autocalculates on a scale that you lose about 30-40% of your troops,where I on manual command would sometimes lose 10%. It speeds up the campaign, makes all the sieges less boring and due to the amount of troops you lose in your town, I personally feel the need to engage the enemy alot more in the open(which was supposed to be the battleground to begin with, but as the ai on alex.exe spams so much stacks you lose track sometimes it's tricky to keep them from sieging every single time).


To balance this ''cheating'', I'm ofcourse using alot of houserules like reinforcing with the oldschool italian troops which are trained in rome/the italian cities and auto_win ''losing'' too(or just hitting the autoresolve button,which means a loss 99% of the times on very hard).

This tactic made me less vulnerable to ctds, made my campaign less focused on sieging and gave me personally abit more enjoyement in my campaign,as I tend to take on the entire world at the same time and fight wars on all fronts while trying to prevent killing the factions I'm fighting(have been at 25-40 regions for 50 years now, going up and down constantyl due to the endless wars),instead of taking over the world in a blitz/laming out factions.

Let's pray EB2 will take full use of the medieval engine which never gave me ctds :D!

Do a Reagan, and go massively into debt to mfund an uber-army, so you can annihalate one particular faction, then focus on the others. If you're trying that tactic, I'd do either Luso, or Aedui.
REAGAN SMASH

YES. High-five!

Luso first, definitely. Mines will make you rich, rich, rich

To quote the Beatles song, "I me mine"

i'm in a similar situation right now minus the sieges. my answer dude is that if you got a strong economy, I do, just start pumping out troops and attack their main troop production centers.

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Originally Posted by Subotan

Do a Reagan, and go massively into debt to mfund an uber-army, so you can annihalate one particular faction, then focus on the others. If you're trying that tactic, I'd do either Luso, or Aedui.
REAGAN SMASH

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Good one! :laugh4: This just made my day! :2thumbsup:

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Originally Posted by Rule The World

http://www.axifile.com?9031462
that is the savegame.

I am fairly new to Rome Total War and I am playing EB 1.2

I don't want to use Force Diplomacy.

Also if anyone can give me tactics to use on the Greek armies should I use my own Hoplites, or just calvary with roman infantry?

I want to get better at the war part of the game. I find that my slingers do nothing against Phalanx troops. But they move down any light infantry unit. Aren't they supposed to be good against armor?

can someone explain. Also if i used archers against the phalanx with fire arrows would that help me kill or shake their lines?

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I had a look at your save game and have been playing it for the last 5 game years. The major thing that I think is giving you trouble is that your whole country is very badly set up. It reminds me of te Western Roman Empire in barbarian invasion. You are not set up economically or even very well defensively.

Some of the main things I noticed was that you have bad garrisoning, I found a general and a unit of Equites Extrodinarii in Capua. That horse unit is 700 mnai a turn. Meanwhile you are fighting in iberia with light iberian spearman. I have nothing against those spearmen, they have their place. But those horses should be moved up.

Secondly I found lots of client rulers. I mean LOTS! You had all your homeland governments with Type 1. EVERY other town had a Type 4 government except for Syrocusae with a Type 2. Each town had a client governer or sometimes 2. Those guys cost money...lots. Between 500 for a gallic king up to about 1200 for a Hellenic horse. But you had no shortage of family members, I found 6 of them in Roma. Unless you are roleplaying I seriously think that is a bit of overkill.

In those 20 turns that I played, I managed to kill off all your client rulers, rebuild Type 2's in all towns, lose 1 town (shame) but take back 2 of the enemies (as well as Patavium which you were siegeing at the save start point) by moving up some of the garrison troops.

You can win, but you need to look at your overall financial security when building your empire next time. Type 4's are good for getting military units from other cultures but generally have public order negative hits and other stuff. Try and ease up on the client rulers too, I know lots of generals is fun but they do cost.

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Originally Posted by Blxz

I had a look at your save game and have been playing it for the last 5 game years. The major thing that I think is giving you trouble is that your whole country is very badly set up. It reminds me of te Western Roman Empire in barbarian invasion. You are not set up economically or even very well defensively.

Some of the main things I noticed was that you have bad garrisoning, I found a general and a unit of Equites Extrodinarii in Capua. That horse unit is 700 mnai a turn. Meanwhile you are fighting in iberia with light iberian spearman. I have nothing against those spearmen, they have their place. But those horses should be moved up.

Secondly I found lots of client rulers. I mean LOTS! You had all your homeland governments with Type 1. EVERY other town had a Type 4 government except for Syrocusae with a Type 2. Each town had a client governer or sometimes 2. Those guys cost money...lots. Between 500 for a gallic king up to about 1200 for a Hellenic horse. But you had no shortage of family members, I found 6 of them in Roma. Unless you are roleplaying I seriously think that is a bit of overkill.

In those 20 turns that I played, I managed to kill off all your client rulers, rebuild Type 2's in all towns, lose 1 town (shame) but take back 2 of the enemies (as well as Patavium which you were siegeing at the save start point) by moving up some of the garrison troops.

You can win, but you need to look at your overall financial security when building your empire next time. Type 4's are good for getting military units from other cultures but generally have public order negative hits and other stuff. Try and ease up on the client rulers too, I know lots of generals is fun but they do cost.

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That's great advice, can you tell me in more detail how I can set up my economy for success. I am trying to build schools in all my cities in a different game with the Romani, and I have gone to greece first to campaign. I feel like I can take over the Hellenes, and at the same time leave carthage alone who will contend with The Luso's in Iberia while I build a few legions. Any more details information or tactics for ruling the world.... LMAO, I get it giddy thinking about it. I must be the only one who'ss 1.90 meters guy who has a Napoleon complex.

What do you build in your cities?

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That's great advice, can you tell me in more detail how I can set up my economy for success. I am trying to build schools in all my cities in a different game with the Romani, and I have gone to greece first to campaign.

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First of all, look at the building descriptions - give special priority to building anything that increases trade (including, but not limited to, mercantile buildings, docks and roads). Also, if you're given the option of mining, do it when you can. For public order, never underestimate the good effect that temples and hygiene buildings (sewers, baths, aquaducts, etc.) can have.

Schools won't be all that useful - all they do is decrease corruption in a city, and while that can slightly increase your income, it doesn't develop the economy. -M

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Originally Posted by Mulceber

First of all, look at the building descriptions - give special priority to building anything that increases trade (including, but not limited to, mercantile buildings, docks and roads). Also, if you're given the option of mining, do it when you can. For public order, never underestimate the good effect that temples and hygiene buildings (sewers, baths, aquaducts, etc.) can have.

Schools won't be all that useful - all they do is decrease corruption in a city, and while that can slightly increase your income, it doesn't develop the economy. -M

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Don't schools affect the traits of your leaders and the retinue you attract?

Buy slingers (and/or archers) to man your battlements. Attack the besieging armies, hit them with all your ammo from the walls and then conclude the sally. After 2 or 3 sallies you will kill/rout any besieging force. Also consider which cities you take to ensure that you only have a small front (so that you don't have to maintain large/expensive forces in each city, only the ones that are likely to be attacked)

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Originally Posted by Zorachus

Don't schools affect the traits of your leaders and the retinue you attract?

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Aye, I've never noticed a corruption-reducing effect for building schools (although this may also be due to never having trouble with corruption in those cities where I build schools!).

As for dealing with corruption; it is sometimes more favourable to spend six turns "building" a town/city guard (or even better, improved roads or baths) than an equivalent or greater length of time building something that might only boost trade income by a handful of mnai per turn.

...of course, mines are by far the greatest individual buildings for boosting income, but require large investments of time and money (and soldiers, if your mine-able regions share borders with other factions).

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As for dealing with corruption; it is sometimes more favourable to spend six turns "building" a town/city guard (or even better, improved roads or baths) than an equivalent or greater length of time building something that might only boost trade income by a handful of mnai per turn.

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Corruption is directly affected by "LAW". The more buidings improving "LAW" will reduce corruption.

I just have one doubt regarding city building, one that i have never managed to discover after countless tests. What is "Unrest"? What causes "Unrest"?

I have heard that having a "blue" face or anything below 75% will gradually increase unrest and having more then that will reduce it slowly, but i havent had any sucess and noticed no difference after having a city more then 10 years with about 150% public order.

Seriously, Unrest is a killer in most of my cities - in some cities it even reaches about 50%!

Conceed a retreat to the mainland of Italy. Build up the cities there and keep two stacks at the top. You will be able to afford about 4-5 when you have maxed out the main Italian peninsula of its wealth. You should be able to max out two mines. The reason for two stacks is that they can take a bashing and give one to defend and after a few years of that your two stacks will be coming close to Gold Shevrons.

These stacks will then be really useful for the Greece push. Just get into a habit of retreating and rearming them in Italy on a continual basis and also utilising and strengthing any new generals/family members to lead them.

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Originally Posted by BurningEGO

I just have one doubt regarding city building, one that i have never managed to discover after countless tests. What is "Unrest"? What causes "Unrest"?

I have heard that having a "blue" face or anything below 75% will gradually increase unrest and having more then that will reduce it slowly, but i havent had any sucess and noticed no difference after having a city more then 10 years with about 150% public order.

Seriously, Unrest is a killer in most of my cities - in some cities it even reaches about 50%!

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Unrest that stays around for a long time is almost always caused by enemy spies in your city. Build a spy of your own and if possible stick a general with +to public security in the settlement. You should 'catch' the spy in a few turns. Sometimes huge unrest can be caused from multiple spies. just wait it out, eventually your spy will get rid of all the enemy spies, or at the very least make it harder for them to get more into the city.

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Originally Posted by Blxz

Unrest that stays around for a long time is almost always caused by enemy spies in your city. Build a spy of your own and if possible stick a general with +to public security in the settlement. You should 'catch' the spy in a few turns. Sometimes huge unrest can be caused from multiple spies. just wait it out, eventually your spy will get rid of all the enemy spies, or at the very least make it harder for them to get more into the city.

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Its impossible to be spies in all the cases. I have placed in cities spies (for years) with excelent skill and nothing was found. In certain cases, like islands, its also impossible to be spies.

100th post, yay!

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Originally Posted by BurningEGO

Its impossible to be spies in all the cases. I have placed in cities spies (for years) with excelent skill and nothing was found. In certain cases, like islands, its also impossible to be spies.

100th post, yay!

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I think I remember reading something somewhere that some cities have constant unrest. Maybe they are meant to represent naturally unruly people or maybe the game hates you and is trying to dislodge you by any means? Also if you are playing on VH campaign setting it might be something included to make it a bit harder. OR it could be a governor trait or an ancillary or maybe you have a negative with one of your governments, type 3's and 4's are normally not so good for public order. maybe they do the unrest?

sorry, double post

Provinces with or without governors tend to have unrest as long as they are far away from my capital (with type 2 govs even). But maybe you are right - VH/VH might make things harder, regarding unrest. Need to test it out.

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Originally Posted by BurningEGO

Provinces with or without governors tend to have unrest as long as they are far away from my capital (with type 2 govs even). But maybe you are right - VH/VH might make things harder, regarding unrest. Need to test it out.

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I play on hard and have had the same experience as you, playing as the Romani, several of my islands have a 45% unrest level, even though they are at level 2 govt, have no enemy spies present, and have been my territory for years... very frustrating because it means my good gov/gen's get bogged up.