Disapointed in Carthage

I was really looking forward to being able to play with the Carthage Faction , but from what all I have read and studied I don't think RTW portrays them well. The really don't have a great trade income , not what it should be atleast , considering there armies were greatly fielded by paid mercenaries , not to mention mercenaries in general are very generic , I don't know if its because I haven't progressed enough in the Game , but they haven't been able to hire Gauls or Exclusive Spanish troops both of which were the back bone of the Carthaginian army. The crest isn't even realistic , it wasn't a black fertile crescent on a white shield or even an elephant it was a Horse Under a Palm Tree with a red back drop. I don't know it just kinda ticks me off , they also had a senate (as did other factions) that isn't in the game , there more of a free lance muck of what there suppose to be. I could go on but I just wanted to throw that out there to see if others have some issues with this faction or others that really lack authintisty.

Sorry about the spelling , Spell check isn't working and I kinda rush threw this in a fit. :dizzy2:

Im also really pissed about carthage, but mainly because its very difficult to play. I really had no fun playing them, very hard. You're attacked by like 5 factions in the very beggining, and by the 5th turn you're losing money and are at your feet.

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Originally Posted by Inuyasha12

Im also really pissed about carthage, but mainly because its very difficult to play.

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*chuckle* See, I'm having a blast playing Carthage for that very reason. Damn but it's hard. ~D

Course, I always played Poland in Medieval. Guess I'm just a sucker for punishment.

To get the Spanish mercs, you need to take Spanish provinces (and have a family member or two snapping them up.) I get lots of them available when in Spain, and they make up the infantry wing supporting my cav into Gaul and Northern Italy (much like Hannibal in this latter regard.) Mercs are very regional in RTW. Keep an eye on Palma, you get good Balearic Slingers there. You know that you have to pull a family member out of the city each turn to check for mercs? You won't see any in the city (or I don't know how to see them, LOL.)

You really need to do the port and trade related upgrades to get money. Higher level port = more trade routs for that port. Also, make sure to arrange trade agreements with anyone you can. Send a few diplomats off on long journeys and stop any strange faction you can find. Playing on very hard, it is tough to get any allies, and this really hurts the economy. Fortunately, the AI doesn't blockade ports regularly (it could be a whole lot worse for Carthage.)

The AI will usually snap up any mercs when it invades, so when you see something coming, buy the mercs before the AI does. It is very disappointing to realize you waited one turn to long, and those nice mercs you were going to buy are now in the AI attack force. This can easily rob you of 2 or 3 units, while increasing the AI force by the same amount. A delta of 4 to 6 units is a nasty handicap... (Also, you can "retrain" the mercs with upgrades before battle this way, VERY handy.)

~D How did you do, i mean i had to abandon corduba and caralis just to be able to hold off the romans at lilybaeum!!! :charge:

And then i slowly build up my income and attacked numidia. But man i got wooped in the first couple of turns.

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Originally Posted by LittleRaven

*chuckle* See, I'm having a blast playing Carthage for that very reason. Damn but it's hard. ~D

Course, I always played Poland in Medieval. Guess I'm just a sucker for punishment.

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Switzerland was tough...NO money, no ports, just those awesome SAP's. It was winnable though if you could get some revenue going through war.

You should try the Spanish in RTW. I've been playing them on very hard. No money, no ability to train units of any worth early on, and the Julii and Gauls always attack me en masse at the same point. Maybe the third time will be the charm.

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Originally Posted by Red Harvest

Switzerland was tough...NO money, no ports, just those awesome SAP's. It was winnable though if you could get some revenue going through war.

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Whoa. I believe it would have been. For some reason, I never got into the all factions mod I found for Medieval. I think it was because things never quite displayed right in the opening menu. I'm sure once you were past that everything was normal, but I could never do that. That's why I'm very grateful that Rome seems more forgiving on that point. Every faction has a intro movie, (even if a lot of them are the same) and thanks to our hard working modders, everyone has a faction leader and I'm sure everyone will have a description soon. I'm excited!

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You should try the Spanish in RTW. I've been playing them on very hard. No money, no ability to train units of any worth early on, and the Julii and Gauls always attack me en masse at the same point. Maybe the third time will be the charm.

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Eh....I already have. I was http://forums.civfanatics.com/images...s/spanking.gif. Ouch.

Carthage is a huge step up from those guys. Man.

And you're right about naval warfare. If a patch ever teaches the AI how to use its ships effectively....Carthage will be a dead faction walking. ~:eek:

you shouldnt have to claim a provence to recruit merc's from there , thats just lame. So at any point can Carthage recruit Gaul's?

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Originally Posted by Inuyasha12

~D How did you do, i mean i had to abandon corduba and caralis just to be able to hold off the romans at lilybaeum!!! :charge:

And then i slowly build up my income and attacked numidia. But man i got wooped in the first couple of turns.

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I didn't wait for Rome to come to me...I took them out of Messana in Sicily as soon as I could. I looked at the map and concluded that both the Romans and Greeks would attack and that I couldn't beat them both from a single province. I concluded that I couldn't afford to lose Sicily, therefore I went on the offensive first. Lilybaeum was never threatened. I think I had an elephant unit and took Messana on the same turn as my invasion. Then I retrained, and defended. The Greeks attacked soon, but hoplites are no match for cav if you handle them correctly. I took Syracuse as soon as I could, then paid the Greeks a few denarii in exchange for a ceasefire.

I built up Cordoba and held on. Bought some mercs when I needed them, built cav, then crushed the Spanish, then Gauls. Spain is poor, so they are easy to beat, but Gaul has loads of men. I dealt with Numidia in between. I actually took Tingi as an assault from Cordoba before the Gauls attacked, but that was a strategic mistake, because I nearly lost Cordoba with my General on the wrong side of Gibraltar.

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Originally Posted by jbluvchild

you shouldnt have to claim a provence to recruit merc's from there , thats just lame. So at any point can Carthage recruit Gaul's?

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I don't think you have to take the provinces, you just need to have a family member wandering around to hire the Mercs. Of course, whoever does own the province probably will take offense to a foreign army wandering around. ~:)

But it's fairly easy for Carthage to recruit Gauls...you start with a family member in Corduba. Mercenary gauls aren't that far away. That said, getting those Mercs to Sicily or Carthage won't be that easy...

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Originally Posted by jbluvchild

you shouldnt have to claim a provence to recruit merc's from there , thats just lame. So at any point can Carthage recruit Gaul's?

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No, you don't have to claim it! But you must have a family member there to recruit from it. That is why the AI can buy up "your" mercs when it enters a region you own. Historically, Carthage had a presence in Spain. The mercs seem to be spread over regions, rather than just a single territory (that is a plus.) I often see the exact same unit in three provinces. If I buy it in one, it disappears from others that turn.

Now that I've entered Gaul proper, I've seen some of their mercs. I've bought some of their light cav. Since I'm marching toward Julii's Rome across the Alps, and can't train any decent infantry in the newer territories, and trying to deny units to my enemies, I'm buying a lot of mercs to fill out my infantry.

Remember, your "Iberian Infantry" are really supposed to be low level Spanish swordsmen. Carthage didn't have much of its own manpower so these are trainable mercs in effect. They are really weak though... Hannibal used a lot of them, but he seems to have counted on them yielding ground in the center vs. legions. So he put his African phalangites on the sides of the center, and used his cav to attack the side and rear. He used the same basic principle for both Trebbia and Cannae. At Trebbia, the Iberians and Gauls in the center buckled and half of the Roman army escaped through this hole. Those mercs were most of the Carthaginian losses, only a few phalangites were lost.

I agree the AI never seems to do well with carthage but it's a fun faction to play with. on veryhard/medium (i hate the fact that the computer gets valour bonuses i can't see and adjust for on harder difficulties) i played as carthage and controlled the entire italian pennisula by 245 bc. Attacking rome early is not a bad idea in this game, playing as carthage i knew they'd never leave me alone so i went on the early offensive took control of sicily, abandoned spain and then slowly picked the roman factions off one by one. . Italy basically became my breadbasket i'd extermanited all the populations of the cities and i was raking in the dosh. After that taking over the rest of the world was pretty simple.

I'm playing Carthage now. I have to agree that they're one of the tougher factions to play. One of their biggest problems is that their infantry cannot go toe-to-toe with the Roman Hastati troops, which means you have to rely upon cavalry, elephants and better tactics to beat their armies.

Conquering Sicily is *crucial* to surviving as Carthage, IMO. Preferrably, the Scipii and Greek cities will fight each other and one will capture the other's city (most likely the Scipii, due to their superior production). While they're doing that, you can build up forces to take first Syracuse, then Messana. Until you're ready to go on the offensive, station an army in ambush mode next to your city so that any attack that comes your way will have maximum chance of losing. With Sicily under your control, and five ports going between Carthage and Sicily, your money problems should be resolved.

One big asset is that the two North African cities grow like weeds, meaning that even on Huge unit sizes, you don't have to worry about population growth problems, and can reach the highest tech levels fairly quickly.

Another note: Don't take on the Numidians if you can avoid it. Carthage and Thapsus are very compact and easy to defend, the Numidian cities are very spread out. Going after the Numidian cities will spread you out, give you huge coastlines to defend against amphibious assault, and will siphon resources away from conquering Sicily and then the Italian penninsula itself. The two non-Carthage cities on Sicily are much more valuable than the north African Numidian cities for a war against Italy.

Right now I've got all of Sicily, and am building up a military infrastructure to invade Italy itself. Meanwhile, I've been focusing on a navy, so that I can take the straights between Sicily and the boot of Italy by force. Once that happens, I should have the ground troop production capability to wage war on the Italian penninsula.

Also, I've finally got my Spanish production (at Corduba) to the point where I'm beginning offensives against the Spanish. This is merely a side-show, however, because by the time any Carthaginian-Spanish armies get to Rome, the Roman factions will be very strong, unless I've already trashed their production bases in an offensive early on.

I'm hoping that the Julii and Brutii will focus on the Greeks and Gaulish and not realize the mortal danger they're in until I've captured half the penninsula.

It seems obvious that Carthage is set up to be fairly easy for the Scipii to conquer. I don't know how historical that is, but the Scipii have to be able to take down Carthage in order to be competitive vs the other two Roman factions. Carthage did fall historically, and what is now Tunisia became the "breadbasket" of the Roman Empire. But it's fun to try to reverse history :)

Oh Carthage, well you can make a hell of alot of money when you get going with your trade but its important that you try to take sicily and not lose it, whats annoying is whats been said that the AI is doing so poorly with Carthage.

Strategy for Carthage.

Points to Note:

- Your Infantry sucks
- Your Elephants rock
- Your Cavalry will win you all battles

First: Take Messana on turn one. Simply destroy the Scipii immediately.
Turn 2: Take Syracuse and fortify Sicily.

All Roman Forces will drop ashore near MESSANA. Some Greek ones might hit later in the south.

-> immediately build basic Temples and then build STABLES, mere Round Shield Cavalry will do initially!

-> Fortify Caralis, send over Reinforcements from Carthage.

Hire some Mercs in Spain.

The initial turns are the toughest.

As soon as you killed off the early and nasty Roman Assaults by all three Factions, you will have battle-hardened Cavalry en masse on Sicily.

You should focus on taking Spain and after that, you have lots of ports, build Biremes and Triremes and begin to fight the Romans. Use huge stacks, single ships are not effective.

Later on, besiege with Large Shield and Round Shield Cav the Barbarian Gauls.

They are easy prey, weak morale and as the SPEAR BONI obviously do not work, things like that will happen if they sally out:

http://www.longasc.de/Stuff/RTW0017.jpg


Marsilia's troops sallied out and got hammered from three directions, turn back, repeat with the next wave that sallies out... ~:eek:

Carthage mit be a bit hard early on, I had only problems on HARD/HARD to withstand the Roman Onslaught early on.

Now the Scipii are severely weakened, the Julii attacked Caralis and lost their leader, as did the Scipii in Sicily. The Brutii are the only major Roman force left, and I am invading Italy from the North and South right now, but slowly, I need to reinforce my cities along the coast against Gaulish Attacks.

Building some ports will net you money without end, Carthage is a sea trade power, and my fleet slowly but steadily gains superiority, only the Brutii and a large Scipii fleet remain a problem.

The Sacred Band Infantry is not worthwhile - your Power is based on Elephants and Cavalry, most of my Infantry are Mercenary troops.

Once you have survived the early attacks, Carthage starts to prosper and its units will ensure you incredible victories against Barbarians and you will be able to wreck Roman Armies, too.

See, I just can't bring myself to field all-cav armies and the like. I know that in the current build of Rome, they're the most effective. But I still can't do it. It's just so....wrong...for Carthage...

So I build lots and lots and LOTS of Iberian Infantry. At least they're cheap! ~:)

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Originally Posted by LittleRaven

See, I just can't bring myself to field all-cav armies and the like. I know that in the current build of Rome, they're the most effective. But I still can't do it. It's just so....wrong...for Carthage...

So I build lots and lots and LOTS of Iberian Infantry. At least they're cheap! ~:)

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Hannibal used cav heavy armies--although not to the extent the game encourages. (I agree that it is discouraging that basic infantry tactics don't work very well in RTW.) He eventually taught a point to the Romans about the need to have sufficient cavalry. Scipio eventually enlisted the Numidians to solve the Roman cavalry crisis and create one for Hannibal--who had been using the same Numidians for a very important part of his cavalry.

I modded in gaul swordsmen and scutari ito Carthage and I am going to make alot more types of mercs available in the carthage area. I will also give them a bigger navy and give them a larger starting money.

Carth H/H Long

Finished a Carth N/N Short campaign.

Sicily - Put Faction leader in your town as he seemed to die on turn 2 if he was in the field. I bought the Hoplite Merc and added it to the Lilybeamum garrison. Scipii attacked the Greeks every time and took Syracruse. Leave defending force, move most of army to Carthage. Put your spy in Massena.

Carthage - build a ship and get ready to send your army to Sardina as the Julii will keep attacking you there until they take it.

Sardina - build walls. get ready for Julii invasion.

Spain - buy merc infantry (ones with Pila) and build stables for cav. Defend for now as the Spanish and Gauls are going to attack.

Put your worst family member and two milita on a boat. Sail to Balaeric Isles. Pick up garrison, leave militia, buy all slinger units, go to Spain or Sardina - where you percieve the biggest threat. (Note, your generic slingers are NOT worth it. When you can afford to do so, station a family member here and keep buying Balearic Slingers when they are offered.) Balaeric slingers have better stats, 50% longer range, and come with 2 experience compared to normal Carth slingers.

If you get a chance (I did not realize this until later), send a small force to take Crete from the rebels. Just buy some mercs (archers, Rodesian slingers) before taking the town. Crete archers are some of the best and only way (open to other ideas here) to get Archers as Carth.

After you beat up the Julii on Sardina (they will be back), take most of your force (elephant is you salvation unit), return to Sicily (stop off at carthage to get retrained with your new blacksmith). The force on Sardina will see small forces of Julii and needs to big enough to destroy them as soon as they land.

Once on Sicily, pick up most the Lily garrison (which might be under siege at this point), take Massena (where you spy is, 48% to open gates, check each turn you have it under siege, you will find it open at least once, then attack). Take Syracruse last. Spy first followed by siege. Once you get Sicily secured, only token forces of Scipii drop off at Messena. Keep one fair army there, most the other non-militia units back to Carthage.

Numedia should be bothering you now. Also, the Spanish and Gauls. I loaded up one elephant and some long shield cav with a family member to Spain to start the conquest there (pit stop at the Balearic Isles for more slingers). My main army I sent into Numedia to take them out of the game. Also, by now, I had lost Sardinia to a combined Scipii/Julii assualt on the town. The Julii never bothered me again once they had Sardinia.

Overall, lots of fun to play, a real challenge. I never seem to have enough cash. Protect your elephants, put one in each army. When they go in, have a cav on their heels. I notice elephants dont kill much before the enemy breaks morale. They are super effective in shattering formations for your follow up cav to decimate. That, plus the Morale hit the elephants cause, crushes the best of troops. Not much difference for the cost between the cheap elephants and their two upgraded cousins. I have only lost one elephant (not unit, just one beast) in my campaign which is 2/3s over.

Watch your Balaeric slingers closely. I have mentioned on other threads their arc of fire is very low and friendly fire is a big problem with them. Micro Manage is key with them. They ARE worth the hassle. Especially when taking towns. The AI likes to stand in the square. Slingers like to shoot them till they are all dead.

Carthage is my favorite faction. Lots of challenge.

Can you change there damn faction crest too , its a horse under a plam tree. Red and White