best barbarian faction?

is it just me or are the barbarian factions a bit... unbalanced? the gauls, basically, suck. they have forester warbands and thats it apart from the generic barb units. the britons have chariots, but no archers (except the chariots- so many things wrong here in a historical sense, it boggles the mind) and not very effective cavalry. they also have no skirmishers which is a real pain in the ass early on. head hurlers are VERY effective, but are so damn fiddly to use.

compare this to the germans. the spear warband is a godsend and is so much better than the basic warbands of the other barbs. they have one of the best archer units in the game with chosen archers, a good range of cav with gothic/light/noble. screeching women are fantastic early game units against other barb nations low morale warbands. axemen and chosen axemen are both solid troops, and then you get naked fanatics, night raiders, and berserkers as well. it seems to me that they dont have any weaknesses. an army of gothic cav, spearmen, chosen archers, night raiders and chosen axemen- with a couple of berserkers for good measure- can destroy any other barb army. And with the same army I can decimate the romans without even trying (this is on v. hard/v.hard)

on a slightly related note, is there a way to add onagers to barbarian factions? I can add them but I cant change the building required to make them, which the barbs cant get....

Certainly no other barbarian faction has been able to stand up to my wall of Germanian spearman with the back up of a couple of units of Screaming Women... ~;)

Add to that the cavalry made up of all my generals (none of this governing for them, they enjoy the fighting and each others company too much, not to mention the Screaming Women...~D )...

Even the Julii have been sent packing by this lot....

Must say that none of the others had a chance when I played the Scythians...

However amongst the western barbarians the germans seem the most powerful...however the gauls has vastly better starting territory and the brittons one of the best starting positions in the game...

They all have cons and pros...

Certainly the Brits and Germans are the best. The Gauls are weak and only have the forester warbands to give them an edge.

If the gauls survive long enough to get forester warbands they seem to have an edge. Those dudes have awesome stats.

The Gauls and Britons have chosen swordsmen, these are much better then chosen axemen for instance.These units are not available in the early stages and thats why its very hard in the beginning for the Gauls especially.
The Germanic provinces slowly populate to higher levels wich is there major disadvantage, at least thats what i am experiencing.U also need to build everything up from scratch but u have the advantage to be the only barbarian faction that fields phalanx spearmen and various other unique troop types.

I tried the Thracians(a bit a barbarian faction), they have some good units: pikemen, falxmen. But its really difficult to defend agains macadonian invasions, well nearly imposible as I am experiencing right now. And its even on medium/medium

CS are not "much better" than CA. Head to head CA win handily.

Even after taking a pilum volley, CA rip through praetorian cohort and can beat urban cohort. CS will lose to praetorain badly and are even with vanilla legionary (which are no match for CA).

CA are vulnerable to missile fire. But given that Germans have a 170 range archer with good atk/def that requires 1 turn of production, CA should not be shot at too often.

Germans are definitely stronger than Gauls. Throw in all their -morale units, and they might have the strongest unit mix in the game. (does anyone know if all the -morale frighten effects stack?)

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Originally Posted by Jeanne d'arc

The Gauls and Britons have chosen swordsmen, these are much better then chosen axemen for instance.These units are not available in the early stages and thats why its very hard in the beginning for the Gauls especially.
The Germanic provinces slowly populate to higher levels wich is there major disadvantage, at least thats what i am experiencing.U also need to build everything up from scratch but u have the advantage to be the only barbarian faction that fields phalanx spearmen and various other unique troop types.

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i like the dacians, they always seem to do ok when i'm playing in that region so i thought i'd chek them out.
They've got the usual barbarian troops warband, archer warband, chosen archers chosen swordsmen etc. which is all good. They also get falxmen, barbarian noble cav and seige engines. Pretty good mix and not the worst starting position (ok it probably is one of the worst but at least it's a challenge).

germanics all the way, especially with temples to Woad...unstopable.

Scythians

Unitwise Scythians or Germans, depends how you like to play. Sure is that the infantry lineup of the Germans is one of the best in RTW. Very costeffectiv Phalanx, Great Skirmishers, incredible good shocktroops, great archer, unique support troop with the Woman....

Nice indeed...

OA

Your forgetting Gauls get Noble Cavalry which is one of the best barbarian cavs in the game. But Barbarians suck either way. They did in real life they do in the game. Hence being conquered for 600 years by the more civilized nations. Perhaps when the expansion "Fall of rome" (my best guess as to the expansion pack) comes we will see more powerful barbarian units.

germans get noble cav AND gothic cav.

and they suck? how so? I am currently wiping the floor with the romans. the barbarians are not weak, but like someone else said they are the zerg of total war. they rely on a horde (which is pretty historically accurate) to win. except the germans who have awesome troops anyway :D

germans are probably the strongest faction in the campaign. they get the best cav (gothics out of the gate wipe the floor with praetorian cav; ridiculous that they come with the exp temple), best inf (chosen axemen > uc given that they cost so much less AND take only 1 turn), and best archers (chosen arch > forester and ph.arch since they take only 1 turn to produce)

Throw in a really nice supporting unit (screeching women), and warhounds, and you have a really impressive array of forces.

All this, and at minor city size.

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Originally Posted by King Azzole

Your forgetting Gauls get Noble Cavalry which is one of the best barbarian cavs in the game. But Barbarians suck either way. They did in real life they do in the game. Hence being conquered for 600 years by the more civilized nations. Perhaps when the expansion "Fall of rome" (my best guess as to the expansion pack) comes we will see more powerful barbarian units.

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I like the spanish, yeah yeah they suck and bull, but the scutarii is a hastatii minus 10 dinarii, and have a warcry ability, they also can beat hastatus 1 on 1 in some cases (when warcry is in effect).

Bull Warriors are upgraded scutarii, they are pretty good too...

I really like the spanish, but they don't get alot of unique units sadly enough... ~;p

From what I've seen so far (Gauls, Britons and Germans), I'd have to say that the Germans are the winners. The Gallic swordsmen seem to collapse after a well-placed cavalry charge, and the Britons' chariots, while strong, will fall after a while. However, I'm loath to charge anything from any direction at German spearbands, I curse furiously when the screeching women turn the tide of the battle to their side, and I always have to keep an eye out for German axes getting ready to pounce and turn my cavalry into bite sized pieces. (Though I imagine the Scythians are sweet, what with their horses and all.)