I bin defeated. Horribly. For the first time ever... And the AI made smart moves.

Something similar happened to me sieging the city just north of Arimium.

My forces were lead by a rookie general with little command, but consisted of huge amounts of troops (3 hastati, 3 principes, 4 triarii, three equites, my general, 3 ascenci, and three leves), fighting barbarians with a moderate amount of troops (2 Naked Fanatics, 2 swordsmen, some spearmen, and a heavy cavalry plus their general).

They rushed out of the gate, but only with one of the Swordsmen, whom my cavalry immediately slaughtered. They sent another one out, and agian my cavalry slaughtered them, but took a few casualties so I retreated.

Then they rushed all out with no strategy, at which point they met a huge hail of fire from all my units. They still charged on and eventuallly their battle line and mine of hastati and Principes merged. My cavalry charged theirs and killed off their heavy cavalry and was fighting their general, at which point they were reinforced with 2 units of Triarii. The other two went around the back and flanked the Gestarnae. Then I charged in the leves to support the rest of the battle line, and once their general was dead I sent the two Triarii who had dealt with him to destroy the Gestarnae.

To my great surprise their units did not run, and the Gestarnae actually killed off two units of Principes and four units of Triarii on their own. At this point most of my army routed and I had to give up the battle, though I fought to the last man.

My general later took a fully reinforced Legion of 6 Principes, 4 Triarii, 3 Ascenci, 3 Leves, and 3 Equites to take revenge on the city. They decided to simply surrender and offer the keys to the city to my general. For their submision I decided to merely enslave the populace, rather than Exterminate them as I wanted to.


btw, I don't know why you are complaining about Hastati. In my experience they are even more useful than Principes. I don't know why, but I find my Hastati rout less, after more time/losses, and handing out more losses to the enemy than my Principes do.

Its amazing what a handful of Nudists can do. In my campaign I'm going to have to eventually fight several untis of gold chevron Aedui Nudists which I'm not going to look forward to.

I had to deal with a couple of them in my Lusotannan campaign. Solution was to set my light and medium spearmen in a straight line with "Defend" on and hide slingers and missile troops in the nearby trees.

Of course, it makes it easier when you have 6 units of Balearic slingers, but only a few should do.

I had a bridge situation yesterday. Huge army on front, and a smaller (with 4 naked) on the rear. My 4 Principes defended the bridge (but none attacked. I think the AI waited for the reinforcements)
So 5 Hastati, 3 triarii, 4 slingers und a Elite Cavalry faught against 4 naked, 4 other spaer/swordsman und a 64 :sweatdrop: General Cavallery

The hastati formed a defensive line on a bit higher ground and the triarii were on stand-by
Because of the way the enemy reinforcements entered the battle, I couldn't bring the slingers in the back of the Gaesatea. I tried with the Cavalry. It worked more or less good, but I had to attack ~5 times to get even one unit down. On the left side of the line the "normal" units crushed into my hastati at one point. I marched one triarii there to hold the line.
Meanwhile the enemy general tried to attack my horses. I could retreat through the hastati-lines but losed a few horses to the now slim line of the naked.
Time had come for the triarii. They rushed in and tried to surround the enemy general. He escaped to the left flank that was already in bad condition. But the triarii following the general and the course of the battle changed. The first enemy unit on the left flank routed.
Then the general got more or less into the back of the 2 triarii that had chased him a while ago. I had hoped this and got my now nearly-regenerated horses into position and... :smash:
One minute later 30 enemy general cavalery had died and the general tried to flee. Unsuccessful.
The rest is standard: triarii und cavallery in the back, routing enemy. The right side broked, but the slingers were able to kill the last Gaesatea on their own because the naked werent able to run anymore.

The point is: 3 naked fanatics killed nearly 3 hastati while under constant rear-attack of a full elite cavallery and a small general! Only the speed of my slingers saved my defense line from an rear attack. :skull: If the big army on the other river-side had attacked I had lose the battle.

Although a defeat is not a good thing, I personally enjoy being defeated by AI army!.Don't know exactly why I like it,but a defeat gives a fresh breath to your campaign!That's why I play Pontus and almost always use General camera zoomed to the ground in my battles(recommended for defeats:)

The game that isn't challenging isn't really all that fun at all.

Granted, if I loose to an enemy too often, I usually burn a few of their cities to the ground.

I hate to say it, but the fact that you lose battles because of AI tactics is awesome. Usually, they just muscle through with numbers and bonuses, but not with actual strategy.

I lost a battle to the Arverni that I had been winning because they wedged their cav and charged my center. I lost half of my army, but was ecstatic, because it was a setback! Wow! Awesome! The AI actually outsmarted me for once.

It gets boring winning battles with massive casualties on the enemy side, and almost none on yours.