Originally Posted by
Shadowwalker
As promised above, some comments about the performance of the various factions in my Qart'Hadasht campaign:
Romani
Took Felsina, Segesta and Patavium early on, didn't go for Taras though. Attacked Alalia then and blockaded virtually all my ports in the Thyrrenian Sea and my core cities (Kart Hadast, Atiqa, Adrumeto, Lepki). Very impressive as it was the first time I've seen efficient blockading done by an AI faction in both Rome and Medieval II. Attempting to secure a peace by paying tribute was rejected, so I started taking their provinces, even when they only held Patavium they rejected peace so I destroyed them.
Epeiros
Took Thermon and Rhegion early on, later Dalminion and Segestika, lost their possessions in Greece/Illyria to Makedonia then, snatched Arpi during my campaign against the Romani, have repelled a lot of Makedonian invasions of Arpi since then. Allies of me for 100+ turns.
Areuakoi
Took Arsé, Iltirta, Emporion, Iliberri and Tolosa within 140 turns, attacked me at Mastia, rejected every peace offer (even when it came with the offer to pay a tribute of 3000 mnai while they were holding only Tolosa and Iliberri anymore). Destroyed.
Lusotannan
The EB 2 Casse, so to speak, in many campaigns they just don't expand. It seems to be dependent on taking Tole or not. If the Areuakoi are taking that town, the Lusos are just sitting back and mourn their fate. 4 Stacks linger around Oxtraca. Only expanded after I gifted them Iliberri. Allies since ~turn 10.
Aruernoi
Took some provinces, as soon as they held Massalia they tried to conquer Alalia and Ebusus. Rejected every peace offer until I gifted them Lugdunon. Repelling Aedui attacks since then.
Aedui
Took a while to start off, have expanded nicely since then, at war with Aruernoi and Pritanoi, peace with Sweboz, lost Nemetokema (spelling?) to a surprise Pritanoi attack.
Pritanoi
The usual slow start, took a belgic province in the end, though, watched Sweboz take Dunopalator (that stack landed there about 10 years before it attacked the city, all the time a larger Pritanoi stack stood directly at the gates of the city, doing nothing).
Sweboz
The usual slow start, the usual attack at Lugiones and Boii after a while. Made Lugiones a horde. Peace with Sauromatae, allies to Qart'Hadasht. Struggling with the last Boii province.
Boii
Expanded a bit, very slow, though, lost their possessions to the Sweboz then. Nothing more to say.
Lugiones
Started nicely (among the first to expand), lost the war against Sweboz, as a horde they travelled all the way from Klepidava to Uiennos (!) to resettle there. Were destroyed after attacking Massalia (me).
Getai
Poor hill dwellers didn't manage to take Sarmiszegethusa or Histria early on (tried every other turn). Badly beaten by Makedonia, now defending their remaining possessions
Makedonia
Beast. First they took out KH in Greece, then simultanously attacked the greek isles, Kyrene, Illyria and Getia. After destroying KH and uniting Greece and Illyria they took the ptolemaic possessions in Mikra Asia and started invading Arpi - which is the first target they haven't kept (although they held the city for a few turns).
Koinon Hellenon
As usual in EB 2.x so far, the KH lost the battle for Greece, managed to take Krete and Halikarnassos though, was chased down by Makedonia and destroyed by them.
Bosporan Greeks
Nothing much to say. Held Olbia for some time, lost it to Getai, then Makedonia. Still hold Kotais. Constantly attacked by Sauromatae.
Sauromatae
The usual expansion, one notable exception though - they held Trapezous for 3 turns, then the city rebelled and AS said "thanks".
Hayasdan
Yet another lazy faction didn't move at all until very recently, have virtually no armies since they took Mazaka (which rebelled from AS).
Pergamon
Nothing at all. Not even an attempt to conquer another province. Had 4 stacks around Pergamon and peacefully waited for the AS to come and destroy them. Which the AS did eventually.
Pontos
Struggled heavily with Sinope and Ankyra, took them (and Nikaia) after a while, though, got repelled by the Ani-Kamah garrison over and over again, eventually destroyed by AS.
Ptolemaioi
Nothing worth to mention, they only took Axum, but lost Salamis early on, struggling to stay alive since then, invaded by Nabataea (which held Diospolis-Megale, Alexandreia and Memphis at some point).
Nabataea
No attempts to conquer Bostra or Tadmur. Took Dedan at least, at war with Saba for ages. Invaded Ptolemaioi lands eventually.
Sab'Yn
Slow expansion eastwards, several attempts to take Axum (which they finally conquered from Ptolemaioi then). Attacked Nabataeans (Diospolis-Megale was no naval invasion, they went by land to there). Peace with AS.
Arche Seleukeia
Monster. About 30+ fullstacks (garrison not taken into account!), wiped out several factions. Steadily expanding, now they start amassing troops at the Hellespont and at the eastern borders.
Baktria
War with Saka since turn one. Bitter fights for Chach and Oyrta. lost both (and Marakanda ) to rebellions which was used by the other factions to step in. Now partially regaining strength, but attacked by AS. I expect them to fall soon.
Taksashila
Lazy buggers.
Noone bothered them but they still haven't even taken all of India.
Pahlava
Took Antiocheia-Margiane and Syrinx quickly. Lost Syrinx to rebellion and then to AS, their armies stand no chance against smaller AS stacks so it is rather surprising they are still there.
Saka
Got halted by Baktria and Pahlava early on, now almost destroyed (Chach is sieged constantly).
Massylia
I was quick enough to take Kirtan before them, they snatched Tuat before me though, forcing me to quickly race for the remainder of the north african coast. They took their three desert provinces and then built up 5 full stacks which were sitting in the desert between Tuat and Garama.
Attacked me with a half stack at Kirtan in turn 201, got destroyed then since they rejected all peace offers (regardless how generous).
Feedback about the 3a Campaign AI and the campaign in general:
(1) AI is reliable if you have an alliance, but once you are at war with a faction you sinply cannot convince them to accept a ceasefire regardless how bad you beat them.
(2) It's odd that you can't establish good relations with any faction. Not sure if this is a Qart'Hadasht thing but the relations to the Sweboz, Epeiros, Ptolemaioi and Lusotannan always went down to "poor" or "very poor" over time, despite paying 1000 mnai/turn as tribute and having established trade routes with them. I was forced to spend large sums of money on them regularly (every 10-20 or so turns) to prevent the relations falling to such low levels.
(3) What's rather nice, though, is the fact that the allies of my enemies (for example Makedonia and Pergamon during the war with Rome) start to view you as a serious problem (relations: terrible) and that the enemies of your allies (Makedonia and AS as I'm allied with Ptolemaioi an Epeiros) have the same mindset. Nice touch!
(4) There are not many AI - AI alliances around, the vanilla M2TW "blobs" I haven't seen yet. Usually the AI factions pick a few alliances (Rome had Pergamon and Makedonia only, for example). There is a rather annoying pattern of most factions coming to offer alliances to the player faction, but only in a package with trade rights (which you can't give without possible trade routes). And they usually don't accept an alliance without trade rights, not even when you offer 20k or more money in addition.
(5) Many of the small factions still struggle to expand their "empires" while maintaining super-size armies due to the way the current money script works. I'm still trying to get a script working that replaces that flat "increase their kings purse to eventually astronomical values" by some faction-size-dependent money script but haven't made real success yet.
(6) I'll repeat myself: ships should perhaps be made a lot more expensive (recruitment cost, not necessarily upkeep) and less available (by decreasing the replenishment rates). At the moment the factions with even just a single port are building way too many ships.
(7) The corruption level (or better: the player economy in general) is quite challenging, but not impossible. I played campaigns as "poor" barbarian factions, too, and these are hard (Aruernoi is really hard!) but if you spend some thoughts on what to build and where, you will experience the benefits. I love that even my current Qart'Hadasht campaign doesn't allow me to just build fullstacks all over the place. I have 3 at the moment: one in northern Iberia, one in Italy and one in Africa, not even super-heavy ones, just the regionally available units and only one unit of elephants. Add in two fleets (1 Penteres, 2 Trieres each) and I'm down to about 12k per turn (which I need to build up a treasury for the gifts to the four allies and for the war times when the economy drops down seriously).