Satres, the nigh-invincible general?

[TheGlobalizer]

Interesting thing happened in the past 40 or so seasons of my Romani campaign -- in the area surrounding Iuvavoaeta, the Eleutheroi had a 10-star general named Satres walking around with a stack outside of the city.

No big deal, I thought. Yeah, the Eleutheroi are tough, but I should be able to take him down. Well, no. His unit is a group of "solduros" (sp?), a group of 62 infantry with something like a 24 attack and 37 defense. In his stack he also has a second group of solduros.

So, I throw some stacks at him.

First stack (hastati, triarii): Loss, escaped with my faction leader and little else. Killed about 400. Ouch.
Second stack (principes, triarii): Better prepared. Loss. Escaped with my faction leader and little else. Killed about 1000, leaving Satres lightly defended.
Third stack (principes, triarii): Loss. Satres appears to have reinforced somehow. However, just before my last troops rout, I kill Satres.

...or so I thought. Satres appears to respawn with ANOTHER FULL STACK.

Fourth stack (pedites extraordinarii, triarii): Loss. Dense forest battle, lose track of my army, get surrounded. Killed about 300.
Fifth stack (pedites extraordinarii, polybian triarii, equites romani): Loss. Smashed up a good portion of Satres' stack.
Sixth stack (pedites extraordinarii, polybian triarii, equites extraordinarii): Laid siege to Iuvavoaeta directly (skip the issue?); Satres attacks me. I use 6 units (3 ped, 3 triarii) to hold off the city's defenses (mostly alpine phalanxes and celtic axemen); I use the other 10 infantry (5/5) to attack Satres' group, with the cavalry (3 eq-ex + 1 general) hitting and running in alternation. I win, with about 60 soldiers (of 1200) remaining.

Sheesh. It took me all weekend to kill that guy.

In the meantime, I chased Carthage out of Africa altogether, pushed deep into Gaul, and held off three full stacks of Epirotes in Segestica.

Anyone have a similarly annoying experience?

[Kepper]

I have found the true about Satres?

Is real name is the Beast, the Hell Ruler, Diablo.

[Che Roriniho]

Yeh, he's to stop Swezboz. When you defeat him, you'll find that he'll respawn he next turn - unless you took Iovovoaeta in the same turn.

Good luck.

[TheGlobalizer]

Yeh, he's to stop Swezboz. When you defeat him, you'll find that he'll respawn he next turn - unless you took Iovovoaeta in the same turn.

Good luck.

Aha. Well, that's a bit annoying. I tend to like to "clean up the countryside" before I take a city (and thereafter manage the unrest) -- hence the "beat my head against a wall" approach to Mr. Satres.

[bovi]

We tuned him to turn up a bit less frequently in 1.1. Whack him twice in a short period and he will take longer to reappear.

* Spawned defender armies regenerate somewhat slower when destroyed.

[Centurio Nixalsverdrus]

Satres is there to stop the Romans from unhistorically expanding quickly into the Alpine and East European area. Similar generals defend Lugouw and Mrogbronna. Get my Sweboz ass handed to me twice by the Lugoz, and my Karthadastim ass twice (but one useless victory though) by the Noricene, back in 1.0.

[TWFanatic]

I've conquered all of the Alpine territories as the Sweboz up to Roman Cisalpine Gaul and have yet to encounter this fellow.

[satalexton]

you must've done it real quick then, cuz i think he pops up after a certain time in the game...don't quote me on that though.. i ain sure really...

[TheGlobalizer]

Satres is there to stop the Romans from unhistorically expanding quickly into the Alpine and East European area. Similar generals defend Lugouw and Mrogbronna. Get my Sweboz ass handed to me twice by the Lugoz, and my Karthadastim ass twice (but one useless victory though) by the Noricene, back in 1.0.

Got it. It makes me think, however -- is some random superhero the reason the Romans didn't invade the Alpine, or was it something else? Could EB factor in other "disincentives" to make the Alpine difficult to retain or undesirable to take? (Though, for gameplay purposes, I rather prefer not having the cities rebel on a whim.)

Just curious. Apologies if this thought has been well-hashed-through before.

[satalexton]

*me imagines celtic superhero flying around the alps*

Now let's look for kryptonite =D

[Aemilius Paulus]

I skipped the towns of Veldideno, Iuvavoaeta, Eburonum and Carrodunum in my Romani campaigns after my spies discovered that each town is defended with a full-stack army in the town and one or two more full-stack armies adjacent to the town (Eburunum and Iuvavoaeta are defended by three stacks if I am not mistaken). Not only this, but the armies are made up of veteran units that usually have two silver chevrons, elite units such as solduros and 5-10 star generals. As the Romani I have conquered Ak-Ink, Vindobona and then bypassed Eburunum and Carrodunum to conquer Ascaucalis, from which I began my subjugation of the Baltic and Eastern Europe regions.

I have let the Sweboz bleed in their fights with these rebels. Once the Sweboz conquered all five of those towns, I declared war on them and caught them in their weakest moment. The Sweboz were incredibly strong in my Romani campaign with the most armies (lot more then Seleukids or Ptolemies, the two second-strongest factions) and second only behind the Seleukids in territories. I advise any other player to do the same. These territories economic value is very low, in my opinion. The only territories that would be worse then them are the provinces of modern-day Russia. I have conquered all of Gaul, Iberia, North Africa (almost done with Ptolies), Balkans, Asia Minor and of course, Italy before going for the lands of Germania and central Alpine provinces. They are simply not worth the incredibly bloody fight you are going to get. At any given moment, I have 8 full-stack armies, with reinforcement half-stack army marching behind them. I do all the building I can and have a 25-30k income per turn, even though all of my armies are made up of solely elite units (not counting the slingers, which are a must).

P.S. The best unit you could use as the Romani to conquer those five territories as well as the Sweboz are the Cordinau Orca with 17 attack (sword!, meaning that there is no penalty against other infantry) and 31 defence after upgrading with bronze weapons and one experience point from a type 4 government. You can get them in the province of Scorcouw (Balkans). They are my favorite unit that Romani can get; I have full stack armies consisting of just these guys.

[Intranetusa]

I was able to defeat the "uber rebels" north of Italy while keeping my losses to a minimum (I single I only lost a battle once, and lost probably less than 2000 troops (huge battle scale) after taking 4-5 of the super rebel cities)

I did this by using at least 2 full stacks on a single city to ensure I wipe them out in a single blow (so I didn't have to retreat, which would allow the rebels to regain their numbers).

I kept causalities to a minimum by expending all the ammo from my ranged units first - I kept my polybian hastati/principes near the walls and let them use up their pilums when the Ai was running around. Then I used my archers and uber levy slingers (ap) to take out perhaps 1/3 of their troops, before using my triari to engage in narrow street to street combat (triaris have an advantage in head on confrontations - especially with TW Fanatic's phalanx mod).

I think my camillian triaris were able to stand up to uber 2-hp naked gallic infantries in one on one head on confrontations. :D


*I trained a crap load of camillian hoplite triaris (2 full stacks of entirely camillian triari) in order to supplement my polybian-era troops

[d'Arthez]

Not correct from a roleplaying point of view, but sometimes it is best to siege the cities in winter, seeing that these generals are affected by movement penalties, and are often unable to come forward and aid in the city's defense. There are other exploits you can use (disabling unlimited men on the battle-field on lower end machines comes to mind).

This is to ensure that you only have to fight the elite stack once... You can roleplay it, as having taken the most important city, as a heroic last stand of the tribe in question, and being required to use the city conquering army only to wipe out the stack, without reinforcements / replacements.

[Olaf The Great]

They're also there to represent a "placeholder" for the Boii Kingdom.


Oh and if you're the Romani/Sweboz, make it easy and just auto_win, it's only there for the AI.

[QuintusSertorius]

Leave him alone. It's a useful buffer against the Sweboz monster.

[Senshi]

But, has the AI any chance at all to get Satres?

In my experience they prefer attacking roaming armies to laying siege so they get askicked every time as Satres respawns immediatly...they would have to arrive with MANY stacks to get this done...

I don't autocalc against these guys, honestly it keeps myself from running north too early as Romani and vice versa. So I first go for Africa, Lusitana or Gaul before I turn to Germania
It requires good income to maintain the multiple elite stacks it takes to kill those mountaineers in "honest battle" (not exploiting AI dumbage)

[bovi]

Satres. Does. Not. Respawn. Immediately. Twice.

[Senshi]

Well, "not immediatly" is relative ;)

Does it mean it takes 20 years, 2 years or whatever?
Just wanted to know if the AI eventually manages to get them killed at all (never experienced it before)

[AlexanderSextus]

in my romani game the sweboz took every boii province EXCEPT that one. they keep harrassing me and i keep whoopin they ass.

[Reno Melitensis]

As QuintusSertorius said, if you are playing as the Romani, the last provinces you have to conquer are the alpine ones. Let Satres guard your northern holdings against the sweboz, because if they invade you they will send stalk after stalk, qiute pathetic, so leave him alone, trust me.

Cheers.