Ptolemaioi armies

[Poppis]

I was browsing through the bibliography thread when I noticed that Edwyn R. Bevans book House of Ptolemy could be read online. I'm halfway through it and I already feel an urge to start a campaign with them.

The only faction I've played in EB is Romani and I truly enjoyed using historically accurate armies with them, so what I was wondering is what would a historically accurate Ptolemaioi army look like in EB?

Also any general hints&tips about the faction are welcome.

[Dubius Cato]

Please give the link dude. I had to spend 3 minutes to search for it!

For example here:
http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/.../Preface*.html

[Dutchhoplite]

If you're reading Bevan you should be giving us tips and hints :)

About the Ptolemaic armies: the Ptolomaic army fighting Antiochos III will be completely different than the one fighting Ceasar :)

You guessed it: unfortunately "the Ptolomaic army" does not exist ;)

How historical will your campaign be and how will you use certain historical facts??

For instance: Their armies did not have many "Egyptian" in the army until the Raphia campaign of 217 BC. Before Raphia the army specifically kept native Egyptians out of the army to keep them unarmed and avoid rebellions. After Raphia the kingdom was rocked by native revolts.

*Makes note to restart Ptolomaic campaign*

[Poppis]

Ah, somehow I knew it wasn't going to be as easy as with Rome.

My campaigns are not in any way historical, I don't use Force Diplomacy. I just liked using historical armies in my previous campaign.

About natives not used before Raphia, the book actually questions this by saying that Diodorus mentioned the Ptolemaic army at the battle of Gaza(312 BC) to have included "a large body of Egyptians, some employed in the transport service, and others armed and serviceable for fighting". Of course the book was published in 1927, so I have no idea whether this has later been proven incorrect.

Anyway, if we assume they didn't use them, would the hellenic units alone be enough to defend against the Seleukeia in the beginning of the campaign?

[Ludens]

IIRC the Ptolemeans only started to use Egyptian pike-units at Raphia. They probably would have used them as psiloi and in the other Machimoi units before that.

At the start of the game, the Ptolemean field army would have resembled the Macedonian army, but for its garrisons it would have to rely on natives or regionals like Karians and Jewish spearmen. As time passed on, more and more natives would make their way into the field armies. AFAIK the Ptolemeans did use thureophoroi/thorakitai, but not to such an extent as the Seleucids.

Incidentally, the greater influx of natives into the field armies was not inevitable: if the Ptolemeans had succeeded in taking over the Seleucid military colonies, they could have used these to keep their field armies pure.

[Dutchhoplite]

Hmmm, Bevan gives a lot of options so you can go either way :)

Bezalel Bar-Kochva writes in his book on the Maccabean Revolt that the Ptolemaic rulers accepted native Egyptians in their armies, first as lights (from Diodorus??) and later as phalangites (from Polybius??).

[Poppis]

Yea, I was thinking about using natives as garrison-only at the start of the game and then gradually incorporating them into the field armies. The hellenic native spearmen seem like a nice cheap garrison unit.

But since my experience with EB is limited to two Romani campaigns(both ending in an unrecoverable(spelling?) CTD), I don't know much about the Asia Minor/Middle East area. So if I go for Hellenic units only, will I be able to compete with Seleukia? Do I lack any important unit types, like assault infantry or decent cavalry?