What to do with the Epeirotes?

[Novellus]

Here's where the important decision is. If you really want to destroy Epieros, go ahead and take Serdike and Taras. However, I will warn you that Taras might be a poor decision. The reason why is that Taras has a wonderful barracks, but it can't be used by the Makedonian faction, just Koinon Hellenon and Epeiros. That is why as Koinon Hellenon, it is advisable to take Taras after the Romani conquer it so that they can train powerful units immediately after occupation. You as the Makedonians however, will have a terrible time should the Romans attack (which they probably will). It would take years for your MICs to be built to a substantial level in order for retraining to occur, and the onslaught of Pedites Extraordinarii, Triarii, and Hastati may overwhelm your initial forces.

However, if you have a capable phalanx-based army and you use your heavy cavalry in coordination with hammer-and-anvil tactics, you should be able to counter the Romans if for a year or two if you have enough soldiers to hold them off. The AI is terrible with dealing with phalanxes, and even Epeirote cavalry can destroy the Roman bodyguard cavalry. So it is easy to charge them from behind to route the Romans (I'm used to playing on VH/VH).

If I wanted to truly cripple the Epeirotes, I would take Serdike instead and work on rebuilding your homeland and preparing to assault Rome. The Romans will become a powerful adversary soon, and they are a mess to deal with should you decide to fight them. There is a good chance the Romans will lay siege to Taras anyway and conquer the Epeirotes there for you. So if I were you, I would simply take out the Epeirotes in Serdike and wait for the computer to do the rest.

The choice is yours. Hail Strategos!

[team_kramnik]

WHen in doubt, just recruit them into macedons military.

[Maion Maroneios]

What exactly have you done? Added the Chaones and Koinon Phalangitai renamed as Thessalian Phalangites? I suppose you had to remove some units to do that, correct?

Maion

[team_kramnik]

Yes, an irish infantry had to go for the Chaonions and I replaced the Celtic mini-elephants with the epeirote and koinon medium phalanx. Also made the mercenary phalanx retrainable as a permanent foreign legion. So when the woodshields become available I'll have the lewy phalanx for garrison duty and 7 professional phalanxes for the royal army. I just hate fielding the same unit twice even in phalanx heavy armies.

Anyone know ancient greek? I named my new medium phalanxes:
Thessalikon Pezhetairoi and Molosson Pezhetairoi
Does that make any sense?

On-Topic:
I gave a few bonuses to the romans so they throw Epeiros much faster out of italy then I could throw them out of greece. So in my last Macedonia game they ended up in central Europe blocking the roman advance together with the cool mini-kingdoms EB added there with the last patches. Rome ended up first taking Corsica, Sardinia and Sicily then conquering Gaul and parts of Iberia before breaking through to central Europe. So if you want to restrict Rome to western Europe this would be an option.

[Maion Maroneios]

Yes, an irish infantry had to go for the Chaonions and I replaced the Celtic mini-elephants with the epeirote and koinon medium phalanx. Also made the mercenary phalanx retrainable as a permanent foreign legion. So when the woodshields become available I'll have the lewy phalanx for garrison duty and 7 professional phalanxes for the royal army. I just hate fielding the same unit twice even in phalanx heavy armies.

I see, pretty interesting. I believe you deserve a balloon for this:

Anyone know ancient greek? I named my new medium phalanxes:
Thessalikon Pezhetairoi and Molosson Pezhetairoi
Does that make any sense?

Actually, the term "Pezhetairoi" in Makedonia was strictly reserved to Makedonian citizens. This means that you should forget the 'Pezhetairoi' part and go for something like this:
Phalangitai Thessalikoi - Thessalian Medium Phalanx
Phalangitai Molossoi / Phalangitai Molossoi Epilektoi - Molossian Medium Phalanx / Picked Molossian Phalanx or Molossian Elite Phalanx

Hope this helped.

Maion

[team_kramnik]

Great thanks, but I'm sorry I might have to change ancient greek as I don't have a soundfile for
"Phalangitai Thessalikoi".
Wiki gives regions of upper macedonia as units of Philip II phalanx: Orestis-Lyncestis, Elimaea and Tymphaea. That would be an alternative but then I'm lacking the needed skins. Well an ox for Thessaly isn't perfect either.
I'll just see the use of Pezhetairoi as an attempt by the Macedonian king to show Northern Greece is becoming a unified nation. Also whereever large forces of professional phalangites would be recruited that would probably have required some social chances with the resulting class identifying with the Pezhetairoi of Macedonia.

Quess I'll go with:

Phalangitai Deuteroi: Lewy Phalanx found everywhere in the homeland regions.

Pezhetairoi Makedonikoi: Phalanx unit mostly recruited from the traditional areas in upper Makedonia. Or what's left of them.

Pezhetairoi Agrianikoi: Phalanx unit based on Paeonians imigrating to Macedon during the Galatian invasion. Again according to Wiki bull is one of the few surviving paeonian words. So I quess it's a better fit then Thessaly. And the Koinon Phalangitai is the best looking phalanx of the game.

Pezhetairoi Molossoi: Phalanx unit founded by the Epeirote King and taken over by the Makedonian King.

Misthophoroi Phalangitai: Freelancers or soldiers from states with cash problems having entered longterm contracts with the King of Macedon.

Hysteroi Pezhetairoi: Veteran Phalanx based on Pezhetairoi Agrianikoi

Chaeonion Agema: Veteran Phalanx based on Pezhetairoi Molossoi

Argyraspides: Veteran Phalanx based on Pezhetairoi Makedonikoi

anyway I can't claim to do very realistic modding:

[teh1337tim]

omfg more cities O.o...
howd you do that?>>.<< ah well...
lemme guess, you took a provice out from somewhere in the baltics OR somewhere in the far east huh..