"M_e_roe", actually - but maybe they had pretty blondes with long legs there...
BTW, that's the Ethiopian settlement I mentioned earlier IIRC.
Yes, elephants and, at this stage more importantly (you won't be able to afford elephants if you conquer it early, which you nevertheless should do to have a well established military infrastructure by the time the Ptolemaioi recognize you as a serious threat, ally with AS and throw everything they have at you) it also has Ethiopians. Swordsmen to get behind phalangites or even stand up to them from the front for a short time while your archers and slingers do the killing from the other side, spearmen to counter cavalry and form a defensive line on the field, and archers; look at their stats in-game and compare them to the native Sabaean archers, maybe test them in a custom battle, then decide which suit your purposes best. I think it mainly depends on where you want to use them (can't retrain them in many settlements, outside of =>Ethiopia<=, for instance).
Oh I almost forgot - lvl1 MINES are your ABSOLUTE top priority. Without them, you will not be able to build infrastructure and support an army at the same time. Keep your settlements building money-generating and public order buildings all the time; build caravan scouts when it is clear that you will be short on cash for a while (cost below 1000 minai IIRC but they take long to build; that way you don't have to spend those turns waiting when you have enough money to start a new building every round).
You should use your starting army to rush the neighbouring Eleutheroi; you can take the north-western one in round one by using your spy to open the gates. That way you don't have to disband your army to avoid running into debt.
Use slingers as garrisons - they have the lowest upkeep per soldier.
The starting battles are a bit tricky - use two of your generals as "tanks" - but careful, they can't take as much punishment as other infantry generals; however they automatically retrain with no cost and they do better in melee than any of your other starting troops.
Keep a careful eye on their stamina - when they reach the second stage of exhaustion (don't know if it was "winded" or "out of breath" or something else because my Vanilla RTW is the German version and there it says "außer Atem") they incur serious damage-penalties and become very vulnerable.
Use "no battle time limit" setting and just park them on "defend" setting in a sheltered position after the first time you rout the first wave of defenders inside the city.
The defenders will come again, charge your generals, lose a few men - and rout again, and again, and again. This will make them very exhausted while your generals rest between engagements.
If you use the battering ram(s) on two wall sections you can choose where to enter; do this so that your generals face the passage to the town square but are "behind the corner" with no enemies behind them; practically creating a killing zone for your archers right next to the gate area when the defenders attack the generals.
Right-hand side of the passage is better than left because enemies in melee with your generals will be presenting their shield-less right to your archers outside the walls. Keep some distance from the walls with those archers so they may fire at the area right behind the wall. This only works with level 1 wood walls, but it saves you a LOT of casualties, enabling you to take the other settlement to the east without retraining (which you will not be able to do because of money issues).
Beware of Eleutheroi armies roaming both of these provinces - the western one will attack the conquered settlement sooner rather than later, so having a task-force ready in your core territory to quickly respond during the first two years is a good idea - or just have spies watching their every move to know ahead of time when they come for you. The eastern army did nothing but mope around in my campaign; I think it is safe to move past this one to conquer the next settlement - although both create unrest by devastating land tiles, something you can ill afford because you need high taxes with low garrisons to get the money for the mines.
After this, you just keep moving and conquering Arabia until you reach the cape on the north-east. Do not conquer beyond it because otherwise you will be awarded a mutual border with the Arche Seleukeia to provide for an instant, catastrophic, epic campaign FAIL.
Keep an eye on the Seleukid border area with a spy at all times. They usually park a half stack there which will do nothing for a looong time. As soon as they set siege to the Eleutheroi settlement on the northern coast of Arabia, prepare to attack THEM before they attack you, they will not take more than two attempts at conquering this settlement because their phalangites are like a NUKE on autocalc. When this happens (here's the part I didn't get to try due to the CTD), I advise rushing for Seleukeia and Babylon; no matter whether you can hold them or not - just raid them, destroy the MICs there. It is the AS main recruitment center beside Antiocheia. It is where their armored phalangites come from - the killer weapon against Saba.
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