[Migrated Faction] The Kyrenaian League

[QuintusSertorius]

A provisional title, because I'm sure someone will have a better name for this little experiment in migration. In both my Pergamon and Massalia games, I've ended up taking Kyrene and holding the ring against both the Ptolemies and Karthadastim - and it's a lot of fun.

Now it is a harder starting position than even Massalia was in terms of recruitment; there's none of the top tier factional stuff to be had there. Even the mercenary pool isn't so great. But the distances involved means you don't have full stacks of elites headed your way every other turn, which means I may have some time to build up a base.

I'm thinking of the islands as targets - Krete, Kypros, Rhodos and Euboia. Possibly Sicily as well. While the first group are a bit meta-game-y (AI doesn't usually try to re-take them), it will at least make my little league viable.

I plan to take Krete, then leave the rest until the factions who own them give me a reason to attack in retaliation. I may set up the Sabaens as a "desert faction" to give me some relief from my two great enemies.

Talking of which, what might you call a Hellenic League centred in Kyrenaia? Is there a more interesting name than the Kyrenaian League?

Any thoughts generally?

[Megas Methuselah]

Magas of Cyrene.

You should consider bribing the polis' starting eleutheroi general (Magas), and killing off all your other family members for him to start a dynasty. Use the "give_trait" console to give him the PtolemaicMakedon trait, and if he has a son, change the kid's randomly-generated surname to something more fitting for the region.

Kyrene, at EB's start date, was an independent kingdom, so maybe you can build a sucessor kingdom out of it to rival that of the Ptolemaioi and Seleukids.

[QuintusSertorius]

Magas of Cyrene.

You should consider bribing the polis' starting eleutheroi general (Magas), and killing off all your other family members for him to start a dynasty. Use the "give_trait" console to give him the PtolemaicMakedon trait, and if he has a son, change the kid's randomly-generated surname to something more fitting for the region.

Kyrene, at EB's start date, was an independent kingdom, so maybe you can build a sucessor kingdom out of it to rival that of the Ptolemaioi and Seleukids.

I didn't know that, excellent. Gives me a good reason to centre a game there as well. Sounds like a neat solution to get rid of all those Epirotes with their traits too.

How do I change the randomly-generated surname?

Any idea how much it will cost to bribe the city?

EDIT: I don't seem to have the option to bribe the city, and the stack nearby under Philon refuses to accept a bribe.

Looks like I'd have better luck altering my starting FMs with the console.

[Hax]

change the kid's randomly-generated surname to something more fitting for the region.

Sure, enjoy your hardcode.

[Megas Methuselah]

I didn't know that, excellent. Gives me a good reason to centre a game there as well. Sounds like a neat solution to get rid of all those Epirotes with their traits too.

How do I change the randomly-generated surname?

Any idea how much it will cost to bribe the city?

EDIT: I don't seem to have the option to bribe the city, and the stack nearby under Philon refuses to accept a bribe.

Looks like I'd have better luck altering my starting FMs with the console.

Aw, hell, that sucks. Use the console to add_money 40000 many, many, many times until you have several million mnai, I guess. Then once you got the city, add_money -40000 until you're back at where you were at.

Sure, enjoy your hardcode.

If he gets Magas, then he marries, then has a son, the kid will be given a randomly-generated surname out of the list of surnames of the player's faction. Let's pretend that Quintus is playing as Epeiros, and the boy was born as Kleon Aiakides. You simply save+exit the game, go to descr_names.txt, then look up "Aiakides." Simply change that name to whatever name you want that is already in the list, including the names of other factions, then resume the game.

To make the job easier for you, I already went into the list and found the following name under the surnames of the koinon: Kyrenaios. Going back to the Kleon Aiakides & Epeiros example, you would simply go under the list of surnames of Epeiros, find Aiakides, and replace it with Kyrenaios. Of course, since the starting Epeirote family goes by that surname, they would all be changed to Kyrenaios, lol.

Trust me, though, I've done this plenty of times in my Massalian campaign. I gotta get back to playing it sometime.

[QuintusSertorius]

Is a change of surname saved game compatible?

[Ludens]

Kyrene, at EB's start date, was an independent kingdom, so maybe you can build a sucessor kingdom out of it to rival that of the Ptolemaioi and Seleukids.

As I understood it, Kyrene was not an independent kingdom but a breakaway province of the Ptolemaic Empire housing a rival claimant to the throne. In other words: there wouldn't be a Kyrenean Empire, Magas would simply take over the Ptolemean one. However, I doubt his Seleucid "allies" would have allowed him to keep it.

[Paltmull]

This does seem like a lot of fun. Might try it myself. What kind of army compositions would be appropriate for Kyrene?

[QuintusSertorius]

This does seem like a lot of fun. Might try it myself. What kind of army compositions would be appropriate for Kyrene?

They're another Hellenistic power, though unless you start conquering Ptolemaic territory you'll be limited to basic Hellenic/Hellenistic troops and mercs. Don't think there are any regionals in Kyrene.

[Paltmull]

They're another Hellenistic power, though unless you start conquering Ptolemaic territory you'll be limited to basic Hellenic/Hellenistic troops and mercs. Don't think there are any regionals in Kyrene.

I meant whether they would be hoplite-based or phalanx-based and so on.