How often do you see Hetairoi and other elites?

**mikepettyrtw** · 09-08-2012, 06:59

I would rather fight Mr.Clean over here 1000 thousand times:

And jam it up with joy with this stack:

Than ever see Scumbag Dave poop-brained-routes-in-20-seconds-but-can-kill-50-HA-and-20-cataphracts-in-protracted-melee-somehow-Pantodapoi again. And Pantodapoi-magically-can-swing-sarissa-360degrees-to-bust-a-lip-in-your-cataphract-charge Phalangitai TOO!!

The only elite units I see the ai field alot are:
Various Elite Phalanxs
Yellow Fever Galatian Heavy Swordsmen (RARE!But I hold them in very high regard! Its always a joy fighting them)
Pedites Extrodinarii (Good Unit, never fought it, but have used it as the romani)
As well as..........
.....
.........
...........

...............

.............................

........................................

.......................................................

......................................................................

.................(I seriously had to stop and think).........................
............................................................................................
I got it!!!!!!!
I once saw Epiros lead an invasion of Italy with some of those Agrianian Assault Infantry with silver CHEVRONS!!:
http://europabarbarorum.heimstatt.ne...egory=infantry
.
..
....
....
Hmmm, the only exceptions to this are Saka, Pahlava, and ........well yeah. Both field cataphracts and the like as soon as they get them and afford the upkeep. The AI pahlavans will even build those scary late elite ones too. And on a regular basis, Saka's armies are made up of nobles. Saka recruit's better than Pahlava but nonetheless both build their elites quite often.

Yellow fever is often swimming loads of gold, but you never see them fielding elephants or hetairoi or anything fancy. Just some pikemen and pantodapoi.(and loads of crappy skirmishers) This isn't just cav, the AI overall doesn't seem to build elites alot unless left alone for a long time,.......or they get on a roll. Many have seen the big blue baktrian death machine; owns half the east, yet not a single cataphract in sight!
What are your thoughts?

**seleucid empire** · 09-08-2012, 07:58

Originally Posted by mikepettyrtw

The only elite units I see the ai field alot are:
Various Elite Phalanxs
Yellow Fever Galatian Heavy Swordsmen (RARE!But I hold them in very high regard! Its always a joy fighting them)
Pedites Extrodinarii (Good Unit, never fought it, but have used it as the romani)

Hmmm, the only exceptions to this are Saka, Pahlava, and ........well yeah. Both field cataphracts and the like as soon as they get them and afford the upkeep. The AI pahlavans will even build those scary late elite ones too. And on a regular basis, Saka's armies are made up of nobles. Saka recruit's better than Pahlava but nonetheless both build their elites quite often.

Yellow fever is often swimming loads of gold, but you never see them fielding elephants or hetairoi or anything fancy. Just some pikemen and pantodapoi.(and loads of crappy skirmishers) This isn't just cav, the AI overall doesn't seem to build elites alot unless left alone for a long time,.......or they get on a roll. Many have seen the big blue baktrian death machine; owns half the east, yet not a single cataphract in sight!
What are your thoughts?

If you play VH campaign, you will see a lot of elites. Often I see Macedonia with 3 units of Pelt maks or hypaspistai. Bactria in my current VH game had 2 units of Cataphract Elephants and 4 units of greek cataphracts. Hayasdan in my VH camp had 3 units of Cataphract archers. Getai armies are like 80% elite on ANY difficulty towards like 230 BC. Carthage fields a crazy number of Elite African Pikemen and those green shield elites who just don't die. I have also seen Carthage recruit lots of sacred band cavalry and infantry. Saba had 2 stacks of their brown coat elites in my last Seleucid game. If KH survives till midgame then they have like 1-2 spartans hanging around. Lusotaneaons recruit their ambrako? (the elite short swordsmen) all day long. And on top of that theres the 4-5 silvershields in the grey death armies

Oh btw if Seleucids actually ever make a stack of those TABs then your nomads will have an extremely hard time. They are almost invincible. Ive seen them charged by two units of cataphracts, and beat them off with about 50 casualties

**Brave Brave Sir Robin** · 09-08-2012, 17:05

The AI factors in mainly cost effectiveness in auto-calcs. Elites are far from cost-effective so usually the AI prefers levies or the professional units with higher stats that are in 80 man units (i.e. Galatian Swordsmen). Elites in 60 man units don't fare so well in auto-calcs compared to 120 man levy phalangites in terms of cost. Also, the AI seems to queue units up like there is no tomorrow even in underdeveloped towns hence pantodapoi and akontistai style spams.

**Kralizec** · 09-08-2012, 17:24

It's not that uncommon to see Carthage deploy elite stacks on the Africa continent. Of course you'll have to be either invade them, or be the Ptolemaioi or have conquered their territories.

Rome often uses lots of Pedites Extraordinarii; but they also tend to field stacks of cheap regional units like those Gallic spearmen.

I'm positive that in a game I played a long time ago the Seleucids fielded some cataphracts and lots of TAB's, but that of course depends on them getting the reforms.

**Ca Putt** · 09-08-2012, 17:57

Carthage loves their elites, most of all elite pikes and Dorkim Leebi-Feenikim Aloophim, but I also see sacred band cavalry rather often.

Ptolemies train most of their elites and spam them

Selucids Really like Silvershields and TABs, not to mention Hetairoi, Cataphracts, Peltmaks and Hypaspists have been rather scarse in my campaigns tho.

Romans often spam Pedexes and Triarii, once they hit problems they spam levy, which is sort of a shame as it means I seldom see Princeps or hastati.

Other factions also use a fair amount of elites but these four are particulary annoying about it. That said I usually play on medium.