Long time reader 2nd time poster - will try and avoid wall of text
1 - I am playing normal (I tried starting hh on S2 and got my ass handed to me @ release!)
2 - I am a fair way in - ruling the whole british isles
3 - I am assuming the below applies for any barbarian factions
Bamboozled by/ help needed
Happiness - wtf is this? I had 4 settlements and NOTHING changed, no new units/attacks/building the hapopiness across my settlements kept dropping well into negatives. I tried to counter is by researching the civ techs but no dice.
Chariots - can someone link/ advise any way to use these things, they feel like bad heavy cav, ace at rolling through skirmisers but turn like a bus and as soon as they stop they die... rolling skirmishers is easy but normally there is a proper melee unit sitting behind it
Conclusions I have reached (probably wrong!)
Characters seem a bit samey - I thought they would have hard counters like S2 but my scout/spy at level 2 had 75% chance to kill a champion... I thought they were supposed to be the hard counter? If you have a decent shieldmaiden(champ) you can single combat ANYONE easily, character or army alike
Skirmishers - 2 points
1 - I am using them a lot like M2 Algahvars (spelling?) they chuck a rock run away - loop around the side and pummel the line, the dps is properly rubbish vs archers in S2/ ME2 they are more like an atrition unit, get them in position and they can grind down numbers and morale over time. Also the LOS stuff means that they are essential for scouting
2 - The barbs feel better with a higher ratio of skirmisher to infantry than I was running in the prologue rome armies, barbs have superior numbers so its easier to tie up the enemy units and skirmishers can do the extra damage needed to actually win
Small armies are essential
The AI will siege you with 2 unit armies from nowhere and it will ruin your day (yes, yes I lost towns to this) my solution was plopping a small 5-6 stack within 2 turns of any of my cities to counter them. Also the AI attacks anyway so you can use them to farm levels for your general/army
Do not expand cities too soon - expanding a city and having no cash means the space becomes slums and you have to pay 500 gold to destroy them to build anything useful
Barbarians can take over friends - have a friendly neighbour you need to kill - dont bother, offer confederacy and they join you free of charge - BOOM
Iceni
They are little blue scallywags and I treat them as such, mass numbers and a mass charge using reserves and skirmishers to get flank ranged dmg and charges
Tech - Army first civic second, you need spears and swords so you have to do that research asap
Things I suspect
Specialisation will be important - Like S2 you may need to destroy a farm so you can build the religious tree etc
Happiness will always end up -ive and with revolts early game - I keep an army back for AI chancy attacks and these guys take the revolt down = happy populous
THE END
Next mission - get to mid game, learn not to suck with chariots
Tomorrow I will be exploring the coop campaign with a buddy for 48 hours.... and trying desparately not to roll spartans because they were in 300!
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