Roman: Julii

[LestaT]

Thanks. Danke schon... will try after I finished all the factions...

[ZIM!!]

I just finished my Julii campaign I had won the game over a month ago but I let Rome rebel and then allowed the Scipii to take it so I could conquer the map it took a long time and a couple of times I was put on the ropes by the Scipii and the Parthians , but I finally conquerd selucia and those elusive cities in Persia that you kow are there but have to search for and at last I trapped the Parthian King in that city due North of the Caspian sea. I had to send calvary scouts to find it when I did the Pathian King was holed up in a huge city with large walls totally unlike any other city in this part of the map he had a huge army with 3 units of Elephants. I waited for years building up my forces shipping them from persia across the caspian sea that had two big stacks of parthian navies in it constantly harassing my convoys of troops, also marcing them across Europe from Germany and shipping them across the black sea from Nicomedia and byzantium even then it was a miserably slow march to get there.. I had to bring in flaming pigs from the balkans it took well over 10 years finally I ran out of paitence and decided to not wait for the flaming pigs to arrive and just hired mercanaries to supplement my meager Roman force by

by the time I reached this point in the game there were no more large cities to conquer (outside the occasional rebellion) to fuel my war machine , my units on the russian steppe were depleted from years of fighting barbarians in Europe and the persians

but crutched with mercanaries including greek hoplites and eastern infantry Samaritans from the black sea javilans from North africa Barbarians from Gual and Briton I thought I would give it a try.. I had units from all over the empire and it was a brutal fight the Elephants gave me a hard time for a bit but I was able to corner them in the narrow city streets.. at the end I won but was so decimated I lost the cirty to rebels the next turn but I eventually recaptured it because the force was mostly peasants. however the capture of this city lead me to the discovery of the last province I was to capture... at the very edge of the world the fabled kingdom of the Amazons.

it was pretty neat it was so far away and hard to get to it literaly to years to march there from the closest city I marched thier with one Roman General and an Army entirely made up of mercanaries as no Roman units were availible or could be spared this far north I finally got there after scouting the city out the year before my army marched in tandem and a unit of Amazon chariots wiped out a straggling unit of mercanaries

it was kind of cool to have this be the last place conquerd a mythical city that took years to get to and a march over hostile territory with a harsh enviornment kind of like the holy grail.. but I was determined to let no land or people go unconquered. The seige was not too bad the city just had wooden walls. the sythced chariots with the amazon archers gave me a hard time before I broke through the walls they are super deadly they just about completely wiped out my units on the rams.. but oh well theyre just mercanaries.... after that I rushed the city the chariots routed a couple of units but they didnt last to long against the cavalary in the confines of the city
The Amazon warriors had a few units of Slave "men" as peasant units but they were just fodder for my blood thirsty mercanaries

so after all this effort to get there and reach this mythical magical city with its proud noble race of beautiful women warriors with a vibrant culture and the great fight to subdue them .. what you ask did you do with these noble and beautiful female warriors?? ... I let my filthy smelly barbarian mercanaries have thier way with them ...got drunk ...then slaughtered them all....
....there was no reason at this point to step out of character....

the Scipii left in Rome were easily defeated of course I had the port blockaded for over a decade I surrounded the city with heavy onagers and destroyed as much of it as I could .. very dramatic .. the rushed in to the burning city through open gates(spies ) and of course slaughterd everyone


The end

[BlackStrider]

The one thing that I can say about the Julii campaign is to rush fast into Gaul. This campaign is mostly about expanding quickly into Europe. Germania wont attack you and are pretty quiet. If an alliance can be made, they will help you beat back Britainnia, who will almost certainly attack you.

[Romulus Augustulus]

This may or may not be helpful, but I've found something out about fighting the Germans. Those spear warbands of theirs can be beaten with light infantry. During the deployment phase, take all of your light infantry, and deploy it in one place, one unit on top of another. If you have light cavalry, use it to kill archers and warlords, and, when their spear warbands are locked in mortal combat, pounce from the rear. I used this to defeat a good sized German force near Trier, which I took a turn later, or so.

[Zizka]

playing the Julii on a hard/hard mode, I found that the first thing to do was secure northern Italia, and take Massina, with an army on the bridge closest to the rest of the Gallic lands you can rack up famous victories for your Family members. With northern Italia secure, forts in the passes (five forts can secure the entire area), your offensive armies are free to take the islands in the western med, and the take and easily secure Iberia. Three forts in the Pyrenees secures Iberia from again the Gallic lands. From Northern Italy one can easily snap up Narbonensis and Lugdensis, and from Iberia northern Africa is easy meat. I have found that leaving the majority of Gallic lands in the hands of the Gauls gives your family members a boarder area filled with large fairly weak armies to combat and thus earn their name as a great general, before retiring to sire children and take on the task of govenorship. One member at Cordoba is all that is needed to keep Iberia running smoothly and it should be a vast money maker. Britannia may be another step but I don't see why, the British and Germans are a pain to fight and their lands contain nothing. With eleven more well placed forts one can cut off then Iuvavum, Lovisice, Aquinicum, Segestica, Campus Iazyges, Porrolissum, and Salona, from their all of Greece, Macedonia, and Thrace are within easy stiking distanace, and promise a good long hard war, with plenty of booty (two more forts on the borders of Dacian and Thracian lands with Scythia secure all of Southern Europe and free your offensive aremies for campaigns in the East. this is actually in keeping with the actual extent of Roman expansion (sort of) and it does make sense when you are constantly looking for tightly securing your borders.

- Nothern Italy (forts in the passes and at the bridge near Messina)
- Western Med. Islands
- Western then Eastern Iberia (cutting off the passes in the Pyrenes as soon at possible, After taking Osca as first conquest if possible)
- Northern Africa
- Dacia and the northern and eastern slopes of the Alps.
- Greece and Macedonia
- Asia Minor

[sunsmountain]

This belongs here:

If you play as the Roman: Julii family, send a spy into Gaul territory. Let one of their cities grow to Minor City (level 3). Check if they have a Sacred Circle to Epona, (the horse god). Take the city. Grow to 12000 ASAP.

Wait for a 'your roman people have embraced Epona as their god'. This happens if you leave the temple alone long enough (dont destroy it, repair it if damaged).

You can now build the Awesome temple of Epona and the Pantheon to Epona, giving your legionary cohorts 4 xp (1 silver), or 5 xp (2 silver) as 'raw' recruits!

I did a search and havent found this tip anywhere so here you go. Added to the Julii walkthrough as well. (and on the org)

[Herakleitos]

Does this 'embracing' work for every god, have you for instance ever seen it happen with Greek gods?

(Goeie tip trouwens! )

[Haudegen]

This belongs here:

If you play as the Roman: Julii family, send a spy into Gaul territory. Let one of their cities grow to Minor City (level 3). Check if they have a Sacred Circle to Epona, (the horse god). Take the city. Grow to 12000 ASAP.

Wait for a 'your roman people have embraced Epona as their god'. This happens if you leave the temple alone long enough (dont destroy it, repair it if damaged).

You can now build the Awesome temple of Epona and the Pantheon to Epona, giving your legionary cohorts 4 xp (1 silver), or 5 xp (2 silver) as 'raw' recruits!

I did a search and havent found this tip anywhere so here you go. Added to the Julii walkthrough as well. (and on the org)

Just stumbled upon this very interesting feature. I started a game as Julii and took two spanish cities (Osca and Carthago Nova) with lvl 3 Epona temples. I also upgraded them to large city level very soon. Since I´ve been waiting for about 30 turns but nothing happened.

I´d be very interested to know how long you had to wait before the embracement message appeared.

I´m playing v 1.3, maybe there have been some changes?

Bastard Operator

[Quirinus]

This belongs here:

If you play as the Roman: Julii family, send a spy into Gaul territory. Let one of their cities grow to Minor City (level 3). Check if they have a Sacred Circle to Epona, (the horse god). Take the city. Grow to 12000 ASAP.

Wait for a 'your roman people have embraced Epona as their god'. This happens if you leave the temple alone long enough (dont destroy it, repair it if damaged).

You can now build the Awesome temple of Epona and the Pantheon to Epona, giving your legionary cohorts 4 xp (1 silver), or 5 xp (2 silver) as 'raw' recruits!

I did a search and havent found this tip anywhere so here you go. Added to the Julii walkthrough as well. (and on the org)

^ Saw this post from about three years ago. I'm curious, does this actually work, or it is all bull?

[roman god's]

well what i did was do what the cover said "total war". i fought everybody no mercy was spent to anybody i usually exterminated the settlement and got tons of money. to was fun but hard. with money drains and rebillous settlments it gets hard

by the way i'm new

[McDoogle]

Hey,



Does anyone know what triggers the army reforms?

Most of my games where i take over Gaul, they come in between 215-224B.C

However i have just choosen to wait in a new game on med/hard. it is now 208 B.C and nothing . Is there a thing you must do to trigger it?

E.g take so many provinces or something?

[Remus]

It depends on a couple things.

First you must build an imperial palace in Italy somewhere.

The second thing is it must be at least 220 BC, but the actual date is randomized. For me it happened usually somewhere from 205 - 195.

As far as any other triggers I am not aware of any.

[scipio the even younger]

QUOTE[Fighting the Germans. Those spear warbands of theirs can be beaten with light infantry. During the deployment phase, take all of your light infantry, and deploy it in one place, one unit on top of another. If you have light cavalry, use it to kill archers and warlords, and, when their spear warbands are locked in mortal combat, pounce from the rear.]

a easier way is to just send in javerlinmen and because spears are so frikkin slow they wont catch u wen u hurl javerlins into them.i used this to isolate and destroy and german spears wen i was out numbered.i didn't win cos y general thought it would be fun to charge the spears,still i killed one hell of a lot more than they did.


a bad general lets success go to his head,
a good general leaves it behind.

[Imperator]

The most important thing with the Julii, like all Romans, is to push your advantage immediatly. The Scipii have the best ships, as well as Syracuse (Minor city) just waiting to be taken in Sicily. The Brutii have the best position, invulerable to attack with the best of the civilized world ahead of them, including all 7 World Wondors. The Julii have the worst of it as far as map position or cities are concerned. However, they have the strongest acting army in the early game, and if you can exploit that, they will quickly rise to the top. The two gallic cities in Northern Italy are vulnerable. You already have a large enough army to take them before the Gauls know what hit them. (Just sent two hastati to siege Sagesta, it can only last 3 turns under siege. Once you have taken those two cities HOLD THEM! The gauls will send massive armies, but if you can build forts in all the mountain passes, it will slow them down. The computer doestn't ever seem to attack forts. Once you are secure in Italy just advance your cities, they are all large towns and can train hastati, equites, and velites. Then just send army after army into gaul, remember, the only big advantage the Gauls have over you is the terrain, and their numbers. Try not to fight during winter, and NEVER fight in a forest. If the Gauls are too strong to invade from the South, simply play the role of a Viking. Sail up to one of their southern coastal cities, capture it, exterminate the population and destroy all the buildings. Then run. It makes you thousands of Denarii and cripples the Gauls who are stuck rebuilding their cities.
(Note-Whenever possible built blacksmiths. I always thought them trivial until I saw what superior weapons and armour could do! The tiniest advantage will show when locked in a close battle.)

[Coccum_Pugnus]

My stratety was pretty strait forward, but I have ended up over extended my self slightly.

All I did was Bliz. all the way to spain, and I think the Marius effect happens after you have gained a certain amount of land or wealth or something, because I never got acess to the Triaria (sp?)

Right now I am making preporation for the invasion of Brition and am moving my diplomats into Roman controlled areas for the final push.

[Craterus]

you need an imperial palace in Italy for the Marian Reforms..
to be able to recruit Triarii, you need the best army barracks and you need to be before the Marian reforms!!

[katank]

You don't need the best barracks. You need army barracks which is large city level and that is less than urban barracks which is huge city level.

In 1.0 and 1.1, an imperial palace anywhere will do. However, in 1.2, you need an imperial palace in Italy after 220BC.

[cunobelinus]

roman wardogs are really week there only good for routing enemys .there infrantry are strong well displined men .i found gauls not that easy to fight they never give up they are easy to take but are always a problem .i have never completed a game with julli so i cant say that much

[Craterus]

I agree littlegannon, the Gauls are tough fghters and they don't tend to give up. I have never completed a campaign with the Julii either.. but none-the-less they are an exciting roman faction to play.

[cunobelinus]

they are esciting but i think theya re the hardest faction out of the romans to play as so i may make a game as them as a bit of a challange

[Rome:Total Slayer]

I have noticed that when playing as the Julii it is best to take as many sea provinces as possible it will greatly improve your Denarii count. Almost imidiatly after taking Caralis move and take palma let this grow as fast as can. then move and take Narbo Martius and Massilia. This way your trade will rise and so will your income. If you feel so inclined you may take Carthage. My advice is to enslave the populance. Because you will have a rebellian on your hands faster than you can breathe.Then if all goes well you move to the west and take anyother sea provinces. once you've compleated that build up your armies and invade in any order you want.

[Rome:Total Slayer]

wait until your able to train arches to engage the Germans. the Phalaxed Spear warbands are tough to beat unless you are able to loosen them up and make them rout. I've found that using your archers to make them pull back away from the walls is an exelent wat to get lots of troops in before the melee gets nasty. charge a phalax and see what happens. Personly Princepes are best used in the Noth. They have better armor and attack than most barbarian units.

[Claudius the God]

if you're fast enough as the Julii, you can capture Carthage before the Scipii do...

heck, on this campaign (medium/medium) i've conquered at least 50 provinces including Rome and the other roman factions, before the marian reforms even occurred, and before i've been able to build onagers of any kind

i started by expanding as much and as quickly as possible, into Gaulish territory, the balkans, carthaginian territory. going to war with the Spanish, and the Greeks, then the Macedonians.

i wiped out the gauls, the greeks, the macedonians, the spanish, the carthaginians and then the Dacians before starting the roman civil war, taking rome and the scipii and brutii territories (about 5-6 provinces each) to gain over 50 provinces... including rome.

[Alexanderofmacedon]

I'm a very slow moving person. I concentrate all my forces on one nation (until rescently I've been forced into more) and break them. I also very rarely take more than one enemy city in a span of two hours. During the campaign map, I look at every single city...

Slow, but fullfilling for me...

[Ariplatostophanes]

Hey, my first post on the Org! Cool. I'm here b/c I'm playing Julii though my questions are pretty general. Here's the backround:

Julii M/M (Hey, its' my first time thru though I must admit the AI is not very aggressive). 246 BC, 14 regions, 27 wins 4 loses (all naval to Carthage but they're not a problem anymore )

Began in usual Julii faction by taking Pata, Medio, and Segesta. Then Caralis. As the Gauls weren't pressing me, I moved on Carthage. I was able to do this by following a diplomatic trick noted on this forum and bribing the captained Senate army on turn two for 2500D. Well worth it, even on turn two. Carthage severely dented two units of Hastati but I won in the end. Also moved down and took Thapsus. Carthage lost their other provinces to Spain and Scipii respectively and I finished them off on Palma. Bye bye Carthage.

I then pushed on into Gaul after taking the two rebel towns north of Pata. I plan to continue on into Spain and take the peninsula. I am allied with the Brits so I don't anticipate war on that front soon. They are warring with Germany who I have only a trade agreement with. Numidia is also neutral so they aren't bothering with my north African towns. I am hoping that after I defeat Spain (currently at war with Numidia), I will be able to turn the Numidians toward Egypt. I don't anticipate trouble from them on the battlefield but I don't really want to have to hike thru all of north Africa to chase them down. Alpine passes are well fortified.

My other plan is to take the remaining Greek towns. The Scipii have done alright for themselves in Sicily and Italy but they have no other regions. The Brutii likewise have their starting two and two across the Adriatic. I allied with Macedonia early and they have most of the rest of Greece/Maced. The Greeks are left with the Pelop, which is where I plan to proceed. I am confident with my current financial situation and allies that i will be able to wage a two front war in Spain and Greece. Which leads to my questions...

1. If I take the remaining Greek cities, I will have essentially boxed in the Brutii and I am concerned that they will turn on Macedonia (the two are allied now). I just recently found Tamur's diplomacy guide so I will offer them a few gifts to keep them going. Macedonia borders me near Pata. Of note, Germany and Dacia just allied, with Germany on my border and Dacia on Maced's. I have a gut feeling that my Maced alliance may last and may benefit both of us greatly if it does. Will it all fall apart if the Brutii declare war on them? Will they not trust me anymore? Will the Senate get mad if I maintain and even encourage the alliance? Should I just dump it if the Brutii attack them?

2. I have an itching to take Sicily from the Scipii. Can I accomplish this using spies and assassins? Will they have the same effect in an ally's city as they do in an enemy's? The plan is to swoop in after the towns rebel and take them for my own, taking advantage of the fact that we all have military rights and I will be able to park my army right outside the city.

3. Simple question: ladders vs siege towers? I used towers during the Carthage siege. It seemed to take forever for my unit to make it to the top. Are ladders faster? I'm assuming they are but offer less protection against missiles. Dummy me, I didn't infiltrate so I didn't know that Carthage wasn't fielding archers.

Thanks to everyone who has posted on the forums. You all have helped me in one way or another during my first campaign. The only advice I can give to other new players is to read ALL the forums. You may be playing as Julii but you will find something on the Egyptian forum for instance that just might save your life.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

1. If they attack, you probably shouldn't keep the alliance -- unless you want the civil war immediately. You can capture rebel cities and sell them to the Macs or buy maps from them at exorbitant prices to prop them up without an alliance.

2. Spies and Assassins can break up the towns and engender rebellion, and then take the rebellious towns, but if you are caught it's civil war immediately.

3. I've heard folks call for both. Start the Siege towers forward and as they draw the fire send your ladders in elsewhere to swarm the walls and sweep them clear. Apparently this takes a bit of timing.

Seamus

[GreatEmperor]

Simple question: ladders vs siege towers?

Dont use both of them, use tunnels! The only problem of tunnels are that you can't place them but with a bit of luck they stand in good positions.

[GreatEmperor]

Are you sure? I find it better to train them on Rebels, because in my game I'm sabotaging the Senate for ages and still none of them has gotten much experience.

[Emperor Aurelius]

I am playing my own julii campaign.I have taken all of gaul,britain,spain(with the exception of corduba which is still held by the carthaginians who actually STILL HAVE THE BEST ECONOMY IN THE GAME!),ireland,germany(well the brutii hold the southern part of germany,denmark,parts of russia,parts of northern Italy,and sardinia.

Right now im fighting against carthage.Carthage only owns palma and corduba but they have the strongest economy in the game!They have sacred band infantry.3 attempts to capture corduba have failed and my expedition force sent to capture palma is now trapped outside the city of palma after temperorarily gaining control of the city being forced out by rebels.The city was retaken by a carthaginian army.

This may sound surprising that carthage is still a power after losing all of Afirca.Even though the scipii still control most of Africa carthage is actually still wreaking havoc on them!A carthaginian army landed on north africa not too long ago.They defeated 2 scipii armies and cost the scipii like 1,500 casualties!

The carthaginians may only hold 2 provinces but they are as dangerous as ever.I tried allying with them thinking that in case of civil war with rome they may prove to be a useful ally.They allied with me but betrayed me shortly after.They actually launched a full scale invasion of the 5 provinces in spain that I control.They even came close to capturing carthago nova itself!So right now I have decided that carthage must go.Im making every effort I can to take them down.


There are no more enemies in the north except scythia to deal with.So im thinking of taking down carthage.Then bribing some scipii cities in Africa to defect to me.I did it several times to them and boy was the senate angry.They ordered me to give back all cities stole.I refused of course.


Brutii power is strong as ever.They control most of russia and are allied with macedon which is VERY strong in the game im playing.They control nearly the whoel balkans!Brutii are now attacking the crimea and are fighting a drawn out war against scythia.Despite heavy losses the brutii just took one of the scythians main provinces and it will not be long before scythia too is extinct.
So macedon adn brutii are hte 2 big boys east of the Italian penninsula in Europe and Russia that is.

Scipii are considered a joke now.The own an empire that has part of Italy,all of Sicily,all of north Africa except the Saharra,and parts of Egypt.Problem?Why are they considered a joke?Because they cannot compltley take control of Egypt.Egypt controls a vast empire and the 3 egyptian territories are constantly in revolt and the Egyptian army keeps send more and more soldiers in from Jerusaleam and Sidonand other areas.This is a problem for hte scipii who at the same time have to deal with frequent revolts in Africa.So if I bribed some African cities it would only be too easy.

[Ariplatostophanes]

Thanks for all the responses.

Sand and Gardibolt: You're right. Germania won't accept ceasefire. I surrounded them down to one province, then gave all the conquered regions to the Brits. It will hopefully keep my alliance with the Brits strong and now there is a British border between the sole German region and me. It was hard giving up provinces but it has bought me time to raise armies in Italy to get ready for pending Civil War. The Brits lost one b/c I gave it to them before they could garrison it. I had to retake it. It held on the second time I think b/c I exterminated again. Then gifted and they were able to hold it.

Great Emporer: Instead of spending money on maps that I could use to bribe away other Roman armies, I've sent a rather worthless dip to just wander the Northeast. Cheaper and accomplished the same thing, just slower.

Emporer Aurelius: Glad to see someone else is playing with me. I love that your game is much different than mine. The Macs are barely holding on with two provinces and one of them is in N Africa LOL. The three powers are Egypt (of course), Thrace, and me. The last turn, all the other Romans declared war on Thrace. I haven't yet and am ignoring the Senate mission to block Byzantium and be forced into war. I'm hoping the other Romans will concentrate on Thrace and weaken themselves back home for Civil War time. When that's over, I can clean up what remains of Thrace. The Seleucids are holding on somehow, despite war with Egypt, Thrace, Pontus, and Armenia.

As far as advice on Carthage, have you tried assasins with spies? Have your assasins strike revenue-producing buildings (ie markets, forums, etc). This will help slow their economy. Then damage the military buildings. You can use a similiar tactic against the Scipii towns. Use assasins to hit "happiness" buildings like temples. You may get the cities to revolt and can them take them yourself. B/c you are taking a rebel city, you won't get negative messages from the Senate. You will need to have an army close by though or the evicted Scipii will take it again. As far as Palma, take the town again and exterminate like I did in Germany above. The second time around, they will be less likely to rebel against you. You may need to keep your army in town until you can build a garrison.

Keep me posted. I am almost done in Spain and am just starving out the last three towns. Otherwise, with Germany contained in the north, I am concentrating on bribing away other Romans in Italy and weakening their economy and military building capabilities with assasins.