The Greek Cities

[Taurus]

Cool bubbanator Glad your campaign is going well and everyone was my enemy too in my Greek campaign.

Good luck in the rest of your campaign

[gmjapan]

A lot of great advice on here for the Greek campaign!
The unit i find most overlooked when playing as Greek Cities is the enemy spy. Yup, the bad guys spies...

I came to this conclusion after trying to hold onto Syracuse. There are Carth and Skippy spies in your city and no way to build your own any time soon to make life difficult for them staying there.
So when you get sieged (by both, usually one after the other on the same turn!) the gates are open.

I used to think the flippin walls were broken as the gates were never shut! But I learned to love it. The enemy drops all its siege equipment and runs in. Make a U shape with hoplites and get some skirmishers behind and to the sides etc, etc.

What it all boils down to is you never have to rely on hoplites on the walls and covering multiple ladders, towers, and the gate. They all go to one entry point. Magic. I got sieged on my 3rd turn so I never got any fancy units beyond what I could already build. Beat back the vastly superior armies with minimal losses and then take both towns with their now minimal garrison. Mop up any stagglers and Sicilly is yours in 3 turns!

I just wish they would pour the darn boiling oil!!

[GreatEmperor]

Yes you are right but be sure that you make a second row of hoplites behind the other hoplites so that the enemy never has the chance to break through. Also use skirmishers but no archers because they would kill your own soldiers. Eventually you can set some archers on the walls to weaken the enemy.

[Alexanderofmacedon]

If you are the Romans, the Greeks are easily destroyed in my opinion.

Not to mention the fact that they are scattered by the Macedonian army, but they have nothing besides Phalanx from some of the battles I fought them with.

[Emperor Aurelius]

Ok congratulations.You are playing the Greek cities which are one of the most fun factions to play as in the game.

ALright you start out iwth the following cities:

-syracuse
-thermon
-sparta
-rhodes
pergamum

Not much right?First thing you must do is put all of your resources into making roads and farms and ports.BUT make sure on your first turn you put some resources to producing more phalanx in syracuse.Keep improivng your economy for 2 turns then start producing a few hoplites in sparta.Maybe 2 more regiments of hoplites.Then attack corinth and use a battering ram to take down the city.An direct assualt wont be that costly because there are only 128 soldiers in Corinth I beleive.So take corinth and use that as an army build up center.


Syracuse:In your 3rd turn rome will attack.DO NOT SALLY OUT.THey will launch a direct attack.If you win carthage will launch a direct attack.If you win that rome will launch another attack.

Heres the attack:

Rome first attack:they will come at you with a seige ladder and a battering ram.Have your archers take down the ram using fire arrows.DO NOT LET THAT RAM BREACH YOUR GATES OR YOUR DEAD!The seige ladder regiment will attack and get some histati and velites on your wall.Do not worry these arent much of a problem.Get at least 1 regiment of hoplites and 2 regiments of militia hoplites to deal with them.YOu only have 2 regiments of hoplites so try not to squander them.
Carthage will attack in the same way.Once again do not let them brfach your gates or there 3 calvary regiments and one regiment of elephants will tear you to shreads.

Rome will attack a 2nd time.They will attack with a battering ram and a seige ladder and sometimes a seige tower altho they miught save this for their 3rd attack.

Now why do I want you to build hardly any reinforcment soldiers for syracuse?Because you WANT them to attack you.At this stage it is important to not launch a full scale attack against sicily to occupy the whole island.You want greece and you want Carthage to not fall apart to quickly.Cuz if Carthage falls then the scipii are going to invade greece.You want to make attacking syrcuse as costly as possible for the romans.You want to lose the war in sicily.BUT you want to take several thousand roman soldiers down with you.I did this.Just hide behind my walls.I beat back one carthaginian attack and 2 roman attacks but a 3rd roman attack took me down.But the romans took far heavier losses in their assualts.

While holding sicily take Athens and the larissa.Now why is it so fun to fight macedon when your greece?Bribery.If you send a diplomat there soldiers will join your army!I got an army of 8 macedonian units to join me.So having soldiers in greece is never a problem.Keep a few diplomats there.Including one special diplomats to fight the romans.You are weak.You cannot take on rome just yet.You need the area from sparta to balzora(north of thessalonica) under your control.Once done with that assemble an army and take apollonia from the Brutii.

NOTE:DO NOT MASSACRE ANY POPULATONS IN GREECE WHEN YOU CONQUER A CITY.The people are already happy to have you rid them of the macedonian oppression and they wont rebel.Next its time to advance.By now im guessing you have lost syracuse but gave the scipii heavy casualities.Advance all of your cities and expand your army.Invade crete.That island if filthy rich.Now you want 3 attack groups.One to head north of apollonia nad take salona up in dalmatia.The other you want to get into thracia and take down byzantium.Send a diplomat up there incase the large thracian army overwhelms you.

The 3rd must be sent to turkey.Make peace with the seleucids and if you have any extra gold give it to them.You want the selecuids as an ally.Take nicodemia and halicar.Then go into azyrc or whatever that city in central turkey is called.Take it from pontus and then give it tot he seleucids.

Now I cannot stress this enough...ANNIHLATE PONTUS.They are the most traitorous empire in the whole game.They will make peace with you and then break it.They want peace?Sure accept it to buy time.But get a strong army ready in turkey because once they have taken all of rebel turkey over they are coming for you and the seluecids.

Fund your seleucid allies.I send them shipments of moeny and the occaisonal city too.Usually just a city here or there that I took from the pontus.Retake ALL of sicily.By now you should be producing Spartan hoplites.From sicily its a short hop to carthage which is probably under scipii control.You do not need to completly destroy scipii.By takeing sicily and carthage there economy is going to go negative.

And from there on there are many possibilities in whom to attack next.I recomend attacking cyprus and taking out either Egypt or the Romans.

[Craterus]

You say all about Romans bringing ladders to the first attack etc. But there is a degree of random. I've seen Carthage attack Syracuse before the Romans in one or two of my campaigns..

There is a degree of random and you can't produce a step by step of exactly what is going to happen.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Good strategy points and discussion throughout.

Question for the grecophiles:

How do you conduct an effective siege assault using greek forces in the early and early middle game?

Once you have onagers, the basic tools are in place, but...

Hoplites seem to be poor tools for scaling or ramming, and peltasts/slingers/archers can clear walls but are less useful for taking them. Aside from hiring Bastarnae and the like, how do you get the right troops in the right place to make the siege assault effective. Its the one instance where a greek "offense through defense" field battle approach isn't readily available.

Seamus

[Garvanko]

Will you really need let alone get onagers in the early to middle game?

[Seamus Fermanagh]

No, I was asking for effective greek siege assault tactics for when you don't have them (early/early-mid).

Seamus

[GreatEmperor]

If the enemy has got wooden walls you haven't got much choice than a battering ram, but if you plan to siege a city with stone walls, just siege and wait for them to sally or to attack you, if they attack you, you will never lose because the hoplites are such a good defending troops that it's almost impossible for the enemy to win.

[Magraev]

Remember that even if you do intend to starve the enemy out it's always a good idea to build a couple of siege-towers.

First you may have to take the city square even with all enemies defeated, and that's hard if you didn't remember to follow the routing enemy forces into the city (or killed them all outside). Otherwise you get a draw - you get the city, but your general may get a bad trait (indifferent commander).

Second you can actually use them as weak artillery - put a unit in them on fire-at-will and they will shoot at the sallying enemies.

[GreatEmperor]

Great plan! Thanks for the tip

[NeoSpartan]

My campain is goin OK, Macedon is dead, but gave away Syracuse (after a few battles, got tired of it).

Anywho, my problem is that I CAN'T GET ANY ALLIES! I am at war with everyone on my borders. Rome, Puntos, Selunid, Egypt, and Thresia. I can only negotiate Trade agreements, and NOBODY wants an alliece.

[Craterus]

Anywho, my problem is that I CAN'T GET ANY ALLIES! I am at war with everyone on my borders. Rome, Puntos, Selunid, Egypt, and Thresia. I can only negotiate Trade agreements, and NOBODY wants an alliece.

That's normal when being the Greeks. You have lotys of enemies, and other factions don't really want lots of enemies, so it'd be easier if they didn't associate with you, let alone call you their "friend".

[rotorgun]

One area of strategy open to the Greek Cities, due to Hellas being essentially a giant penninsula, is the use of sea power. By building ports into shipyards and dockyards as rapidly as possible, seapower allows Greece to project her project her influence enormously. After securing the Greek mainland cities and procuring a temporary truce with Macedonia, I was able to stop the Roman invasions of the western coasts by intercepting her armies at sea. Yes it was expensive. Surely I had to go on the defensive in the east for some time. In the long run, however, the Romans were unable to compete with Greece on the seas while trying to conquer her usual run of enemies. Once I drove the Roman navies from the Adriatic and the western Mediterranian seas a close blockade of her ports in
Italy, Africa, and Sicily seriously crippled the Romans. Not only were their armies unable to embark, but the Roman economy was seriously hampered by the loss of overseas trade. (This was the main cause of the Punic wars against Carthage if my history is not to hazy)

Don't think that this was an easy way to get out of fighting on land at all. There was still plenty of fight left in the Roman factions. Aside from the Briton tribes, they are by far the most persistent enemies in the game. It is just that much of their vaunted land strength can be neutralized by enticing them into a naval contest. After putting the lid on the Italian Supermafia, Shift your focus east. Finish off Macedon, and then take on the Dacians followed by the Thracians. When possible, invade Anatolia, as the cities are rich by this time and you will be ready to eliminate Pontus and the Selucids as they are usually weakened by fighting with each other and the Egyptians.This leads me to say a few words about Egypt.

Egypt, by the time I was drawn into fighting them, (they attacked my navy of course) had built a cosiderable empire by eliminating first the Parthians, and then the Selucids. I came into conflict with them as I expanded against Pontus, whom they were fighting. After that, the fight was on! Having trained her forces to a high degree of experience and equipped them with the latest armor and weapons, Egypt was a force to be reckoned with. If you want to experience punishment, try your western soldiery against a force of Pharoahs
Spearmen backed up by his Archers, all sporting plenty of silver chevrons, swords and shields for quality. Allied with plenty of fast moving Cavalry and Chariotry, also well experienced, these armies are almost unstoppable with a Greek army woefully deficient in Heavy Cavalry and decent light infantry. The deserts and passes of the Cilician Gates were heaped with the bodies of the slain from these deadly encounters. I only succeded in taking some of the cities in Syria and Palestine by enticing Egypt into a fight to the death over the entrances to Antioch. Even when I defeated her armies in the field, my armies were left in ruins for many turns.

While holding off Egypt, I was eventually able to finish of the Romans, and take on the Gauls for the win. It was actually pleasant to be fighting the plain old, predictable Barbarian hordes. Much has been written on fighting them, so I won't bore everyone with details on how to win against them. I would sure appreciate someone else's ideas on effective strategy and tactics against the Egyptians.

One more thing about finishing off Rome. An advantage that developed during the naval war was that I never did have to completely eliminate the Scipii. I cleared the Italian mainland by naval assault supported by a land attack from Illyria, finishing off the Julii, and the Senate in the process. (Well, I did have to take the little Island of Palma to finally eliminate the Julii) After this I sealed off North Africa, all the way to the Atlantic, and then stormed Sicily with another,two pronged, naval invasion led by some Spartan hoplites, in company with some onagers and ancillary troops. It was rather comocal seeing all the Scipii armies gathering around the Carthaginian ports with nowhere to go. This is the beauty of a close blaockade. I wonder if Napoleon
pondered this on the Island of Elba as he walked the lonley hours along the beaches staring out to sea after his defeat?

rotorgun

[cesar the mighty]

i started tough. i took corinth, athens and then rinforced my army to attack the romans. as im better at defending, ijust stood in front of the others army face so then it attacked

[GreatEmperor]

For the Alliance Problem: You should make peace with all of those your at war with, so they become Neutral. After that it's much easier to make allies since you don't have much enemies.

[Emperor Aurelius]

Well Seamus to be quite honest with you I cannot answer your question.Im no expert at seige assualt with the greeks.I reccomend building 6-7 ladder regiments of hoplite or a unit even better than that.Try and overwhelm the walls.WHen I was rome in the early campaign the Greeks actually nearly took a cityt from me in a direct assault.They used plenty of seige ladders and the sort.I lost 80% of my army trying to get them off my walls!MY histatii were actually no match for their spartan hoplites and even regular hoplites did some nice damage!

Spartans are the best for assault though.Armoured hoplites and regular hoplites will work too.As long as you have a large army.

Oh yes and you are correct (whoever said it) about the fact that I cant predict exactly how they will attack or what order the attack will be in.But thats what happened to me so I'm just sharing.BUt IRecommend you only buld 2 militia hoplites in syracuse.I like to see Rome lose 1600 men trying to take a city and kill 600 of my men....

[Emperor Aurelius]

ALso rot brings up an intereseting point about the greek armies lack of good calvary.I noticed this.ALso there hoplites tend to be annoying due to the fact thatt hey are extremely unflexible....try that against the fast moving desert axemen and chariots...

[bubbanator]

Attacking doesn't have to be a disadvantage as the Greeks. I used it to my advantage several times when defeating an enemy quickly was of great importance.

As you advance your battleline towards the enemy, have your mercs and whatever cavalry you have on the flanks. Stop your line about 50 feet from the enemy. The enemy should charge you in which case you then have two options.

1) If your army is larger of close to the size of the enemy army, close the flanks and begin to encircle the enemy with your phalanxes and mercs on the sides of your line. Send your cavalry around to the rear of the enemy and slam into the center.

2) If the enemy has substancialy larger army than yours, instead of closing the flanks, you will want to refuse the flanks by slanting your edge phalanxes and putting mercs on the edges of those like this:
.............. _________
........... /...aaaaaa.... \
cc........m.......m..........m........cc

a = archers m = mercs c = cavalry
*I had to put all of the dots because the edit screen was being retarded and wouldn't line things up right. Disregard them.


The enemy will then procede to plow themselves into your elite phalanxes in the center of your line. They will be harrassed by archers and will be unable to get to them because of the semi-circle you made. Send your cavalry around the flanks and hit them in the rear, pinning them between your cavalry and a row of sharp pointy sticks.




As for a general stratagy, after you consolidate most of Greece and repel the Brutii incursion, you can make an invasion of Italy and finish off the Brutii then move on Capua to take out the Scipii and then rebuild and take on the Senate. After that, it is all about taking the offensive. Your lands are safe for now and you can begin offensives in all areas of the world. Push up into Gaul, take the rest of Greece and move north to unite your empire, assult Asia Minor and then you can attack the Selucids. After that, it is always fun to pincer the Egyptians. Have your armies push from the north and send an invasion force to pillage their main cities over near Alexandria.

[Alexanderofmacedon]

If the enemy has got wooden walls you haven't got much choice than a battering ram, but if you plan to siege a city with stone walls, just siege and wait for them to sally or to attack you, if they attack you, you will never lose because the hoplites are such a good defending troops that it's almost impossible for the enemy to win.

That's what I do, even as Romans. With the legionaries, the javelins thrown route a couple of enemy units before they hit my line. With those routs the morale of enemy drops and usually I win he battle with very few casualties...

[rotorgun]

Bubbanator,

Your formation is right on for the situation you described about being outnumbered. It was the only formation I was able to use against some of the superior Egyptian armies that attacked my Greek force. I especially like the use of mercenary infantry to guard the flanks and rear of the Phalanx line. I was trying the same formation, but using Heavy Peltasts instead. They are not as good in melee as the Barbarian Mercs, admittedly, but those units were not always availiable to the Greeks while fighting in the east. The only difficulty was transistioning this formation for pursuit once the enemy began to break. I had to keep toggling off the "Phalanx formation" icon so my Hoplites could keep up, and at the same time be ready to toggle it back on if the enemy was able to reform.

[GreatEmperor]

You don't need to put off Phalanx formation if you group the units. If you do that they will all walk the same speed. Just use some more cavalry and let them chase the units that are fleeing. The Hoplites will stay in Phalanx and everyone will keep their position. Be aware that you don't put the cavalry in the same group because if you order the whole group the walk and then order a few units to chase your whole group messes up.

[rotorgun]

Good advice GE,

In most situations using your cavalry to chase the routers is appropriate, as that is what they are designed for. There were a few battles, against armies with a large contingent of experienced units, that my cavalry was unable to keep up enough pressure on the routing units alone to keep the others from reforming. I found it helpful to have the main infantry line continuing to slog forward to discourage this tendency. I found that by grouping the phalanx as a seperate group I could get them to run as a formation when I toggled off the form phalanx icon. If the enemies main line tried to reform while my cavalry were off chasing some of their routers, especially other cavalry, I then simply ordered the phalanx to reform. This usually induced the enemy to rethink their plans of a rearguard action.

It was not the case in every situation, of course. I only intended to mention a peculiarity of the hoplite units. I also tend to give my entire army a doubletime command once I see the enemy attempt to withdraw. I then refine this by giving each unot or group a specific target or group of targets to chase. I found that this is not the most ideal approach with a phalanx line if I needed to keep formation.

[rotorgun]

Good advice GE,

In most situations using your cavalry to chase the routers is appropriate, as that is what they are designed for. There were a few battles, against armies with a large contingent of experienced units, that my cavalry was unable to keep up enough pressure on the routing units alone to keep the others from reforming. I found it helpful to have the main infantry line continuing to slog forward to discourage this tendency. I found that by grouping the phalanx as a seperate group I could get them to run as a formation when I toggled off the form phalanx icon. If the enemies main line tried to reform while my cavalry were off chasing some of their routers, especially other cavalry, I then simply ordered the phalanx to reform. This usually induced the enemy to rethink their plans of a rearguard action.

It was not the case in every situation, of course. I only intended to mention a peculiarity of the hoplite units. I also tend to give my entire army a doubletime command once I see the enemy attempt to withdraw. I then refine this by giving each unot or group a specific target or group of targets to chase. I found that this is not the most ideal approach with a phalanx line if I needed to keep formation.

'[the Greeks] all raised a shout...then they were all running forward... clash[ing] their speaers and sheilds together. But the Persians, even before they were in the range of arrows, wavered and ran away' - Xenophon

[Alexanderofmacedon]

When your phalanx's are given to you in battle formation they are given in this sort of fassion:

---------
---------
---------
---------

That is not enough of a front line for a phalx unit. I spread them out into only two lines:

------------------------
------------------------

Then put lines of peltasts behind, to make depth good, for keeping cavalry from breaking lines.

------------------------
------------------------
==============
==============

In my opinion that's way better, then having deep units of phalanx.

[Craterus]

I do 3 rows per unit, if it's all infantry, but they withstand cavalry charges a lot better 4 lines deep.

[Alexanderofmacedon]

True, but if you have phalanx longer it is more useful for me. Not to mention the fact that I do have infantry 4 lines deep. The second two rows are just heavy peltasts.

[rotorgun]

You have an interesting suggestion for the phalanx; backing up the extended line with Heavy Peltasts seems intriguiging. I assume that you toggle off the default "skirmisher " mode? Do you do the same with the "fire at will " command, or do you preferr to command each HP unit to fire? It seems to me that by combining the two units in such a way one gets a sort of "legionary" unit with super long spears in front. The only question remains, what do you do about the flanks of such an extened line?

One of the main reasons that the Phalanx worked so well was the very depth of the formation giving it that forward impetous during the "Othismos Aspidon", or push of shields stage of melee combat. To quote Ploibius:

" those further back than the fifth rank [in a phalanx] cannot use thier pikes
[in a charge]...But those men by sheer pressure of their bodily weight in the charge add to its force".

Do the Heavy Peltasts in the rear make up for this lack of pushing power? The
Phalanx line you suggest could be too brittle to withstand the charge(Ephodos) of an similar force of Hoplites arranged normally.

Rotorgun

[bubbanator]

I usualy set my phalanxes to 3 or 4 ranks depending on the situation and the type of hoplites that they are. You don't want militia hoplites 2 ranks deep. A group of pesants charging will break it in two. My stratagy for most battles is to draw the enemy into my center where my Amored Hoplites are waiting four ranks deep to withstand anything they throw at me while my flanking troops and cavalry hit them in the rear. Your line doesn't even have to be longer than their's for this to work either. If you present your center as the most obvious target, then that is where they will converge upon. Pin them between Greek Cavalry and Armored Hoplites, even elite units will rout in such a prediciment. Once they do you can just mash whatever's left of them into the ground with your cavalry.