Dacia

[IliaDN]

Originally posted by Dromikaites
the Romanians chose to fight: difficult terrain, where the technical (heavily armoured Polish or Hungarian knights) or numerical superiority (Turks and Tartars) were negated. Now, back to their ancestors, the Dacians

The ancestors of the Romanians were Romans not Dacians, and trust me, all my fellow Romanians say that Romanians are half Dacian half Roman. But how can this be true when Romanians speak a latin based language and has no Dacian elements whatsoever. (lets not forget what happened to the native Indians in North America)

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Patria Nostra Romania

Maybe you should post this as a thread in Monastery, if you want detailed answers?

[pezhetairoi]

Alright, I've started on a Dacian campaign and I have some insights to offer. Firstly, going for Getae is basically a waste of time since your main army is closer to Tylis. Don't even waste time trying to attack Lovosice and Aquincum. They're so undeveloped and so low in population that they simply aren't worth the effort. Secondly, the Thracians start spamming peltastai quickly, and are soon coming up with falxmen in Getae, so your best bet would be to strike hard and fast for Tylis. In my campaign I only took Tylis after 10 turns OF manoeuvre to draw all Thracian forces into the north, around Campus Getae, and even after taking Tylis my debt didn't improve. Yes, that's one thing you'll note--the Dacian debt is the most annoying thing you'll have to deal with early-game. You can't exterminate, because then the tax rate would fall crazily for a one-off injection of cash, and you can't retrain even then, because you'll be in debt. It all boils down to casualty minimising, which is difficult. Eventually I managed to lock the sum of the Thracian army in Campus Getae (idiots) and besieged them until they gave up and sallied, upon which I shot them to pieces with my archers.

As Dacia you will not get any rest from Macedon once you take Thrace. In my game, the moment I took Campus Getae a large Macedonian army marched for Porrolissum, and was only drawn away from there by my storming of Bylazora. In my campaign, the Macedonians went a little crazy on light lancers, I'm afraid. You know something's wrong when the MAcedonians behave like the Scythians and send a 12-unit army with 11 of lancers. Well anyway. I drove straight for Thessalonica after retraining my depleted grand army (still the only I had, with my western frontier under threat from Macedon, who had Segestica, my northern one threatened by Germania, who had Lovosice, and my eastern frontier threatened by Scythia, which was building up menacingly.

I turned my faction heir into a military genius in the Thessalonian plains when he came under attack from two great Macedonian armies (all of which had 11-12 lancers) which he managed to beat off with combined operations from flaming arrows, massed family-member charges (I had 7 family members with me, the sum of my royalty) and falxmen in flanks. Nevertheless, I sustained seriously heavy losses. If I recall, in those three battles I lost nearly a quarter of my army (including 2 factioners), mostly in barbarian cavalry and gaesatae, in exchange for utter victory and 2 Macedonian family members killed, which is all in all not too bad a deal. Then I played a Napoleonic style campaign that drove apart three Macedonian armies (yes, it was frantic) trying to merge, crushed the faction heir's force, and attacked the largest element after that just outside Thessalonica, drawing out the garrison and emptying the town in my victory. Thessalonica was plague-ridden so I just sent two gaesatae in.

In summary of the rest of the campaign, I fought two more great battle which later emptied Larissa and Athens for my taking, signed an alliance with the Brutii, and took Segestica which turned rebel after my capture of Thessalonica. I also took Aquincum, having earned enough money to raise a new army exclusively of nobles, falxes and chosen swordsmen and archers. I'm poised for a two-pronged attack of the Romans after I finish off Macedon in Corinth.

I think Dacia has been the most challenging campaign I have faced so far. Even when I was playing Armenia and faced my first defeat, I do not think the situation was ever as desperate as mine... One grand army of mediocre troops facing three large armies of the deadliest light cavalry ingame, saddled with monstrous 5-digit debt... At least my Armenian economy never let me down.

What paths of expansion have you Dacians tried out? Any variation from mine?

[Mountaindew]

my experiences with dacia is to immediately defeat thrace, macedonia and the brutii. its a lot of hard work, so always take control of battles yourself. like pezhetairoi said, its all about casualty minising.

my plan was to take greece, establish a nice base in greece, and launch my plans from there. starting where u started isnt good at all. a good plan (that i have found) is when you are about to be attacked by the germans or scythians from the north, porrolisium and campus gaetae are definitely theirs - concentrate on getting greece. destroy all buildings, and move troops out of towns...the money will do you good.

one thing i also found about playing greece - the plague can be annoying, when it started from Thessalonica. if you control Thessalonica, dont let nething out. if you dont, dont send ne spies to infiltrate it YET. all of greece was under the plague - one thing that dacians lack at the beginning is population, along with money. this deadly plague delayed me from taking all of greece, so i had to duel with the brutii a bit.

so once you have greece in your hands, its pretty easy from there. nobles, chosens, onagers kick ass!

[Mountaindew]

battle wise, ive found in the beginning that a mixture of cavalry + archers are effective, particularly against the greek factions. they have slow hoplites which u can shoot to bits from long range, and mass ur cavalry to drive away their missle troops.

against rome, however, its gonna be a lot harder. yr cavalry r gonna work a lot harder. all this is pre-chosen, pre-nobles. once u got chosens and nobles, then it becomes a lot easier. A LOT EASIER. especially with onagers and ballistae, u can afford to sit back and rain expendable projectiles rather than being all barbaric and charging in with nothing to fall back 2.

if only they had horse archers...damn...

thats my 2 cents...

[gmjapan]

My Dacian Campaign fell flat at the first hurdle.

I drove all available units south to the nearest Mac city. The first major engagement was going really well. Was. My units, despite having an advantage started routing. First 1, then 3, then, well the rest really. The Mac army was suddenly like a hot knife through butter.

I even heard myself say "butter" in realisation at the scene infront of me!

I couldnt recover after that (no wonga) so quit. I fully intend to start a Dacian campaign again soon though after review of some of the comments here. The challenging start position is too appealling...