Spain

[Tzar Kaloyan]

Your post inspired me to take this faction! Taking up a challange was what I was looking for in my now previous campaign for the Dacians. Turns out it wasn't much of challange as there was just too much breathing room for the Dacians to expand quickly and get really dangerous. So, Spain it is on vhard/vhard.

Frankly, I expected a dire troop situation, but Spain starts with 2 decent armies. Merge these into one and you have an awesome army at start!

Your peninsula is like a bottle -- put an army up in Osca or ambushing in the passage, and you have secured your area, save from the sea invasions.

Furthermore, you only have 2 basic immediate challangers -- Gauls and Carthage. You have to take both their cities, but should do it in steps.

Carthage views itself as a world power, like the Romans, which makes them arrogant. That means that you should forget to extract large sums of money from them. In addition, they should get really busy elsewhere and probably won't have enough resources to reinforce their armies. Thus, the theory is that if you smash them before they get a chance to grow their presence on the peninsula, you won't be challanged too much by them. What I did was to send a diplomat to their ambushing army (he reaches it on the 2nd turn) and extract an alliance, trade rights and map information for a 2-turn tribute of 2,850 per turn. This gives me enough time to bring my Northern army (I left my old faction leader by himself to guard the town) and merge it with my Southern army, before paying a visit to my new ... 'allies.'

Gauls are really not interested in a war with you, at least not from what I have seen. Their first action is to take their troops out of the peninsula, probably to support the war against the Britons! Although their town lies smack in the middle of your area and from both strategical and tactical standpoint should be your first conquest, I would advise you leave it for after you have dealt with Carthage. In contrast to Carthage, the Gauls immediately accepted my proposal for an alliance, trade rights and map information and coughed up 2-turn tribute of 5,000 without any haggling! Like Arnold, I kill the people I like last!

The diplomatic haggling should bring you some early money. Your first priority is to build roads, followed by economic buildings. Disbanding units is not always recommendable, although I would partially agree with you in this case -- getting rid of one of the two townwatch units in each of the cities allows you to continue maintaining order even at highest tax rates. Begin to gear up your army production in Osca -- it's where the fighting is going to be!

Well, this is just my assessment of looking at the map and playing for 4 turns. In theory it looks so wonderfully simple and straight forward. Now I need to get back to my campaign and start executing! Good fighting to you soldier, hope my rambling helped you.

[Tzar Kaloyan]

Mdaaa, now I see what you meant about the Romans in Osca. The way to go is to send your armies there on turn one and wait for the Julii. They will come.

Looks like playing for the Spanish successfully is a third-try-can-succeed deal. My first two attempts were shortlived. Although the peninsula is fairly protected, the Julii keep disembarking next to Osca -- never seen such determined buggers!

The success of this third campaign so far rests on three things:

1) Single-mindedness. Everything is done to support the effort of defending Osca from Julii. An alliance was signed (and honored so far) with Carthage and although the Gauls refused an alliance, nothing was done to offend them (yes, that means no traspassing through their land)

2) Bribing. This was already discussed in the previous posts above -- I merely modified the strategy a bit. Since I did not want to anger the Gauls and open another front (my undoing in the second campaign), I had to raise an army on the East Coast exclusively. The best way to do it? Bribe the rebels!

Some of you, and I was in that camp before, look at the rebels as a punching bag to train your generals. Instead, as the Spanish, you should look at them as a very, and I can't emphacise enough the word VERY, cheap source of army units. Let's do a simple math: let's say you want to recruit 4 units of mercenaries -- cavalry, 2 infantry and a slinger. The cavalry will cost you ~850, the infantry -- ~750-800 each, and the slinger will be another 750. The total will be ~3,100. But my diplomat successfully bought out 2 such rebel armies for ~1,100 each! That is an ~80% discount! In fact I felt in such love with bribing, that I bought myself the Carthagenian army (the captain that guards the passage) for ~1,200!

3) Seal your key passages with strong rebel armies! Here is how you can execute this strategy (real example). A rebel army appeared just north of Osca. It had 5 strong units. In the city was my army of about 20 units with a 7-star general. My army attacked the rebels from the south. The rebels retreated further north towards the passage. I waited a turn (because if you do it the same turn you will actually fight them) and then repeated. The rebels retreated again, going up and into the passage. I left them alone and for 5 turns now, not a single Gaul army has come from there. And when I will need additional troops, I will send my diplomat to buy this army.

You can do the same with bridges and other key choke points that are not important as trade routes.

As for fighting the Romans, note that none of your early troops, even when lead by an experienced general, will stand toe-to-toe with the Roman troops (anything above a town watch). They will turn and run. It is utterly important to flank with another unit to give your frontal unit some breathing space. And remember -- the proper place for all this cavalry is charging from behind (or as bait to pull aside enemy units).

A good strategy against the Romans (and their mostly sword infantry units) is to use a strong first line of missile units -- slingers work best, backed by a second line (naked fanatics or iberian infantry) that can stop a charge if needed, but won't do much fighting otherwise. I then use about 6 round-shield cavalry units (3 on each flank) to flank the enemy and pursue. The idea is to advance within a shooting distance and start shooting. The Romans will either just stand there (thank the AI for this) or will attack you. In case of attack, give them a nice warcry from your second line -- that will slow them or stop them, giving your first line some more time to shoot. Once the Romans engage your infantry line, flank with cavalry. With a good general on your side, the Romans will route fairly quickly.

There are some variations you need to use depending on the Roman army you face. If the Romans have a lot of Velites, a shooting match will result in high casulties for you as well if you have similar missile units. In this case, charge with your cavalry, have the infantry run behind them, then pull the cavalry and let the infantry melee them. Run your cavalry around and hit their sides. Don't use your skirmishers UNLESS things are tight -- casulties from friendly fire can be fairly significant.

Another variation is when you face Roman family members and their cavalry. Those guys can kill an awful lot of your swordsmen and the AI just LOVES to charge with them. In such cases, I use a unit of Barbarian mercenaries to guard my center, while my cavalry protects my flanks. When the AI charges, I counterattack and in 90% of the cases manage to kill their general even before their infantry has reached my line.

As far as fighting the Gauls, cut their warbands with your iberians or naked fanatics, but above all USE the wardogs! A warband that has already engaged the dogs will route if another unit charges it.

Now, soldier, take the Spaniards on vhard/vhard and if you DON'T win the game with them, then ... just repeat the reading!

I keep learning from my campaign and editing my post. One good way of attacking a strong enemy, in addition to bringing a strong army , is to end your turn on a bridge. Once you start expanding north into Gaul territory, you will be well-advised to follow this strategy -- the Gauls are powerful (at least in my game) and they have full-stack armies in the south. By stopping on a bridge, you always ensure that if attacked, you will defend the bridge. It is much easier to stop a number of chosen soldiers at the bridge, then to face them out in the open!

[Maltz]

I just tried a Vh/Vh campaign as the Spain for only about 5 years. I have gained 4 settlements (Carthage's Croduba + 3 of Gaul) and has a healthy income of 5000+/turn. I hope my experiences would be useful to you:

1) Spain is very poor at the beginning, so I didn't build any more unit except garrison peasants.

There are only 2 factions who will buy your map for about 2.5k each (in Vh, I am not sure in other settings). I have not exterminated a single town because I wish to keep the population and let them pay more taxes in the long run. So far 70% of my income is tax, then some trade and mining.

Once your diplomat travels far enough to sell maps to the Romans (4 chances in total), and meet other diplomats from all over the world, the poverty is officially over. Feel free to bribe all captains you see.

2) I separated my starting army into 2 groups, led by the 2 best generals (btw, the starting clan leader died in 3 turns). Spanish has great starting generals.

The first group took the Gaul settlement, the 2nd took the Carthage settlement. The AI usually sends out some captain-led army to look around, so it is easy to storm the castle. I sent my starting diplomat to bribe the Carthage army - free slinger and cavalry right away!

3) Many players mentioned that the starting army of Spain is poor. I think they are not that bad because their starting generals are really awesome. The round shield cavalry is good enough for a lot of purpose, while the skirmishers can be treated as regular food soldiers. Slingers kill a lot of warband in sieges.

So far only one battle was hard. The hard battle comes from Roman! The Julii soon landed a 8-unit army led by a 3-star family member, but after a bloody struggle ended up in a cross-sword close to my town. I gained 3 retinues in that single battle! The Julii just landed their 2nd army, but were 3 miserables hastati. Also, it is beside my new town. I am already quite happy that they no longer bother invading my starting pennisula.

4) Expansion is slow and rather linear, because there is really only 1 general directions to go: towards the European mainland. Thus the Spanish campaign is not really complicated. There is nothing very outragerous to try early on, so there is no crazy territorial gain.

5) Barbarians' settlements are good to "occupy" because there is no cultural penalty. However, barbarian lands are poor and always have economic hardship for the lack of ports. Taking 20 babarian towns (eliminating German and Brits) doesn't really mean "20" as Carthage or Numidia taking Italy, and of course not as Burtii taking Balkan. I'd rather march towards Rome even before Guals are gone. Leaving them weak prevent the Brits and Germans from their grand invasion. Buy some precious time for ourselves.

However, due to the long distance between Rome and Spain, by the time of the great Spanish invasion, Romans should have developed a bit and quite powerful. While finance is always tight, I guess there will be some really hard fights...

6) Somewho nodbody wants to ally with me, same as being Carthage and Numidia. Therefore, I have to be prepared to face Germania + Britania on one end, Roman on the other end.

So far although I am still winning, my 2 starting armies are not really looking healthy. Most units are about 1/2 strength and I really wish to grab a good town to retrain them all. I guess Gaul's starting capital looks good.

Spain is not a really easy faction to do "crazy expansion", and there is certainly no future to stay and build in Vh/Vh. Our town's growth rate is essentially 0 !! Challenging faction. (not easier than Numidia I think)

[Es Arkajae]

Edit: This guide was written before the 1.2 patch, I'll be completely updating it once I've had a chance to re-evaluate the Spanish more and I will post in this spot to say I've done so. For now just a couple of tweaks regarding slingers and the two missing Spanish units. The rest remains unchanged so keep that in mind.
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Spain is not too difficult, however instead of allying with the Carthaginians at first I would instead reccommend allying with Gaul and then attacking Corduba. First off disband all those useless skirmisher units, and gather your roundshields and Scuttari together, and also hire some Spanish Mercenaries and balearic slingers if you can and march on Corduba, take it and you can then ignore Carthage for the rest of the game and let the Scipii wipe them out.

Corduba is a huge moneymaker if you can get it earlier it will make your job far easier, and you should definantly get it before it reaches 6,000 pop.

Numantia can wait until you're much better prepared, afterall the Gauls are the same culture as yours.

The whole peninsula is easy enough to seal off with just three forts guarding the northern passes (including the two along the coast).

I would also reccommend building a navy at putting it near Osca, as well as a diplomat, once you've conquered Spain and sealed it off and are upgrading for your assault on the world then sit your army in Osca, its close to where you'll be invading and it will be well placed in case a Julii army still gets through.

Use the diplomats to bribe landing Julii armies for as long as you can, and when/if war finally does break out then use your fleet to intercept incoming Julii fleets.

As for missile troops, normal slingers naturally are crap, you will have to use mercenary balearic slingers for most of the early game (or until you've upgraded enough), however one of the types of Spanish religious shrines gives a +3 missile modifier. What you should do is build your slingers in a settlement with a temple giving a +3 experience modifier and then transfer them to a settlement with the +3 missile modifier and retrain them, they will be even better than balearic mercenaries. I say this because slingers unlike balearic mercenaries can be retrained and casualties replaced so that you can take them with you on campaign far from Spain and not have to worry about replacing losses as you can do so in captured settlements.

For your armies the vast bulk should be Scuttari, you may be tempted here to build masses of Bull Warriors, but keep in mind that you need Sacred Circles of Esus to build them, so theres no topping them up in enemy territory from captured cities (unless you want to wait around to build the improvements).

And Scuttari aren't all that less than Bull warriors, especially since unlike the Bull Warriors which have to gain their experience you can build Scutarri with +3 experience with the right religious shrine. This puts them nearly on par with non-experienced Bull Warriors. In fact better in some regards as Scuttari have much better shields providing better protection from missile fire and they take only one turn to build. If on the defensive deploy your Scuttari in a battle line set to fire at will and with enough time to spare have them give a war cry. Sometimes the enemy army will rout just from the javellin volleys.

Bull Warriors though are incredible, they have excellent mellee stats (they also have war cry) their javelins inflict massive damage (+17 ) and they have +2 hit points, their shield is smaller than the Scutarri one but at least they have one. The only problem is that they're very expensive to build (although they don't cost too much to maintain considering), they take two turns to build and that they must be built in a city with a Sacred Circle of Esus which also means they can't be built with experience upgrades. These guys are tough as nails, have great stamina, strong morale and can inflict great damage both with their javelins and their swords.

I would reccommend deploying at least two units of them with your armies (which as said should mostly be Scuttari) the place for these guys is on your frontline flanks. Spain has no spearmen or phalanxes and these guys as damaging as they are and as tough and strong as they are are just what you will need to recieve flanking attacks from the enemy, whether from their cavalry or (if your opponent is fielding across a larger front than you) from multiple foot units all trying to turn your flank. Bull Warriors will lose formation under the initial impact from enemy cavalry, but they will hold their position and fight it out in melee with the enemy cavalry and will most likely win. They are also tough enough to take on two or even three enemy foot units at once. I've seen one unit of these guys hand a couple units of Chosen Swordsmen and two warbands their arses.


Oh and the Spanish are supposed to have Longshield Cavalry and Onagers, in actual fact they don't.

You have to mod the game files in export_descr_buildings to enable the Spanish to build them, just make sure to add the ability for spain to build Carthaginian medium cavalry to all the stable buildings including and after the second tier stable, and carthaginian onagers to all the missile buildings from the second tier missile buildings onwards. That way if you capture a 'civilised' city with higher tier buildings than you (a barbarian faction) can build you'll still be able to build these two units from them.

[Claudius Maniacus Sextus]

I as iberia concentrated the first building slot on econ.,gatherd all units(ex. miltia)in front of the bridge near the carthage's town.Attacked,conquerd,and enslaved the town.also got an alliance with gaul.Build a stable and and a barracks in evrey town,after that only build econ. and used my S-E town for upgr. military structures.made troops constantly for my future gaul campaing,until i had 2 full armys then attacked gaul in the peninsula.placed an army in the N for guarding.Now i control the hole peninsula.next conquerd palma some W african province(yup,war with numidia) finaly convinced carthage to a ceasefire.and after that trained armys containing 3bullwar.8scutari and slingers and cav.
sooo......further conquerd half of gaul teritory then stoped.conquerd more of africa,and so on.
I must mention that for my early peninsular campaing i used mass Iberian Infantry and cav. plus any mercs. i can hire.
This was on H/H and!!!........julii never landed.A tough game nontheless.
PS:Sorry for spelling


Enjoy!

[Imperator]

With the spanish you start off with a good army and several good commanders use them! First capture Numintia because the gauls pull out fairly quickly and the city is undefended. Next go for Corduba because its a really good city and beacuse they usually pull out the garrison you can bribe it easily. Watch Osca the Julii will come after it again and again, but after the first 3 trys they run out of steam and fight the gauls. After you control spain there are two options you can sail to numidia or you can push into gaul. Personally I attacked Numidia because they get long sheild calvalry whitch you have a hard time getting. I also built up an army in northern spain to hold back the julii and to slowly encroach on Gallic land. The gauls peut up a tough fight so you can't just wiz through and hope to win. If you are running low on money here's two usefull tips. 1. Take Palma its an island not far frome the coast of spain and a good money producer. 2. Watch the rebels in your land they will be popping up all over the place.

Good Luck
(P.S. you cand continue a temple of Ball to a temple of Esus)
(P.S.S it make people happier and trains naked fanatics and Bull Warriors)

[Craterus]

The Spanish sound like a good, challenging campaign. That's one to consider for the future. Thanks for the tips everyone.