How to survive the early turns of the Roma mod?

[econ21]

[I just posted something like this post in the RTR Roma mod forum, but am repeating it here as some criminal patrons here encouraged me to try the dratted thing. ]

Anyone here care to walk me through the first few turns of the Roma mod? It was recommended to me in my thread on RTR in this forum and I really like the look of it. (Could be influenced by the very nice v6.0 Roman skins.) But it just seems maddeningly hard to start.

I consolidated my forces into one army. Spent all my money building two buildings and now am making a small loss, running a deficit. The Greeks in southern Italy have very scarey armies, so I avoided them and went to attack the Arretium. I was attacked by a full strength rebel army and had a Pyrrhic victory, losing nearly all my army.

Any advice I can get would be appreciated, but I have a few specific questions:

(1) With the economy, how far in debt can you go? Is there an overdraft limit? Do you pay interest? Do you get sacked if you beyond a certain level of debt (what level)?

(2) How do you manage the early economy - disband some troops to save costs? or build more troops at the cost of a deficit? I've read you should fight exhausting battles and then retrain to resurrect your army - is that the idea? I've been trying to balance my books, which seems to rule that out. But is balancing your books a mistake?

(3) What should be your early build priorities? I liked the idea of an archery range in Rome - but did not see how to afford any troops without going into the red.

(4) Any hints on fighting battles? Against the rebels, I deployed a long line of hastati and principes, set to fire at will with javelinmen at the front. The AI matched the length of my line, swept aside my skirmishers and virtually wiped out my principes/hastati in mutually assured destruction. Only aggressive charges with triarii and my general's cav saved the day. I've read that you need to exploit the AIs stupidity to win - any examples of this?

I really like the appearance of this mod, but right now it just seems far too difficult for me. Any help getting over the initial learning curve would be greatly appreciated. Uninstalling and going back to RTR just feels deflating. I suspect if I could get the hang of this mod, it would keep me going for a long time.

[Spartiate]

Just finished the Hannibals War mod for RTR which was similarly difficult.I'm gonna try the Roma mod on monday and i'll share commiserations with you then.Is it true that the Roman line up has been changed to include the historically accurate units of the day?

[econ21]

Not sure - the Romans have the usual equites, hastati, triari and principes plus some velites that are not called velites (yet). Perhaps the main difference is that you can only build these in Rome and elsewhere you get weak auxiliaries of the appropriate culture. The Roman units are really nice looking - RTR v6.0 skins - but fight like Gaulish warbands!

I've temporarily given up on the mod. The battles don't feel right - I was back to relying on my General's cav for shock combat - and the strategic issues seem an exercise in frutration. But I'll be interested to hear how you get on.

[Spartiate]

Whew...................this is bloody hard.I hit upon the right strategy almost(entirely to be honest) by accident.I immediately wasted my treasuary upgrading some buildings in Roma and training new Hastati and Triarii.I sent one army north to lay siege to Arretium and one south to lay siege to Bovianum.Phyrrus of Epirus was sitting on the other side of the city with a much superior force and he didn't want to talk peace.Anyway.......the rebels sallied in Arretium(outnumbered me 3:1) and a horrible battle ensued in which i killed most of them and lost most of my own troops as well.I lost my skirmishers because apparently they cannot SKIRMISH.At the end we had a draw and my army dissolved leaving a weak Arretium which the Gauls later took.Now the pressure is on.
Next turn and Phyrrus attacks me.I retreat for the first time since STW.A second Greek army lays siege to Neapolis,the bank account is empty and things are looking grim indeed.I pulled every available unit together to reinforce my faction heir and went back to face Phyrrus.At last a bit of luck.I had the high ground.I now know how to use my non-skirmishing skirmishers and i think i had 5 units of Triarii in total plus some Hastati ,one Principes and assorted Italian Auxiliaries.I won an Heroic Victory and headed straight down to relieve Neapolis.A second Heroic Victory left the Greeks quiet short of troops on Italian soil and the next turn(bank account well into negative figures now)i lay siege to Croton.I go straight in on the next turn and with my troops losses plus this new city all of a sudden i have a yearly profit of 1280 to 800 denarii per turn.Over the next few turns i took Tarentum(Greek army disappeared to later appear at Patavium) and eventually Bovanium while training no new troops.After another 8 turns i ended up with money to spend once again.Oh i slaughtered the population of all cities i took.........you really need the cash.
This mod is very hard and the troops cost way too much in upkeep for their limited abilities and poor morale.I can afford only one standing army and all my garrisons are poxy Town Watch.All my cities are constantly at 85% happiness and i am vulnerable to attacks by any number of factions if they should turn on me.Having said all that i am really enjoying it but i never would have stuck it out with-out the hard lessons of that first defeat.
So basically don't try to maintain large armies,make treaties left right and center and always slaughter populations when you conquer.Hope this was of at least SOME help.I have never been so challenged by this game.


P.S i love the speeches.

[ScionTheWorm]

Ally with Gauls before the greeks does it (first turn). March into greek provinces in southern italy and wait for them to attack you. You may loose a lot of battles this way, but more troops will probably not come as they're having trouble on other fronts too. After you've crushed the greeks you take all provinces up to gaul. If gaul wages war on you meanwhile killing greeks, just try to keep them from invading you. Shouldn't be any trouble as long as you don't take any provinces from them...

Btw when killing greek you'll loose a lot of soliders, so you will get more to train new troops... so don't care too much about the economics except for this war.

I think the problem comes when you own most of italy. Gauls are the worst

[Slaists]

my 2 cents...

before i start, i have to note, i followed the author's "house rules": i.e., huge unit size, no extermination of populations (just enslaving or occupying); no destroying temples until you can build your own, etc. following these did make the game more fun.

i have to confess, i used to take all generals out of my towns (except rome) before storming an enemy town though... this approach made rome's growth much faster. note, you can recruit most roman units in rome with 0 build time...

0. obtain trade rights with gauls (if possible: ally with them), carthagians, and.... GREEKS (until they attack)... i was able to keep carthage as my trusted trade partner for quite some time... (until i actually had an army to move into sicily). hey, i even allied with carthage for some time while they were battling greeks in sicily. by the way, carthagian troops in Roma are not easy opponents... check their stats before attacking them :) not sure if this is considered "cheating": i charged about 1000 dinarii for map + trade rights + aliance/ceasefire packages in the first round...

1. i didn't try to build ANY new troops for some time... exception: town milita units to garrison... and some italian auxiliaries to complement my main consular army consisting of rotarii, hastati, principes and triarii...

2. rebel towns. i took Bovianum (like in round 2-3). it was a a good fight (the rebel army there were no pushovers since the greek town levies can be deadly in city streets). i achieved a couple benefits: a battered army (lower upkeep; i wouldn't merge the battered units - just replenish them when needed) and a cash source (the Bovianum alone allowed me to move into "blue" numbers). i followed up with arretium but not until i was done with the greeks in the south. note, the rebels near arretium serve as a buffer between you and the gauls initially. their armies are not weak and the gauls are not able to match them for some time.

there is a little caveat in attacking bovianum: in the first move, leave your general (a +5 management star guy) in Capua rather than make him attack Bovianum (helps the cash flow) and attack using your captain. in the third turn (it will be summer again), move the general out of Capua to join the beseiging army and lead the assault. make your triarii take the walls: it will be quite some fight but u'll enjoy it... i would suggest getting rotarii up the wall at some remote place and order them to take over the unmaned sections of walls: helps in eliminating the wandering garrison units...

3. in general: don't expand into the gaul territories until you really have to... those are expensive and slow to subdue. rather: clean the italian south from greeks. the towns to the south are profitable whereas the ones to the north are an expense item on your books for quite some time...

4. try to manage the "flow" of greek armies by intelligently placed forts. man the forts with understrength (depleted) auxilia units for lower upkeep. the forts are there not to stop the enemy but to delay until u are able to move your main army to deal with them. note, if the enemy beseiges a fort, your cash flow does not get hit whereas if it's a town - you lose a lot of money... very important in the start game while the money is tight.

5. in dealing with the greeks: make them attack you! they are vulnerable in attack while being very hard when on defense... my tactic was to beseige a greek town and wait for their reinforcements to come so i could fight them with my army defending. preferably, make them attack you in the winter (with the timer on: shorter battle allowance); if you have to attack (i used to attack and destroy all smaller greek groups marauding southern italy whenever i had a chance): attack in the summer... you will notice, that a few crucial battles will provide you the turn in the tide of war... ahhh, yes, try to avoid pyrr's army until you have dealt with his minion armies... my tactic was just let him do what he pleases and attack the others in his rear... build a fort in his backyard if you do not want to face him after a successful attack on a minor greek army.

6. once you are done with the greeks in southern italy, the turn of the gauls should come. most likely, they would have attacked you by now already... my initial goal was to conquer all of northern italy and seal off mountain passes with forts. once that front is secured, you will likely have a decent cash flow able to support another consular army (hastati, principes, triarii, velites) for expanding somewhere else...

7. as far as units go: rotarii are good! :) they have low upkeep, no-melee ability to speak of, however their effect on enemy morale is devastating... my general battle-tactic against greeks (and the gauls) was to let the enemy approach, pepper them with rotarii first, then, let the hastati line unload their pila; then the principes line do their damage... by the time the enemy hits yours lines, their morale is already pretty low...

8. always watch your wallet! :) roma is hard on it! :)

9. by romanizing cities you are effectively cutting down your trade income... (balancing between economy and military power...); there is no hit on trade with the first level of the scipia buildings, a 20% (i think) hit with the second level scipia, a 50% (or so) hit with the municipality and a whooping 80% hit with the full citizenship... i personally do not agree with the approach that developing your cities should damage your trade income... but, i guess, the author was trying to model a system where the lesser citizens are taxed more... i tried to mod the game so the hit would be on the taxable income instead: but it did not work as intended (the tax level was unaffected). i modded my copy so that the municipa (you need municipia to build the higher level trade buildings) hit on trade income was reduced to 30% after accounting for a little trade bonus i gave to the roads... (+1 to trade for every level of roads); i left the full-citizenship hit on trade unaffected though... i have to note, i was able to pull a positive cash flow with the vanilla settings though... however, i had no cities at municipa level or higher except rome in that game (i didn'f finish the campaign).

10. build up fleets! i had wolf packs of 5 ships guarding every two ports... once the &I^^!@# hits the fan: the AI will block your ports and you will be losing a lot of cash unless you kick their boats away before the blockade even starts.

11. note, the greeks are a bit easier (lower stats) than the vanilla greeks in RTR

12. get a unit of barbarian cavalry mercenaries into your main army asap... playing on huge unit size, hunting down the routers so they don't come back to haunt u becomes a very important tactic...

what else? hmm, i'll edit the post if i remember :)

other than that, enjoy! this is a great mod! :)

p.s. as far as your question on building priorities: i made construction of all economic buildings my priority number one... you have to prioritize though: many provinces have harbors removed: those have bad prospects as far as trade revenue generation goes. the harbor-less territories become prime candidates for "full citizenship" with delayed trade building development (Ariminum being one example). an academy in rome is important too... provides you with a source for anciliaries early. roads are important too... since you won't be able to build AND have another professional army for some time: the ability to move your consular forces around the peninsula will be crucial. as far as garrisons go: i would have town militia for mass complemented by the italian auxilia (cheap upkeep) and a few units of hastati hanging around Capua. Capuan hastati can reach most towns you control at the beginning of the game once you have paved roads. They help a lot to fight the rebels...

p.p.s. the trait acquiring system for roman generals has been changed in the mod. if you leave them in town for too long (a few turns might be too long), they'll acquire really nasty generalship traits... :)