Strategy for Playing E/W Roman Empire in BI

[Probus]

If You are planning on playing as the E/W Roman Empire factions first in BI, what are your thoughts on strategy for holding the barbarian hordes at bay, and may even driving them back/eliminating them? Likewise on dealing with rebellions/civil wars, as well as religion. Do you plan on simply holding the frontiers, or going on the attack, to take the war to the Barbarians, before they bring it you?

Personally, I'm going to play as the W/Romans first, as this will be a great challenge to see if I can reverse the course of history by destroying the barbarian factions and completely reuniting the Roman Empire!

Strategy wise, I'm planning on maximising my use of the Sarmatian Auxilia, and other roman elite units, as much as my finances will allow. I'll also leave aside monks and other such units, and try to find the optimum roman army mix based upon the units in the BI Demo', the tried and tested roman units from RTW e.g. onagers, and those as yet unseen Roman Lanciri, which I heard mentioned somewhere? Not sure if I will have to take an E/Roman province to be able recruit Plumbatarii, or the fearsome armoured E/Roman cavalry, of which I heard of and seen some screenshots of.

I'll also try to exploit defensive river crossing battles, which I haven't found to be that much more difficult in the BI Demo', and night battles to my maximum possible advantage.

I may also go on the attack opportunistically, if I see a Barbarian faction is being squeezed by the migration of others.

Rebellions and attempts by generals to usurp power will be brutally suppressed. This might also help with the squalor levels in W/Roman cities, which I understand will be high!

Interested in maybe going pagan in the style of Julian the Aposte, whilst avoiding being killed on campaign in Mesopotamia by some bitter Christian, as he was

Ultimately, at the right moment, I relish the challenge of taking on the E/Romans in a war of unification, particularly sweeping down the through Balkans to take Constantinople! As anyone who has played the Roman Civil war download battle will know, this will be awesome!

Like to hear your thoughts.

Cheers

[Taurus]

Hi Probus ,

Sounds like a very nice strategy and it seems you have been planning it for a while .

Personally I would like to start as maybe the Huns or the Vandals but when I do take my turn at restoring the Roman Empire either as the East or the West then I will most probably hold my frontiers from the beginning maintaing a nce perimater and allowing my armies to build up. Then once I fell my armies are strong enough I will then take the war to them.

Thanks

[Doug-Thompson]

Rome Total War's diplomacy game will come closer to the fore in the Barbarian Invasion, I'll bet.

I realize that just sent a shudder of dread through any players reading this.

Seriously, though, I think the diplomacy game design of RTW was very ambitious — maybe overly so. The period of history in the original game didn't lend itself to diplomatic solutions. It was much easier for any but the weakest factions to build some units, conquer some weaker factions, get the economy going and steamroll everybody.

The "Decline and Fall" period is a whole different ball game politically. With a few key improvements to make alliances and protectorates, it could be a situation with a seriously weakened empire having to make short term deals constantly, playing one enemy against another, making sure some factions are defeated but not crushed so they can remain in play, or wiping others out completely.

[Steppe Merc]

The question is, will the diplomatic system be able to handle it?

[Probus]

Hi Taurus,

Thanks for your thoughts on strategy. I hope that you enjoy your first BI campaign, whichever of the Barbarian factions you decide to play first.

You are correct, I have been thinking about my W/Roman strategy since I learnt about the BI XP and the separation of two Roman factions, which I think is both realistic and fantastic in terms of game play/strategy etc.

Having read the latest FAQs, I now know that rivers remain impassable on the campaign map, so I will attempt to hold the Barbarians on the bridges/fords along the Rhine/Danube frontiers, as well as the gap between the two, which from the Sept' UK PC Gamer is where the Alemanni are headed for, not to mention the new city located just north of the eastern North/South pass through the Alps. I will also defend the river frontier of the consolidated W/R' province of Illyria/Dalmatia, which borders the E/Romans north of Salona in RTW.

I omitted to mention Diplomacy and the use of other agents, but I will certainly be aiming to use all three types of agent to maximum effect, which makes me wonder how spies/assassins will be able to interact with Barbarian Hordes? I will definitely use diplomacy to play of

I will have to refine my strategy when I see what armies/garrisons are available to me when the games starts in 363 AD, as I now understand that quite a few cities will also be in revolt from the off. I may strike out and take Tara/Caledonia if it proves to be profitable?

Similarly, I will have to refine my strategy in terms of Religion, having read the latest info' on the interaction of Governor's religious affinities and that of their respective populaces. I also intrigued by mention of sending clergymen to slowly convert settlements to your chosen religion, though I understand that there are not any new types of agents in the BI XP?

Units wise, as said before I intend to be very selective about which Barbarian auxiliary troops I make use of, and generally, as much as my finances will allow, debarbarize my W/Roman armies. From some messing about with BKB's Ad Decium battle, I am now fairly certain that the W/Romans can recruit Plumbatarii, as logically they should, as i found a ready made unit card for the W/R' version.

In terms of Generals revolting, I may try keeping my best generals close to but separate from large armies, with the addition of diplomats/spies, as well, in order to try and discourage large-scale internal revolts.

I was maybe a bit too narrow in singling out the E/W Roman factions, so it would be good to here any other thoughts on strategies for playing any BI factions.

Cheers

[Doug-Thompson]

The question is, will the diplomatic system be able to handle it?

That's a fair question. We'll see.

[sapi]

i hope so.....

[Grifman]

Having read the latest FAQs, I now know that rivers remain impassable on the campaign map, so I will attempt to hold the Barbarians on the bridges/fords along the Rhine/Danube frontiers, as well as the gap between the two, which from the Sept' UK PC Gamer is where the Alemanni are headed for, not to mention the new city located just north of the eastern North/South pass through the Alps.

I suspect this will be pretty much impossible if CA has built this game properly - after all if you can hold the Rhine, Danube, it won't be much of a challenge, will it? You're going to have too many barbarian hordes and WE revolts on your hands. If you lose your army on the frontiers trying to do the impossible, you've lost the game and can't recover. Trying to hold on the frontiers will doom you to disaster.

I suspect that for the WE, at some point, Gaul and Britain will have to be abandoned. There will just be too many hordes crossing the Rhine for you to hold them off. You have to keep Italy and Africa, maybe Spain if you can, but Italy and Africa are the core. You might waste away your armies trying to hold a province that is impossible to do anyway. Timing will be important on when to relinquish control.

This leads to the strategy of not spending money upgrading provinces you can't hold in the short term. Hold Gaul as long as you maximizing your revenue, then fall back, hold the passes in the Alps and Pyrenees, and let the barbarians fight for Gaul and Britain. Sending money to various factions to keep them killing each other might be a viable strategy. Or allying with a weaker faction or two. Whatever you do, keep a strong enough navy to squash any attempts of the barbarians to "vandalize" Africa.

Build up Italy, Africa to produce revenue, watch your back in the East, then retake Spain first (or whatever part of it you lost) since that will be easier to defend once you've taken it. Then build up and try for Gaul.

Should be an interesting campaign if you can pull it off. But trying to hold the Rhine should be a recipe for disaster.

[Orda Khan]

I agree, it does not look ( nor should it ) possible to hold these positions and consolidating seems to me to be the sensible strategy

........Orda

[professorspatula]

A bit early to be coming up with good strategies I imagine.

Anyway, from what I've seen of the campaign map in the recent screenshots, as well as from the demo, the Western Roman empire commands a large portion of the map, but the settlements are spread out and not as dense as in the barbarian lands which seem to consist of many more smaller regions. This suggests lots of armies will come at you (possibly in a short space of time), but it'll take time to bring up reinforcements from across your empire. This coupled with the very high unit upkeep costs for the Romans (in the demo anyway) means you might not be able to even afford an army to keep the hordes at bay when the campaign starts. I imagine a few settlements will have to be sacrificed and a few brave defensive battles on the open field will be required just to keep the barbarians in check before a proper fightback can commence.

Of course, if the AI remains dire, a few cavalry units and medium infantry will destroy anything the AI throws at you and it'll be a walk in the park again. Hoping it isn't like that though.

[Sol Invictus]

I agree; I think Grifman and Orda are assuming a fairly competent AI; oh God don't we all hope. If that is the case, then I agree that the WE will have to as slowly as possible, pull off a fighting withdrawl to the Alps and the Pyrenees and hunker down in Italy and Spain. I will at least make an attempt to hold Gaul; Britain is a lost cause, I'm assuming. It all greatly depends on what direction the Huns take. When playing the WE, I will pray that they go south insted of west. If the WE can keep it's generals loyal and make a good alliance, I think they have a good chance to hold back the Germans.

[Conqueror]

The AI factions are supposedly biased to attacking those factions/territories that they historically fought, so it should be quite likely that Huns will end up fighting the WE.

As for the withdrawal starategy, I would suggest using scorched earth tactics with it. Leave a peasant unit (or what ever is the cheapest unit type) in each provincial capital so that the barbarians have to lay siege for at least 1 turn when they attack it. On that turn, destroy all infrastructure so that they will have to rebuild from scratch. That should slow down their expansionism quite a bit.

[Probus]

It has been really good to read your thoughts on BI strategy so far, but only time and experience of playing against BI's AI, particulalrly river battles, will tell which of us is going to be the most successful in executing our strategies.

I having been playing a lot of river crossing BI Demo battles and find that setting up an infantry killing zone around the defensive end of the bridge/ford and using cavalry forces to thwart the swimming units' crossings, as they emerge, before attacking the flanks of the main crossing, works extremely effectively, provided you also have sufficient outranging artilery to deal with the Barb' foot/cavalry archers etc. In short: tried and tested, and it works.

Has anyone else been studying the campaign map screenshots in the 187 New screenshots thread?

Having studied the campaign map screenshots in the 187 New screenshots thread, I am now in a position to set out some of the key threats and opportunities facing the W' Roman Empire (WRE) in the opening turns of the game, which I'll list and discuss below. The only thing I don't know about these screens is what level of difficulty the person who generated these screens was playing the BI XP.

From looking at the campaign map screenshots covering the opening years of the new campaign, I've discovered that:

1) The Alemanni AI initially heads from there starting position at Vicus Alemanni for Augusta Treverorum, in circa 365 AD, then Colonia Agrippina, and after that Augusta Vindelcorum, before turning on the Franks at Vicus Franki;
2) the Alemanni are not very strong to start with, i.e. one half strength army in 365 AD, which compares fairly well with the various half and third strength WRE armies in Gaul;
4) The first roman provinces to rebel seem to be the large province in Gaul containing the settlement of Avaricum, the amalgamated province of RTW Illyria/Dalamatia, containing the settlement of Salona and the modified RTW province containing the settlement of Luvavum;
5) The Saxons, Franks and Goths seem to be similarly weak, though the Goths less so, and slow in approaching WRE frontiers i.e. round about 380 AD;
6) Many Roman cities are losing large amount of money from the off, namely Sambrovina, Augusta Treverorum, and Especially Rome i.e. 4652Denari in 363AD! I suspect many others will be money losers until remedial action is taken, but Londinium and Colonia Agppina are in profit;
7) The WRE starts without Hibernia, Tara, Mauretania, the province containing Campus Frisi, part of the modified RTW province of Gemania Inferior, and the modified RTW province of Campus Lazyges.

In response to the info I have gleaned form the above my strategy will now include:

1) Holding all the fords and bridges along the Rhine from the off, by amalgamating any available armies in Gaul, as well as reinforcing my forces in the divided RTW province of Norcium, as this is where the Barb' threat, specifically the Alemanni, seems to strike first;
2) Building a stonewall immediately upon starting the game in Colonia Agppina and Augusta Vindelcorum;
3) Retaking any rebellious WRE settlements as a secondary priority to that of securing the river frontier crossings, unless I need the money from retaking them immediately, as once the Barb's cross it will be more difficult to thwart them;
4) Removing Valentinanus the Wrathful from Rome PDQ as the city's losses of 4652DN at the game start in 363 AD bear out his appalling trader trait all too well.
5) Going on the offensive against the Alemanni and Franks with aim of eliminating within the first five years of the campaign, and taking some of the provinces listed in 7 above, especially Mauretania.

In addition to what I have already mentioned previously, that will do for a start anyway!!

Keep your strategies coming...

Cheers

[Rodion Romanovich]

I'll personally quickly try to find out as much info as possible about my enemies, regarding troops strength and similar. If I feel it necessary, I'll start by withdrawing from some territories and go back to more defensive borders. The key is to assemble spread-out troops. Use fortifications to tempt the enemies to tiring sieges, then move around one or a few larger armies to relieve the sieges, and when possible, go on the offensive. If possible, I'll start expanding from the start of the campaign.

I'll not make the mistake of the 3rd century emperors who destroyed the Roman economy by training too many armies (60 legions), and instead take advantage of the mobility I mentioned, with good fortifications. Too badly defended cities might have to be abandoned. If necessary, I'll push the frontline quickly forward to aquire good fortifications where my frontline lacks it. But even wooden walls can do wonders, only problem is if the siege resistance time is too low, so the strategy of a mobile larger army is made impossible.

The ideal strategy is to quickly adapt all these large mobile armies to the opposition expected at the frontline. Eastern areas will need heavy foot archery and artillery to support a strong, stabile infantry. A cavalry force will be necessary to counter the enemy cavalry, but the enemy cavalry I might expect to be too powerful to take heads on, so anti-cavalry troops will be one of the main things to get hold of.

Above all though, quick early conquests to increase generals' loyalty (if it works a la M:TW) and help economy, and remove future threats, is the main thing to strive towards. I'll as quickly as possible find a weak spot in the ribbon of enemy factions along my borders, and strike. R:TW BI will probably still not make rebellions and stuff much to worry about, so speed conquest will probably still be a valid strategy. After crushing one of the most threatening tribes I'll be on the defense if needed, before striking the next one. After some time I'll have economical strength - something that'll be my basic overall strategy of greater importance than the purely military strategies - and be able to go on the offensive everywhere.

[Silver Rusher]

The micromanagement will be unbearable. WRE starts with something like 23 provinces.

[Sol Invictus]

I think the key for the West Empire will be Cicero's quote about infinite money being the sinews of war. If the West starts the game loosing loads of money and most of the Barbs immediately head west, things will be dire. If the West Empire can buy a little time to stabilize things, they may just get by with only loosing Britain and a few cities in Gaul. I think the Huns will be the determining factor in whether the West Empire has that precious time. Should be a real chaotic romp.

[kataphraktoi]

Anyone going to set up a defense in depth of "limes". Along the Danube or Rhine, you set up rows upon rows of forts with a peasant unit in each one just to slow invaders down till u can bring up ur better forces. SOund familiar?

I'd like to kick off as the E Empire. Interestng problem for me would be see where the bulk of my forces would be. Its likely that I'll be in eternal conflict with the Sassanids and have to face the Huns or Barbarians with meager forces. So I'll try that idea of defense in depth. If I can't hold the Danubian line, I'll have to settle for defending important coastal centres like the capital, Thessalonica, etc and drive the enemy out later.

Constantinople will, of course, be a military base in itself as the center of ultra elite troops in the same fashion as the Tagmata of later years as an offensive strike force.

[Sol Invictus]

Yeah, I don't think East Rome is going to have an easy time at all. As you said, the Persians are always going to be nipping at your heels and who know when the next wave of crazed barbarians will come thundering through the Balkans. At least for West Rome, they will only have to face the threat coming from the east initially; well, that and internal rebellion from unhappy generals.

[Orda Khan]

It certainly sounds an interesting prospect

......Orda

[Dark_Magician]

If You are planning on playing as the E/W Roman Empire factions first in BI, what are your thoughts on strategy for holding the barbarian hordes at bay, and may even driving them back/eliminating them?

1. on 31st of december several major German tribes crossed Rhine which was frozen. So - no "river crossing" mess.
2. Stilicho did not respond to this invasion leaving just borger forces to deal with it, he was watching eastern borders.

I'd expect Romans to be backstabbed by the Eastern Empire when barbarian hordes attack. There should be little chance to simultaneously withstand massive barbarian invasion and invasion by powerful eastern rival.

[Marshal Murat]

For the Western Roman empire, I would build forst along the Rhine border, and as far down the Danube as possible. Then Establish some very strong bases in nearby cities, with a strong foot force, with some cavalry and artillery.

[kataphraktoi]

As for E Roman Empire strategy for uniting the empire and taking Rome?

Yeah, I'll wait for ther barbarian invasions to hit the West even if they hit the Ballkans first, I can afford to use peasants to slow the barbarians down. But my plan to attack the West would have to be piecemeal and drawn out.

Like Justinian, I'll have to attack the important parts first which means Carthage will be on the hitlist as well as Sicily.
Using Africa and Sicily as a secure naval, military and economic base I'll use the resources there to snare naval outposts in the Balearics, Sardinia and Corsica. Hopefully I'll be able to launch Amphibious attacks on major Italian cities.

But as eveyrone knows, plans are one thing, execution is another

[Doug-Thompson]

Years ago, I had a board game called "Imperium Romanum" that covered the same period of time. I played the Eastern Empire a lot.

I tried to juggle and balance the first couple of games, then realized my problems would be a whole lot simpler to solve if the Sassanid Empire was wiped out first. It was always threatening to declare war on me. You had to roll a die for it every turn. If I wiped it out instead, conquering the rest of the map was a snap.

The same preemptive plan might work here.

[econ21]

The same preemptive plan might work here.

Yup, in Total War, wiping out factions early is usually the most effective (and least exhausting) strategy. I wonder if I will have the stamina to simply try to "hold the line" as the W. Roman Empire and not move into other lines? I like turtling and this might be one set up in which such behaviour is historical.

[Doug-Thompson]

@SA

One interesting aspect of the "horde" option might be to make "blitz" openings less practical for the Western Empire. If you blitz some barbarians, they'll just turn into a horde and reestablish themselves somewhere else, either in your territory of somebody elses.

If so, that would be interesting and an improvement.

[econ21]

Yes, the "horde" feature sounds interesting, although it sounds more like something that will help barbarians biltz (no real estate to garrison) rather than protect them from pre-emptive blitzing themselves. I don't understand it completely, but from what I gather it does not seem to stop the player wiping out a barbarian faction in the few provinces it initially possesses. Kind of like defeating the Golden Horde on the turn they arrive in MTW (or indeed, stopping the Mongols early in MI). On the other hand, the over-stretched Romans probably aren't in much of a position to go charging into barbarian hordes in the early game (unless katank is leading them!) .

[Kralizec]

I simply don't see how such a rush would be feasonable. Like said, the WE consists of stretched, barely loyal provinces. If the game follows history reasonably well, most of these have to be abandoned. I'm probably going to ship all troops in Gaul to Brittain and fight the Saxons over it

[Conqueror]

@ Germaanse Strijder:

Now that's an interesting plan. If you can win the battle for Britain then you can use it as a base to build up an army and launch assaults against the barbarians. Coupled with an all-out defense of Italy on the Alpine mountain passes, you'll have the barbarians in Gaul squeezed between two fronts. That might cause problems though, since your empire will be split in two isolated parts, and if the loyalty mechanics in BI take such situation into count (hopefully it will) then you'll have a very real risk of losing britain to a rebellion.

[Probus]

Please keep your thoughts on any faction strategies coming...

I've just revisited the BI FAQs and revisited the campaign map screenshots at: http://www.gamestar.de/aktuell/scre...?galleryId=1172. As a result, I have noted the following:

1) The Saxons and the Alemanni do not possess the ability to Horde;
2) The strength of the 1/2 and 1/3rd strength WRE armies in Gaul, which are laying siege to the WRE Rebels in 366 AD, three years into the new campaign, which could be combined to make a formidable 3/4 WRE field army;
3) The starting strengths of the Saxons and Alemanni.

If these positions are as per the final game version, and again allowing for the fact that it is not known what level of difficulty the BI XP was being played in order to generate these screenshots, is it just me that thinks that the WRE rebels could be ignored for a few turns whilst going on the offensive to eliminate the above Barb' factions?

I may withdraw further forces from Avaricum in the first turns of the game and combine them under the leadership of the Marcus Flavius, who is apparently loyal, since he then is shown in the screenshot leading one of two WRE armies besieging the green coloured WRE rebel forces in Avaricum.

Even without additional forces from Avaricum, with a 3/4 strength WRE army I am confident that I could strike a knock out blow on the Alemanni when they head for Augusta Treverorum, before taking out the Saxons, thereby securing Gaul and Britain.

In play testing battles against all of the barb' factions using Rodeo BI App' I've found that with a strong WRE army, I can defeat any equally strong Barb' Army, even on the v' hard difficulty settings.

My conclusion, I hope the player generating the campaign map screenshots at gamestar was playing the BI XP on the easier settings, or that CA strengthen the starting strengths of the Saxons, Franks and Alemanni factions in the game when it is released in T- 1 month!

[Horatius]

Here is what my Western Roman Empire Strategy will be for the first game I play.

1. Defend Britain by building up a navy and reasonable armies, and preventing generals from rebelling by not letting them into cities.

2. I won't spend too much money defending Gaul, instead I will withdraw to prevent Spain or Italy from falling while making sure with agents that the Barbarians in Occupied Gaul fight each other as I build up economically and militarily for a counter attack.

3 Invest in the Navy to save Africa.

4. Try to help the Eastern Roman Empire against the Huns in order to make the Huns as weak as possible when they get to me, since they did attack the Eastern Roman Empire first.

I am ging to download the demo soon and start playing.

I wonder if you could make an Alliance with the Caledonians in Scotland and the Scotii in Ireland in order to defend Britain.