Arverni or Aedui anyone?

[PseRamesses]

Can´t seem to find many posts on theese new tribes. Has anyone played the through. Share your thoughts! Post a guide! Would love to hear your experiences.

[Mujalumbo]

Hm. I'd say the same old Aedui/Averni strategies apply.

Of the two, I've only played the Aedui for a significant amount of time, and that was while ago, so I've already forgotten all of the starting towns' names. ;)

The Aedui start out with a pretty significant medium army, Botroas (javelin-armed swordsmen) and Gaeroas (javelin-armed spearmen), and Leuce Epos (medium skirmisher cavalry). And at war with the Averni.

Of course, cue roads and what-not in all your settlements. I've decided to evacuate my men out of northern Italy. My first strategy was one of "aggressive defense". I started by pooling my starting armies, and then occupying defensible terrain in Averni lands. (Too bad Aedui don't get Forager trait.) This forced them to come to me, and was able to destroy their starting forces.

Spiralling into debt, I moved quickly before the Averni could begin training replacement Botroas and Gaeroas. I forget the names of the towns I took, the ones immediately south and east of the Aedui's starting position. Since they could only train Lugoae (spear warband) and Baguadas (short-swordsmen), and my starting armies were now highly experienced veterans, taking these objectives was frankly, easy.

Unfortunately, this campaign was so long ago, I've forgotten what my finances were like at this stage. I do believe I could begin basic infrastructure construction. Note, one of the towns in the Alps you'll want to put a type 3 or type 4 (the one that grants 1 exp). Along with MIC upgrades, and a certain religious building (forgot which one), you'll be able to train 2 exp. Mori Gaesum. Once you put in a blacksmith, you'll have yourself a very decent phalanx unit...

I abandoned this campaign after finishing off the Averni, and, er, "spreading freedom and democracy" to the neighbouring Eleuthoroi tribes, then going to war with Rome. (Technically, a town in northern Italy rebelled back to me while Rome was beseiging it or some stupid reason like that. Either way, our brethren were under attack, and that's just not cool.) True to form, Rome was able to dump stack after stack of Triarii, Principes and Equites into the northern campaign. My two units of Gaesatae have killed so many dirty Romans, they're three-gold-chevrons. My starting Botroas Gaeroas are all multiple-silver chevron units.

Just got tired of the conflict, pain and the glory.

[jebes]

I employed much the same strategy, but in my Campaign, Rome never conquered Cisapline Gaul and I did not expand beyond the one province I controlled there. I almost lost to the Arvernii because I halted my attack to regroup and build a bigger army when they only had one province left. Well, the mad cash for the AI allowed them to build about 3 stacks of armies which I narrowly beat before I was able to siege the city long enough to stop their construction of troops and reinforce my own.

Because Rome was not a factor, and I was bored, I thought I would skirmish with the Iberians a little and take a province or too. Well, I go screwed again by the mad cash AI as they bribed 5 province away from me and sent me spiralling into debt. I quit the campaign after taking all of Iberia and Gaul because I am scared of the Sweboz and the Romans. I did start the war with the Sweboz before I stopped, but It was not going as well as I hoped.

[Mujalumbo]

Fighting Rome is hard.

At the start, they have a javelin-armed spear unit, a javelin-armed sword unit, and an uber phalanx unit. Hmmm... where have I seen those before?

All things being equal, Rome's units will kick your ass in a straight up fight. Their biggest pain in the @$$ is the early Triarii, obviously. There's numerous threads which deal with defeating them. To summarize, Gaesetae or experienced units up front, hit from flanks or rear with cav.

I had a funny campaign. Aside from the Averni, I was in a Barbaric League along with pretty much everybody else (Iberians, Sweboz, Casse, Sauromate, Getai). It was cool. We raided and pillaged and a grand ol' time was had by all. Good times, good times...

[Keba]

I played with the Arverni. I immediately moved on an offensive and wiped the Aedui off the map. They only had that province in Italy left. It took me four years to drive the Aedui past the Alps (and a lot of luck, I managed to wipe their main army by sheer accident with a lesser force), and then it took me another six years to get out of the debt accumulated during the war.

Later on, they become fairly easy, I had about four or even five victories against superior Roman armies. As long as you don't get caught up in a multiple-front war ... you should be fine, while elite units are expensive as hell, they are indespensable.

The army is versatile. I make much use of the archers, since they are armed with spears (and exceptionally useful). Their cavalry is not much, but it is better than that of most surrounding factions. Infantry is somewhat on the light side, but the Neitos reforms solve that, and the Gesatae are exceptionally useful as shock troops for breaking an enemy army.

Eleutheroi are a major problem, as they are numerous in various province in Gaul, and brigands are somewhat more numerous than in other places. For the most part, you are forced to ignore them, as most of the time you will have bigger problems.

My greatest gripe with these factions is the lack of stone walls, but other than that, they are truly pleasurable to play. I actually liked them more than the factions I preffered in vanilla such as the Hellenes or the Carthaginians ...

All in all, neither of the Gallic factions is easy, but they are very, very fun.

[Mujalumbo]

Ah, yes, I forgot about those archers.

Yes, I included them as well to soften the enemy up somewhat. If causing a casualty or two after emptying their quivers counts as "softening up." *grumble* *grumble* They do cavalry a nice surprise when the cav tries to run them down...

[Zero1]

I've had alot of success as the Aedui, basically I disbanded the troops that I wasnt going to use and attacked the Arverni head on from the start, combining them into one big army. I took all three of the Arverni Transalpine holdings but lost my one Cisalpine holding to them, then I went about uniting the rest of Gaul and beefing my army up. By the time I had most of TransAplpine Gaul united, I had one big experienced stack, and the Arverni had been building up their forces, I attacked immediately before they could become a threat, crushed them, and eradicated their faction. Then, I turned back to uniting all of ancient Gaul proper and recently succeeded.

On the battlefield one big key to my success has been the use of Germanic mercenaries to make up the center of my line. In my experience, the Fraemarhajoz or however they are spelled are simply "better" at holding the center line then their Celtic counterparts due to their better morale and denser formation. My own Celtic spear armed southern infantry makes up the near flanks/outer center and my sword armed Celtic troops either make up the outer flanks or are positioned behind the center as sort of a "second wave". The versatile Celtic light calvalry makes up the far flanks for flanking/harassing manuevers and of corse to persue routers.

[PseRamesses]

One cool thing happened during my first Aedui campaign. Two civil revolts in favor to me.
The first happened before 260bc when Iverness, the most western settlement on Ireland rebelled against their Casse opressors and joined me. The Casse responded and attacked me the very next turn which lead in me almost depleting the entire Caledonian fighting force. The Casse never left the Islands after that ;)
The second one was Ancyra who trew off their Seleukid oke. Boy did I shatter thoose silly guys with their long pointy things against thoose walls. I kept theese settlements through the entire lenght of my campaign just for the sheer fun of it.

[jebes]

I found the best success heading south to recruit Greek Phalanx mercenaries and then flanking with Gaesatae. If you conquer Iberia, the cathageians have a nice Phalanx unit as well.

[paullus]

Aedui is the one campaign I lost (on VH/M). I disbanded a few troops I doubted would be too useful, and took a main army south toward, I think, Lugdunum (could be naming the wrong city, this was back in early january). Got danged ambushed by their main army, and lost in a close fight.

Fought a kinda guerrilla campaign while falling back to my settlements in Cisalpine Gaul and the one on the Channel, thought I had stabilized things, though I lost the others to the Arverni.

Sensing blood, the Romans and Germans invaded, and from there it was over, as I hadn't been able to make enough money to get back on my feet yet.

[Zero1]

Finally lost a battle in my Aedui campaign against the rebels in the region of modern-day southern Germany, right above the Helvetii region. I was besieging their city with a full stack raw recruit army, I thought I could take the city with my superior forces...hahaha I was wrong.

I had overlooked the fact that they had four units of Gaesatae, and I had one, I figured I could take it using my traditional tactic of Fraemaharjoz mercenaries ramming the front gates and forming a solid shieldwall, then using my archers to lure them into a frontal charge, then have my other units who had rammed the walls, charge in and flank them.

Well, first of all, they took the bait, yeah, but only with one unit of Gaesatae, who began to thuroughly thrash my Fraemas, eventually I had to send in re-enforcements, then they sent in their other Gaesatae while mine were busy relieving my Fraemas. I saw the battle going poorly and decided to try a wide flanking manuever with my reserves. I sent my seven or so Boataroas into the city, and around the buildings to flank their force in the rear from where it was engaged with mine. They responded by attacking them with their remaining two Gaesatae, and charged the flanks with calvalry to prevent an encirclement.

Enter, mass rout, my entire army was defeated through clever usage of defensive structures and use of the unstoppable Gaesatae...AND I'VE NEVER BEEN HAVING MORE FUN IN MY LIFE!!!

I love you EB

[Reverend Joe]

One cool thing happened during my first Aedui campaign. Two civil revolts in favor to me.
The first happened before 260bc when Iverness, the most western settlement on Ireland rebelled against their Casse opressors and joined me. The Casse responded and attacked me the very next turn which lead in me almost depleting the entire Caledonian fighting force. The Casse never left the Islands after that ;)

Goddamn, you changed history!

[jerby]

gaesatae really are bringing lfie into this game...one of the first times the AI scared me to death. you really gotta be on your toes.

[PseRamesses]

gaesatae really are bringing lfie into this game...one of the first times the AI scared me to death. you really gotta be on your toes.

Yeah, I do love them although they seem to be a bit well equipped.
Ancyra is infested with them. It´s like when Sigourney Weaver reached the mother-aliens lair, brr... quite intimidating.

[pezhetairoi]

I played as the Arverni. I decided to wipe the Aedui off the map, but first to unite southern Gaul. Hence I attacked Tolosa and Burdigala and took them, then moved on to Massilia and Aventicos. In all these cases my Sotaroas played crucial roles since I'm more of an eastern, archer-heavy player.

I initiated war with the Aedui in the 5/6th year. The pivotal area of the campaign against the Aedui was just south of Bibracte, where the Aedui threw army after army of their starter troops against my sole army, which consisted of all my starter troops. (My towns were all garrisoned with only one unit of Clyddabre since i believe in offensive defence)

When the dust settled the bulk of Aedui fighting power in the region was destroyed, and it was only a matter of walking into Cenabum and Bibracte since the former had only one unit in garrison and the latter was emptied.

Next I turned my attention to the rest of Gaul, and unified it. I left the Belgae as a buffer between me and the Sweboz. I turned southwards to the Alps, and attacked Mediolanum. The Aedui had squandered the fullstack they usually built up there in futile piecemeal attacks on my southern periphery, so I arrived there to find only 6 units behind the walls. I stormed in and took over with ease. On a sidenote, Mediolanum is a low-level settlement, usually only large town at most, but it has the highest-level MIC building (I think) or the Gauls. Interesting.

Anyhow, I pushed further and further south into Italy after that, getting into a terrible bloody war with Roma. It was made even worse by the fact that in the Italian peninsula the Arverni cannot recruit anything more than Lugoae. I.e. my army was getting progresively depleted and supply lines were lengthening.

The climactic battle against Roma came, aptly, at the gates of Rome, at the river ford just next to it. The Roman field army was a fullstack that had five units of triple-bronze chevron triarii, 4 units of equites, 2 generals on 100-man singulares, and an assortment of rorarii, hastati and principes to make up the remaining. I figured I would never be able to beat that on a level playing field with my troops (I never built a single unit of gaesatae) so a chokepoint was my only chance. It worked like a charm, but I lost about a fifth of my strength shattering that. Nevertheless, that was the deathknell of the Romans since they were left with only a smattering of units in Capua and Cannae that were easily dealt with. I ended my Arverni campaign there, because the troop resupply situation was really getting too bad to handle.

[Zero1]

Anyhow, I pushed further and further south into Italy after that, getting into a terrible bloody war with Roma. It was made even worse by the fact that in the Italian peninsula the Arverni cannot recruit anything more than Lugoae. I.e. my army was getting progresively depleted and supply lines were lengthening.

The climactic battle against Roma came, aptly, at the gates of Rome, at the river ford just next to it. The Roman field army was a fullstack that had five units of triple-bronze chevron triarii, 4 units of equites, 2 generals on 100-man singulares, and an assortment of rorarii, hastati and principes to make up the remaining. I figured I would never be able to beat that on a level playing field with my troops (I never built a single unit of gaesatae) so a chokepoint was my only chance. It worked like a charm, but I lost about a fifth of my strength shattering that. Nevertheless, that was the deathknell of the Romans since they were left with only a smattering of units in Capua and Cannae that were easily dealt with. I ended my Arverni campaign there, because the troop resupply situation was really getting too bad to handle.

See, this is the reason Samnites became my beeeeest friends on my conquests into Rome. I exterminated every city I conquered and used to loot to hire samnite mercenaries to bolster my ever waning army...it got to the point where all of my regular troops were garrisoning to prevent rebellions and my main army was made entirely of Samnites!, but by then the war was practically won as the Romans had lost Rome proper.

[pezhetairoi]

Which is precisely why I quit the campaign. Samnites are damnedly expensive, and it became a little weird to be playing the Arverni without a single Arverni unit in my army. It would be nicer if I could recruit some Samnite units that were retrainable.

[PSYCHO V]

Glad to hear you guys are enjoying it. The OB is only the rough guts, if you enjoy this you'll love the next version

It was made even worse by the fact that in the Italian peninsula the Arverni cannot recruit anything more than Lugoae.... Nevertheless, that was the deathknell of the Romans since they were left with only a smattering of units in Capua and Cannae that were easily dealt with. I ended my Arverni campaign there, because the troop resupply situation was really getting too bad to handle.

Arr...this isn't Vanilla or RTR...you can't expect to run across the map and conquer huge areas and build all troop types in the first several turns. Patience
Further, EB is about historical reality, don't expect the Gauls to be able to churn out Praetorians and Triarii in the Italian peninsula.


my2bob

[Ranika]

Everyone can get some Samnites in proper provinces to train, with the appropriate government and such; no region should be a total loss unit wise, though you will find that Celtic factions fare better in recruitment by conquering Celtic regions in Europe, which are plentiful, and will be able to get a fair bit of other, neighboring units (including an alright amount of Greeks, when done, with the proper governments, meaning conquering Greece won't be a total bust).