Any ideas on this one?

[GeneralHankerchief]

So, here's the situation:

It's 146 BC (yes, 146). The Civil War has been dragging on for about 30 years now, with the Scipii slowly making gains. I am pushing to cut the other Roman factions off from water, with moderate success. However, in Thrace, my faction leader Decimus Scipio runs into this:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Good news: They haven't been aggressive.
Bad news: They're massing.

The closest army is in central Greece, and it has to blast through Thessalonica and Bylazora to get to the action.

Anybody have any ideas on what to do? I would like this city in my possession as well as these armies removed. It's times like these where I wish night battles were included in RTW vanilla...

[warhero]

You could
A) Raise another army with a strong general to bring up to the front with you
B) You can hold for a bit and see what the enemy does, either move and spread away like a bad AI, or attack you.
C) Seeing as the Highest command stars is 4, you can sally Forth, lead your armies and test your skills and luck

This has happened to me before, and I tried Option A

[Craterus]

Let them attack. They probably won't send all the armies, and if they do, you could probably still win.

[jhhowell]

A couple of thoughts. First, you're overflowing with gold, so if you have a diplomat handy you could try bribery. That will likely end the game in a hurry, so it's arguably an exploit...

Second, Campus Scythii appears to be heavily fortified and poorly garrisoned. If you can shift your camp to within a single turn's movement, you can snag the city and hopefully provoke the Brutii into attacking much tougher walls than your field fortifications. You might be close enough already, but I suspect the onager is too slow (and it's the key unit since you need to be inside the walls before the massive army can react).

[El Diablo]

Go for the bridge. If they attack you there then their bad. You have some good ranged units. It would be the best place to defend.

If the do not attack you at the bridge then see how many merc you can recruit (and if enough) take them to attack the city to the north (leaving the majority of your army at the bridge choke point) and wait for them to block the river with their own corpses.

Good luck...

[Caius]

Buy Mercenaries.

Or retreat.