Any tips for Saka Rauka

[Laman]

After recently failed (again) with Saka Rauka, I'm wondering what viable opening strategies exists. Conquering Eleutheroi provinces to get the economy going don't work, they are too poor (as well as decently defended).

What I did was first conquer Chach. The western army took that settlement to the west, and the eastern army + the cavalry from my starting city took Sulek. Those who took Chach attacked the Baktrians, and crushed their forces in their two northern provinces, and my economy was seeing positive numbers, though by that time I had to face two Pahlavan armies, larger then mine armies and of the same type of troops, and I'm not good enough to reliably win when severely outnumbered in HA vs HA battles (think 3 units vs a half-stack).

I was thinking of altering the strategy, so that I take Chach and Sulek, but the western army moves south, joins with the forces that took Chach and go and smash the Pahlavas, or alternatively just ignore Chach and leave it as a buffer, while going on a looting spree, if possible whacking Pahlavas, as well as hurting Seleucids and Bactria as much as possible.

[Meothar]

I was successful (in 0.81) with Saka by attacking and annexing Baktria (didn't care for the rebel provinces at the northern edge of the map...fighting a half stack of HA just to get a city with 500 people in there isn't worth it). Then, I conquered the Parthians by picking one small army after another (when they move garrisons etc). After that, you have no unbeatable enemy left.
Another interesting try for experts would be going for India and avoid every city on the way, because Indian cities have lots of inhabitants.

[Limbs]

you could take a look at my campaign with saka, it's 1.0 and h/h, the thread is called rather misleading "Post empires!", but it ended up being my own campaign story instead. I've been planning to continue on but the game has crashed a bit to often for me to stomach it all, but I'll give it another chance very soon. Here's a link: https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=93299

[SpawnOfEbil]

Go on a conquering spree with your starting army, exterminating willy-nilly. This should get you qutie al ot of money.