So is my campaign ruined?

[IceWolf]

My Greeks high water mark was 45 territories. I had taken Greece, Italy, N Africa, part of Gaul and Spain when it all fell apart. I was left with with 1 stack in Spain, 2 in south Gaul and 2 in ships. Croton and Carthage rebeled. Then Sparta and Athens did. While transporting my two fleeet armies back to Greece I lost all of Sicily. I now have Greece and 35 total territories. I had thought that reuniting Greece would produce enough trade to get the cash flow in the black again, but it didn't . I now have a six figure and growing debt, 5 stacks and no navy. I feel like there's a giant fork sticking out of me right now, am I done? Thanks

IceWolf

[CrazyGuy]

The first question I would ask is how your empire just 'fell apart'? Was what that you did?

In your situation I would gamble massively, if you have five stacks pick on the two strongest opponents, I'm assuming the Romans and Egypt, and send two stacks to each and sack everything you can.

While it might not give you enough money to remove your debt, it would cripple 'everyone' and bring everyone back to 'Year Zero' where you can start again and hope for a little more luck!

[Warmaster Horus]

Hmm, you know, there are player's who'd be happy to have such a crisis in mid-game.

I'd recommend uniting your empire again, like CrazyGuy said, and taking on your current foes. Exterminate every settlement captured, to get some cash back. Then, try to be at peace, so you're at least trading with everyone.

Of course, your debt is going to get higher and higher, but there's a time for war and a time for peace. Yarr!

Once you're finished, once everything's peaceful, disband your stacks in different provinces (disbanding adds the amount of disbanded soldiers to the population of the province, and if you disband five stacks in, say, Syracuse, you're going to have a lot of squalor on your hands there).

Good luck. Tell us how it goes.

[Severous]

Five stacks sounds too much even for wealthy Greece. I assume there are big garrisons as well. Without Athens the income from Greece drops significantly.

Any chance of hosting a save of your campaign somewhere so I could download it. Would be easier to work out what to do..if anything.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

Good advice so far for you from the other posters.

You have lots of military power but a crippled economy. You cannot do all things without debt ending your game.

Phase 1:

Part "A"

Use the best two full stacks to retake your Aegean home zone. It's the most lucrative area in the non-mod games with all the trade. Take back all of the cities on the Aegean that went against you. Sack them. Take any cities you don't own on the far side as well. Sack them. They'll be quiescent and very lucrative once any damaged spots are repaired.

Be sure to re-spot your capitol at the center of your "home zone" to minimize garrison requirements on your money-making cities.

Once your home zone is stable, remove unneccessary duplicate buildings -- decide where the troops will be produced and do so there, do not (if you are) try to do all things in all cities -- too much capital outlay. Some buildings can be sold to reduce debt.

Part "B"

Use the other 3 Stacks to sack the 3 Niles cities, Jerusalem, Sidon, Antioch, and Tarsus as rapidly as possible. Snipe off any other cities you can easily reach. Don't worry too much about casualties. You need to reduce the number of your armies and are looking to RAID not keep at this phase in the game. Sell off everything and let them rebuild.

Part "C"

Let the leftovers in the Western Med fend for themselves. Don't spend anything on them for now.

Part 2

Ideally, you'll bring yourself down to a total of 2-3 full stacks of really sharp troops (you may need to disband some if the casualties during raiding weren't enough). Focus on defending the Aegean basin while you bring all of the economy back on line. Hammer any local threats quickly and with maximum force. Spend minimally on the military, but keep at least 2 strong stacks.


Part 3

The return -- once your economy is up and running, its time to go back to your previous stomping grounds. No one vulture will have gobbled them all, so take one at a time, keep your army costs in line, and pay 'em back in spades.



A fun campaign you've given yourself! Far more interesting than the typical ones we read of.

[SSJVegetaTrunks]

The thing about this game is that it's NEVER over till it's over. As Severous said, uploading a save would allow us to give you detailed advice.

[IceWolf]

Problem is I have no navy, the Selucid scum trashed it. The two fleets that transported my stacks back to Greeece were sourrounded by like 12 selucid fleets and destroyed. I can't get to the rich Egyptian cities. I can only attack northern/eastern europe which isn't lucrative.

IceWolf

post scriptum, I don't know how to upload a save

[Omanes Alexandrapolites]

Hi IceWolf,
First you just need to find a good fast free file sharing site - this one earns very positive reviews, although you can always find a list by Googling "Free File Hosting".

On the hosting service I have linked to, all you have to do is click the browse button, and find the folder marked "saves" in your R:TW directory. This folder could be in either "C:\Program Files\The Creative Assembly\Rome - Total War" if you have the Gold Edition or "C:\Program Files\Activision\Rome - Total War" if you have standard Rome: Total War.

After you have found the saves folder, you need to locate your troublesome save. Double click on it in the browse window, click the "upload" button and let the uploader do it's magic!

After you've completed that step, just copy and paste the link into a post, hit submit, and your done!

Good luck, cheers!

[Seamus Fermanagh]

You don't need fleets. One or two ship units per stack is fine. Send them Rhodes -- Salamis -- Sidon -- Jerusalem -- Alexandria and you should'n have to leave the fleet un-ported except after the Alex drop off. This assumes that you have onagers for one-turn assaults on the raid targets(land troops, take city, port fleet, reload, next target). The 2nd stack can follow the first, but go North from Sidon.

[SpartanPhalanx]

Hi IceWolf,
First you just need to find a good fast free file sharing site - this one earns very positive reviews, although you can always find a list by Googling "Free File Hosting".

On the hosting service I have linked to, all you have to do is click the browse button, and find the folder marked "saves" in your R:TW directory. This folder could be in either "C:\Program Files\The Creative Assembly\Rome - Total War" if you have the Gold Edition or "C:\Program Files\Activision\Rome - Total War" if you have standard Rome: Total War.

After you have found the saves folder, you need to locate your troublesome save. Double click on it in the browse window, click the "upload" button and let the uploader do it's magic!

After you've completed that step, just copy and paste the link into a post, hit submit, and your done!

Good luck, cheers!

I've tried viewing my save files in a note pad but its almost unreadable. Do you need a special program to get the infor from a save game. I am interested to see how the rest of the world is doing but I don't want to remove the fow.

Thanks :)

[Omanes Alexandrapolites]

Sorry SpartanPhalanx, but the CA haven't released the save game structure. Some people have managed to crack certain aspects of it though, although these attempts were only mildly successful.

[gaiusjulii]

The first question I would ask is how your empire just 'fell apart'? Was what that you did?

Firstly I wont add my own advice as you already have some sound advice to work with, I would be interested to know how this happened? as crazyguy said... I am interested As i may want to recreate this in my own campaign to spice things up a little.

G

[SpartanPhalanx]

Sorry SpartanPhalanx, but the CA haven't released the save game structure. Some people have managed to crack certain aspects of it though, although these attempts were only mildly successful.

Thanks mate :)

[ixidor]

Yeah, then tell us what happened. I wouldn't bother to have some nice rebellions in my campaign right now too

[Centurion1]

Seriously tell how you messed up, i wish something that interesting would happen to me!!!!!!!! Oh and were u playing medium , hard, very hard, or wat??? Somee really good posts for you though