Advice on survival

[Laevex]

This is my first campaign on vh/m. I am playing as Qart-Hadast and I have just hit the most dangerous point of it. It seems alliances are there to be broken as far as the AI is concerned, despite the regular tribute I kept giving to all my allies.

The Ptolemaioi recently started a desert war with me, which caused me to send two full stacks in counter-attack and to gain control of one more desert province. I also won a spectacular heroic victory against the Ptolies with the older and less elite stack of the two, lead by Celeas - my greatest commander - at the price of around half the stack biting the dust.

The desert war is not my only concern however. For around 20 years the Koinon Hellenon have been annoying me by landing stack after stack on the Italian peninsula. I managed to repel many of these with my navy before they could land, but fleets cost so much! This means I need a constant army in the area to repel any of these Greek forays.

The Aedui were until recently my allies, but this alliance failed when the Ptolies declared war. This means that my northern Italian provinces are now threatened by potential war with marauding Gauls, so defence is needed here too.

After having problems with public order in my 3 Iberian provinces, Arse rebelled to the KH. A full stack of Iberian troops quelled this rebellion, but I fear many more are still to come. I still have not been able to successfully withdraw this army from the city, as it needs a huge garrison to prevent further revolts. This means my Iberian provinces are effectively unprotected, which is unlucky because the Lusotonnan have just betrayed me, besieging Gades (although this was repelled).

To top all of this trouble off, I am now COMPLETELY broke! For years my only expenditure has been on my military and attempting to keep public order and this means my economy can no longer support my Carthaginian empire.

Here is a map showing my armies etc.:


Please give me some advice! I need help!
If I don't lose (or maybe if I do) you will be rewarded with a really good AAR, as I have a bank of tons of great screenshots.

[Caesar89]

you could always try one of the money scripts to help reduce the huge stacks each of these factions will eventually send at your forces and cities.

Also try using spies on enemy settlements far away from your borders to force enemy to divert units to quell rebellions caused by your agents.

A more practical thing to try it to push your borders to strategic positions such as bridges or mountain passes then build forts for easier protection.

[Teleklos Archelaou]

Well, you don't have to fight against the Ptolemies right now, do you? Can you give them Augila in return for some peace? That might allow you to focus on Iberia more. If you can get it pacified and conquered, you'll be able to minimize your exposed fronts. Maybe concentrating on Iberia almost entirely for a while? Esp. if you could make peace with the KH also. Getting rid of your most expensive ships would surely help things. Great campaign though! It's good to see a challenge for a faction like Carthage that late in the game! It is what we hope for actually.

That's a very interesting map. How the heck did Epeiros take Crete?

[Centurio Nixalsverdrus]

Take Iberia, think of the mines and the easy border. Take Patavium, Bonnonia, Mediolanum and Massalia for the defensable borders. Don't march your armies back to retrain, just send them additional units and merge. Maybe you can make peace with the Ptolemies, or at least ally with the AS. Invade Hellas, it'll give you loads of money. And disband most of your fleets and elephants.

[pseudocaesar]

why havent the sweboz moved at all?

[Laevex]

Thanks for all the tips. I just hope the Ptolomies will accept a few years of peace for one province. I think I will take your advice and focus on crushing those pesky Iberians now.

That's a very interesting map. How the heck did Epeiros take Crete?

Well Epeiros were doing quite well earlier in the game. I think they were at war with KH but it was still strange that they invaded Crete because they had no settlements on the eastern coast of Hellas. Playing on BI makes the AI fun like that.

[LusitanianWolf]

Hum, you should take Iberia before think in face the ptolomoi. The Italy/syracus farms + western mediterranean sea trade + iberian mines were enought to support 1 full elite stack with 2 elephants units + enought armies to protect my lands and to face african rebelds, one of them with light artilary + an nice fleet + an 10k income to me.

[NeoSpartan]

Here is what I would do:

1. Make a 2 stacks and send them to the ptolemaio lands. Take thier cities, exterminate the population, and destroy all the buildings. (keep some cities if you want to)
2. With this $$ train another stack and send it to Greece and sack those rich greek cities.
3. Take iberia.