Which (mainland Greek faction) is superior?

Originally Posted by Lysander13

As for what would've happen to them had they been able to fend of the yolk of Makedon. Always an interesting question.....

Aye, always interesting, alright. I expect they'd have to contend with the white of Epeiros, then? Or perhaps the shell of the Romani. Rofl. XD

No offence intended, but the opening you presented for that jibe was so...inviting. I couldn't resist. ;-)

I once made the purpose to split the KH up in three factions starting in a triple alliance, but the team was not very happy about it. I still think it's a good idea though.

Btw, with the full Mak-roster, you can shatter everyone with almost no losses, in an easy and maneuverable battle-deployment. It is just invincible - the only thing it requires is an able commander. After all I think there's a reason Alexander conquered the world.

Makedonia has one of the best unit roosters in the game - that is truth. The armies of KH are very flexible but Maks have Thrakians to do this job. And Epeirotes have the preatiest phalanx - Chaeonion Agema.
btw. one offtopic question: what do the seleukid argyraspidai have on their shields?

Originally Posted by pezhetairoi

I'm not sure that'd be a good idea, really, you'd just get stagnation in Greece because they'd be too busy fighting each other to fight the Makedonians, which is not exactly what Chremonides intended, I'm sure...

Not if you get a superfaction like for vanilla, they would fight together long enough to beat any neighbouring threat but after they get a sizeable empire infighting would start...

To be fair, it would make more sense for an alexandrian era mod than EB but given the free slots in MTW2 it would have a chance.

Well, I prefer Epirus non the less. you have to play diferent than with the other successors. Regarding Mak unit roster, sure they've everything but I tend to compare them to the AS and well, it seems shallow. Epirus as the Chaonions who're an amazing phalanx force and their cavalry an go toe to toe against the Maks. They only lack an elite flanking unit (the Illyrians do great job since they are 100 but I expect this to be a flaw) but I guess with the rebalanced stats in the next version, we'll have a few surprises in all factions. I'm looking forward to the new FM bodyguards of the KH if you say they are only inferior to the Dosidataskeli and it's derivates!


Cheers...

Originally Posted by pezhetairoi

Aye, always interesting, alright. I expect they'd have to contend with the white of Epeiros, then? Or perhaps the shell of the Romani. Rofl. XD

No offence intended, but the opening you presented for that jibe was so...inviting. I couldn't resist. ;-)

...Hehe...Cute...Now get back in the Tavern where you belong and save me a spot at the bar right in front of the big screen will ya

Alright alright... *potters back to the Tavern* Ya, there's a whole dance hall area in front of the big screen, just bring up a chair on EPL match nights, we broadcast them live. :D

Makedonia!

Hetairoi + phalanx = enemy slaughter

In fact, after I had built up 2-3 phalangite armies with hetairoi, my Makedonia just steamrolled everything from romans to seleucids so easily that it almost got boring - every battle ended with total or nearly total enemy slaughter, with less than 100 own casualties...

Makedonia are the greatest faction on the game. It is almost impossible to be beaten when you have agryspidai, the assault infantry and decent archers.

I personally don't like KH, their lack of cavalry really hampers the way I like to fight. Their unit roster just isn't as strong as Makedonia either.

I have never been Epeiros, for the same reason that I refuse to be AS or Ptolomies, they are dirty underhand cheating scoundrels! So I can't really comment on them.

The problem with RTW is that it's very easy to be very cheap with phalanxes, as once in a decent line they're almost impossible to break through. One thing I'm half wondering is if it might be an idea for EB to either make the units smaller or raise the price.

I have only seen enemy cav attack my phalanxes from the front.

[Jab at AI]Whoever the player picks.[/Jab at AI] -_-'

Originally Posted by Zarax

One option would be in EB2 to represent the cities using all the faction slots left, basically in the same way as romans were represented in RTW...

I'm sure this would be highly unpopular but it's a possible solution...

Originally Posted by johnhughthom

Slightly off topic but I've been using the KH and have managed to beat the Epirotes and Maks out of most of modern day Greece. Now I don't have a great knowledge of this era of history but as far as I'm aware the Koinon Hellenon was formed due to the threat from Macedon and only lasted a few years before it was defeated. My question is how long do people think this alliance would have lasted had the Macedonian threat been defeated, surely Sparta and Athens would have been at each others throats after a while, especially if there were spoils of war and newly conquered lands to share out. I take it there would be no way to simulate something like this with the RTW engine, perhaps something for EB2? Or of course I could just be totally wrong with my reworking of history .

If the BI engine were being used, the KH could be split into 2 factions by way of the "shadow faction" function (like WRE/WRE Rebels in BI vanilla) ie "Lakhedaimon/Peloponnessian League and Attic Alliance (please excuse the cheesy ahistorical names, these are only being used as reference)" (although I don't know if it is possible to rename the original KH to any more suitable name once the alliance of poleis breaks up) as for when the faction splits, it can be done either when a city rebels from the KH, or (if possible and the talented bunch of folks that write the scripts for EB have the time/inclination) the rebellion could be scripted (have Sparte, Korinthos, Syracusai if in KH hands...maybe Demetrias if in KH hands form a Spartan headed alliance)

Except that takes up a faction slot and the EB guys want to shove as many peoples in there as possible not just greeks.

If the three cities of KH were split up, they would be single cities with little power and not interested in expansion. That would put them as less eligable than other Greek cities that were somewhat expansionistic, like Syracuse, Pergamon, or even Massilia. If the KH was divided, it would be best represented with rebel cities.

In my Romani campaign it seems the Koinon Hellenon are expanding a lot (took 2 provinces from Epeiros, almost all Makedon provinces, and they've got possessions up on the steppes too)... It will be an interesting war once our unstable neutrality ends I forgot the command for turning off fog of war so I can't show any good screenshot though.

KH are the bane of my life on my Makedonia campaign! I managed to push them all the way back to Rhodos, and kill all but one of their family members.

Unfortunately, this just pissed them off! They have managed to forge a rather strong empire in Asia Minor and attack me AT LEAST twice a turn from diferent angles, including almost constant boat landings.

They're seriously hampering my war with Eperios, and are costing me a bloody fortune in keeping a standing army ready for their inevitable attacks.

Originally Posted by MarcusAureliusAntoninus

If the three cities of KH were split up, they would be single cities with little power and not interested in expansion. That would put them as less eligable than other Greek cities that were somewhat expansionistic, like Syracuse, Pergamon, or even Massilia. If the KH was divided, it would be best represented with rebel cities.

Which wouldn't be so ahistorical (KH fans don't kill me please)...
Representing a potential late behaviour of KH is quite hard as historically they were always on the defensive against a single power (maks and later on seleukids)...
IMHO without Rome stomping around they would have been crushed by macedon or a ptolemaic protectorate...

A possible option would be starting with just Athens and Rhodes with Sparta joining via script if a decent sized victory is obtained against the maks and give less empire controlling potential to the faction as a whole, meaning that mantaining public order far from the core would be very hard...

In XGM we created a rebel greek faction to represent that but of course it's not very practical for EB purposes as it would be a "wasted" faction slot...

That said, if any hellenophile would like to see more historical greek action we welcome everybody that can give us historical information on XGM forums (actually given the team size all positions are welcome)...

Originally Posted by MerlinusCDXX

If the BI engine were being used, the KH could be split into 2 factions by way of the "shadow faction" function (like WRE/WRE Rebels in BI vanilla) ie "Lakhedaimon/Peloponnessian League and Attic Alliance (please excuse the cheesy ahistorical names, these are only being used as reference)"

A shadow faction still requires a faction slot, so to include this another faction needs to be dropped. Since the Greeks weren't the only faction plagued by internal dissent and rebellion, this would be somewhat unfair. Also, you can only set one name for this shadowfaction, hence they are going to be called the Lakedaimon league even if the rebellion just consists of Rhodos.

I really like the KH, but I agree with Zarax: if you are going to split it, you might as well drop the entire faction. Alone none of the city states stood a chance.

As far as city-state factions goes I'd rather see Syracuse, Massilia/Emporion/Saguntum or the bosphoran Kingdom, all in interesting locations for varied conflicts...

Originally Posted by Zarax

As far as city-state factions goes I'd rather see Syracuse, Massilia/Emporion/Saguntum or the bosphoran Kingdom, all in interesting locations for varied conflicts...

Makedonia wins, everybody else loses. I mean, Epeiros still has a good unit roster, and Makedonian phalanxes + heavy cavalry just beat anything the enemy have, unless the enemy flanks your phalanxes... Then you're toast with both.

Koinon Hellenon, on the other hand, isn't strong. They lack decent cavalry and their hoplite infantry can't stand even Phalangitai Deuteroi in a prolongued conflict. Their missile superiority is easily countered by Makedonian cavalry, and lack of KH cavalry, too.

Originally Posted by MarcusAureliusAntoninus

If the KH was divided, it would be best represented with rebel cities.

This would be my personal preference regardless, but I can understand that's troublesome considering the work that's gone into the faction.

There are a lot of factions that start with a single province, most of them much lesser developed than Attica. And they all manage to get on to the road to imperial glory. Why shouldn't the Greeks? Give them a bit stronger starting armies, even if it would be ahistorical, it wouldn't be that ahistorical as a pan-mediterranean greek city-state empire consisting of Athenian nose-up aristocratic democrats and Spartan country-bumpkin fascistoid hillbillies happyly sharing their empire of free Greek city-states.

Btw, Empire and Free City-State are two totally contrasting terms, representing two totally contrasting ideas of governance, politics, life and generally anything.

For the human player these were fantastic challenges to play, and for the AI - well, one would crumble after 10 years, one would crumble after 30 years after conquering 2 provinces, and the last one will become a major player. That's what I predict, and I think that's even more than they could have expected in history. Much more.

Uhh... right. I seem to recall Rome having already been an empire when it was internally still a republic (if not exactly a city-state anymore). Ditto for Carthage, and Athens too if I'm not mistaken, and not a few of the Medieval Northern Italian mechant-cities...

"Empire" is a position of power in relation to others, not some specific social or organizatorial pattern. You're missing the distinction here.

Not that a free city-state could not be under the rule of an outright dictator or tyrant, for that matter, although that's not strictly speaking relevant here. The free city-state part only defines certain aspects of its territory/core regions and its relationship to something else, ie. being free of outside control.

You are right about that, being a city-state doesn't prevent from becoming an empire. But I think that it's highly unlikely that multiple city-states would form an empire together, especially if they are so different to each other as Athens and Sparta. They could only when one rules over the other as a dominant power, like Rome ruled over Italia, and Athens over her Aegean empire of small cities.

Fair enough - but what if they agreed to leave each other alone and concentrate on doing their own thing as a sort of confederation ? A sort of Ancient Greek Treaty of Tordesillas combined with a loose military alliance. A pipe dream IRL I know, but I'd say some corners will have to be cut anyway due to the limits placed by the game engine...

If diplomacy were more reliable in RTW (or even MTW2?) trade rights, alliance, attack my allies and military access would be great. But it isn't, and I guess the faction slots have better places to go.

The only way within RTW engine limits would be using the old romans+senate system (oracle of delphi = senate or maybe sparta/rhodes), it would be interesting if anyone makes an alexandrian era mod out of EB...

Originally Posted by gran_guitarra

Okay, here is my question.
Which of the factions in mainland Greece (a.k.a. The Makedonians, Epeirotes, and Koinon Hellenon) do you think has a superior unit line-up?

[snip]

I think that the Epeirotes would have a slight advantage in unit line-up. The Makedonians make a close second, and the Koinon Hellenon are the weakest of the three.

I haven't played Epiros at length. They are a somewhat elastic but quite defeatable opponent for the other two. My impression of their roster is it a powerful one at the top end but patchy and regional. They definitely have the best starting position: the threat of Rome is nothing compared to the advantage of having your 7 star general sitting on a Mumak at the gates of Pella on turn 1.

Makedon has a powerful roster from the bottom of the tree right to the top. Most factions have some gaps at some point. Maco's have useful core and regional units at almost every MIC level in every starting and adjacent city. Every direction they go they seem to get units they can use. There is very little "barracks browser dissapointment" for the Antigonids.

If anything their units get better at the top as it flowers into the classic Diadochi line-up. To my mind the Agrianes are the ninja-icing on the cake, but there are also lovely surprises like elite pike in Asia Minor and Hypasts in Thrace (IIRC).

The KH have a fingernail grip on Hellas and a healthy line-up of hoplites: healthy and stodgy like porrige. The foot-guards for the generals make them admirably suited to city defense but its a dull slog to win field battles at sandal pace.

The Maco's have the roster to win skirmishes, footslogs, hammer and anvil field battles, "Cannae" type defensive annhilations, seige assaults, basically they are equiped to win any sort of battle. Only HA armys would worry them in open battle, but their (VG Stamina) Prodromoi give them a chance.

Elephants make for positive results, and Epiros has some regionals to allow a flexible approach, against most opponents. They are better set up to win in 272, but that isn't a result of a superior roster.

KH start on the back foot, masking their skewed unit selection. Can they get Tarantine Cav? A few regional tidbits might accelerate expansion but they are a creeping menace at best. I reckon they are a beautifully represented "faction" and their unit roster represents a genuine challenge to an experienced player.

I enjoyed playing the KH a lot despite unhappy experiences fighting the (Polybian) Romans. Massive casualties from walking into pilae forced me into mandatory enslavement of conquered settlements.

Originally Posted by gran_guitarra

The Koinon Hellenon are also pretty screwed in position. They start off with three cities only. One of them has an army large enough to take it nearby, the other is undermanned, and the last one is an island which is making negative thousands of mnai.

I'd just like to point out that no city loses you money. Ever. That number is just a ratio to how much of their income goes towards supplying troops. In all actuality, that's probably the city making you the most money if you check the trade screen.

I like Epeiros myself for the faction goals. I never understood why Makedon's goals aren't the recreation of Alexander's empire.