The Makedonian Army Dishonoured

[Centurio Nixalsverdrus]

This thread is about bribing btw.

I'm currently in the year 196BC. Mighty Makedonia owns half of the world, from Pannonia to Persia. It fields four mighty phalanx armies, and several other forces.

One of the mightiest, and the most important, got bribed yesterday!

There was no message. I even didn't notice it at first. The damn Romans bribed more than half of the army of my King! I had divided the army in two stacks to better move them around, because there were reinforcements to integrate into the army, so the cavalry was with the King, the infantry nearby under a captain.

They were bribed by a roman one-experience-point diplomat. I was first surprised because I saw a Roman mini-stack of three units of Syrian archers (my Syrian archers of course), before I fully got it. They bribed into desertion

1x Argyraspidai
4x Hysteroi Pezhetairoi
2x Taxeis Triballoi
3x Thureophoroi
1x Thraikioi Peltastai
3x Hypaspistai of the Basilikon Agema.

Now my Illyrian flank is open. Suebi besiege Segestica. I don't have much troops left for this army. How can I ever again do anything military with my King? Thank God he's already 61 and imbecil. I think I'll let him perform a suicide charge, whether to regain his honour, or to die for the suffered shame!!!

When I try to bribe, it never works! 10.000 mnai are never enough to bribe three silly units of Pantodapoi Phalangitai. I don't understand this, please! Can't you somehow mod the bribing thing to something more reasonable?

For your information, Rome is currently being driven out of Italia proper. You see the traitors went to the loser's side...

[MarcusAureliusAntoninus]

The AI often has tons of money, which they chose to waste bribing your army. You, unfortunately don't have tons of money to bribe.

Bribe ease is based on the Influence/skill of your diplomat.

In RTW v1.2 bribing was super easy, but CA decided to increase the cost of bribing in v1.5.

Bribe costs (like all of diplomacy) are hardcoded.

[Digby Tatham Warter]

Centurio Nixalsverdrus,
My sympathies, good sir!
What campaign setting are you playing on and did you have a spy in the stack to help stop bribes?

[NeoSpartan]

It happens, they will start bribing settlements soon too.

To avoid this you could take following steps, or a few of them:

1-Have a diplomat in those settlements.
2-Have a family member (non prone to bribes) in the army.
3-Have dipolamts in the armies
4-(best) Train several assasines and have them gain expireince in killing. Have them murder rebels and captains, then low level diplomats.
---Have a spy work with your assasin to improve his chances.
5-NEVER let enemy diplomats into your lands.
6-Keep an eye on neutral diplomats in your lands.

hope this helps....

[micasa]

Centurio Nixalsverdrus,
My sympathies, good sir!
What campaign setting are you playing on and did you have a spy in the stack to help stop bribes?

A spy in the stack helps avoid armies being bribed? I had no idea...

[Tellos Athenaios]

Agents are characters and characters cost more when you bribe them.

[Spvrrina Vestricivs]

Bribe costs (like all of diplomacy) are hardcoded.

Which is a real pain in the proverbial and is the only part of EB that's left unrealistic. Which is a shame as expanding the diplomacy would make the game even more interesting IMHO.

I just take the expediate route of assassinating any enemy diplomat I find. I've had 2 faction leaders become Master of Assassins and gained the Master of Assassins anciliary as well.

I've not had an FM bribed while there was a diplomat in the city/with him and, every time they've resisted the offer of a bribe, they get loyalty traits.

[paullus]

yeah, keeping diplomats and spies in your armies and cities is the way to go. I do have a lot of sympathy for you, Centurio, that's a really nice army you lost. 3 units of hypaspistai? Whew! That army must've cost the Romans a couple hundred thousand--can you look in the faction comparison screen, and gauge the extra expenditure the Romans had in making that bribe?

[Centurio Nixalsverdrus]

Did I mention they were all double silver-chevroned?

Thank you all for your advice. I could see in the money-graph some kind of break, but that might as well be because they lost 5 cities in the last couple of years and got another 5 cities sacked.

Yes Suebi bribed Patavium in the very same turn (hardest turn in history, really), and bribed Aquincum a couple of turns ago. The German empire stretches from the Baltic to the Adria now.

I have already a fairly big corps of agents, namely spies, since the AI is so fond of sending spies at your towns to cause unrest, and with own spies in it they get thrown out every few turns. I have a few Assassins wandering around, but it's just not always possible to kill every diplomat you see. And one mistake, and you have to carefully train another assassin... Diplomats I have a few to talk to my neighbours if needed, but I'll start to send them to frontier towns now. And I'll let spies and diplomats accompany my field armies from now on. Lesson is learned...

I conquered Bastarnolandam and gave it to Carthage, who are allied to the Suebi, in hope it will immediately rebel and cause a Suebi-Carthage war ending their alliance. But nope. 80% loyalty and increasing, and 7 units of Poeni citizen militia already there . I will send a couple of spies there and damage some buildings though.

Digby, difficulty is the recommended VH/M, no I had no spy there, but will do so from now on...

[Kull]

Keep a diplomat in every city. They are specially designed for EB to make it VERY dificult for the enemy to bribe your cities. Armies are bit more problematic.

[Poulp']

Keep a diplomat in every city. They are specially designed for EB to make it VERY dificult for the enemy to bribe your cities. Armies are bit more problematic.

RP-wise, they can represent the Missi dominici of your empire, present in every town to spot and report troubles, and deal with foreign representants as well.

[geala]

I like it when the AI tries to bribe my armies. It creates at least a bit of pressure when your reinforcements are wandering around. Makes my assassins worthful. One time one of my important full stack border armies on a bridge was bribed because I missed that the general had died the turn before. Gave me a bit of adrenaline.

What I wonder about is the fact that you have only four full army stacks when you rule half of the world? I own as Epeiros late in the game only Greece, Italy (Roman armies consist only of Celts ), Sicily and some parts of Getai land and Asia minor, and I have (to have) 10 full stacks, 7 of these with phalangites (from which 3 have elite agema phalanx units, agema cavalry, elephants and artillery). Pezhetairoi and Ph. Deuteroi are relatively cheap, aren't they?

[Centurio Nixalsverdrus]

What I wonder about is the fact that you have only four full army stacks when you rule half of the world? I own as Epeiros late in the game only Greece, Italy (Roman armies consist only of Celts ), Sicily and some parts of Getai land and Asia minor, and I have (to have) 10 full stacks, 7 of these with phalangites (from which 3 have elite agema phalanx units, agema cavalry, elephants and artillery). Pezhetairoi and Ph. Deuteroi are relatively cheap, aren't they?

I'm sure I have more than 4 full stacks. I have 4 traditional Makedonian armies, each with a reserve corps, that consist only of quality troops. Further I have a couple of auxiliary full stacks, mostly without Phalangites. The rest are garrison troops, mostly militia Hoplites. I feel the need for an additional auxiliary force and perhaps a fifth field army though. I make +30.000 mnai per turn, and I always like to spend everything on buildings. The armed forces cost me about 185.000 mnai per turn. So funnily I'm not swimming in money.