Between the Sea and the Grey Death: A Guide to Pontos

[Elminster12]

Pontos is finally up to snuff compared to other factions, but it certainly isn't at the beginning. It is correctly rated as one of the most challenging factions, and requires a good knowledge of phalanx tactics and plenty of battlefield skill besides. Herein I shall offer opening strategies and general tips.

I. How to Begin?
Your opening is crucial to succeeding in a Pontic campaign, as it is with many factions who start in sticky situations. You have two main avenues open to you:

A-Conquer the Eleutheroi settlements nearby. Sinope, Trapezous, and Nikaia all have ports, while Trapezous, Sinope, and Ankyra have mines. In general, I suggest avoiding Ankyra early on: it has a tough garrison that includes Galatikoi Tindanotae. These guys are basically the Galatian gaesatae, and will put a big hurting on your basic pantodopoi phalangitai.
Your armies in the field, believe or not, are capable of conquering a settlement each(Ariozabarnes/Sinope and Ariarthes/Nikaia); however, it should be noted these will be difficult battles, especially Nikaia, so you may wish to delay and/or hire some mercenaries. Alternately, you can levy some troops from Amaseia, where you can find slingers, phalangites, levy spearmen, and even good medium cavalry. You can send Ktistes off to Trapezous, or wait, either for the spring for Arsames or a marriage(to get experience to some one who is likely to be alive longer than the next few turns), or wait for Ariozabarnes to finish up in Sinope and have him lead your armies on Trapezous. It should be noted there is a sizable stack of archers and skirmishers in the province, which can be dispatched easily, especially if ambushed. Just keep an eye on it with your spy to make sure it doesn't ambush YOU, which would result in unwanted casualties. Your starting troops from the capital can handle the garrison. The governor(Neoptomeles, IIRC) is pessimistic and thus his soldiers will break easily.

tl;dr Pros/Cons
+Conquers a broad, rich power-base
+Level 1 governments available in all cities(except Ankyra)
+Stay at peace with the Grey Death for as long as possible
--Amaseia and Nikaia are vulnerable to attack from Mazaka and Ipsos respectively
-Runs the slight risk of antagonizing Hayasdan

B.Slay the Beast
The Grey Death, of course, will betray you. So, you may wish to simply get ahead of the game and betray it first. Capturing Mazaka is quite easy, and it affords you an excellent defensive position from which to deal with Seleukid counter-attacks. You can then proceed similarly to above, or go all out and get after Ipsos and Sardis, which would remove the Seleukids from Anatolia. Of course, you then align yourself with the Ptolemaioi and may cause your fellow dependencies to do the same in a swifter fashion.

tl;dr Pros/Cons
+Protects Amaseia and offers a strong position
+Flexible
+Mazaka has a mine and excellent recruitment
-You border the Ptolemies
-Mazaka isn't as immediately profitable as the Greek poleis on the coast
-If pursued all the way, makes you vulnerable to a Ptolemaic betrayal

Commonalities include paying off a great power in hopes they will continue smashing the other great power into a bloody pulp(or get smashed in turn.)

Also, in closing, a few notes on recruitment
1)Trapezous
This and Sardis are the only nearby ports, though Trapezous is more useful to you as the Bosporos is rich and the Sauromatae probably won't be much more than a minor nuisance.

2)Trapezous and Sinope
Both cities offer you an array of Hellenic soldiers, including hoplitai, hippakonistai, and peltastai. These elements will supplement your more rigid factional phalangites and cavalry. Additionally, Trapezous possesses some Caucasian units as well, including archers.

3)Ankyra
Though it may be a bit much early, Ankyra should be brought into your empire sooner rather than later no matter which strategy you pursue. The Galatian soldiers offer your army a lot more flexibility and power than it would otherwise possess, and also offers archers. Why am I making such a big deal about archers? Should you come to blow with the Hai or Sauromatae, you will find them very useful for neutralizing horse archers.

4)Amaseia
Though recruitment in the surrounding area is vastly better than it was in v81av2, Amaseia is still going to be your best recruitment center, and early on, could very well be your only one. As such, special attention must be paid to its maintenance. Build health and other population boosting buildings as quickly as possible here and lower the tax rate to keep the population booming.

Tips
1)DO NOT disband all of your soldiers. This is inadvisable due to the following reasons:
A)You will likely suffer large cultural penalties in conquered cities, meaning you will need some soldiers to keep order
B)The Seleukids can betray you at any moment, so you will want a workable force of defenders in vulnerable areas
2)If you're fighting a defensive battle and are outnumbered, try arraying your phalanx in a /\ pattern, with your cavalry and light infantry on the wings. This makes it very difficult for the enemy to flank your lines, and also doubles as allowing you to trap them in the teeth of the formation when/if you get the opportunity to flank them(it also works if they out-flank the formation as well).

3)As tempting as it may be to do so, don't do anything to Nikaia...at least with Ariarthes. He will get negative traits for killing fellow Greeks(-3 influence for enslaving, -5 for exterminating.) Unfortunately, Nikaia happens to be the most unruly of the nearby cities.

That's all for now.

[Treverer]

Indeed, "Pontos rocks", with EB 1.0 even more ...

In my campaigns with Pontos, either successful or unsuccessful, I noted some similarities (level M/E):

- AS is rather peaceful if you stay at war with Ptolemaioi & KH (after taking Sinope and/or Nikaia);

- The Hai betray you sooner or later, so I learned to strike first;

- Ariobarzanes' son Mithridates has the tendency to father girls, one son among four is the exeption.


Additional information:
- build your first mine in Nikaia, it gives 1200 compared to the 600 mnai of Trapezous or Ani-Kamah or the Hai-capital.

Roleplay tips:
- Did you notice the decrepancy between the gov2 regions (old persia) and the Victory Condition regions? This gives you as player the possibility to do some role-play, similar to the Carthagians "Barkid" / "Anti-Bakid" traits. I call it "Persian" / "Anti-Persian" trait (though a hidden one ), the struggle within the Pontic Royal Family about the direction to conquer: either try to get all the old Persian Empire lands back (= gov1 & gov2 provinces) or go for the V.C. provinces. I'm not sure which way is easier.

- When conquering new provinces, I'll roleplay that too.
These provinces get a gov3 ("Pontic Hellen Satrapy"):Trapezous, Sinope, Nikaia, Pergamon, Ipsos, Halikarnassos, Side & Tarsos.
The provinces in modern-day Greece & Byzantion get a gov3 too, they're Hellen after all ... at least this is how it is seen in the Royal Palace,
The "old Persian Empire" provinces get a gov2 ("Pontic Persian Satrapy").
Exeptions/special cases:
Mazaka is considered Homeland to me and thus I build a gov1 there, btw the only province that gets a gov1 immediatly after conquest.
Antiochaia first gets a gov3 and maybe later leveled up to gov1.
The two Hellen cities of the Chersonesos get a gov3.
Galatia, Sythia, Skythia minor & Jerusalem/Judaea get a gov4 ("Pontic Allied State"). I respectively the P.R.F. see those people as "special cases", fitting neither in the Hellen nor in the Persian dominated culture and thus binding them via an "ever lasting alliance between the P.R.F. and the Rulers of G., S. or J." to the Pontic crown is the best way possible, for both sides. Judaea is chosen due to their (unique) religious concept: monotheism. Their client ruler will be replaced after death.
The "Barbarian Territories" in Europe (= all the non Hellenic V.C. provinces) get a gov4, their client rulers will not be replaced after death (I even think that an assasination by an own Assasin would be alright before they die naturally).
Upgrading the Homeland provinces:
After 25 years of Pontic rule, those provinces with a Homeland "sticky" can be upgraded to gov1. (Feel free to change it to 12, 16, 20 or whatever years you find adequate). But: don't exploit your MICs, if you can recruit, say "Syrian Archers" in Antiochaia and you thus have a regMIC4, stop recruiting them (be either strict and even stop retraining them or adopt my Houserule: if their's already a regMIC4 built, it's alright to retrain them).

A last recommendation:
Read After Action Reports (AARs). Not only have their authors put hard work into them, but you as a reader can learn something from them. I, for example, learned how to get better at role-playing.

Enjoy Pontos or whatever faction gives you the "This-is-my-faction-and-I-want-to-play-them-now-and-I-want-to-know-all-to-become-a-better-player-with-them"

Yours, Treverer

P.S. Additional hints may follow via edit.

[gurakshun]

[QUOTE=Elminster12]
3)Ankyra
Though it may be a bit much early, Ankyra should be brought into your empire sooner rather than later no matter which strategy you pursue. The Galatian soldiers offer your army a lot more flexibility and power than it would otherwise possess, and also offers archers. Why am I making such a big deal about archers? Should you come to blow with the Hai or Sauromatae, you will find them very useful for neutralizing horse archers.

[QUOTE]

I just want to add that thereuphontes toxotai (bosphoran heavy archers) are far superior to anything you can recruit in asia minor - it is worth the expedition up to the bosporus to take the 2 greek rebel cities there as your general will receive a nice bonus. As well, you need to get there as soon as possible so you can set up infrastructure to start making and shipping out the heavy archers as they will be your missle solution for the rest of the game.

the celtic kingdom of galatia is good for providing the celtic slingers, though, which will help you immensely in the beginning (combined with their type 4 gov't and gallic temple exp boost, and DONT DESTROY THAT TEMPLE!)

Really all you need is your factional phalangites and cavalry supplemented by galatian components...take your pick. the greek units you can recruit tend to be far inferior....and should only be used as garrison (because they can be retrained easily in their hometown when they get sieged).