Tips for starting a Pahlava campaign

[athanaric]

As soon as you can afford them, Asavarân-î Dêhbêd (Noble Medium HA) should be one of your main units. They are fairly cheap for a Noble unit, fast, decently armoured and yet have great stamina. Not to forget their powerful AP lance. Although their range is inferior to that of Saka units, they can tackle any army in the game, if deployed correctly.

[Cute Wolf]

As soon as you can afford them, Asavarân-î Dêhbêd (Noble Medium HA) should be one of your main units. They are fairly cheap for a Noble unit, fast, decently armoured and yet have great stamina. Not to forget their powerful AP lance. Although their range is inferior to that of Saka units, they can tackle any army in the game, if deployed correctly.

Well, the Saka version has less ammo...

Just try to mop up your enemy with pahlava shivatirs' arrows, and all will be ok...
Try to avoid war with saka too early, because if you didn't prepare armoured men, both sides got bloody casualities.... and AS or Baktria will easily pwnd ur depleted men...

[Tollheit]

I'm a fan of the Daha units (except for Daha Rog Baexdzhyn Aefsad, although they are the best elephant killers in the game) .
Both Daha Baexdzhyntae and Daha Uazdaettae are excellent units.

Try to remain at peace with the other nomads, i.e. do not expand too much towards them, and make sure they have borders with each other, not only borders with you (should you offer them a settlement as a gift, include enough money with the offer to pay for a sizeable garrison).
Send a diplomat to them and inform them of any attacks you are about to launch against their enemies, by offering them as gifts. Should they refuse the gift, prepare for war.

For cavalry archery combat, seek the higher ground, seek forested ground, make use of cantabrian circle (unless they chase you with fast horses). Use a single unit in cantabrian circle or a heavily armored unit to soak up most of the enemy's arrows.

[Dieu Le Fera]

I use spies to the fullest... I usually take the four closest Selucid cities by unrest using my spies to try to hold off a war with Selucia... some times you get lucky and take another city before you get the lovely little transgression pop up. By then though you should be able to support a stack to run circles around the phalanxes. I use cities defensively too... sally out use my arrows return and do it again the next season.

[Zradha Pahlavan]

The Saka will probably be a pain in the ass, but there's nothing you can really do about them early on. Just hold them back at Khiva if possible, but be prepared to lose that city. If it is lost, don't let them keep it though.
Baktria will stab you in the back sooner or later, and taking them out will remove that nuisance and will put you in a better position to eventually destroy the Saka or go into India. (the indian elephants don't like arrows)
If the Seleucids attack, and they will, you'll want to take them down as soon as possible unless fighting full stacks every two turns is your idea of fun. Overrunning the old Perisan provinces is often a good idea, though it is sometimes frowned upon around these parts because it is a 'blitzkrieg'-type strategy.
Whatever you do, I advise that you not piss off the Sauromatae until you've got a decent sized empire.
Hayasdan and Pontos won't be a real problem, though they have some obnoxious armored horsemen.

As for armies, I think standard horse archers, a few nobles and bodyguards, and javelin cavalry would probably be the sort of army composition that would have been used historically, but I'm hardly an expert on the subject.

Oh, and you're probably going to be dirt poor for most of the game.

[anubis88]

Wow, thanks for all the great suggestions.
I started playing, and now hold Khiva, Nisa, Asaak, Apameia, AM, Hecatompylos and Zadrakata. I lost and regained them a few times, won countless Historical Victories agains AS and everything seemed well.
But i left Marakanda in AS hands, and now they attacked me from the north with 3000 men. I only have about 400 defending the area. I+m gonna have some problmes now.

Fortunatly the Saka and Baktria have left me alone so far

[Zradha Pahlavan]

Make sure that you take over all the eastern Seleucid provinces or they'll attack from two sides. Had that happen to me and it was very annoying.