newb's multiplayer blog

[piranha45]

im putting this thread up to chart my progress on MultiPlayer, and to hopefully get some commentary from MP veterans.


Game 1, I was Spain and the enemy was Greece, I was more interested in finding out if i was able to play MP without a hitch; was thoroughly pleased to find i could. I got thrashed.


from here on, I'll plan on playing excusively Seleucids in preparation for Sunday's tourny. (Me=seleucids, unless noted otherwise)

Game 2 enemy Julii, I got a little of everything, he got Praetorian Cohorts&Cav, and Archers. I got thrashed.

Game 3, enemy was Greece. He got ~6 armoured hoplites, an onager group, Spartan group, and several Cretans. He put them in a box in the map's center. I got ~10 groups of Silver Legionnaires with +1 exp each and an unarmoured general. Started them out stretched 2 men wide across the map in a row. Converged them around 2 sides of the box. The Grecian box developed a few holes, and I ran some Legionnaires in those holes to get at their backsides. I ran my general into THE BACK of his frontwards-engaged Spartans early on, and my general instantaneously fell over dead. Cretans are sporadically Fire-Arrowing me (and him, lol) throughout. I had about 6 Legions that held firm throughout the fight, and his encompassed AH's steadily melted away. When his Spartans routed, he left game and I mopped up the AI.
I alt+tab and make this thread, because I'm an excited lil newb

I reckon I won because he thought Seleucids didn't play to make exclusively legionnaires, and made his army accordingly. Eh?

[piranha45]

just fought 2 battles against the same guy.

game 1 he was Julii. I had 13 Silver Legions, no upgrades, and unarmoured general. He had 3 archers, armored general, and the rest Urbans. I got an Average Defeat

game 2 he was Julii, he got the same exact army as before. I got Armored General and the rest in no-upgrade cataphrats. I got a Clear Victory by charging, pulling out, repeat, on top of him losing his general to mine halfway in the battle. It was a quick battle.

game 3 some other guy is Parthia. He gets a balanced force of HAs and cataphracts, with 2 slingers and armored general. I get mass cataphracts, no upgrades, with armored general. I bolt for his cataphracts and general the moment the game starts. Bulldoze both slingers on teh way over there. Clump of white armored horses ensues, but I charge and pull out of his back end once and his catas flee. His general is gone. Now its just his ~6 groups of horse archers against my 8 groups of cataphracts and general. I set 1-2 units each on each of his separate groups of HAs. It takes a while, but i manage to nail each group. Clear Victory!

Losing is interesting and enlightening. Winning is fun!

[Prince_of_Macedon]

Once again, congratulations on making the leap to MP.

Keep in mind that you might have competition picking the Seleucids on Sunday

[Xavier Dragnesi]

I've found that playing Seleucids, a good formation for infantry (thought a bit slow in moving) is four or five of their best phalangists, then two units of legionaries to protect their flanks. Especially if your enemies army is mainly infantry or light cavalry, this works extremely well.

[piranha45]

Thanks for the tip. After 3 months of playing vs the AI, I am so terribly accustomed to exclusively using homogenous armies... its probably something I need to get over.


I'd rather use seleucids (as opposed to romans) as I've never used them before, until today. New things are fun(ner)!

[LeonidasOfSparta]

Upgrade units...gold/gold..

[Xavier Dragnesi]

Thanks for the tip. After 3 months of playing vs the AI, I am so terribly accustomed to exclusively using homogenous armies... its probably something I need to get over.

Homogenous armies are quite good as long as you know the type of troop you are using is strong enough to compete against the type of men that your enemy is producing. But if you come across a guy who uses a faction that you've never played or experienced before, then you should put in a variation of troops so you learn from this experience what goes best against that faction.

[Selifator]

Slight problem for the tournament: most people are better than the average guy. We have a number of people who are very skilled, see if you can play against a clan member, they are (most of the time) the best players.

[_TubbZ_]

Yop thats right Leo is an excellent player and so is Turkish who regularly spam this forum (they are clannies btw)... I am a complete noob tho so be gentle (i may sign up to this one...)

[Prince_of_Macedon]

Yop thats right Leo is an excellent player and so is Turkish who regularly spam this forum (they are clannies btw)... I am a complete noob tho so be gentle (i may sign up to this one...)

Cool, maybe you can help host for me j/k

BTW, TubbZ is NOT a beginner

[piranha45]

Slight problem for the tournament: most people are better than the average guy. We have a number of people who are very skilled, see if you can play against a clan member, they are (most of the time) the best players.

lol, you confirmed my suspicions. It'll be a good learning experience for me, then I havent even run into any of the much-maligned chariot archers, yet!

Upgrade units...gold/gold..

By gold/gold, you mean weapons/armor but no experience, right?

The temptation to get quantity over quality is strong! I suppose it depends on what faction you're facing though... Vs that Greek player I mentioned above, I think getting quantity instead of quality saved me in that game. Versus the Parthian and Roman player though where I used mass cataphracts, gold/gold probably would have worked fine, hm?

[Selifator]

Well, I think we're all glad more and more people join. And expect some chariots to appear (thankfully no-one has chosen Britons or Egypt).

[_TubbZ_]

Cool, maybe you can help host for me j/k

BTW, TubbZ is NOT a beginner

I ain't oh well if you see me on ask me for a game... {VI-Victrix}TubbZ or {VI-Victrix}FlubbZieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee... (i prefer the last one) and i am a beginner and so are you Prince, and if you do have like 17 peeps i will be happy to help host although i expected more ...

[Eccentric]

Well, I think we're all glad more and more people join. And expect some chariots to appear (thankfully no-one has chosen Britons or Egypt).

The last few games I played online have been full of chariots and they weren't
all my chariots either, btw I lost every one of those battles, in one battle my opponent had a bunch of chariots and head hulrlers and I had a bunch of chariots and spearmen, the result? a crushing defeat , at least my opponent wasn't a noob.

[Selifator]

A noob would probably fail to use chariots correctly.

[Oman]

I am a fellow Selucids lover. What isnt to love about them ? but those Cata, well, they do love to crush roman skulls with their 'alt' attack maces. When rules dictate that you cant use eles, most of the killing power lies iwth the catas and they are the difference between winning and losing. i.e lose you catas, lose the fight, get your cata in amoungst enemy units (not chariots) and they can easily turn the battle in your favour.

I like the way Selucids need really good timing though, unlike romans that are very forgiving if you screw up, those pillums from the cohorts save the day often. Selucids though, they need really good timing, due, as i said above, to the importance of the catas. Same with thier chariots. What lethal, awesome weapons....but how fragile. A few volleys of flaming arrows and they run amok, often killing more of your army than the enemy. They also die quickly against spears. But oh the joy if you get them amoungst some horsies, what fun! They also like killing urbans, as long as you attack from behind. Selucids rock!

[Xavier Dragnesi]

The problem with Seleucids is that though they are powerful (I like them too) they lose alot of their strength when it comes to rules such as no eles or no cataphracts.

[piranha45]

The easy answer to that is, host your own games.

[Prince_of_Macedon]

I am a fellow Selucids lover.

Ah, so you are becoming a son of Alexander, I see

[piranha45]

I lost 4 consecutive games as Spain (one guy made a spartan-archer box and I couldnt do anything to it, one guy went mass Berserkers+peasants against my well-balanced army and pwned me, the other 2 were Romans who outmuscled me with urbans and praet cavalry)...

and then I won 3 consecutive Spain games! yay!

The first guy was seleucids and he got peasants+eles. I anticipated it (or catas.. im not sure how well slingers and javelins do vs cataphracts, but I figured it was still a better answer than anything else in the Spanish arsenal.. are they the best thing spain has vs cataphracts?). I sure showed him! muahahha.

The 2nd guy got a bunch of roman soldiers. I got 4 gold/gold Bull Warriors and an iberian infantry, in addition to regular general. It turned out his soldiers were Early Legions and Archers. Thankfully, the Bulls thugged those guys out.

The 2nd guy fought me again. I figured he'd get berserkers and peasants or archers. I figured I'd go mass skirmishers. He actually got a lot of axemen... it was a slaughter; he called me mean names and left.