The state of a sample ExRM game after ~120 turns
I'm currently playing a game of the ExRM v4 beta as Pontus, finding little things to polish as I go. I thought potential downloaders might be interested to see how it was going.
As Pontus, you don't really have much money early in the game. (There's a reason Pontus didn't conquer all of Anatolia by 200 B.C., after all.) So you need to play slowly and steadily, taking advantage of your relative isolation from the major powers and allying with the Galatians and Armenians to keep them busy elsewhere. The Greek City superfaction, represented locally by the Heracleia/Sinope duo and across the Euxine by the Kingdom of the Cimmerian Bosporus, is the first enemy you want to make. I've been expanding gradually and staying friendly with my neighbors, and right now I think I have a good position for making tons of money on Black Sea trade. My cities are well-developed, and I can put together a powerful army on short notice. Also, having just conquered Olbia, I'm now in range to acquire an army of Bastarnae mercenaries (skirmishers, shock infantry, and nice light cav), and those guys are worth the trip.
In the meantime, you can see that the more powerful factions have been busy, but nobody is steamrolling. Bactria is gradually gaining ground against the Seleucids, but the barbarian superfaction in India is holding them off reasonably well, and Parthia (just like IRL) is gradually becoming a force to be reckoned with.
The Galatians are doing pretty well for themselves, at least till I backstab those dirty barbarians.Macedon has conquered most of the rest of Greece, but Greece has few enough regions in the ExRM that conquering it isn't a recipe for an economic steamroller. Powerhouse, yes, but not a steamroller. The Chremonidean League is down to a couple of islands, but those are fairly wealthy and they might still pose a threat. The Ptollies are doing pretty well vis a vis the Seleucids—they've captured the Syrian heartland of the empire, and at this rate may well end up cutting them it in two unless the Seleucids manage to complete their conquest of Armenia. Armenia usually does better than this in test games, but is getting stymied by the "horse peoples" superfaction to its north, here representing the Georgians and Albanians and having conquered Atropatane.
In the west, Carthage has a solid empire, but doesn't seem to be expanding well. Rome has some Epirote problems in southern Italy, but with the barbarian superfaction (in the form of the Italian Celts) in the north and the Greek Cities superfaction having conquered all of Sicily in the south, the whole place seems to be at a stalemate. It will probably fall to someone eventually, but I have no idea who at the moment.
The Germans have conquered a lot, but those aren't very well-developed territories and they're only just now meeting organized faction resistance, so my guess is that their expansion will shortly grind to a halt. The Celtiberians don't seem to be making much headway against the 'Ippeideimos superfaction (the non-Indo-European locals) and the barb superfaction (the Lusitani), but the Gauls are doing quite nicely for themselves. The 'Ippeideimos are also doing well in Dacia, having driven the Dacians out of the Danubian plain and conquered all of Illyria. I'd have liked to make the Illyrians part of the barb superfaction, but we needed that one to represent the Boii colonization of Pannonia, instead. Yes, in the ExRM, you can play as the Pannonian Celts...come on, you know you've always wanted to!
Overall, I like where this game happens to be here. The map is changing gradually, but no one faction is steamrolling yet. Much of the map is still being contested, and we haven't even lost a single faction (admittedly, the Chremonidean League probably won't be coming back). This game is still completely up in the air even after 122 turns, and I'm clawing my way to medium power status. This is exactly what I wanted when I began working on this, and I think it's what Carados wanted, too. This is fun.
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Originally Posted by demagogos nicator
