State of the World in 216 BC (3.5.3) - still getting endless full AI stacks
I think I should get with the program and upgrade to 4.0... just as soon as I stop the Golden Horde in the east and the Warhammer 40k Orks in the west, a.k.a. the Green Goblins, a.k.a. Gauls.
Seriously, almost every turn they send 3000-4000 men stacks against my 1700-strong legions. Every single engagement is a complete victory for me with 5-10% losses and 90%+ elimination. It's getting tiring. I should've exhausted any nation's resources by now. Why do they not sue for peace? I'm as puzzled as Hannibal was. Hope I don't end up the same way.
I'm deliberately not pushing ahead, because it's only 216 BC and already I have all of Northern, Central and Southern Italy, and Sicily, and all of Greece except Athens and Chalkida, which are Macedonian - I had to actually step in directly to intervene on their behalf to prevent them from getting slaughtered by Ptolemy. Athens I left Greek, until the Macedonians attacked from Chalkida and took it for themselves. On the west, I took Massilia but not Arverni, which means I get horde after horde of crazed Gauls flinging themselves at my invincible iron wall almost every turn. How are they even reproducing quickly enough??
I've stopped at Maronia and stationed 2 full legions just across the Hellespont, where they ravage the beaches and olive farms of Abydos. Every single turn the Ptolemaics offer yet more generals and soldiers up for massacre. Bactria is not pressuring them, instead going after my Sarmatian allies to the north of the Black Sea. Armenia is a client of Ptolemy. Pontus and the Seleucids are a forgotten memory.
Meanwhile, to the west, the Iberians have united under an invincible war-chief and are pressing into Numidian lands held by Carthage (Numidia became my ally very early on but Carthage squished them before we could do much). There is no sign of any Hannibal Barca rising up to take Iberia and beginning a march on Rome. I've peacefully purchased Corsica, Sardinia, Melite and the Baleares from Carthage for ridiculous amounts of gold, which appears to be helping them somewhat, because they're starting to push back the Iberian horde. The funniest thing is, from what I can tell, their most successful troops appear to be... Latin-style legionaries they recruited from Corsica. The grim Libyan spearmen of legend are nowhere to be found. And elephants appear singularly ineffective with auto-resolve combats between AI opponents.
I'm about to launch a takeover of Iberian lands, for no reason - they're actually well-disposed towards me, because they came with an offer of alliance (which I turned down). But this campaign is so un-historical it's driving me nuts. I want some semblance of the actual Roman expansion plan, which means I have many more decades of Hellespont slaughter to go... unless I force a ceasefire, which wouldn't help because it'd give Ptolemy even more time and resources to rebuild until he becomes even more unstoppable (except by me).
Meanwhile, in the north, the AI appears to have run into some of the usual diplomacy bugs found in vanilla. The Britons and Germans declare war and make peace alternately every turn. Germans meanwhile declared war on Sarmatia, then the very next turn took them as clients (while the Sarmatians are still allied to me). Dacians are struggling and would be extinct if I didn't gift them some cities I took back from the Ptolemaniacs.
I hate to say this but I'm beginning to not look forward to the next century or so. Fighting endless hordes of Ptolemaniacs. Do they stop being a juggernaut in 4.0?
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Originally Posted by jtlannister
