Seleucids unstoppable?

[malfuriouspete]

So taking the macedonian tips to heart and concentrating on them... I have completely ignored the seleucids and now they have become a stack producing machine.

The Ptolemaics were getting pounded around by the seleucids, they lost most of their cities, and them being my allies, I sent 2 armies to Alexandria, re-captured it and gave it back to them... set up an army on the bridge just outside the city and then have been constantly attacked by stack after stack

Most of their armies are around the Nile delta now and Asia Minor is relatively lightly defended so I sent an army there to start capturing some cities... but sooner or later my army on the bridge will be destroyed because I can't replace the troops fast enough with mercenaries and in my haste forgot to give the commander a churigen to help with casulties

It certainly goes to show that some games the seleucids destroy the ptolemaics or vice versa... and to add to the craziness, Bactria, Armenia and Parthia aren't making attacks on them either apparently

so another call for tips, anyone have any good ideas about how to tackle the Seleucids??

[joerd9]

apart from massproducing troops and slowly taking their cities one by one? Not really. Although it might help a tiny little bit, and only if you can spare the means, to land 2-3 legions near Antioch and perform a campaign of devastation along the fertile crescent (i.e. Antioch to Seleuceia and back). but what wins your war in the end is building an army, sieging this city, taking it, rinse repeat.

[Delvecchio1975]

What i've seen sofar is that you wrest Anatolia from the Seleucids, they're controllable - it makes them as strong as say the Ptolemies, even slightly weaker.

[Mars Magnus]

Boar!
Unstoppable seleucids????
Crazy!
Actually the are ussually destroyed!
But waht do you???
It is very strange to see the Seleucids creating a new Alexander-Empire!
Enjoy it!!!!
Could you add this savegame???
I want the seleucids to make the greatest empire of the world!
And than ,one time,you have conquered the eastern Rome Empire with the macedioniens,fight against ne etablished Seleucid Empire!!!
That´VERY FUNY.
I destroyed as Roman in RTR 6.2 in the last part of the game all of the eastern(main Macedonia)empires.
Macedonia streched from my home Bavaria to the western coasts of the Asia Minor!
I recruited with 120.000 Denarii in one turn only Principes.
One units costs 580 Denarii.^^
After 4 years i head recruited almost 20 legions.
7 in Africa,2 in Spain,6 1/2 in Italy and 2-3 in Gaul and Gewrmania.
That was very nice,because i crashed all Ai until to Susa with thsi troops^^.
And now i have almost conquered of of the world.
Only some bactrains and Parthiens exist yet ...

[Switch]

Yup, sadly whatever you do you'll end up with one superpower foe. If you neuter the Macedonians, the Seleucids will grow to massive proportions. In my current Roman campaign that's exactly what happened - I made sure to stop the Macedonians getting ridiculously powerful using the tips I (and others) suggested in your Mac thread. I then had to deal with the Seleucids.

Could you post a screenshot of your current status? Methods for countering a big superpower depend on your own strengths.

The Seleucids declared war on me after I'd taken the Macedonian homelands. I also had all of Italy and all of Africa west of the landblock under my control. It takes a long time to bring them down, but I kept a legion or two up by the Hellespont and mainly defended against Seleucids coming from Asia Minor. Meanwhile I fielded two legions of Roman troops and another legion of mercenaries and sent them down to what used to be Egypt.

I exterminated Alexandria, Memphis and the other Nile cities. I pretty much abandoned them after ripping down all the useful buildings and marched East then Northwards along the Mediterranean shore, conquering/exterminating cities as I went. After about 10-20 turns I'd worked my way all the way up the Mediterranean coast, while fending off several stacks back at the Hellespont.

Their forces had mainly been concentrated on attacking me, so I met no real resistance ravaging their more inner territories. Eventually though they managed to bring some stacks to start reconquering their (now hollowed out) cities, and for a while my ravaging stopped.

I trained 5 more legions, sending 2 to reinforce the depleted Hellespont forces, and three to go back to Egypt to re-re-capture their cities. My initial invasion armies headed east and sacked their homeland (Babylon, Seleucia, etc), while the reinforced armies in Greece stormed Byzantium then Asia Minor, which was now comparitively lightly defended, their main forces having moved to defend against my middle-eastern incursions.

The Seleucids are now pretty much finished. It's taken probably 100 turns at least, and they still have 40 or so settlements, but Asia Minor is completely mine, and I have 2 stacks roaming towards what used to be Baktria, exterminating cities on their way. More legions on the way to help deal the killer blow. They can't stand against me now!

Hope that helps! Like I say, it takes a long time to bring down the Seleucids, but it's not difficult if you keep sending legions to attack their homelands, while also pursuing a 'normal' border war. Their homelands are very rich and vital to maintaining armies. Taking them and sacking them really hurts their economy, not to mention giving you a nice boost - Just remember to keep Italy churning out legions ^_^!

[malfuriouspete]

Could you post a screenshot of your current status? Methods for countering a big superpower depend on your own strengths.

Sure thing, what shots would you like to see??

[Switch]

Sure thing, what shots would you like to see??

A picture of the minimap would be fine I should think, and perhaps a shot of your current army sizes .

[CountShast]

Yes, if you show us some screenshots of your minimap/armies it would give us an idea of what to help you with.

[malfuriouspete]

here's a minimap and some shots of where I'm fighting the seleucids and the current armies in the area. I got another legion sailing to Alexandria and another legion stationed at Philippi

[thegravytrain18]

Whats a churigen? How does it help casualties?

[pannonian]

Whats a churigen? How does it help casualties?

Chirurgeon. Having that in the commanding general's retinue makes the first 40-50% of your casualties (based on when they fell in battle) recover. I've not noticed any difference in healing rate between the different healing ancillaries or combination of.

[Companion Cavalry]

Sabotage.. no I am not joking if you can bribe say their capital or any other

province in their empires core and give to another faction, by experience the

other faction usually beats the selevkids. Or you can just give large amounts

of troops to their enemies

[Phillius_Ceasar]

Thats werid for the seleucids to dominate. in most of my games they get annilated by the Bactrians/Armenians/Parthians and the Ptolomies.

or they lose their eastern providences

[Switch]

Hmmm... Well you're not in an awful situation, but if you want to actually take the Seleucids down, you'll have a tough job.

Are you at war with any other major faction? Carthage, for instance (though they look like they're still fighting Numidia)? If you are, I'd recommed procuring ceasefires and trade rights from everyone except the Seleucids, otherwise you'll be way, way too overstretched. Alternatively, call a truce with the Seleucids (or at least stay on the defensive), and deal with your other enemies first, before turning your attention to the mighty Blue Empire.

Once you've done that, I'd focus on hit-and-run raids with the stacks you have now. It doesn't look like you could afford to support any more troops than you currently have, and they have bigger armies than you. Do all you can to terrorize them in Egypt and Babylonia, and keep on the defensive wherever they're pushing you. It might take a while and a lot of careful maneuvering, but you should be able to dint their economy enough to start taking a proper swipe at their land (i.e. with the intention of occupying it, not just raids).

Looks like you got unlucky with Alexandria so heavily defended. Try and finish off the siege as quick as you can, and send the non-besieging legion south towards Memphis. This cities along the Nile are immensely wealthy and populous, so exterminating them gives you a boost and hurts the Seleucids (remember to destroy all the buildings). If after you put Egypt to the sword you've still got a stack or two left, you can either head up along the coast of the med, or push on east towards the Seleucid capital (I'd go for the latter).

As for the situation in Anatolia, you seem to have a nice foothold in the south-west. Hold onto it if you can. I'd recommend keeping the garrissons of Symyrna and Halicarnassus small and instead have the troops in the field (if they besiege a city you can always move your army to relieve them - It's a more efficent use of troops imo). I'm sure you can annhilate a couple of Seleucid stacks down there, even without taking more land. And while they're concentrating on trying to push you into the Sea down there, you can perhaps move some forces from the Phillipi direction and attack Byzantium/Maronia.

It's your call how you play it - You don't need to follow my advice exactly. Just keep in mind these two things: 1) It helps you immeasurably to raid their homeland cities (they won't be able to afford lots of stacks/diverts troops from other fronts). 2) Don't attack from a single direction. Make them split themselves up so you can destroy their stacks one at a time, hit them where they're undefended, etc. They have a big empire, but that just makes it hard for them to defend it all at once.

Good luck!

[malfuriouspete]

I'll post an updated mini-map sometime later today, I made some headroom in Anatolia and North Africa.

I'm indeed at war with Carthage but they are pretty much beat now, they may have a few inland cities. I'm also at war with Numidia b/c I got careless and tried to assassinate a general which failed... tried offering a truce plus cash but they wouldn't accept. The Greek Cities also have a few cities too, Crete and 2 cities near the Hellespont.

Also at war with the Gauls but they have their own troubles with the Iberians and I haven't attacked or been attacked by them in years... but still at war

I asked Bactria to attack the Seleucids, gave them cash plus a monthly tribute to help out... don't know if they are doing anything yet as I don't have any spies that far east yet

Basically with the Seleucids its a war of attrition... they send stack after stack and I position myself near bridges and make sure I have at least 4 Cretean Archer units as well as some Hoplites or other spear man to create a choke point... most of the time, they send something like 3000 troops and I destroy them with the loss of about 150 men... unfortunately my laptop can't handle that many men jammed into a small space on the bridge and the game lags to high hell

so I managed to build a provincial barracks in Sparta and Elis (sp?) so at least I can back up my troops in Anatolia. In egypt, its a bit more tough and I rely mostly on mercenaries to get the job done

[CountShast]

If you know for sure, that you wont be able to handle that many men then just use the automatic fight.

[MavsWorld]

Firstly, you need to finish your wars, and procure trade rights with people. You're stretching yourself trying to fight all these wars. You should be able to hold your own against the seleucids if you just play defensively. All they'll do is give much needed experience to your troops and generals.

If you have naval superiority, begin blocking all their ports. Launch a legion into the heart of their empire. Bring 3 or 4 spies with the army, and put the spies in a city. Then assault the city; the spies should open the gates this turn or next. Upon taking the city destroy all the buildings, and set the tax to maximum. You'll get money, and hopefully the town will rebel before the seleucids can retake it. As they dislike you so much it will be filled with a big garrison of rebels.

Repeat this for all their mid cities, avoiding battles with large armies. Remember to keep your spies scouting so you can avoid battles. Once you've caused a big enough disturbance, load all your troops back onto your ship and send them to wherever they are needed.

The Seleucids will be dealt a strong economical blow, and will also have to move all their large armies back to the middle of their empire to retake their cities. This can also encourage Bactria or Parthia to try and take the cities too. It will take the Seleucids quite a while to move their armies from their frontiers to the middle and retake all the cities, as the pc likes to siege cities for a few turns. You'll therefore be given time to finish off your other wars if you haven't already done this, and you'll also be relieving your allies forces so they can rebuild.

[sumaznguy]

The thing about the enemy Ai at least form my experiences, they leave most of their cities with a light garrison, especially ones that are surrounded by their own settlements. That makes huge AI empires very weak.

I was playing as Pontus and at first I was like "holy crap" @ the numerous stacks that the Selucids were throwing at me. But then I decided to attack them back. Instead of attacking the nearest Selucid cities, I just went pass them to attack the middle cities with like 1 unit garrisons. I used a few armies to attack various cities at once so if the Selucid attacked me with a huge stack I just withdraw while my other armies are sieging cities. I was able to carve a hole into the western empire of the Selucid empire. Then I used my new cities to supply me with the money and troops I needed to take care of the rest of the nearby Selucid cities. That's when the Ptolemic Empire declared war on me. Then I got Medieval 2 and stopped playing. But I stopped playing that too. Now I am playing Zeus Master of Olympus rofl. But as soon as RTR 7 comes out I will be playing again. I can only imagine its going to be vastly superior to the current version.

[Darkarbiter]

The thing about the enemy Ai at least form my experiences, they leave most of their cities with a light garrison, especially ones that are surrounded by their own settlements. That makes huge AI empires very weak.

I was playing as Pontus and at first I was like "holy crap" @ the numerous stacks that the Selucids were throwing at me. But then I decided to attack them back. Instead of attacking the nearest Selucid cities, I just went pass them to attack the middle cities with like 1 unit garrisons. I used a few armies to attack various cities at once so if the Selucid attacked me with a huge stack I just withdraw while my other armies are sieging cities. I was able to carve a hole into the western empire of the Selucid empire. Then I used my new cities to supply me with the money and troops I needed to take care of the rest of the nearby Selucid cities. That's when the Ptolemic Empire declared war on me. Then I got Medieval 2 and stopped playing. But I stopped playing that too. Now I am playing Zeus Master of Olympus rofl. But as soon as RTR 7 comes out I will be playing again. I can only imagine its going to be vastly superior to the current version.

Yes but the problem is the timeframe... I mean they haven't even finished TIC yet.
RTR Platinum is still a very good play though.

[ThePianist]

I have another suggestion: somehow get one of your cities to have plague, or look on the map if any cities, including AIs and rebels, have plague, and build many spies. You get to decrease the Seleucid stacks without fighting.
add: Noumenon already wrote the same thing.

another thing: since it takes 4 turns to build Phase I, 6 turns to build Phase II and 8 turns to build Phase III and another 8 turns to build a provincial barrack, that's a total of 13 years between capturing a city and being able to produce faction troops. So suggestion is: when you capture several cities, decide that one or a few (but not all) be eventually producing armies, and start building the Phases in those cities. In the others, start to build temple buildings (so you don't have to garrison these cities as much) and build economic buildings. That way not all of your captured buildings are busy building the Phases, some of them are building temple buildings so not as many of your units are preoccupied with garrison duty, and some are building economic buildings (including roads and ports) to increase the overall income.