Different soldier and factions, balanced or no?

[Giaus Marius]

Hey, im just writing to see if anyone else finnds very unbalanced situations in the vanilla RTW....they can be military, economic or geographic (cities that a faction starts with or is surrouded by), for example....

I am currently playing as Parthia, and i have found that they have easlily the most unreliable infantry in the game, except for when they are fighting cavalry. I own 20 territories, including Antioch, Sinope, and Sidon, and that is only because i have to use my horse archers and persian cavalry for everything (none of the starting cities except for the very far north one start anywhere near cataphracts). The infantry are mainly a distraction for the enemy, and if i am fighting a weak army half my size, auto running will easily kill over half of my men and i will lose.:hmmm:

As well, they start with the relativley large city of campus sakie which is of no help at all bringing you into debt the whole campaign.

I enjoy this challange, but find it frustrating my infantry cant do better than peasants.

[piranha45]

you must be referring to Parthia. Yes, it is a very boring faction to play as. I conquered all asia, turkey, saudi arabia, and egypt (about 30 provinces) before I got bored and stopped playing... tWICE. I thought it would be better the 2nd time, but I was wrong.

[The10thLegion]

get spqr total war (a mod for rtw) and it makes pontus and all the other factions much more fun. Its better to play as the romans but its still nice to play as the other ones too.

[Xavier Dragnesi]

Yes, I have played as Pontus. Their strengths aren't really in infantry until you can get their hoplites. (I haven't actually got up to the stage of getting hoplites, but I've played as Pontus as a quick battle, so most of my unit information is from that). Also they are quite good once their powerful cavalry kick in, and when you can start producing chariot archers, they are virtually unstoppable.

[conquestor]

the pontus are weak early on, if you manage the early onslaught of enemies you will be the strongest faction in the region in time.

[Giaus Marius]

Im sorry, but i meant parthia, i thought i had corrected my self, but yes, pontus is kinda hard to be, and yet the ai almost always succeedes:hmmm:

A really over balanced one is if you play macedon. You can take all of greece in like 5 turns

[Xavier Dragnesi]

Well Parthians are pretty awesome once you get to their cataphracts. They are strong and pack a powerful punch. Their infantry is average, true, but you can also get cataphract archers, which are also wonderful, and also cataphract camels. You can also recruit elephants. It's the cavalry that's the power of the Parthians

[Eccentric]

Yea, Parthia's cavalry is the best in the game, although they don't have cataphract archers, Armenia does.

[Giaus Marius]

Yeah, if they had that cataphract archers it would be good, but i dont think they could be able to flank as well as the Perisan Cavalry can. If they had heavy spearmen or something like Armenia, then they would be able to stand up to rome after the reforms i would imagine.

[Lord Thesaurian]

the parthian inf suck bcause theyre not sposed 2 b used as ur main arm. ur HAs and cataphracts can own pretty much anything, so depend on them, not ur crappy inf.

[Xantrip]

IMO, Armenia is more fun and better than Parthia. It also has Cataphracts and Horse Archers, and it has better infantry as well, like Imitation Legionaries. Cataphract Archers are a plus, but they're awfully expensive. I usually take one.

[hanibalthegreat]

Well just do it my way once you realize that your Inf sucks beyond all hope you start expecting less of them

[aznflea]

a game with diverse unit choices can never be balanced. further made worse the nature of the game where geography can make or break a nation

as for gameplay, youll just have to get used to it.

[davidliao623]

omg Rome Total War this game is seriously unbalanced simply for all kind of reasons, thats why the game Rome Total Realism is born. It has transformed the game RTW more realistic in factions, history, units, name, map and a lot more things. Go and download the Rome Total Realism mod.

[darthbane7]

Hmm, someone like RTR... Nah, a lot of mods are appropriate for balance, like say XGM, the aforementioned RTR, EB, RS, SPQR, DarthMod, and a lot more. These mods help balance out factions (ie, so the other faction have a fighting chance against post-marian rome).

One thing I don't like in RTW campaign is that the Seleucids start out with little money, but a HUGE empire and little troops. Not a good combo, eh? (WRE, anyone?...)

[hastati lord]

One thing I don't like in RTW campaign is that the Seleucids start out with little money, but a HUGE empire and little troops. Not a good combo, eh? (WRE, anyone?...)

umm r u talking about vanilla? because i believe that the seleucids have 4 or 5 starting cities in vanilla which isnt my definition of huge

[Roxas]

umm r u talking about vanilla? because i believe that the seleucids have 4 or 5 starting cities in vanilla which isnt my definition of huge

Well I think he means too much spread out, its not big its just all spread out with dozens of factions bordering its empire

[hastati lord]

Well I think he means too much spread out, its not big its just all spread out with dozens of factions bordering its empire

true but they are still fun to play as
btw i dont think there r quite a dozen factions bordering them

[conquestor]

Just try playing to win as the thracians. They have inferior units and must rely on weak archers, phalanxes, and barbarian tactics. However, I did once massacre a macedonian hoplite army by mass charging with basternae and skirmisher calvs that had no ammo.