Numidian Strategy

[WILHELM_II]

OMG! :evil A NUMIDIAN GUIDE?

Yes, this is a Numidian guide, generally thought of as the weakest faction... definetly NOT. A faction's strength is not determined by the game, it's determined by you... so, let's make Numidia a little bit stronger shall we.

Well, here comes a little overview

Overview

- Numidia's military is better than you might think, they might not have such a wide unit choice, but what they have, it's good. The Numidian Cavalry, it's a LOT stronger than most people think. Surrounding any unit (Even Urban Cohort) with 2-3 Numidian Cavalry, peppering them, and charging them kills. Then we have Desert Infantry. A very good allround unit, nothing wrong with it. Use it as much as you can. Numidian Legions... well, that speaks for itself of course. Numidian Camel Riders... oof, my favorite. They scare all horses, they just ride down anything they come acroos, and it's fun to see how stupid the camels walk :

- Numidia's campaign situation on the other hand, it's starting position, is not that good as you might expect, but, conquer only one single town, and all your problems will be fixed (this comes later) At the beginning, Numidia's overall territory is divided into two parts : Cirta, Dimmidi and Tingi, near two Carthaginian towns, and on the other side Siwa, near the Egyptians. Both strong adversarries, so, you need to be offensive. Money is not so much of a problem, unless you don't manage your towns very well, and only focus on military. Some more of this later.

- Numidia's economy begins quite strong (Except one town) then drops a bit, gets into a depression (every game this happens, and there is nothing you can do about it) bit, after you conquer one single town, your income will rise. But it will fall again unless you conquer another, and another, and so on. So with Numidia, your economy is only stable if you have a constant expansion. Preferably to the east, as barbarian towns often don't give so much trade. I would conquer Spain though. But leave out the rest. You should build roads and ports early on, as you need a lot of trade stimulation, to help settle your economy.

Conquering

Who would have thought, that Numidia might conquer... sheesh. But, back to the point. Numidia's conquering is a quest for a stable economy. And of course, to win the game, but primarily it's an economy quest. Your very first town to conquer should be Carthage. Why? Becouse, with it's sea and land thrade, it connects Siwa, you your main chunk of land. Until now, Siwa always had a negative revenue, even with Very High Tax right. After you conquer Carthage, they give you about 700 on Easy, 500 on Normal, 300 on Hard and 150 on Very Hard. So, from something that was a trouble early on, you make big profits. Right... but as you look, after a bouple of turns, your towns start to get a negative revenue. Argh!

So, keep conquering, but, if you want to build up more before starting to conquer, there is a little option :

You conquer only Carthage, Thapsus and Leptis Magna. In that order. You do not conquer the little town under Dimmidi (OMG, the first time ever I can't remember a town name :p) Just keep those going with Siwa, keep all towns connected, in some sort of way. And build shrines to Tanit, rather than Milqart. Baal shrines are not that important, as Numidia can build peasants just as well as other factions You can keep this up for about 50 turns, then, somehow, the economy goed bad, maybe becouse of too much population.

But, if you begin to conquer. You have all of Africa, except Egypt. Leave them as they are, they sohuldn't worry you. You have to own the following provinces when you start to conquer : Siwa, Cirta, Tingi, Dimmidi, Carthage, Lepcis Magna, Thapsus, Cyrene, and the Sahara town. The first thing you should just... conquer, is Palma. Why? Becouse this is going to be your major Trade Centre (And planes didn't exist at that time, so don't worry about terrorists), it is going to be your connection with Europe. Make trade agreements with Gaul, Spain and Julli, the SPQR, the Scipii, the Brutii and possible the Greeks. When you have Palma, start building up forces quickly, and make sure that no town has negative revenue. The first thing you should take is Carthaginian Syracuse (if the Scipii haven't conquered it yet, if they have, you've run out of luck, and should start with Egypt). The first thing to attack is Memphis when you go to Egypt, as you'll need the loyalty very hard. Next is Alexandria, with it's lighthouse, always useful. And then conquer Thebes. Don't go too far east, just conquer away the following cities to get some trade booming : Petra, Sidon, Jerusalem, Antioch, Tarsus, Halicarnassus, Salamis and Rhodes. Develop trade, and boom the trade as much as you can. When you have about 5000 revenue on Easy, 4000 revenue on Normal, 2500 revenue on Hard, or 1000 revenue on Very Hard, you can conquer Parthia and (possible) leftovers from the Seleucids. Now, it's time to cool down. You will have all the middle east, and Turkey (including the two Armenian towns) And you should have a bordeer with Scythia. Cool down, as you have a tradeboom going, and this one is going to last. Now, where should you go.. conquer Spain, and onto the barbarian areas, or go for Greece? I'd say, go for Greece, and take Sicily at the same time. The Romans should pose no problem at all for Numidia. Desert Infantry is a good all-round unit, and the Numdian Legionaries will do their job, even before the Romans possibly already can build Legionaries of their own. Cavalry should be no problem, as your Desert Camels should wipe them out without any trouble.

When you have Greece and Sicily, conquer away Italy, and get going to finish the campaign. For me, 50 provinces while holding Rome isn't finishing the campaign. For me, possessing the whole world and Rome is a victory, and a good one. Make this your goal rather than the 50 provinces.. but then again, it's your choice...

Your Buildings

Oh goody, Ho Hum (© Spork Corporation, All rights reserved. Spork Guide subsection fifteen, line eight hundred and ninety-two.) In my opinion, Numidia has possible the easiest townbuilding of all. Just get to a 6000 Size city, and you have all cavalry. You get their main unit with one experience there too! Get to 12000 and you have all Numidian units. Easy, quick, fine, good. Conquer Carthage, build just two buildings, and you can make all Numidian units. Easy, quick, fine, good. You can conquer away, all at the beginning, before the Romans can even make Principes.

But, now to buildorders. With Numidia, especially at the beginning, I always build Roads primarily. Why? Numdian lands are HUGE, you need to be able to transport troops quickly to anything dangerous. And, becouse Numidia's main source of income (at the start) is land trade. So, what comes after roads? A Shrine to Tanit, which boosts trade. After that, build a marker, or trader or anything in that matter, as long as you see some apples in the Building's picture.

Numidia's main way to fight, is ranged. Nearly all factions require building a Barracks sort of building, as the first of all military buildings. I'd rather build an Archery. Why? Numidian archers are just good units. They might be simple archers, but there is something that makes them good... wait, I KNOW WHY. THE FEATHERS :

The next thing should be stables, as Numidian Cavalry is such a good allround unit, oof. Then comes barracks. So, Numidia has some sort of reversed military build order. You may want to choose stables first rather than Archery ranges, when you are beginning to conquer Europe, but by that time, you will have good allround armies, so it won't really matter whether you build the one of the other first.

Oh noes, the Scipii

Yes the Scipii (Scee-Pee-Ee, not Sci-Pi-I, that isn't Roman, that's Chinese), they always bug you. When they're alive, when they're dead, and... something inbetween. If you don't get an alliance quick, they will keep invading you till about 5670 AD. So, what to do against the Scipii... here are a few basic tips, for those having trouble with these weird little Chinese Romans...

1. Bribe them. Get Lilybaeum before they do, try to make an alliance with the Greeks if they've not been driven out yet, and bribe all possible Scipii. Try to bribe Messana, if you have enough Denarii for it. Make Syracuse a buffer against the Scipii.

2. If you're too late, you can do the following : Put an army on Syracuse (not the town, the whole island) And pick off small Scipii forces. This makes your troops experienced. Now, just wait for the Scipii to bring a large army, and slaughter them. More experience. If your troops are getting short, get Lilybaeum, but don't conquer any further, as you need to really conquer Europe, at the same time you attack the Greek penisula.

3. Get an Alliance. Offer money for it, offer maps for it, anything, except giving a town away. Get a bit cushy with them, if not, they will stab you in the back, and you will get a message, with that FANTASTIC SCREAM (I can't stop listening to that sound when I get the message :p) With the following title : Betrayed. Offer each 5 years or so, to do a map exchange, that will usually help getting a bit more close with eachother...

Fighting Battles

Numidian fighting can be a bit complicated, but also, a bit simple. The goal is, to weaken enemies by heavy ranged fire, and then let your main units finishing it. Not quite so many factions have the ability to do this, only three are the real masters concerning this : Scythia, Armenia and Numidia. Why is numidia among them, while they don't have any Horse Archers. Well... ALL of their first line units, are ranged units. Numidian Javelinmen, Numidian Cavalry and Archers. Use this. Pepper enemies, and just let your Numidian Cavalry charge. In later stages of the game, use the Legionaries as Javelinmen, rather than Infantry. Let them pepper enemies together with your ranged units, and make sure they waste every spear, arrow, boulder, and er... that's it. Then charge with everything. Don't worry about cavalry, becouse Numidian Cavalry can handle all early-stage cavalry, and by the time you get to face better, and stronger and heavier cavalry, your Camel Riders and Desert Infantry should do the job.

A basic starting Numidian army looks like this :

7 Numidian Cavalry.
7 Numidian Javelinmen
6 Archers

Basically, a good army, weak against cavalry. So target cavalry when firing rather than infantry.

A mid-game Numidian ARmy looks like this :

4 Numidian Cavalry
4 Numidian Javelinmen
10 Desert Infantry
2 Archers

Now, you can also counter cavalry easily. And you have a basic infantry force


That's the basic type of warfare with Numidia. Now comes late stage-fighting. Through the game you didn't really need to make your own formations and battle setups... But sometimes, Numidia needs to take a more human formation, rather than an AI formation. Usually I just say in my guides : find out yourself. Why? Becouse you need some own experience, intuition. IT will help you later on in the game, not just with Numidia, I mean the game generally. It helps stimulate you to think better during battles, and it will help you make formations of your own. No formation is best, how good a formation is, is again, determined by YOU.But, with Numidia, I make an exception. As the following battle tactic needs some explaination, beoucse I've decided to give you an alternative, as most of you find Numidia difficult to fight with.

L = Legionaries
NC = Numidian Cavalry
DI = Desert Infantry
A = Archers
CR = Camel Riders
NJ = Numidian Javelinmen
LSC = Long Shield Cavalry


_____DI___DI___L___L___L___L___L___DI___DI_____
LSC__CR__CR____NC__NJ__NC________CR___CR__LSC
___________________A__A_______________________

Basically : Use your Legionaries as a main force, Desert Infantry For flanking. Archers, Javelinmen, Numidian Cavalry and Legionaries will pepper. Desert Infantry charges the flanks, alongside the Legionaries, smashing into the main force. Long Shields go way behind the enemy lines, and smash in from behind. Camel Riders slaughter the enemy Cavalry. Hammer and Anvil (Whoops, Ripoff from Alexander the great)

Well... This is about it, not really anything more to tell. Which faction should I do next?

[nipsyr]

I am thinking this might be pinned for I do not think we have a pinned Numidian post. Looks like a start.

Numidian Military Section:
I would like to see a breakdown of what I can build, specifically when and perhaps where if your going to help create a strategy.
What units at 2000, 6000, 12,000, 24,000 population city limits? What is an early game and mid game and late game Numidian army mostly consist of? What are some good mercenaries and where should I look for them?

For example the early game would be perhaps your first 15-20 cities. Of these cities maybe 5 will have 6,000 population. So your primarily in the early game using units from 2000, 6000, population cities and they are, and you build them where?

The middle game is 20-35 cities. Once you get around 30-35 cities you will probably have around 5 cities around 12,000 population. So your vanguard armies will have some 12,000 population units, and these are your main fighting armies and they will primarily take you to success. What is the makeup of this army? Where might I build this army?

The end game is 35-50 and you will be marching with mostly 50-75% 12,000 population city units. You might have one army or two with some 24,000 population units, toward the end, to conquer the last 5 or so territories.

Numidia's campaign situation:
I would think at least it would be necessary and prudent to perhaps describe the difference between playing a Numidian normal campaign map vs a very hard campaign map. Mostly the difference is with a very hard campaign map you will have 25% less money per turn and another big change though is the increased need of spies and diplomats, and perhaps need to prepare yourself to bribe enemy armies. Basically normal vs a very hard campaign for Numidia is one has extensive bribery and the other has practically none. Regardless of your personal belief of whether bribery is bugged or fine, how you deal with it, or have chosen to deal with it I would think is important. Of course your campaign map difficulty will dictate the extensive nature of bribery.

As far as the campaign goes, I would think you could at the least say take these three cities first, perhaps at least get the player his first 10 territories and then suggest the rest is up to him with maybe outlining briefly the obvious routs to success.

[nipsyr]

Nice strategy guide. I think it is very informative. I kind of would like to read a Egypt guide because I have never played them. I also would like to read a Gaul guide just because so many people say they are weak. A Spain guide would be interesting with its mix of units to read about.

I am thinking Seleucid maybe. Like to read how you deal with the (2) turn Silver Shields and if you make it to gettting Legionaires and if you actually use many of them. Also with Seleucid your mix of horse and elephant units would be interesting and why maybe you chose one over the other. Plus Egypt really is a pain for Seleucid players I read and strategy is always good.

But I see among the list of posts that Armenia, Scythia, Macedonia, and Thracia have none so maybe they would be the place to start. We need to PM the moderator of this forum to suggest pinning this.

[Spork]

Willhelm has released... just about every guide fathomable, at this point anyway. He may go back in time, insert more factions and then in turn write mor guides, but thats just silly. Silly, silly. You'll find Seleucids down there somewhere anyway, because the admins have yet to sticky them with their sticky magic.

Another splendid show of guidemanship. I'll try this out soon, Numidia is an interesting option.

[WILHELM_II]

Nipsyr :

Seleucid : http://www.twcenter.net/forums/index...howtopic=18430
Spanish : http://www.twcenter.net/forums/index...howtopic=18871

[Damage_Inc]

Should sticky this. There is no other Numidian Guide.

[Matt King of Greece]

Sticky this Plzz someone before the good vanishes into the mist of time.

Or i get my might Numidians war army to invade hahaha. (conquered the romans with numidia)

[EmperorJulian]

Sorry to revive a super-dead thread, but hey I'm actually using Numidia now and I could use some input. Although I haven't read this strategy before, I can say from first hand experience that the continuing solvency of the Numidian treasury IS quite depedent upon expansion. Any pause in city aquisition turns your spike in funds into a very small profit. A profit that's simply not capable of sustaining blockades, sieges or even cyclical changes in trade income. Given this fact, I find maintaining a constant influx of dinarii is perhaps the most difficult aspect of this campaign for me.

In my case most of my attempts at a Numidian Supremacy have involved evacuating siwa immediately, letting it revolt and thus gaining a (usually long-standing) alliance with Egypt. With my Eastern Flank secure I then blitz the Carthaginian Posessions and in rapid sucession take Carthage, Thapsus and Lepcis Magna. I rarely bother with Nepte as it's not all that valuable anyway. One constant threat that I rather dislike is the presence of rebel armies that tend to siege my cities (mainly Tingi and Dimmidi). These armies can be a handful in the early game when money is scarce. Another difficulty is the fact that before I even siege Carthage I'm typically 7000 dinarii in the hole, meaning that for almost 4 years I'm not able to build any improvements or make any new units in my remaining 3 territories. This is most annoying.

Once the Carthaginian poessesions are secure, it seems most prudent to move into Sicily. This can be a difficult proposition however as the Scipiones tend to be rather resiliant and may have occupied the island entirely before you get there. In point of fact I only managed to take the island since I sunk a large reserve force sent by the Scipiones which resulted in the death of 3 of their generals. I've also found taking Caralis from any Roman faction causes them to fixate on that island (once Sicily is overrun). This fact alone prompts me to believe that Numidia must establish some form of naval superiority, rapidly, so as to prevent amphibious invasions of their territory. On the other hand, I find that while I'm at war with all the Romans, only the Scipiones seem to attack with armies, the Julii and Bruti seem more obcessed with naval blockades.

In my one successful campaign I managed to take the Eastern Coast of Spain, but as it was getting on to 220 BC I found my expansion far too slow and my income per year (perhaps 5000 dinarii) to be far too small. As I mentioned earlier this income can be severely curtailed if you end up enduring multiple blockades (reducing it to zero or negative ammounts at times). The other issue is by holding on to the Western Mediterranian Region, Numidia ends up at war with everyone that might potentially trade with them. An issue that is none to desirable. Numidia does get the benefit of a number of family members that are acquired rapidly during the early parts of the reign, despite Syphax dying off quickly.

Anyway, I really am not sure how to make the campaign work. Taking on Egypt is possible, and you can even take Thebes or Memphis with the minor-league army in Siwa. I find this to be a rather futile gesture without more stacks to back the first army up. I can see however a benefit to moving into the Eastern Mediterranean. Numidia could use more trade income and access to more friendly markets, and owning Egypt certainly would improve the power of the faction. the Scipiones are a constnat menance however and I really don't think it's wise to leave Sicily in their hands. What is the consensus opinion here? I've read a number of strats on the Org and many recommend taking Egypt, or just the opposite (evacuating Siwa). I wonder which is best?

[Aemilianus]

I've never played with the Numidians at all, but judging by the way things look here I don't think it would be that hard to take out Egypt if you could hold one of their home cities, here is why.

They, worse than any faction in all of Rome that I have ever faced, sucks at assaulting cities, especially one with a stone wall. Egypt, at the beginning of the game, only holds four provinces, and if you take out, say, Memphis, it will hold three. I'm sure at some point they'll send a pretty stiff army, but all you would have to do would be to defeat it and try to avoid general field actions against the Egyptian troops, and I can't see why you wouldn't have them (three provinces can't upkeep an army, and they can't build one quickly either). Carthage can be fought with your western provinces, and if you can defeat them (an entirely separate front) then you have all of Africa and a clear shot at the islands...I cannot think of a better situation.

Again, this is only speculation, but I really think that's an idea, provided that first Siwa army can do its job.

[caratacus]

A very good campaign guide for a faction I like playing simply because its more of a challenge.

I agree with most of your strategy but I would make greater use of both mercenaries and naval power. The navy is used to protect trade but also used to undertake raid and plunder of enemy cities using mercenaries. This would both briefly gain extra income before they are inevitably recaptured ( not much given the mercenaries are expensive but nevertheless both powerful and expendable), but also more importantly slow the progress of rivals through income deprivation. Prior to these cities being retaken, as is usually the case, make sure to destroy their buildings which further degrades your enemy's forces and ultimately demise by your all conquering army.

To tackle aggresive behaviour of factions such as Scipii, gift a city between you and them in order to drag another faction into the conflict, as alliances in the games diplomacy are unreliable. For Scipii this would mean ensuring that the Greeks have Sicily which would act as a buffer between North Africa and Italy and tie down their troops trying to take it, giving you time and resources. But this should be done after Carthage is defeated and her former naval power has become yours to prevent direct incursions from the sea.

Playing Numidia is rewarding but you have to be prepared to be more creative and different in approaching strategy than simply expanding your empire city by city, as this will result in coming up against a faction who is simply stronger than your own. However it must be said that I have never finished the map playing Numidia but this is never my objective as its very unrealistic to do so. No simply expanding the frontiers out of North Africa and taking on those mighty Romans is rewarding enough for me.

[EmperorJulian]

Well as I've continued using the Numidian Faction I've come up with some more thoughts on the campaign. Using RTW Vanilla 1.5 (with slight modifications: changing Faction tendencies and starting denarii etc.) The strategy which seems to be most prudent is to leave Siwa behind, then using the western armies (augmented by new units and mercenaries) to take Carthage and Thapsus ASAP. This will typically result in one or more heroic victories as Carthage can send larger forces (with elephants) against you at the start of hostilities.

Then the "fugitive" force from Siwa marches across the desert to take Lepcis Magna (which may or may not be in Carthaginian hands). This allows an alliance with Egypt and keeps them off your back for an as yet indeterminate ammount of time. Once Western Africa is Secure the next step is to invade Sicily. Defeating the Scipiones isn't massively difficult, however I find they like to keep a large multi-general stack in reserve, this stack can prove to be a big nuissance once Sicily is completely overrun. In any event, in my latest attempt, I managed to lose 1 city (Siwa) whilst gaining 7 more in 15 years. Nepte is easilly taken to consoldate the gains in Africa, in my case, after Sicily is secure.

Now Egypt I think starts with 5 territories to begin with. Usually while I can take Thebes or Memphis, I am quickly overrun by massive stacks, usually multiple full or near-full stacks. Now my Generalship is pretty good, but it's not really all that likely that a small force of mainly javelin-men and javcav will be able to defeat a full stack Egyptian army with mutiple generals. I DO notice that if you take Thebes or Memphis Egypt gets "tentative" for a while, and will not immediately counter-attack. In fact they seem more disposed to go "behind the back" and take Siwa away from you, rather than hit you first. When they do attack it's usually with mulitiple quasi-full stacks with several generals, chariots, bowmen, spearmen et all.

I recall defending Thebes at one point, where I had three generals and a small merc army I defeated 1400 Egyptians, yet they came out of the battle with 900 or so to spare. This is why I'm not "sold" myself on attacking Egypt right away. It MAY be possible to "stall" in Siwa while your armies take Carthage and Thapsus. This could very well open the door for operations in Egypt, however, while your waiting to take the cities in the West, Egypt is busy building up units to take Siwa as well. And the inevitable attack of the Scipiones is guaranteed to come at an inoportune moment. Don't get me wrong I really like the Numidian Faction, I just wish I had a bit better idea of what to do during the first 20 or so turns. Cheers!

Note: I also think the AI gifts money to itself on Hard/Hard. That being the case taking a city or blocking their ports may not make that much of a difference. I know the AI can create generals out of thin air too, which is seldom a friendly gesture towards the player. Anyway just wanted to add that in too.