The Macedonian Question

[Vectis]

Ever since I started playing RTR I have only really used the Sarmatian faction and the Germans, yet in both I seem to always have the same problem.

Whilst I am busy capturing the nearby rebel territories before anyone else does, and creating some sort of base from which to expand my fledgling empire the Macedonians seem to wipe out all their local rivals and then send stack after stack against me. The other factions seem to be totally useless against them and never once attack them to create a diversion, to allow me time to regroup.

Once when playing as the Sarmatians I was advised to attack and capture the Greek peninsula which seem to work, but as the Germans I am finding this a little difficult geographically.

Every now and then they agree a ceasefire whilst the same move bring in more stacks to my territories.

Why is it that they seem to go through other factions like a hot knife in butter? What has Germany possibly got that is so important for them?
:hmmm:
I create my own stacks which have defeated them time and time again, yet if I let the AI resolve the battle the Macedonians always win. Are their units stats unrealistically high?

I love this game, but fighting battle after battle against Macedonian phlanxes is stretching my enjoyment to its limit. How can I, as Germany, rid myself of this annoying faction, so I can do a little empire building of my own, rather than a constant defence, and have a little greater variety in my battles.

[florin80]

I don`t think it`s so much a problem with macedon itself but with who controls the balcans and the greek cities in particular. It`s a very rich region with many cities and relatively easy to defend once there`s noone else left. It just so happens that the macedonians are in the best position to take this and then expand easily. If greece would be given a chance to win the region it will be the new macedon sort of speak.

As for the autoresolve, it depends on what level of dificulty you play and on the fact that the sarmatians are cavalry based armies. In autoresolve the victory goes unfavorable to the infantry based armies.
Iirc the 2hp units had the hp reduced to only 1 in favoror of more defence. This is because the 2hp seems to unbalance autoresolve. If indeed you`re playing a version that had this fixed it shouldn`t be a problem anymore.

As for what you can do is to have some other faction between you and macedon and pump money and help into them so that they don`t disappear. If you don`t have a common border with them it means less headache.

[morteduzionism]

As Florin said...

Create a buffer faction between you and the Maks. Whether it's Illyria or Thrace put someone in the way.

What do the Maks control? If they control the cities on the coast of the Black Sea I'd march an army over there and clear them out and gift the cities to Thrace or Sarmatia.

Then take that army into Makedonia and take some of the mining cities from them. Either give them to the Greeks(be careful, the Greeks are just as bad if not worse than the Maks) or let them rebel. Anything other than leaving them with Maks.

Best bet is to make the conscious decision to not allow them(Maks) to cross the Danube. You may have to go into the area more than once.

If you hammer them a couple of times it should be enough to give the other factions the time to develop and raise more competent forces.

Don't actually keep any territory. Station Diplomats in/around Thrace and Sarmatia...and maybe Greece(honestly, I wouldn't give the Greeks anything...there's no doubt about it, they're worse/stronger than Maks) in order to quickly unload the provinces. I'd advise against destroying any buildings either, the reason is you want whichever faction that takes over the city to be able to actually hurt the Maks, if you destroy all the buildings the Maks will just roll right back in.

Not only will you have hindered Mak expansion you should also have a pretty decent general(from his campaign in the south) and a pretty good diplomat(from gifting those cities)...bring the general back* to continue expanding your territory...

Station a spy in the region and if they start acting stoopid again...well...send another army to explain the error of their ways...

*I've been able to go from Italy(Rome) all the way to the Black Sea(taking cities) and come back to Rome(taking cities) in under 4yrs(using 4 turns-per-year) and I've also taken 10yrs to do the same trip...just to give an idea of how long it'll take

[Captain Jin]

Ive done a similar thing as Rome. I came in and razed cities on the southern tips of Greece as well as invade the Balkans. Ive kept Greece and Macedon on a similar playing field, still alive but neither too powerful and Illyria and Thrace still live at about the same power. I was actually proud of that. The only issue now is the Seleucids are massive power house in the East that have eliminated the Ptolemaics.

[Ivanelme]

Ive done a similar thing as Rome. I came in and razed cities on the southern tips of Greece as well as invade the Balkans. Ive kept Greece and Macedon on a similar playing field, still alive but neither too powerful and Illyria and Thrace still live at about the same power. I was actually proud of that. The only issue now is the Seleucids are massive power house in the East that have eliminated the Ptolemaics.

Wish I could say that with my Greek campaign. The second I knocked Macedon out and went to make my move on the Ptolemaics island and Nile Delta settlements the Seleucids back stabbed me. Can't a guy just rebuild the Hellenistic Empire in peace?

[morteduzionism]

I was actually proud of that. The only issue now is the Seleucids are massive power house in the East that have eliminated the Ptolemaics.

Ah well, nothings perfect...besides you have alot of water between you and the Seleucids...

Wish I could say that with my Greek campaign. The second I knocked Macedon out and went to make my move on the Ptolemaics island and Nile Delta settlements the Seleucids back stabbed me. Can't a guy just rebuild the Hellenistic Empire in peace?

But you're Greek.... all these tips/strategies is to stop Greece...lol...they're not intended to be used to help Greece...lol

[Ivanelme]

But you're Greek.... all these tips/strategies is to stop Greece...lol...they're not intended to be used to help Greece...lol

Heh, yeah, not exactly going to employ them though. Don't want to create a buffer so much as take the region. Will probably do it once I come into contact with Rome again, they have started ignoring southern Italy after 3 major military defeats, not to mention the old Pyrrhus is back there (this being 30 years later) hold up in a fort with about 1k hoplites by the mountain pass that leads to Croton and Tarentum, and the only reason I have it there is because there has been a lot of army activity in that region, and that seems to make them think twice about invading again.

[The Sloth]

What disgusts me most is the extreme rabidness of the AI. It does not matter what faction I play or where I am. The SAME turn I share a common border with Macedon/[insert random juggernaut], regardless of how small it may be, they send their armies to pay me a visit and blockade my ports. Existig treaties do not matter.
I once had an alliance network as Pontus with Macedon, the Ptolemaics and the Romans. As soon as we had a common border, Macedon backstabbed me (they were already at war with three factions). Macedon being more powerful, the other factions sided with them, but even they didn't really understand what was going on. The Ptollies tried to renew the alliance between us, but Macedon broke the resulting ceasefire one turn later.

This is the one and only thing that the Vanilla version did much, much, much better. At least it was possible to keep your alliances if you put in the effort that was necessary.

[morteduzionism]

First you should understand something: the AI values the destruction of the human player more than it does self preservation.

It's illogical but it's the reality of the game.

I once had an alliance network as Pontus with Macedon, the Ptolemaics and the Romans. As soon as we had a common border, Macedon backstabbed me (they were already at war with three factions). Macedon being more powerful, the other factions sided with them, but even they didn't really understand what was going on. The Ptollies tried to renew the alliance between us, but Macedon broke the resulting ceasefire one turn later.

That's why you should always attack first.

Whenever a faction who shares an ally with you comes into your territory-attack them! If you allow them to attack you first, you get the results you describe above. If you would've attacked them first the Romans/Ptolemies would've ended there alliance with Makedon*

What's better is that when you do this, based on my experiences with Carthage and Illyria, the faction [Maks in this case] will almost always agree to give both money/cease fire on the next turn. I would get @5-10K per cease fire with them. They'd attack every other turn! It's my opinion the AI is trying to trick you into lowering your defenses on that border so they can attack you.
____________________________
*In my campaigns(playing as Rome) both Illyria and Carthage would constantly attack me. The strategy I mentioned above worked 100% of the time. At various times I would share allies with Illyria and Carthage, not once did my allies ever side with my enemy when I attacked first.

Having said this I must also mention that another person did mention that in their campaign it didn't work. He attacked first and his allies sided with his enemy. As I said I've never experienced it, but I guess it is possible. Regardless, it's still probably better to just attack them first anyway.

[Jamey]

The short answer is that there is no easy way to deal with Macedon. If you are lucky, you can build a network of alliances with at least two of Greece, Illyria, and Thrace which can oppose Macedon. If you do, odds are one of the others will wind up taking the majority of Greece and then becoming a superpower.

My experience dealing with Macedon as Germania is that you have to be prepared for a long drawn out war. I eventually captured Salona, then shipped an army to the Peloponnese and broke Macedon's financial back. I could have captured a port in the area sooner, but I kept the remnants of Gaul as a buffer between me and the Romans so that I wouldn't have to fight a two front war with Macdeon and Rome.

After capturing Greece I demonstrated that quantity has a quality of its own in taking out Rome. I was playing a mod for RTR which added the horde feature to barbarian factions, so I followed the horde of Gauls into Italy and cleaned up the remnants of Rome with my experienced armies.

[Mikail Mengsk]

?????

The diplomatical AI is hardcoded, so it changes NOTHING from vanilla to RTR... IT's the same dumb idiot AI. XD

[The Sloth]

?????

The diplomatical AI is hardcoded, so it changes NOTHING from vanilla to RTR... IT's the same dumb idiot AI. XD

Uh? Thats wierd. I know that in Vanilla, I used to make an alliance with Macedon when playing Greece, and together we would steamroll the map. I had to keep them happy at all times, but it was possible (and somewhat fun). Also, this was on H/H.

In RTR, I dont even bother making alliances anymore, since there is just no point in doing so. To be honest, I have the impression that your allies are more likely to attack you than neutral factions. And I never play anything but M/M.
I heard something about a difficulty bug. Is that it?

Err, back to topic.
I tried to weaken Macedon by modding their starting armies and settlements back to nothingness, but even that seems to only delay the demise of their neighbours. I noticed that the Greeks just leave Athens, their wealthiest city, with one unit and send the rest to stand around the settlements they lost to Illyria (not that they would try to take them back, of course...)

[florin80]

Nothing was changed to the ai because of the reasons said above(it`s not possible). It is the same rtw ai. But this differs from one RTW version to another(including BI) so this might be it. And, of course, things on the strategic map(like what armies, moneys, regions and so one the factions have access too) are a bit different in RTR so it might take a different turn than in vanilla. And it is possible that the attitude some faction have towards others at the start of the game have been changed(haven`t checked yet).

[Artax]

The diplomacy also depends a lot on the difficulty level. On H and VH campaign AI puts all the effort to defeat the human player no matterwhat even if the odds are greatly against them.

They seem to ignore everything: alliance, peace and you probably noticed that when there begins a new war and let's say your ally is the ally of your new enemy AI will always keep the alliance with other AI contolled faction.

[Ivanelme]

In the campaign I am playing as Greece I share two boarders with Rome (southern Italy and the Alps) and I have yet to be attacked. They tried it a few times early on and lost every time and haven't come back since. They just moved north have have pretty much wiped out the Gauls, I also share a boarder with Carthage in Sicily and we have trade rights at the moment, haven't been attacked by them but once I think.

[TKainZero]

IN my Pontus Campain, i have 2 or 3 boarders with the Maks, and i have been fine for like 20 years...

We are allies, and i give them extra cash anytime i have more then 20k...

They were allies with both Illryrains, and Romans, but Backstabbed the Illryians instead of me, and then then Romans attacked them too in North-eastern italy after Illyrian's died out... The Greeks, Thracians, and Illryians were all wiped out by the maks, but they havent expanded east, i have Nicomedia, and they have Byzentine... i have the southern coast city on the west black coast, and all the northern ones...


Me and the Maks are cool... At least as long as i fight TSE, and they fight Romans, they dont have a stack 4 turns from me...

[Clearchus of Sparta]

I have a simple philosophy

If it moves...... attack it......It it doesnt move......... attack it till it does