How large of an army do you maintain when conquering?

[InVinoVeritas]

I've been struggling to find that balance point between too large to financially support and too small to conquer quickly without leaving your conquered cities under protected.

For example, I take two full stacks east to destroy Epirot, who has about 3 or 4 cities across the Adriatic. Two cities fall quickly, but if I wait for 5 turns to garrison some troops, it gives them a chance to recover and consolidate. If I press on, some other nation usually swoops in and puts my pitifully defended city under siege.

So should I be charging around with 5 full stacks, or leaving a larger defense force in my cities?

[century x]

Well it all depends on who you are conquering.

I mean if you want to invade the middle east with just two armies your not going to get far.

8 stacks is good to take over all of Greece and Macedon and its a good force to keep the peace as well in your new cities.

[zznɟ ǝɥʇ]

I fight 'passive-aggresively.' I go in with two-three stacks, but leave one in the city and position the others so that any battle will likely involve both of my stacks, and maybe two of the enemy. That way the battles are larger and more decisive. The going is much slower, but the losses are less and the enemy is weakened quite a bit.

[swhunter]

i take 6 stacks (as Greeks ) take a few cities pillage them to build another 2 more stacks from my experienced level city , build a few forts near a bridge if any and wait til i have 2 more reinforcement stacks that come to my aid . Then take a few more cities by piecemeal.
At times i take 2 or three cities at a time depends who's fighting me and where.
With the pressure on the enemy they fall back to their most advanced city and try to recover. In doing so i don't attack a large force in a city but hit the smaller ones around for support. Til another 2 more stacks come along while balancing my economy.
I also take a city and leave one stack near it. Gives me 6,000 troops to play with.
Also i use spies to bring discontent to their cities.

[Lucius Aemilius Paulus Macedon]

I took macedonia and epirus with one stack and the penopales with 8
guess wich one was harder?
anyway I usally use 2-3 armyes for all campains if they wereout then I just let them go back and hold my freaking cityes, anyway beon the advance evrywere and you won't have to worry about getting backstabed.

[EternalSlayer]

If you're looking for a good balance you should look to position your stacks in the best positions possible. I generally do not garrison my cities with any troops apart from those necessary to keep down unrest. If an enemy stack does attack one of my cities I'll always have a stack nearby to take it out. Try to identify possible threats to your cities and position your Legions accordingly. I would also recommend that you build up a strong economic base before you set out to conquer Greece and the Balkans. That way you can always recuit another stack to help you if things get tough.

[InVinoVeritas]

Thanks guys, this should help me out. Do you know the maximum number of troops that help to suppress unrest? I heard it was 5 units, so that's what I've been keeping in each city that's not on the front.

[Coldcall]

Thanks guys, this should help me out. Do you know the maximum number of troops that help to suppress unrest? I heard it was 5 units, so that's what I've been keeping in each city that's not on the front.

I'm not sure there is a limit except a limit on how many can fit into a city barracks - 20.

Also you should not need more than 2 or so units to keep your Roman mainland cities pacified. In fact often if you have a good governor you dont need any units in a city to keep it happy.

[Atticus]

if you invade another nation with the intention to occupy their lands, have a full stack of town watch or whatever units you use for garisson duties accompany your legions.

when you conquer your first town, move your army/legion out of the town and the full stack of town watch in. that way you have your conquering army ready to attack a new target or to defend your new province when the enemy lays siege to it (so you don't have to sally out and can fight a normal battle).

when you conquer a new town, move some of your town watch out of your firstly conquered city into your newest gain. your first town is starting to get used to its new overlord so less town watch will be necessary and can be used for other cities.

keep doing this till you have conquered all the cities in the area you invaded.

[Lucius Aemilius Paulus Macedon]

I think it's just unit by unit it dosen't stop improving public order after the 5th.

[Praetorian_Mossop]

I've never had a chance to build up my military and do a large scale invasion, I always find another faction will attack me before that (which means for honour sake I must invade his lands until he kneels before my king ). Take my Pergamum campaign for example, at the moment I hold 27 settlements ranging from virtually all of asia minor, the coast of the middle east and I'm now pushing into Epiriot Greece. I use 6 full stacked armies and I know I should be recruiting more - 2 launched the invasion of Greece, 3 stopped the Seleucids in their tracks and I have one sitting on my southern border in case of any invasion. Ideally I would have about 10 stacks forming one great army pushing through the Seleucid lands - but there are always other factions attacking me!

I think the hardest part is getting the balance between military success and financial faliure, it all depends on your economy!

[Paidonomos]

I typically invade with 4 or 5 stacks, but the key to my strategy is strategic incursions into enemy territory. 3 stacks usually move on the enemy's frontline cities and they usually draw the wrath of much of the enemy's army. The other stack or 2 then move on the newly sparsely defended areas. This most often sends the enemy into utter confusion as to what to do. By then they have sieged one or 2 of the cities I took, but auxila legions are now on the scene to support the invading legions. Such a strategy allowed me to conquer the entire map by AUC 599

[Kahnovitch]

Depends a lot on which faction you're playing as and who you're up against.

I wiped out most of the middle east with two stacks as Parthia.

I had a battlefield stack of HA's and a siege stack of merc infantry and foot archers.
Parthia doesn't get artillery so settlements have to be taken by infantry force.
An interesting premise considering they have shite infantry that takes 1 turn to produce even when set on zero recruitment turns lol!

[El Crumb]

For newly conquered cities i create around five or six town guard and install a half decent governor if possible. If one isn't available then i build an academy first so any governor can beneft from it's ancillaries and public happiness bonus.

For town and villages, two or three town guard and normal or low taxes (depending on population) usually does the trick.

As carthage i don't have so many standing armies. Africa is vast and even with good roads and harbours takes time to traverse. So i build a decent barracks, stables and archery range in my large towns/cities and if invaded or threatend by nomadic rebels i can quickly put together a basic force to fight them. I play 0-turn recruitment. Once the battle is over i disband the force back to it's settlement. Saving money on upkeep

[torzsoktamas]

In my Roman campaign after a bunch of turns Gaul decleared war against me.He had like 7-8 fullstack armys.I attacked them with 4 fullstack armys consisting of VE legionaries a few cavalry,triarri and velites.I defeated their fullstack armys in a few turns.To conqueror their settlements I had to make another fullstack army and a halfstack army.To keep the peace I made a bunch of townguards.

[Martin N]

in early game, i always retrain my units at the cities i conquer, unless its a town, as you cant build hastati/princ/tri there, i build 4 city militia and move on, in late game with the legions, im always careful because its not possible to retrain so far away, so its wise to use century x idea on taking a couple stacks of auxilia on conquering missions to bolster your main force.

[InVinoVeritas]

All of this advice has made a significant difference in my campaigns, thanks! El Crumb, you mentioned building an academy if you don't have a decent governor to instate, very good idea. Which temples do you choose in a recently conquered city? With so many different ones to pick, I'm usually picking randomly, unless the city has mines, then I pick Vulcan, or lots of trade resources, then I pick Mercury.

[Martin N]

i always pick mars, extra law % so i can tax more, and the god of war is awesome anyway!

[InVinoVeritas]

Hm, I'll have to try the Mars temple. Is there any way to see what additional benefits the larger temples have before actually building them? That would help make the choice a little easier than basing it off of the initial benefit.

[Samuel Adams]

I have to maintain several armies for several campaigns at all times it seems.

I had at my height 3 Legions and 25 Auxilia Cohorts plus archers and cav in Brittania; 4 Legions on the limez with Germania, plus the auxilia garrisons in cities and 20 some odd cohorts plus archers and cavalry on patrol; 2 Legions on the Limez with Dacia (occupied by Germania-One legion in fort with 4 Auxilia cohorts and several cavalry ala to act as scouts, one legion patrolling the Macedonian Borders); and no less than 7 Legions in my Middle Eastern Campaign (Legio III patrolling north and into Seleucid-held Armenia, Legio III Cyrenica taking Cyprus then landing north of Jerusalem to begin the push east, Legio X Fretensis and 2 others taking Palmyra and 2 other legions starting the Northeastern campaign to relieve pressure on the Auxilia Garrisons of Susa and Babylon, being reinforced by Legio III Cyrenica and the Galatian Legion later on. This doesn't even start to account for the dozens of Auxilia cohorts and Horse Archer Cataphracts I had running around skirmishing with the Seleucids to keep them on their toes.

I basically had to go around with a Veteranii legion that was acting as Marines/raiders and exterminate any large city I came to with a small garrison to pay for it all, and eventually I had to abandon Britain and disband the legions there, including I Paetorian.