Giving rome a go

[Aegrim]

Ok if any of you read my other thread i'm new to RTW, but i've played quite abit of ME2.

I searched the wiki but couldn't find much info on the civil war aspect of playing the romans, i've decided i'd give the Julii a go (romans must be red in my head) and i was reading up on some of the extra features you get when being the romans and was hoping for some tips.

I havn't got nearly that far yet by the way, i'm just starting to stretch my legs out of the alps, i've had quite a few epic battles allready and i'm getting my hang of the units, mostly using the main infantry guys (Hastati?) to run into them and using my general to hit'em from the rear (i'm loving their spears, i had an epic battle to defend a bridge against gaul with them, lines them down the river and set them to fire at will and they all pretty much cleaned the bridge in one massive salvo).

Any tips on how to use the roman units more effectively?

[Selifator]

What you want to do against the barbarians is form a single line of hastati or principes to hold the enemy warbands. Use your general and equites to strike them in the back. If you manage to capture most of their cities before they develop, you will be able to build your buildings over most of theirs. The cultural penalty is reduced this way.

Also, always try to do the senate missions. They give you rewards, and help improve your standing which in turn gives your generals better chances for senatorial offices, these give added trait bonusses.

When you get the message that the people would support you if you would march on Rome, you can start the civil war. This will make three new enemies, the other two Roman factions and the Senate. Before you start the civil war, you should move armies to Italy and try to take over as much cities as possible in the first turn of the war.

[Xavier Dragnesi]

If this is your first time, a major suggestion I'd put to you is to definitely use speed to your advantage. The AI is sort of slow, and so if you are quick, you can take advantage of that so that you can conquer more before another AI faction gets too powerful. But if you are too slow, you will soon be facing many massive AI empires threatening to destroy you.

[Aristarchus]

As the Julii, I recommend making a fortified eastern frontier before you spend too much energy in the west - consisting of Iuvavum in the north and the Dalmation-Illyrian coast, up to Salona if you can. This will check the emerging power of the Brutii somewhat and give you options to intervene in Dacia once they're on their last leg. See the map in my new AAR "Julii Rubicon" - where I concentrated on setting up the eastern frontier, then on Africa and taking Carthage before the Scipii could, and only then moved north into Europe and took all the western and northern provinces. This strategy weakens your eventual civil war foes.

[Aegrim]

I'm currently steam rolling up to the english channel atm. Although i've got piece with the gauls, but i'm planning on fortifiying the towns i take from the british (who'd managed to get down to the west of the alps) and then in one swoop have multiple armys charge west over into the gauls.

also, chariots are a major pain, they seem to just plow through formations from any direction. any tips?

[Gaius Flavius Belisarius]

With Chariots, either let them get enveloped by your infantry and launch a cavalry attack from their rear, or wipe them out with your cavalry early on. They have awful defense, and I often find that a first strike against their chariot held flanks will rout them, and leave their infantry much more exposed to your cavalry once they engage your line of infantry.

[Aristarchus]

... also, chariots are a major pain, they seem to just plow through formations from any direction. any tips?

See the thread on how to fight chariots. Your map looks good, pretty typical for the Julii. For a Julii story on facing the Briton chariots, see Chariot King. That one hurt.

[Gaius Flavius Belisarius]

As Selifator said, definitely try and go out of your way to circumvent the power of the Brutii. I generally played as them, and went to ridiculous lengths to keep the Julii in Italy, by capturing Patavium and Mediolanium before the Julii. Be careful in the civil war, because the Brutii are really military based if the AI plays them, and you will probably be outnumbered by a good margin (yay for the AI having seemingly unlimited resources).

Knock the Gauls out as soon as you can, they're kinda pathetic in vanilla RTW, so it shouldn't be too much of a problem. This will give you a large resource base to draw from, as does Greece if you're so inclined to tackle that. If you take Gaul I'd advise taking Spain next, because like I said that will give you a decent resource base (and source of slaves). Additionally Spain has the added benefit of being a peninsula, so once taken it's pretty easily held. Although I would watch out for Carthage, the Iberian faction is pathetic, but the Carthaginians can pack a punch.

[Selifator]

Spearmen in front, javelins behind, archers set to flaming arrows. If neccesary deploy with your back at the border. Chariots are overpowered so I think you can use lame tactics to beat them.

[Xavier Dragnesi]

Also with chariots, guard mode seems to help

[Aegrim]

interesting read Gaius, but I'm not going to try impeding the other Roman factions. I like kind of roll playing it abit.

i noticed one of you guys mention something about me playing vanilla, what mods do you suggest i use to make the game more fun? I'm not bothered about changing the graphics that much, they're nice enough for when i just want to watch two units charge into each other for a few seconds in between moving them about.

Are their any mods that actually break up the factions so they act as independent barbarian factions, instead of the whole of france and co being in one big faction.

[Xavier Dragnesi]

There's a mod recommendation thread in the main RTW forum.

[Cluny the Scourge]

The way to defeat melee-chariots (e.g. British Heavy Chariots) is this - do nothing. Make sure they can only hit your infantry beforehand, and make sure your infantry and ready in drawn up a fairly deep formation and not scattered, but otherwise they need to be just plain standing still doing nothing. The chariots will sweep in - then get bogged down and be cut apart like child's play. Your men will do all the work by themselves - closing in around the chariots like a glove. This is on one condition however - and directly contrary to what was suggested above - your men MUST NOT BE in Hold Position mode. They must be in 'Attack at Will'. If they are in Hold Position they will be massacred. What you must absolutely NOT do, also, is use cavalry against them - they get a bonus against cavalry and will slaughter them.

Missile-chariots (e.g. British Light Chariots) should be destroyed with Archers of your own. Don't waste time trying to catch them with cavalry. Just make sure you have plenty of archers to cut them apart from a distance (they're very vulnerable to this).

[Aegrim]

do the brutii always get bogged down with Macedonia? They're only just getting to asia minor atm and only hold 2 citys around the greek area. :S

[Xavier Dragnesi]

Well, the Brutii are meant to head east, it is basically their aim for the game. However, they do seem to move relatively slowly, yes.

[Aristarchus]

As the Brutii, you have to take the Greek peninsula, whoever owns it. Forget anywhere else until you get that economic base - then you can expand any direction you like.

[Lord Thesaurian]

as rome's strength is her infantry, I usually just follow the basic line of tactics (using infantry to hold, missiles 2 weaken, cav 2 flank or rear attack). Of course there is often need for elaboration, but u sound like u got the hang of things. One thing, though, when u attack britain or any other civ w/ chariots, pre-marian units dont stand a chance unless u turn fire at will on and quickly surround and decimate the enemy chariots. Otherwise u will die every time, usually because ur troops are either 2 scared and/or weak 2 face the chariots' terrible charge without serious help. Hope this helps