Syracuse Problems

[Kesselring]

Anybody else who plays/played syracuse having problems with carthage early game? I'm playing on VH/VH of course and everytime I get sacked by about 4-5 full stacks of carthagians (not playing AI bonus) in about 15-20 turns. The worst part is that I really don't start getting money until I capture either the carthage city on Sicily or the rebel city (which is what I usually go for since carthage stacks it's defenses). I can fight Carthage 1v1 pretty well until up to 10 turns and then they just get what seems infinite amount of manpower coming over seas. I even blockaded all ports and tried getting more sea power than manpower to take out most of their boats which I accomplished pretty well and still they've got like a powerhouse of money coming their way. I get to the point where they recapture my rebel settlement and then they're sieging me and sieging me until I just say F it. I also try to ally with as many close factions as I can to try and get carthage on some other fronts but none of them seem to want to help me (stupid AI).

Is there anything, any hints, or anything at all someone would know to help me? I love playing syracuse, but haven't even made it out of sicily yet... it sucks.

[Pinkie Pie]

for a starters lower the difficulty settings

[DimeBagHo]

In general I don't think there is any point in playing above H/H. XGM is already quite hard and the Syracuse campaign is one of the most difficult in XGM (though Massalia is harder). On VH/VH quite a few campaigns are impossible without cheating.

In my last Syracuse campaign I took Sicily, Corsica, and Sardinia as quickly as possible. Then I re-grouped and retrained briefly before invading Africa, starting in Lepcis Magna, and then working my way west to Carthage. By the time you get to Carthage you should have built up a sufficiently good army to beat the Carthage garrison.

Also, don't recruit too heavily early on or you will run out of money. Phalangites and Syracusan Hoplites are the best value for money, but Numidian cavalry are also extremely useful.

[Kesselring]

I only recruit 1 of those heavy calvary units in the beginning then the rest militia phalanx or hoplites like you said, maybe a slinger group or two (they really really help against the carthage heavy infantry which they mass tons of). I can seriously beat carthage back and back and sometimes I came close to sieging them but they always get reinforcements, they like to hide their ships until they need to use them.

I really don't see the point in lowering the difficulty, I play VH/VH all the time in vanilla RTW. I'm quite used to going against early powerhouses (Gaul, Thrace, Macedon (atleast in my games)) and never had any problems. I guess you're right though XGM is a bit harder than the original.

[Squirrelman]

Is M/M acceptable? XGM (especially the one-city wonders) is much harder than anything in Vanilla.

[CaesarVincens]

Whatever difficulty you like is acceptable.
I myself played XGM on VH/VH for a while, but more recently, I would play on H/H as that gives a more enjoyable game for me.

[Kesselring]

So today I started a new campaign (my third) for syracuse on VH/VH and wouldn't you know it, I finally captured sicily. Moving onto the other islands now, and yes the trick was to blockade and get seapower over carthage since they only have bireme's in the beginning. Now carthage is stuck with it's main forces on africa, everytime they load up a ship I sink it they've lost 4-5 full stacks now because of that tactic while I keep taking their island cities. Life is goood, also finally got my first full stack, with atleast a stack back at sicily readily available to defend. Syracuse is prolly my favorite faction to play so far because of the challenge they get.

[TM Is Back]

Good news GO on with your strategy.

[Diomede]

No Roman zerg-rush yet? Nice going!

[Kesselring]

I actually went to rome, set up trade rights, waited a turn, set up an alliance with them right away, so for 30 turns we've been longstanding allies, and I even sent over a small force to help them in a few of their fights while at the same time I'm making one of my newer generals a commander powerhouse. Right now they're on the verge of giving me military access. Then once carthage is out of the picture and I invade from spain. I'm going to also set up a beachead into rome, taking them out from the capital with about 2 full stacks and then taking a stack in their southern undefended cities to take that out. Right now carthage is my main priority. After that, building up an invasion for the eastern island rebel cities, then going right into TSE. Hopefully once TSE is dealt with the only problems after that it looks like so far is thrace, parthia and scythia. (which all seem to be teaming up on germania at the moment)

[Grimbold]

Played on M/M, as always. Took Croton and conquered Italy. I then moved into Greece and, at the same time, took Massilia.
By this time, Gaul and Carthage were quite powerfull. So i screwed my campaign up by taking Emporion and then was facing Gaulish and Carthaginian stacks there.
Thats about what i remember from my Syracuse campaign.

[Kesselring]

Played on M/M, as always. Took Croton and conquered Italy. I then moved into Greece and, at the same time, took Massilia.
By this time, Gaul and Carthage were quite powerfull. So i screwed my campaign up by taking Emporion and then was facing Gaulish and Carthaginian stacks there.
Thats about what i remember from my Syracuse campaign.

Ah, bad move my friend. See my campaign so far is looking like this (on VH/VH). I've captured my own island where I start, obtained sea control over carthage. Captured all carthagian islands. Headed east in hopes of getting that island owned by the indepent greeks. Got that, set that up as a headquarters for my siege into asia minor (taking out the rest of the greek indepdents and stopping TSE from getting a quick victory, btw TSE is really easy, all that stretch they have and they can't control it). Now i've got a beachhead into asia minor, seapower over TSE. Blocking most of TSE's ports. Also have 2 stacks heading toward mid africa to work my way into carthage. Hopefully by the time I have atleast 3 captured cities of carthage I'll also have around 5-8 TSE cities to fund the colony transformation. My allies are rome and macedon which are both at stalemates with bordering foes at the time being, working on building up for a southern italian invasion force.