Campaign help Scipii faction

[ma junior]

hey there i need help from you lot as you are all experienced rome players. im playing a campaign as scippii and the first thing i need to do is take sicily but it is taking longer than i hoped, ive been held up for a long time the year i think is 239 bc time while the other romans are making light work of their enemies. if i try to capture a city on sicily, they either defend against it or send at least 2 full stack armies to deal with it. my city messana has been under heavy fire from both the greeks and carthage

and any attempt to expand is completely smashed by their armies which have numerical, tactical and technolgical superiority over me. (the carthaginians just recently got those heavy hoplites and elephants)and im almost about to get dumped off the island as im under siege by one full stack greek army with another carthaginian full stack army to the west and the fact that greece and carthage are also at war with eachother isnt helping in any way. i have wasted at least 14 full stack armies already trying to take the island and the best i could do was capture the carthage city, which they took back killing 3 of my 7 family generals in the process. and i only have 4000 with profit of 672 a turn so please help me

[shikaka]

Start over.
If you still have 2-3 settlements, while they can field full stacks of heavy hoplites/elephants, it is not easy to win. (I also think that Brutii is a better faction to learn the game. Macedon, Thrace and Greece are easier to defeat then Greece, Carthage and EGYPT)
If you keep on playing, this can be your best game ever though!



Most likely you were not fast enough in the beginning.


The starting army at Messana is enough to siege Syracuse at the first turn. If you are not confident, hire the mercenaries on the island. (you can ship a general from Capua and 2 hastati to Caralis - Sardinia - in the meantime)
If the Syracuse garrison sallies, you can make short work of them using the hastati pila (set hastati on fire at will). If they don't sally, build siege towers or ladders! Your hastati have short swords, militia hoplites have long spears. This means it is more economical to fight them on the wall (where they cannot use spears) then on the streets.

The initial carthagian stack on the island can be tricky, but if you can get the elephants scared, they will go berserk (killing their own) or flee. After that Carthage is doomed, as that was their only reasable force.

So: 1st turn siege on Syracuse, assault (retrain), defeat Carthage (while landing at Caralis with 2-3 units) establishes your empire nicely in maybe 4 turns. That is because the AI cannot defend against blitz.





If you keep on playing:

- use hastati or princeps to hold a line, put them on fire at will. If you can advance (or let them come) to pila range. That pila is awesome, they can completely stop a charge.
- use your generals bodyguard! The roman general is a very strong (overpowered...) heavy cav. They work wonders when charging the rear of the enemy occupied with your hastati/princeps
- if there are elephants use velites or archers with concentrated fire arrows on them, don attack them with swords if possible
- before battle, look for small hillls what gives you an advantage if you take it. (the AI troops will fight uphill with penalties)

-


If you don't know them, learn the controls!
If you set up your formation, you can
- move with keeping that formation if you use ALT+right click (when everyone is selected) to move
- you can rotate the guys with keeping the formation with < and > buttons when everyone is selected. (this is useful if the enemy tries to attack from the flank)

"if i try to capture a city on sicily, they either defend against it or send at least 2 full stack armies to deal with it"

If they are able to do this in the 1-2 turns (I have never seen them this strong!) when you are building the ladders/towers, your best bet is to take onagers with you, and assault (shoot the walls) inmediately!

[ma junior]

ok i will try that. you make it sound so easy.... anyways i think they get full stacks from their home lands and ship them over to sicily.

[Lucarius]

could you make a screenshot of it ? and post it here.
it will be very interesting.

[ma junior]

cant sory, print screen not working, expecting a new keyboard in 3 days.

anyways i managed to fight off the greeks, it took every one of my units all that is left are 3 mercenry peltasts 3 hastati and 2 generals, the total unit count is 320 however the carthaginian army then attacked me with 2550 troops and i knew i could kiss the city goodbye so i just had to send everyone from capua to messana. in a desperate hope to save my skin on sicily

[CarthagianNewbie]

Okay the first option would be obviously to restart the campaign from the beginning with an eye to dividing your enemies, that is picking one faction to fight off first Carthaginian or Greek Cities. I would leave the Greeks alone in this scenario, as the Brutii are going to start fighting them and no need to add to your headaches. Second thing you might do is make a dash at Caralis (Sardinia) with a token force to boost your income and few town watch, a mercenary slingers unit, and a stockade will typically hold that island against all enemies early in the game. That way you can concentrate on taking Lilybaeum, at the beginning Carthage has only a single Elephant unit (and this might be counter to some people's rationale) but in battle early you have little hope of defeating this unit. However, you can hope for it to run amok and effectively remove itself from a battle. Sending a Velite unit to attack the Elephants by turning off their skirmish mode and then re-enabling the skirmish mode is a good method of getting the AI to send the Elephants rampaging after a unit.

In your present circumstance, it seems what you need is some breathing space. I hope your lone Archer unit is still alive and well its job should be to find off any and all siege attempts at Messana. You obviously have no land trade with this city and provide you have at least a few missile troops should be able to be back the siege attempts though you might be forced to sally out countless times to whittle those forces down.

As to turning the tide, it really depends on your opponents fortifications and your own troops available. Siege towers come with the ability to fire missiles. You are only limited in the time in takes to construct them. So an attacking army with perhaps four peasant units moving siege towers that are only being used as a missile platform is a way to even the technology tree. However, that advice is useless if your opponent cities are not walled, as you are not allowed to build them against stockade defended cities.

Good Luck!

[gmjapan]

If you are continuing that campaign, I'd suggest a different approach. Check out the situation at Carthage city itself.
Typically their happy citizens mean it is defended by a family member and maybe one other unit. If Sicily is so well defended that you are losing multiple full stack armies (and Carthage will be rich if you havent taken anything from them) send a small force to Carthage instead. Four Hastati will get you in the city on a ladder or 2 to murder the general after a 1 turn siege, no problem. Exterminate for unrest and cash. If you think you can hold it, produce units and strengthen your position. If you arent sure you can hold it, destroy all buildings. The next armies Carthage reinforce from here will be town watch and iberian infantry based which cannot stand to your hastati. If Greece is out of the island, send for peace and trade rights.

Whether you stay or flee, scope out your next target for the same hit and run. Lilybeam and Thapsus will both be major blows to the enemy and are again typically defended by a family member and other unit. If you can field and lose full stacks to no gain on Sicily then you can afford a hit-squad in some boats.

Maybe describe your army build and a typical deployment so we can provide pointers.

Carthage is the real prize though.

[General Strabon]

Try to make peace with one of them, Greece will be the best option. You said that they are at war with each other, so try to use Greeks to take Lilibeyum, and then finish them. I recently finished Scipii campaign on hard, and used that kind of tactic. Then go for Africa. Do you have some good generals? With four and more stars.

[Genius of the Restoration]

What difficulty did you attempt it on?

[Maxent]

Well it would be easier to restart because Greece And Carthage Have Powerful Late Game Roosters,And you should take Sicily Fairly soon

However if You Are going to Continue i suppose you should make Peace with one,like What General Strabon said

[Lucarius]

you could also make a peace and ask for a alliance (i should ask greece)
and then ask for military assistence.
and then you could fight Carthage with Greece

[nhinhonhinho]

Make peace with Greek. If possible forge the Ally with them. Then concentrate to Carthage.

The other has already give you the strategy so i will give you some tactic and battle suggestion. Try to hire Greek mercenery. Build a powerful fleet if possible and blockade all of their dock (number is more important so use the first ship). There are 2 kind of army i found very useful

1.Rally in Equites if you not have Marius reform yet. You can event make a full stack of them plus general. In battle just charge them from all side. Early and mid Carthage units can't stand again Equites. Just beware their peoni inf or sacred band (hope they still not have them) and elephant

2.When you have Marius reform use a full stack of 5-7 Early-Legionary and the rest is archer auxilia (plus BG and 1-2 light cav to chase routing enemy). Your fire power is superior to any enemy.

When besiege cities try to use Sap. You just need one of them and it will cost 1 turn

[Lucarius]

So ? how is it going Ma Junior ?

[General Strabon]

Very reasonable tactic nhinhonhinho. Ma junior, you must do a blitzkrieg on Sicily, or try to make the same on Carthage.

[Maxent]

Yeah Try to get carthage

[King_Arthur]

So how did you go?

[Lucarius]

yeah we want to know

[Hopit]

he got owned and died from the shock... (I want to know too )