Overwhelming Seleucid (Greek Campaign)

[Lencenqt]

Hi guys,

(Huray first post?) i dl XGM a week ago and played it a lot on H/H. (as Greek)
I only installed RTW again to play this mod.

Now its something about 242 on my campaign i believe and. I destroyed macedonia + thrace basterds and ship to greek indies citys to conquer them (North africa + Black Sea) and moving forward ONLY in the area at the black sea because i am really frightened off the Seleucid Empire. I put a footstep into minor asia (Halicarnassos), which is settled by greek indis/pontus/seleucid empire/eastern kingdoms.

In future i want to conquer minor asia but i had a LOT of problems against thrace (dunno why their light infantry on mass crushed my elite hoplites (different types)) and in Camilla they were also very powerfull (war elephant + pikeman). When I am @ home i will post a pic of minor asia + surroundings to give you an overview. Maybe you have some advice for me? (army camposit + attack form north /halicarnassos + wait that one faction kills all other (will be seleucid i guess))

Sry for my bad english!

[DimeBagHo]

I know how you feel about Thracians. They always seem to be the ones who hand me an unexpected defeat. Fighting the Seleucids will be more like fighting the Macedonians however, the longer you wait the harder it will get. So if you want to invade Asia Minor you might as well just jump straight in. You can make a lot of money there so it will pay for itself.

With the Seleucids you do have to watch out for a couple of things that can be a painful surprise. One is elephants. For them you need units armed with javelins. The other is cataphracts. For them you need Hoplites or Thorakitai, but expect some significant casualties.

BTW, I'm glad you like the mod.

[nhinhonhinho]

In many games TSE often get crush by Parthia. If so you will have to face a more dangerous opponent. So move into Asia minor quick. Seize 3 wonder there (including Rhodes) then you will have enough money to fight.

Army note: Thureophoroi made a very good support units: Use them to garrison or let them support main columns. They're good javelin troops and will defeat both jav cav or elephant. After that let them support in melee. Just don't let them fight in small number or again tough units alone.

[Steve5513]

I'm currently on a Macedonian campaign and my Empire stretches from Greece, way out East to Seleucia (Though I don't own that city) and down to Egypt. I also hold Egypt and the entire area just East of Carthage territory, though not Arabia.

I'll post a picture.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Take out Thrace completely if you haven't done so and if they aren't already too big, as they can be a pain. The Romans might take some time to start heading East, if they choose to. In my campaign the Romans were stuck in Italy and Siciliy up until about 30-40 or so turns ago, at which point they blitzed Gaul. Parthia can turn into a horrible nightmare to fight but I know one way of defending against them in sieges. One thing you will notice is they only ever bring along about 1-4 units of crappy Eastern infantry. All you need to do to defend cities against entire stacks is get 5 or so groups of archers and use them to take out the siege equipment. Like the garrison I have in the above picture, though you could certainly get away with fewer infantry than that if you wanted. I have a very nice economy though so I didn't want to take chances.

You don't even need to take it all out. Battering rams get destroyed by towers, and one siege tower will always get destroyed if it's near the gate and you have walls that can fire artillery. Just take out any siege equipment that will let their cavalry get in, such as sapping points, with you archers on flame arrows. Then, the pitiful amount of infantry they bring in will get slaughtered by the few you have. This will be easy even with few infantry because they only ever bring those Eastern Spearmen guys.

Even so, when you get far East, you may need to fight Parthia in a pitched battle. I find that taking massive stacks of Thorikatai (Or however you spell that) and try to catch at least one unit of cavalry with your spearmen, doing so will get the AI to just charge everything at you, which is exactly what you want since you don't want to just get picked apart by their arrows.

You should jump right in and don't fear the Seleucids because they get crushed by Parthia. With Thrace gone the real threat will be if Scythia works their way down or the Romans coming East. Your best bet is to hope they both sort of meet in the middle if they decide to go in your direction and get tangled up in a war with one another.

EDIT: Actually, while I'm here, has anyone got any advice for the Romans? I'm having a hard time in their territory. Up until Parthia I took 6 Phalangites, 5 Greek hoplites, 4 Prodromoi, 4 Slingers and a general which served me well until Parthia, though I thought it would do good against the Romans, however I find myself getting crushed by their massive infantry swarms. My cavalry proved ineffective at hammer and anvil because they always seem to take massive amounts of Triarii. I was thinking of replacing Phalangites and Hoplites with Thorikatai. Would that be a good idea?

EDIT2: nvm. Got the hang of it now. Thanks to my extermination campaign against them (Exterminate, destroy buildings, set tax rate very high then leave) most of their cities are rebels now. Feel sorry for them. To keep fighting them now would be like beating up a small child.

[Fouch]

My normal tactic against rome is to use long infantry battle lines with phalangites in the center. The computer tends to try to fight, in it's own broken way, by using manipoles. So they are very bunched up. If you can get them stuck on the phalanxes in the center of your line you can fold in the wings and get a 3 sided engulfment. Triarii are always a pain, even surrounded they rarely break but this should at least get you some reliable wins.

[nhinhonhinho]

Stick with good Phalangites (Phalanx Pikeman is enough). Place them in the center.Support your phalanx with multi units of Thureophoroi.

Place Thureophoroi behind Phalangites line. If you have enough of these guys you can cause a massive damage to your enemy. Then your Phalangites will be able to defeat the remnant. Your Thureophoroi can also act as the very good line infantry and flankers (as good as Hastati). Just make sure these things

1. Don't waste haft of your javelin to kill their generals who sometime make a suicide charge direct to your line. Your phalanx will made short work with them

2. Don't wastetoo much of your javelin to rout 1 or 2 canon fodder units. Sometime AI become more cunning and he shall send a few unit to charge your line first to take javelin

3. Watch your flanks. It's rather easy since you have a plenty of Thureophoroi

4. Throw all your javelin. Then move Thureophoroi to a flanks. If the enemy is strong. Just wait a little bit for Phalangites to tire them out. Then simply broke their flanks with fresh Thureophoroi