Seleucids Campaign

[TTRouble]

Started a new Seleucid's campaign a few weeks ago to see how to reduce the really bad corruption that has plagued the last 4 campaigns with the faction and also to improve the managment and influcence skills of family members, generals and governors. Compared to the Macedon campaign's the Seleucids apart from Antiochus III in all previous campaigns had extermely poor managment and influence levels and high corruption. 50 years into the campaign and corruption was eating anything from 40-60k per turn with many of the cities showing -2000 to -7000 a turn with happiness levels at 100%.

Objectives:

1. Primary - to hold as many settlments as possible. As previous campaigns to build Merc building at Selecuia to recruit horse archers to prepare for Parthia and level 2 armourer at Antioch.
2. Build Academies and law related buildings within the first 5 years at Seleucia and Antiocoh. Build acadamies at the other cities as a priority. Recruit generals at those two cities and send them out to the various other cities and also to send generals/family members to Seleucia/Antioch to retrain.
3. Build up the economy and ensure that population levels increase or are stable and keep happiness levels high.
4. Wait to go on the counter offensive by year 40.
5. Make allies with Carthage and Macedon at least.

This campaign's been very different from the previous ones - currently at Year 587 SE:

Settlements - 38
Battles won - 260+
Battles lost - 15

1. Family members and Generals/Governors - vastly improved over the previous campaigns. Majority now have 4-5 managment bars
2. Corruption is still there - hitting between 30-40k but in return I'm now seeing 20-25K + coming in to the economy. Happeniess levels are high across all of settlements that the Seleucids started off with.
3. Construction costs - some family members/generals are able to construct buildings at less than 50% of original costs
4. Economy - 30-50k a turn at present. Antioch is generating nearly 90k a turn with happeniess levels at 250% (tax very high) and thats all due to Antiochus III being there. Seleucia, is at 35k, with happeniess levels at 145%. Tax revenues - 240k a turn, Mining - 15k, trade - 50k, farming - 9k.
5. Much more active in helping Macedon/Greek's against seiges or naval blockades.
6. I've effectively done what Seleucia's done splitting control of the empire between east and west - Seleucia dealing with Parthia, etc to east and Antioch Syria and Asia Minor.
7. Army units - two types (1) Specific to fighting Parthia - 8 units of horse archers or more, 4-6 heavy cavalry (usually 1 Companion cavalry unit and no cataphracts), 3 foot archers, 3 Thorkatia
(2) Greek/Roman - 3 phalanx units, 4 -6 Thorkatia, 3-4 Syrian Archers, 4 Heavy Cavalry, 2 x light cavalry.
8. Elite units - I've tried to keep the elite units to a minium, and only now have recruited one unit of Silver Thorkatia shields, Hypaspistai, 2 Silver shield phalanx units and those are with the king at Anitoch.

A quick overview of some of the other factions - this campaigns been very different from any of the previous ones :

Parthia - They had problems for the first 15-20 turns fighting rebels and free people which they previously would have defeated fairly easily. They've been as always really hard to beat and theres been some truely epic battles against them but this time they have not been able to build gold level armoury, which is the first tiem since DVK gave them that option 2-3 campaigns earlier. Also number of stacks was less than previously but that could have been due to them having to fight the rebels for a longer period. That was good as I was only able to recruit 1.5 stacks within the first 10-20 in the east to face them. They are now down to a single settlement and hopefully I'll take that soon !

Note - Cataphracts can really devaste a Phalanx - The Ai's been really clever at times, hitting the infantry head on and on the flanks simultaneously with various cataphract units and against the Phalanx (non levy) thats been causing 80% losses but with the thorkatia's thats never been more than 60% unit losses depending on the battle. Thorkatia's are primary infantry unit.

Macedon - Allies - Really having trouble on all fronts - the Roman's attacked fairly early on and they have effectvely been on the back foot since. Lossing settlements to Rome, Pergamon, Dacia and Sparta. AI had 4 full stacks near byznatium for 10 turns but left most of the westeren cities open to attack by Rome and Dacia simply wouldnt move them to west.

Greeks - Allies - They've been pretty strong in this campaign, although they lost Massilla to Rome and one of the Cities in Asia minor to Pontus. On the greek mainland they've lost 2-3 settlements to Sparta apart from Athens. theyve captured all of Sciliy and Byzantium and have held onto everything else.

Pontus - Constantly at war with Armenia and the Greek Cities. have attacked the Seleucids but sued for peace after loosing the first battle.

Pergamon - reduced theyre settlements to 4 in asia Minor. Only faction that I've come across that had a full stack army of Gold armour and Gold chevrons. I've avoided this one at all costs as most units are elite except for 3 levy pikemen units.

Armenia - Allies - Attacked by Pontus. Expanded into Pontus territory and have held those taken but are currently being invaded by the Samaritans.

Ptolemy's - improved - more archers and horse archers. better mix of heavy and light cavalry then previously and also some armies have upto 30% of the units with silver armour where as that was pretty rare before. AI also recruiting less Levy Pikemen which has been good. They've lost 50% of their settlements to the Seleucids but only in the last 10 years and currently I've split their lands in two.

Sparta - not only have they survived this long but they have captured a large chunk of the Greek mainland and have been agressively expanding against Macedon and the Greek City states. they were nearly destroyed by the Greeks having lost Olympia, Sparta and Argos to the Greeks and only had Crete left but since then they have just go on the offensive.

Rome - Really agressive at the start on both fronts, taking two settlements from Macedon within the first 10 years in the east and more in the west. Right now theyre on the back foot having lost most of what they captured in the west to the Averni and Dacia and in the east everything back to Macedon. Currently having to fight dacia in Caspain gaul. Lost Sciliy to the Greeks.

Carthage - Allies - Have held all of African settlements and have 80% of Spain beating back Rome. Currently at war with the Gallacie for control over Spain.

Dacia - Really strong and have expanded rapidly west and east, takign settlements that I would have taken as Macedon. They've taken all of Roman territoires in the east and have marched into Caspian Gaul with 2 -3 full stacks.

Averni - Control most if not all of Gaul. Captured and held Massila from Rome and have a toe hold in Spain.

Sycthians - Have also done fairly well, and are at war with Macdeon and the Greeks.

Samartia - Have a really large chunk of the map and have been fighting mainly the free people and rebels. Currently at war with Amernia - lots of full stacks on the northen border of Armenia although they haven;t attacked in force.

I'll post a current campaign map and the stats.

TTrouble.

[dvk901]

Nice report, thanks.

[TTRouble]

Camp 6 :

Again different from No 5. So far much more successful in getting the corruption levels down and the economy in good health. Currently 35 years into the campaign and corruption is down to just 2-3k a turn compared to nearly 45k in all of the previous games. Family/Governor/general Skills and Traits and skills are as good or even better than before. 2 family members able to build at 40% or less - one is in Antoich and the other in Seleucia.

Settlements - 27
Family members - 87
Income - average 40k a turn

Battles - 147 won, 4 lost

Armies - lot less infantry across the board, esp against Parthia. Against Parthia - its practically all heavy cav, horse archers, foot archers and the odd couple of throkatai depending. Surprisingly, that setups been working really well against them although I have been riding my luck at time esp when facing spearmen and having none to combat them with. In the West, more balanced between cav and heavy infantry. Still have to build elite barracks in Antich and Seleucia though.

Greeks are really doing well this time around and just wiped out Sparta. They've lost 2 settelements but taken all of greece and a chuck of Gaul.

Captial city - Antioch (53k a turn/Happeniness 185%/Tax very high) and I've effectively got Seleucia (33k a turn/Happeniness 135%/Tax very high) as a second captial city in the east.

TTrouble

[TTRouble]

Its now 65 years in to Camp 6 and the game is getting very tough to play (can't believe ppl say its too easy on H/H, but hey if you just blitz everything at the start) with the AI constantly on the attack on all fronts . Sometimes too tough and its like I just need to give up!

Territory - have expanded to 37 settlements (100 settlements just sees like way too much)
Economy - anything from 18k to 60k a turn. have yet to go negative.
Corruption - Prior to taking over most of Asia Minor, it was down to just 2k a turn. Right after taking most of Pergamon's lands and splitting Parthia in two it's back up to 10k aturn but thats much better than the 40-50k in all previous campaigns.
Happiness - across all settlements is pretty good. No rebellions at all.
Family Members/Traits - Still going very well although all of my adrimals somehow picked up the coward trait even though there nearly all 4-5 stars. A number of family members have the disloyal trait all of a sudden.
Army -In the East - still heavily cavalary based 90% heavy cav and HA. Works a treat against the Parthian's but there's been at least two-3 heavy defeats.
In the West - More balanced - mainly throkatai, some hoplites like at crete and Rhodes, archers, a small number of phalanx, lots of slingers and a good balance of heavy cavalry. I still haven;t receruited any of the elite Selecuid infantry units.

Battles - 347 wins and 11 losses

Other factions:

Rome - they've got a huge number of full stacks (10 near Greece alone) and after being penned in by Dacia and the Averni are on the attack. Not looking forward to having to tangle with them.

Macedon (allies) - theyre in real trouble. The greeks have basicaly crushed them and theyre down to a single settlement.

Pergamon (at war) - Reduced them to 2 settlements in Asia minor and they have a 3 more on the Greek manland. Theyre at constant war ahainst the greeks at the moment and look like loosing those there.

Greeks (at war) - They've done really well this campaign, defeating Sparta, about to crush Macedon, fighting Pergamon and have the sycthians on the back foot too and I was hoping to keep them as Allies, so that they would keep the Rome at bay. Howver, they attacked my settlement at Crete with the Ptolemy's - defeated both of those armies. They ahve also lost 4-5 full stack armies on ships heading to Crete.They have 4-5 full stacks in Asia Minor as well, so I'm hoping to try and get a ceasefire with them.

Pontus (allies) - In real trouble against Armenia and down to 2 settlements. They have 3 greek full stacks real close to one of those.

Armenia (allies) - Doing really well against Pontus and have captured a nice chuck of territory. I could be in trouble if they decied to attack as I simply don;t have enough armies to fight on all fronts.

Ptolymes (at war)- Lost all settlemenst in Asia minor to me and As I've not been expanding south, they've been able to get a lot stronger than previously but I've prevented them from taking any settlements. Have defeated all of their armies. Ai's introducing more heavy cav and archers and a lot less heavy pikemen which is good.

Parthia (at war)- man these guys have been so tough to fight, even more than ususal. One diference is that the AI previously by now would have more heavy cat HA but now seems to be recruiting lots of spearmen. Now that could be due to my armies being 90% cavlary

Carthage (Allies) - it looked as if it was all over for Carthage. They had been pushed out of Spain by the Galleci and were getting hammered in North Africa as well but they seem to be holding their own at the moment and taken back one settlement in Spain.

Galleci - steaming through spain and North Adrica. Possible that they will crush Carthage but not sure when.

Averni and Dacia - Both at war with Rome. With the Roman's causing 2 Averni settlements to rebel. Averni have driven out teh Belgea to Britain.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

next Step - Defeat Parthia and the Ptolemy's, although I'm at least 2 full stacks short to take on each faction, esp as the Parthians are now showing up as Gold armoured. Hopefully that'll increase the income coming in and give me some respite from the constant battles.

[TTRouble]

100 years into the campaign:

Defeated the Ptolemy's and Parthia. Was hoping to leave Macedon alone as they only had the single settlement and were allies but they decided to invade Athens so had to defeat them as well. Right now still at war on the Greek mainland with the free greeks and Rome. I've left whats left of Pergamon in Asia Minor alone for now as I want to consolidate the cities in Greece, although they have attampted to restake Sardis and a couple of other cities. The Greeks in Asia minor have been keeping both Pergamon and Armenia on the back foot and are acting like allies !

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Roman Armies:

Roman Legions that I've been having to fight. I've only lost once and that was a close battle but even when i win, the losses to infnatry units is 70% or higher.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Greek Armies:

Typical greek armies on the mainland.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Currently building the wonders of the world. Started with Babylon however that doesn;t show as one of the completed buildings. Temple to Zeus at Olympia is complete and the one for Rhodes is 75% complete, with Harlikanssos to do. What Is the temple to Zeus at Pergamon and also I've not noticed much improvement in the happiness levels at Olympis??

Law and Order/Happiness levels are good - from 300% in Sparta to 250% to the settlements in the East, although i do have a few settlements in Asia minor and Thebes (Africa) where its about 90-110% . Tax levels are Medium to very high except where I've just captured a settlement where I set it to low so I can build the necessary temples of law, baths etc.

Armywise, I'm planning to start recruiting the Argyrasides Phalangites and Argyrasides Throkatai, and the Royal Hypaspists -10,000 strong if its possible. made up of 5,000 phalanx, 3000 throkatai and 2,000 Hypaspists to go up against Rome.

Naval, the Seleucids control all of the med from Sciliy to Antioch. The AI's building a mix of base ships and top level vessels for Rome and Greece but not more than one or two per fleet.

[rory o'kane]

Nice to see the Roman AI producing rather balanced-looking armies!

[TTRouble]

Those later Roman units are as hard as nails... first contact was with a Polybian legion and that was nicelly balanced as well but I was able to give them a wee pasting. These later armies are a different kettle of fish , the really high casaulty rates has got me really thinking about what infantry units to field. The same Roman legions against my anti Parthian armies HA based armies though get totally wiped out in the custom battles that I've fought.

The Roman units themselve are just simply stunning, esp units of types like Legio 1 Minerva the detail is just breathtaking possibly the best in the game that I've come across so far.

[Rex Basiliscus]

How well do HA fare against legionaries? How long has it took you to consolidate your starting regions in terms of public order?
How much income per turn do you have and can you have construction in all cities every turn?

[TTRouble]

Hi Rex

Regards the HA/heavy cav army I've only tested against the legions in the custom battle (open flat land) and using Alex.exe, and in those my losses are 200-300 men whereas the Roman losses are total - usually 300-400 left at the end but usually no more than that. I've tested against both types of Imperial Legions that I've shown and each time the results are the same. I'm planning on testing 3 of those HA armies (at least one is nearly all 2 silver chevrons) against the Roman's in the campaign soon, to see if theres any difference compared to the custom battles - right now I've been using them to take out the various rebels and moving them west.

here's my HA/HC Army setup - I had to add 2 throkatai units for this battle but usually it would be made up of 10 HA, 3 foot archers, 4 heavy cavalry (inc 1 Companion), 2 Aspidophoroi or javelin cavalry to protect the archers and the general. Battle below was against Parthia

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Public order for the starting regions - Let me get back to you on this but from memory it takes about 30-40 years may be slightly longer and another reason why dont expand or take terrirtory well into the campaign.

Income - right now, its between 80-100k a turn profit but at the start for the first 65 years at least its never been more than 40-45k a turn. That's usally meant that dpending on the building type, I;ve had to be selective in what gets constructed and where. This campaign its been much better as I'd cut corruption levels down to 2k within the starting regions where as previously it would be at 40-50k a turn.It only jumped back up to 15-20k after capturing Asia Minor and most of Greece.

[TTRouble]

120 years into the campaign - thoughts on Roman AI faction:

* As Rome the AI seems to be a lot more smarter and tactical in my opnion esp at this stage of the campaign. Examples:
River/bridge crossing - never attempts to attack on mass, at least on the first attempt. Sometimes sends just a single unit across to probe and then retreats or simply waits for the next turn. Once across the river - the chorts don;t always forum up as expected but fan out esp if their close enough to engage my troops. All of the other factions that I've come across will simply attack the centre once across.

Army movement - the Selecuid's control most of the med, and after loosing 5 full stacks at sea, the AI is no longer sending troops by Sea but over land only. The Greek faction for example simply kept on attempt a naval invasion until they ran out of troops.

* The legions have been really balanced esp the imperial ones - very nice mix of auxillary units with each legion. The Roman cavalry including the Praetorian cav has always come of second best to my Seleucid heavy cavalry and I'm yet to recruit and use any cataphract units against them. The Seleucid cavalry units are the only units that are able to make sure that you do not loose. All of the Seleucid infantry come off badly against the roman legions and auxiallries, even the elites. The legionaries and chorts also do not rout very easily even after several cav charges to the rear. They simply stand and fight. I;ve tested the same armies in custom battles with the alex.exe and there the chorts will rout after they have been hit by the 1st cav charge.

The only Seleucid army that is capable of beating a Roman legion without getting seriously mauled are my HA/Cava based armies - so far they have suffered minor losses max 200 casualties but causing 90% or higher losses to the Romans. 6 victories and no losses although those some of those roman armies have not been full strength stacks. However, this HA/cav army can only really take on a single full stack Roman army as they end up running out of ammo - against the Parthian's you could fight at 2 full stacks if need be. In heavily forested areas its been harder to use the same tactics but on open ground theyre awesome.

Right now Rome has approx 13-14 full stacks preparing to push out from Caspian Gaul, its was 6 of these full stacks (nicely balanced as well) that kept on running away. As I only had 9 full stacks - 6 balanced armies, 2 HA/cav only armies and a reserve stack, I ended up counter attacking by sending 4 stacks via teh sea inc one of the HA stacks to Italy, capturing Magna Greacia. Thats caused the AI to move 6-7 stacks out of Caspian Gaul by land and not by sea even though it has a fleet in the North.

On another note - since applying LAA I've had no more CTD's even after a marathon 4 hours, altough mem usuage has been as high as 3.4 GB.

[dvk901]

Great. Nice report. The issue with LAA is interesting. I wish we could talk about it more, since it does seem to be a problem solver. But rules are rules.

[TTRouble]

221SE - 127 Years into Camp # 6
Selecuids, H/H, 0 turn. BI.exe
Overview:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

I'll keep it short and sweet:

Rome - some of the toughest battles since beating Parthia. Praetorian legion defending Rome was super tough, and again only able to beat them with superior cav. Have captured Rome as well as Magnea Greca. Had to ship armies from mainland greece and Asia minor into Italy.

Sicily is about to fall to the Selecuids too 2 Roman settlements left. The recently captured Roman settlements are rebelling instantly, apart from Rome where happiness levels are at 300% at Very High Tax. Only the ones in Magnea Greca have stablised

Roman Army: Whats left of the Roman AI armies - usually whats left of the existing legions, now AI's recruiting mercs as well.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Greeks:Still doing very well and have been taking on Armenia and Pergamon. I'm not actively trying to take them out as they're proving highly effective against Armenia.
Pergamon: Down to two settlements. Forced them out of Asia Minor. Once they are weakened a wee bit more by the Greeks on the Greek Mainland I'm planning on taking them out
Carthage - They were down to a single settlement but they've got 3 back after the locals rebelled.
Galleci - Building up their armies in the north of Spain to invade Gaul. They've got a pretty good hold on North Africa
Armenia - Fighting both Samartia and the Greeks. They look pretty strong - lots of stacks north of Anticoh facing off against the Greeks, Samartia and Rebels. I'm panning on attacking one of their stacks to see what the units are like.
Averni - Fighting against the Samartians and Rome, although they no longer have to worry about the Romans.
Samartians - Allies, they're expanding into Averni territory and were about to face a major Roman Invasion - there were 11-14 full stacks in Caspian Gaul about to invade Samartian territory. I'm curious to see what kind of armies they are recruiting.
Balgae - Building up armies in Britain looking as if they're about to invade Ireland

I had thought 100 settlements was way too much, but I'm now thinking it may not be, esp now that the Selecuids have 78 - I've delibertly held off from being too aggressive.

TTRouble

[Rex Basiliscus]

Nice! Gratz on 1000 victories

[dvk901]

Interesting. I wish the site hadn't been so adamant that we couldn't explain this in much detail. I understand the whole changing the EXE thing, but for crying out loud, we're dealing with a 6 year old game that's starting to have issues on newer systems. If we can't talk about the solutions, then CA\SEGA should take some responsibility and step in and do it themselves.

[chris10]

Interesting. I wish the site hadn't been so adamant that we couldn't explain this in much detail. I understand the whole changing the EXE thing, but for crying out loud, we're dealing with a 6 year old game that's starting to have issues on newer systems. If we can't talk about the solutions, then CA\SEGA should take some responsibility and step in and do it themselves.

lets not forget that RTW still is a product in process of selling (just recently ported to MAC Feb/March 2010) and that the RTW source code ( in a rewritten cleaned version) still is the base of all TW games after RTW...even Shogun 2 will still be of the core code of RTW. So its more than unlikely that CA will release the source code or allow anybody to interfere with it and from their point of view...why should they bother with patching such an old game ?...On the other hand...some things can not be changed or fixed without breaking others. Example: Battle AI from Empire and Napoleon...even if CA wanted they could not implement the improoved battle AI from Napoleon into Empire cause the source code could not deal with the new routines and thats the reason Empire never got patched into an acceptable condition.
Personally I doubt that RTW / RSII or any other mod would make proper use of more than 2GB of RAM and it has yet to be prooven. So I wonder why everbody talks and favours a solution which has not even been confirmed by proper testing. All screens where task managers are shown are only proove of an existing memory leak because even the most modern high end games do not make effective use of more than 3GB of system RAM.
The reason why CTDs have been reduced after applying the LAA is simple.
CA never completely fixed the memory leaks although they claimed they did..they are still there and the game fills the RAM with crap the longer the game runs and especially after 3-4 battles in a row the RAM is not emptied properly which can (not inevitably) result in a CTD once the system reaches the limit of RAM.
The LAA only covers this fact up to a certain point but for the overall performance its irrelevant.
As Iam fully aware of these specific RTW "issues" I exit the game between 1-2 hours and restart and never have these typical sudden CTDs which are coming from an overfilled RAM. My CTD history with RSII is exactly ONE...and that was the first turn Hannibal CTD right after installing the mod. ...and I use Win7 in a brand new system ...

[TTRouble]

Camp 6 - Victory:

Camp No 6 - completed in 250SE, so it took quite a while to get to 100 territories. I wasn't able to fully defeat the Romans, they were down to a single settlement north of Caspian Gaul but that was thwarted by the constant attacks by the Samartian's where ever I had any territory close to there's.

Summary:
Law/Happiness levels - there were no rebellions from mainland Greece, Africa, altough there was one rebellion in a city captured from the rebels in the far North East. The Roman provences in Italy and Sciliy on the other hand were constantly rebelling, altough Rome itself and the southern Greek cities in Italy didn't. The Capital was still Anticoh. Finally nailed the appauling corruption levels that the Seleucids usually have.

Militarily: The Samartians have to be one of the best and hardest factions in the fame. They have possibly the best heavy cataphract and HA units, and up until then the Companions and Longchorpi were able to do the job but against the Roxlian lancers they were getting mauled, so I was forced to recruit cat's as well. The Phalanx, I basically gave up on alhtough I was able to get a staggered phalanx formation to work really well against the late Imperial Roman legions but the losses those units take even to the silver shield was too much. Each general usually had at least one Argyrasides Throkatai and Royal Hypaspists, while the King had substainlly more. Again cavalry units formed 1/3 or more of an army - in the east esp against the Parthians. Samartians at least 75%.

AI Factions:

Averni and Belgae - both doing very well, and surprisling the Belgea were on teh offensive in Northern Europe against the Averni. The Averni had their hands full with the Samartians and were getting rolled over until the Samartians decided to attack the Selecuids.

Rome - down to a single settlement at the end and surronded by the Samartians. As mentioned before, the captured roman settlements were constantly rebvelling. One thing that I id find odd was that settlement levels were 50k+ but AI had in many cases on built level 1 sewers yet the happeniess levels under Rome were well over 150%.

Galleci - doing wel in Spain altough having problems holding onto the settlements in Africa as they were looking to push out of Spain into Gaul so were moving armies that way.

Carthage - came back from one settlement and were pushing the Galleci from North Africa. To keep them in check and stop them attackign Sciliy I was regularly paing the Galleci a wee bit of money.

Armenia - they looked very strong and were still allies so I left well alone. Lots of full stacks and they were constantly fighting the Greeks and the Samartians.

Greek States - in Asia Minor I left well alone, as they were proving to be a good counter balance to the Armenian's and even when they did attack I was trying to not to wipe out their armies.

Rebels/Free People - Doing really well, and some of the armies in the east were frightening .. 2-3 gold chevron, gold armoured heavy Cataphract/HA fighting machines which I left well alone.

The economy was good through out the empire:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Samartian Armies and Generals:


Some of the best AI armies of any faction to date

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Armenian Armies:

Looked formidable .. so stayed well away.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Greek Armies:

Very few ranged - Archers or slingers units at all, surprisng considerign tehy have access to a really good mix of archer and HA units.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Roman Armies:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

I've kick started a new campaign (camp no 8)with ALex and I've noticed a number of differences already.

Cheers

TTRouble

[Rex Basiliscus]

Should the victory conditions be lowered to 70 or 80 regions? 100 seems a bit much, especially with the corruption levels Seleucids face.

[TTRouble]

Rex

I think 100 is about right, although may 105 might be better . When I got to 65+ I thought it was too much but you find yourself rapidly getting to the 80+'s even when not being overly aggressive. Once I got to 90 cities I found that the Samaritans launched multple invasions (2-3 stacks at a time) and I promptly lost 2-3 to them although I did get those back.

70-80 .. would be too easy, esp once you grab Asia minor and push into mainland Greece. You could simply get that number by taking out Armenia, Asia Minor, Parthia and the Ptolemys.