TALES of CONQUEST

[byzantineklibanophori]

MOD: IBFD6


Just like to drop a line and say everything in this mod is going fine on my laptop ^ ^

Having a great campaign and frustrated (which is good ^ ^)

Heres how its unfolding so far:

1) Defeated the Huns outside of Hadrianople early and gained some respite. But later more Huns turned out up and I lost a decisive battle in which an Emperor and few other generals were slaughtered with their men. Hadrianople is taken.

2) Ostrogoths rampage in the Balkans and sack Thessalonica and Larissa and leave it in the hands of rebels.

3) Huns capture Sirmium. I now hold Constantinople, Dyrrachium, Athens, Corinth and another city in the Balkans with small forces unable to resist a major push by Huns and Ostrogoths. Constantinople is manned by petty troops of infantry and archers. Oh no!!

4) FOr some reason Huns decide to move up north and leave the capital unharassed. I take this time to rush reinforcements from the east in haste. At this moment, I decide to include lots of horse archers as the new decisive arm of my army...and march them pell-mell across Asia Minor under a new core of generals.

5) Defeated Huns marching to Constantinople. Won battle outside of Constantinople. With new army I march towards Hadrianople and defeat the Huns outside of Hadrianople and seize it back.

6) I begin the construction of forts in the Balkans to stop future advances and allow me time to gather more defensive troops.

7) Raising new recruits from surviving cities, I recapture Larissa and Thessalonica. North of Thessalonica are a series of forts several lines deep keeping the Huns out until I can mobilise a large army to fight them. At the moment, most of my resources are entrenched in the east.

8) In the East. I'm locked in an engaging wide eastern front war against the Persarmenians and the Sassanids. The Sassanids have stealthily marched large armies across the Syria desert to attack my exposed cities of Callinicum and the roads leading to Jerusalem and Philadelhpia. Thanks to local levies, they have been repulsed.

9) In the Mesopotamia region, the Sassanids earlier captured a city, which was later recaptured. I also captured Nisibis, lost it, then recaptured it again!!

10) I poured lots of resources into developign Pityus as a major military base for expansion. IN the face of Persarmenian aggression. I decided to attack and try and overwhelm them and maintain a defensive stance against the Sassanids.

11) Co-ordinated attacks from Pityus and Nisibis have seen my armies penetrate and capture Van, Kotais and Artaxata in quick succession.

12) Major battles near the Tigris has stopped Sassanids attempts to recapture Nisibis.

13) Huns invade through the Caucusus, after sacking Phraaspa, I hastily move my armies back north to defend territories around Pityus, Kotais and Artaxata! Gah! Huns! But to be fair, I provoked a Caucasus attaack by my failed attampts to attack their Black Sea cities.

14) Persarmenia is now one city (Taran), but I can't finish them off because of 2 stacks of Persarmenians left and a large army of Sassanids with lots of heavy cavalry..doh!

15) I have an army of cavalry penetrating through the Zagros mountains trying to co-ordinate and invasion and an attack on Ctesiphon. Confident of maintaining my defensive position in Nisibis I send my armies south bypassing major Sassanid forces to drove towards Ctesiphon in the hope of pulling Sassanid armies back into their home territory and fight there.

16) I also have an army marching towards Al-Hirah to stop the menace of the Sassanids in attacking my weak defenses in Syria.

17)

[byzantineklibanophori]

Update to frustrating campaign...I hate you Sassanids, burn infidels!! DIe! Die! DiE!



Purple indicates my lowest point in the campaign

Aquablue is my counter-attack after some dogged pitched battles and the loss of many family members (weeps)

Black line is my current boundaries. I lost Nisibis from an attack I forgot to send troops against

What's happened so far:

1) I captured Ctesiphon and had to face Sassanid armies drawn to it like bees to a flower!! I still maintain the city but my sanity is being pushed to the edge by so many desperate Sassanid armies trying to recapture it back.

2) I lost Nisibis a few turns ago, I took it hard as it cut my supporting routes to Ctesiphon and forced me to halt my offensives to capture Al-Hirah and Susa. I've also lost some battles outsde of Al-Hirah and Susa which also halted my advance.

3) With the death of a general outside of Sinda on the Black Sea coast, I've abandoned the settlement and moved my cavalry army on ships to attack other Hunnic Black Sea settlements as revenge for that loss. But the aim to move my cavalry armies to reinforce my forces in the Balkans who have recently recaptured Sirmium and aim to sweep the Huns out!! The Balkans is ridiculously the most heavily fortified region on the map but its worked a treat against the numerous Hun armies as these forts actually isolate and separate Hun armies for me to concentrate on one army stack at a time and annihilate those dogs

4) After having diverted my forces north in the Caucasus against the Huns, I now throw my forces to try and conquer the rest of Persarmenia divided between Sasanid and Persarmenian forces. I hope to destroy the Persarmenians for their wretched and traitorous alliance with the pagan Sassanids. :tooth:

5) Right now, I'm fighting tooth and nail to recover Nisibis after suffering a staggering defeat near Singara...gah!! But I'm poised to throw as much of my armed forces to push the Sassanids out of Mesopotamia proper.

6) The long term consideration for the Byzantines is how far in the east they want to keep advancing. Mesopotamia is not ideally a highly defendable area so it might required a heavily fortified line in the Zagros mountains and an aggressive policy of deep raids using horse archer armies that are expendable and mobile. But the Byzantines want to conquer Armenia and hold the entire Caucaus line against the Huns.

7) In the West, the Western Romans are still very strong. No weaknesses to take advantage off at the moment Damnit, they're so suppose to be historical weak hehe, but its all good ^ ^