Finished Campaign on hard mode with Arche Bosphorus, here are some suggestions and a summary.

[spirroouu]

Victory at last with Arche Bosphorus
This is the current state of my campaign, I have won by military victory, it took me about 50 hours or more to complete this campaign with this faction that I absolutely love and would gladly help get better. I can conquer the world but this would be pointless, instead I'll be playing them on very hard.


I saw a few recent posts asking how to complete a campaign with Arche and if it was possible or not, I am glad to say that it is possible and in fact fairly hard, since you need a few things to happen in a certain order to be functional.
I will tell you how I proceeded, but first, my summary:




Pro's and Cons of the faction
Pro's:
- The faction has a good feeling to it, you start out with one complete province.
- The hellenic feel is clearly present and you can really feel the need for independence.
- The units are quite strong once you get the Thorax Reform.
- The passives (10% more movement range) are great.
- The nation is challenging and feels smooth to play with, as their expansion is quite logically constructed.
- The starting region includes Crimea(river) which is a peninsula, this makes the defence gameplay very interesting early on.

Con's:
- The starting point is not optimally placed as the adjecent regions are all horse archers which are a pain to deal with.
- You will not be able to expand anywhere unless a few conditions are met, this has to do with the horse archers up north.
- The hellenic units can feel quite weak, even when they are rank 9 and maxed armor and damage, although it depends who you are up against.
- You barely have any economic advantages or bonuses, you basically start from scratch.

How to start?

So as a start, you absolutely need to destroy Saka Rauka up north, this is the only condition you need to fulfill in order to be succesful in your expansion, they have 3 starting options and will choose one at random, the options are the following:
1. They go for the people up west and destroy them without losing a unit, in this case, you are a goner.
2. They go for the people up east and destroy them without losing a unit, in this case, you are a goner.
3. They go for you, you are a goner.
4. They go for someone else but lose, you have to spearhead for their capital and take it.

If option 4 is met, you are all set for a long, entertaining and honestly lovely campaign.
A good thing to do in order to make your income grow, as it is very low to start with, is to send an agent early on to the Iceni, talk them through a trade agreement and there you go, whole map is uncovered and you can start trading with ALL the hellenic factions. Use this agent to explore some more places and get a good income. This is not a must but it is REALLY helpful as you income will heavily grow:


The units:
The Arche units get really interesting in the late game, as multiple tactics are available later on, this is how your army should look like on a high turn number:


I can give screenshots on the unit stats if you request them, this is my recruitment center:

Research rate is 450% so everything goes pretty smoothly.

Complaints/problems that could be worked on
First off, the starting point and ressources are blatantly unsufficient making a good start almost improbable unless you are lucky.
The hellenic units are, if not fairly well upgraded not as good as their stats tell them they are.
The cities that should have artillery still lack it which is probably a 1.0 fix.
There are a few tweaks that should maybe happen here and there, for example some of the unit caps lying and giving less than you should have.
The nation lacks some nation unique features likes unique unit rosters (as the symbol for the maxed Bosphoroi hopitai are the same as the maxed Bosphoroi Legionari Hoplitai)

Apart from that I really enjoyed the hours spent, feel free to ask any questions regarding this campaign and this nation. If I can do anything to help this nation get more public drawn to I'll do it, and if I can do anything to make them expand more modding seen, I'll gladly do it.

[Stívarðr Reynitré]

Wonderful campaign. Looks really goo. I'll be checking back in the next few hours and I'll likely have some comments/questions!

Thanks for the effort this took to put together.

[Dresden]

Thanks for putting this together, perhaps you can post it in our Guides thread http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...he-DeI-Library

Concerning the artillery, are you referring to the city garrisons? They did not have their proper artillery components?

[spirroouu]

As I am a starter on these forums, may I ask how to copy a post out without having to copy it all over again? ^^

[spirroouu]

Theres the point though, I have not been keeping an eye out to the politics at all, I have not touched them.
Here are some other bugs that I found: the text is missing for the arche bosphorus capital, the main city building line is not visible, when I hover over it it does not show anything.
The politics screen is useless now as when I reload my campaign all general details are invisible, I can click them but nothing appears, I have chosen to ignore politics and it balanced out too, which, meant to be or not, was quite handy.

[spirroouu]

Indeed, I found that the cities with 2 artillery spots do lack the actual artillery, other than that the ones with 4+ spots did work out well for me.
Noteworthy too: I had no civil war, I have filled the imperum bar but no civil wr has occured, which I found to be odd.

[Dresden]

If you keep the politics balanced properly a civil war is not guaranteed in this mod. Thanks again for the insights and report.

[Noone likes Thebes:(]

If you keep the politics balanced properly a civil war is not guaranteed in this mod. Thanks again for the insights and report.

What counts as balanced for factions like Carthage where there are 4 sides? I think I'm going to have to abandon my Carthage campaign because its been completely ruined by a civil war I don't want to grind out. All of my armies are in the Crimea and the magic 25 stacks that appeared in Carthage along with it converting without a fight has pretty much made my situation hopeless because I cannot maintain even half my armies anymore financially and within 4 turns all of my heartlands are gone. All of this without warning as usual and I'm only at intimidating Imperium level. :S

[Dresden]

If you can't edit your own posts yet, I can post it for you and list your name as the author.

It sounds like you may be using another text mod or another mod is interfering with the text from this mod.

[spirroouu]

Yeah sure, go ahead.

[FlashHeart07]

Nice one Gave me a few ideas for my own Arche Bosphorus campaign. Took a different approach and attacked Pontus instead.
Well done on the guide spirroouu.

[spirroouu]

Thanks Flashheart!
No Dresden, I don't use any other submods or mods, only DEI. I can screen it if so wished?

[Cope]

Nice stuff man.

When you said 'There are a few tweaks that should maybe happen here and there, for example some of the unit caps lying and giving less than you should have.'

Can you be any more specific or have you forgotten about that now?

[spirroouu]

Nice stuff man.

When you said 'There are a few tweaks that should maybe happen here and there, for example some of the unit caps lying and giving less than you should have.'

Can you be any more specific or have you forgotten about that now?

Well the problem is that for some instances the unit caps says one but you can not train any of them, to be more specific, the elite Hoplites, I had not selected them as a general if that would be your suggestion. The "problem" is really random and I have not been able to recreate it on purpose. However it is not that bothersome

As for tweaks, the cap of the hoplites in question should be raised to 2 in my humble opinion, the Elite Hoplites are not strong enough to be a unique unit.

I can screen my units as they are maxed with all the possible stats (techs, training camps etc... all of the non rank stats)

Nice one Gave me a few ideas for my own Arche Bosphorus campaign. Took a different approach and attacked Pontus instead.
Well done on the guide spirroouu.

Yeah that is one take on the matter, but you'll (or someone else) have to deal with the Horse archers. I wish you luck with that, they are a needle, one that stings.

[Augustusng]

As for tweaks, the cap of the hoplites in question should be raised to 2 in my humble opinion, the Elite Hoplites are not strong enough to be a unique unit.

Yes... well, for me I'm just annoyed that they prevent me from making my main line symmetrical XD. I have to pick one flank for the elite hoplites, leaving the other weaker unless I have some other unit to fill that spot. I suppose historically Greek states usually fielded their elite on the right flank, but that was because the opposing army did the same thing (and a few times battles were won because one side switched this). The AI doesn't really make decisions like that, on where to commit their elite units.

Also nice campaign. What's up with Persis and Mesopotamia? Did you just march those armies down there to meet the victory condition, or what? Always annoying when you've been expanding in one direction, but the objectives tell you to go the other way lol.

Arche Bosphorus is definitely my favorite faction to play as in DeI though. They've got a tricky starting position and a big, varied roster of cool units. In my campaign I went for more of a "diplomatic" military victory, controlling quite a bit of territory through alliances and client states.

[spirroouu]

Also nice campaign. What's up with Persis and Mesopotamia? Did you just march those armies down there to meet the victory condition, or what? Always annoying when you've been expanding in one direction, but the objectives tell you to go the other way lol.

Well I was planning on running all of Pontus over, but there is a tripower going on which I did not want to break, I took my chances when Galatia went to war with Pontus (they were a satrapy) and took over their lands, I have kept a logbook of my expansion from turn 230 => 333 Which I always love to look at. I had to spearhead for Persia because they were liberated by Galatia and did not want anything to do with me, then I finished off Galatia.

[mephhhh]

how in hell did you get research rate up to 450%???

[spirroouu]

I have all my dignitaries (around 7) all going for 15%+ research rate. Most of my cities have a +24% research rate library and lastly all my generals that I don't need/fleets have traits that give them more research rate. Which accounts for a total of 450% The new Royal Academy building helps alot too. Basically all the last tier techs take 11 turns for me, which is nice.

[Lord of the Isles]

Many thanks for this thread.

I started my first ever Arche Bosphorus campaign a week ago and have enjoyed it very much (well, all except battles against big Horse Archer armies which are a pain on the ass). I suspect my current (turn 50 or so) position is destined to fail: I've been fighting against Khartli, Colchis and the Samander (?) faction with only a stack and a half (all I could afford). Just finished them all off but before I could consolidate Saka Rauka, until now friendly with trade & Non-Agresssion Pacts, have declared war and to be honest I am dead.

So I shall restart (Hard Campaign & Hard Battles again) and try your plan to go first (and early?) against Saka Rauka. Wish me luck.

And just to contribute something myself: versus the Eastern Horse Archer armies I have found 2 possible counters. One is to have lots of cavalry yourself (some speedy light cavalry best but other shock, melee or missile cavalry with decent melee values can be ok). That isn't possible (at least early in the campaign) with the A.B. roster so go to plan B: a fair amount of foot archers good enough to kill horse archers faster than they can get you back. I've been using 5 or 6 units of the good damage stats archers that A.B. get as an A.O.R. unit per full stack and that has been good v Eastern H.A. armies. Lots of micro-management to direct fire v. the right targets mind you.

[spirroouu]

Well, I have now just started a new campaign with Arche as they are my all time fav, thing is, I am playing them on VH/VH. I usually autoresolve the battles against horse archers as countering them early on is just plain impossible even with, as you said, an army full of horsies.
The start is extremely hard with them as you are surrounded with fairly hostile nations, I can give you a preview of the current state of my campaign?
Foot archers do work indeed but unfortunately you have only 3 recruitment slots whilst they have 6. I am currently playing my VH/VH campaign with limited recruitment.
What I suggest you do is simply restart but change one thing, get a trade agreement with Massilia, send a spy over there as soon as you get the money, they will accept and you might be able to haggle 2K from them. The trade will clear a whole new route which will let you acces most of the greek states, they will accept trade, then send your spy to Knossos, they will most likely be defensive and then military allies and then ask them for a confederation, they will accept.

As far as it is though, you are lost, priority number 1, no matter what you do, is to get Ponto Caspia in your nets. There is no going around it. Don't forget to keep an eye out on the Pontus-Hayasdan relations as one of the nations will get the upper hand, be sure to ally the right one! If you have any questions tell me, I know almost everything about the Arche, if this next campaign (which I can show you) goes well I'll probably go for legendary/legendary. Right now I have 7K income with 2 provinces (Ponto and Bospho) and am going to catch the gold giving settlement (a MUST if you mass out trade agreements, currently have 10+ TA, 5 Defensive allies and 2 military allies in VH/VH) At any rate, good luck!