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[Lusitanio]

You had more than one healer type follower with your fm? Interesting.

Yes, a physician and an historical ancillary that gives health bonus and reduces the casualties. I was surprised when I was allowed to transfer the ancillary to my General since as you know, once you have one type of ancillary that reduces the casualties, you normally can't transfer another one.

[Jurand of Cracow]

Yes, a physician and an historical ancillary that gives health bonus and reduces the casualties. I was surprised when I was allowed to transfer the ancillary to my General since as you know, once you have one type of ancillary that reduces the casualties, you normally can't transfer another one.

My previous opinion on transfers of the ancillaries:

Ok, this is one perspective, I understand it's valid for the EBII, fair play.
Nevertheless, I tilt towards another view: all human/animal ancillaries represent unique people/creatures who feel attachment to a general (or vice versa) and because of this are not transferable (otherwise you've got a Master Smitch or a Swift Steed serving for 100 years to generals from 4 different generations). This result also in stacking inferior ancillaries on older generals (to die), while passing the better ones to the young. I don't like it, I prefer to make probabilities of acquiring the ancillaries lower but make all of them die at the moment their master dies.
However, the titles (in the SSHIP there're provincional governors and ministerial ones, and also crowns for the FL) represent staff accompaning the holder and as such they can be transferred to another general.

[tentaku]

My previous opinion on transfers of the ancillaries:

I only recently started stacking retinues and it's been fun.... Previously I just let retinues stay with whomever they started with and they died with their masters. Now I would collect war-like retinues and stack them on whomever has war authority(imperium/elected general). I also have to watch out so governors don't die of old age while on the job, so that their retinues do not die with them and can get passed on...

[tentaku]

Tentaku the first time you see a famous battle site in the campaign map?

yeah never seen a famous battle site while I played eb2....

[Lusitanio]

yeah never seen a famous battle site while I played eb2....

That's sad, especially when I get four of them on just one test campaign

[Rad]

Good for you then!
I'm thinking of starting a Celtic campaign just for all the druid related healing stuff

[Lusitanio]

Well, in this case, since it was an historical character, I could say it was the decision of the Basileus that he accompained the army in campaign

[Roma_Victrix]

Here's my Romani SPQR campaign and it's only at a measly 700 turns thus far, but I'll share with you what I have thus far before I get to turn 1000.

As you can see, for a long time the Roman Republic and Seleucid Empire dominated opposite sides of the map, with West Asia, Central Asia, and Eastern Europe basically in their hands. Western Europe, Southern Europe, and Northwest Africa fell into in mine, and for a brief moment around turn 500 it looked like two behemoths, long at peace with one another, would ignite the fires of war. Now, two-hundred turns later around 98 BC, it's basically just the Roman superpower and a cluster of other factions who are quickly eating away at the once mighty grey Seleucid giant. I had a two-decade long war with the Seleucids that wrecked my economy for a time, but when the dust settled I was in good shape and they rapidly declined into a full imperial collapse. Who shall be the next super power to challenge me? Step forth and be smited!

In the next 100 turns, I plan on turning back west and breaking my long-standing alliance with the Pritanoi, so that I can invade the British Isles, even Northern Ireland, because why not? Who's gonna stop me? The Seleucids? Nope. They dead. The remaining factions are just fighting over the scraps and they exist only due to my benevolence and graciousness. The once proud Getai, Kimmerios Bosporos, and Pontos recently felt my wrath and my blade. Even my old ally, the Ptolemies, had to be put down like mad rabid dogs for their insolence.

Turn 100:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Turn 200:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Turn 300:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Turn 400:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Turn 500:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Turn 600:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Turn 700:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

A Koinon Hellenon siege of a Roman huge city when I still had Polybian units in the mid-2nd century BC (they're using Libyan cavalry against me here):

Pictures from the campaign battle map:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[Jurand of Cracow]

Thanks, RV!
What I've found interesting is that there was very little AI expansion and very few changes of territories in general. Only the Seleukids at some point were doing it, at times Hayasdan, Sweboz and Sauromatae. Look at Pritanoi: they've taken 2 provinces in 200 turns. Only in the following 100 they could take over the whole Islands.

Ceaterum censeo: the initial expansion of the human player should be slowed down by design (ie by the EBII team). The advantage of the player to expand due to his decisiveness gives the AI not chance. There should be mechanisms to slow down the player since it's not possible to speed up the AI.

[Roma_Victrix]

Thanks, RV!
What I've found interesting is that there was very little AI expansion and very few changes of territories in general. Only the Seleukids at some point were doing it, at times Hayasdan, Sweboz and Sauromatae. Look at Pritanoi: they've taken 2 provinces in 200 turns. Only in the following 100 they could take over the whole Islands.

Ceaterum censeo: the initial expansion of the human player should be slowed down by design (ie by the EBII team). The advantage of the player to expand due to his decisiveness gives the AI not chance. There should be mechanisms to slow down the player since it's not possible to speed up the AI.

I would argue against this, because I think the game has been a pain in the neck enough as it is in terms of grueling expansion, cultural conversion that takes forever, and insanely bad public order. In my opinion, this is authentic/realistic enough in representing the problems of expansion in antiquity. Qarthadasht/Carthage was expanding in the first 100 turns as you can see, but I actively and deliberately curtailed them between then and turn 200, and by turn 300 I had totally curb-stomped them. It isn't really their fault that Rome is so badass! You also forgot to mention the Sabaeans, who have been strong throughout the game and are now becoming the next big hegemon of West Asia, minus Anatolia and the Levant which I now mostly control. Even the Baktrians are expanding in earnest now.

The Pritanoi are my allies so they don't have enough avenues for expansion now that I've taken over much of continental Europe. The Pritanoi actually controlled parts of northern Iberia, northern Gaul, and are still in northern Germania, but I've taken the southern half of Germania and they still have to fight over Northern Europe with the Sweboz and Lougiones. The game already threw the kitchen sink at me by having the Koinon Hellenon faction betray me while they were still allies, so I think it would be silly or not realistic to have all of my allies turn on me just for the sake of AI expansion. I'm currently allied with the Scythians, Parthia, and the Pritanoi, while the now irrelevant Numidia faction of the Massylii/Masaesyli are my client state sequestered in the Sahara and North African interior (I made sure to kick them out of the Mediterranean before subjugating them as vassals).

[paleologos]

Roma_Victrix may not post images frequently but when he posts, he does it with a vengeance!

[Rad]

Do the British Isles, Roma!

[Dooz]

Roma, are you able to see your family tree scroll this late into the campaign without insta-crashing when you click to open it?

And thanks for posting, love seeing updates and encapsulations like this.

[Roma_Victrix]

Roma_Victrix may not post images frequently but when he posts, he does it with a vengeance!

Thanks. You can expect updates up until I reach turn 1000. I wasn't joking about that. I'm gonna do it.

Do the British Isles, Roma!

That's the plan! I still have to break my long-held alliance with the Pritanoi, though, and that will be painful, as they have been loyal allies. Even if I invade the British Isles in 70 or 60 BC, that's still a decade or two before Julius Caesar landed there historically, and more than a hundred years before the Romans actually conquered it in earnest under emperor Claudius, starting in 43 AD. I'm at year 96 BC right now, so I've got more than a hundred turns before I even reach that point. My number one priority right now is to complete the conquest of the Black Sea basin, and securing the rest of eastern Anatolia, which is still shared among Rome, the Seleucids, and Armenia/Hayasdan.

Roma, are you able to see your family tree scroll this late into the campaign without insta-crashing when you click to open it?

And thanks for posting, love seeing updates and encapsulations like this.

You're welcome!

To answer your question: yes! My family tree scroll has crashed to desktop for about a hundred turns or so now. I think it's due to the general limitations of the M2TW Kingdoms engine. Therefore it's a hard-coded issue that the EBII team cannot fix without SEGA/Creative Assembly explicitly allowing us to change the hard-coded limitations of older Total War games. I wish that wasn't the case, but such is life. You can still look at all your generals in the generals tab, right next to the tab where you can view all of your agents (diplomats, spies, assassins).

[tentaku]

Between turn 600 and 700, the only other superpower Soviet Seleucids suffered an implosion

and it's unfortunate about the family tree. I guess I should be more selective about who can get marrie and who needs to stay single, to trim my family tree....

[Roma_Victrix]

Between turn 600 and 700, the only other superpower Soviet Seleucids suffered an implosion

and it's unfortunate about the family tree. I guess I should be more selective about who can get marrie and who needs to stay single, to trim my family tree....

I've come to discover that this is a very bad idea, because you need as many family members as possible just to ensure you have enough competent governors to sit and babysit unruly provinces with low public order and not enough of the culture converted to your faction's culture (in the case of Rome, Western Mediterranean polities, just like Carthage). If you run out of good governors, your good ones will die off and, without replacements, your more unruly provinces will undoubtedly riot and then rebel after a period of having less than 70% public order. You don't want that to happen, not unless you're a fan of rebuilding your own empire and retaking the same settlements over and over and over and over, wasting time, money, manpower, resources, momentum of expansion, and attention that should be placed elsewhere.

The Seleucids at least had a good long run and they've made it into the 1st century BC alive and somewhat intact. They reached their absolute height of expansion around turn 500 as you can see, with all of the Balkans and Black Sea basin in addition to the West Asian core of their empire and their Central Asian holdings to the east. They never managed to push very far into the Arabian peninsula, though, and the Baktrioi, Sabaeans and Armenians are currently carving up the dead turkey and taking up the Seleucid mantle as rulers of the east. Hopefully another superpower emerges once the dust settles, otherwise the game will be boring after I take the British Isles from the Pritanoi!

[Dooz]

In the Autumn of 152 BC, the great power in the west declared war on the greatest power in the center of the world.

Spoiler for 152 BC: 

Twenty years later, there would be only one.

Spoiler for 132 BC: 

City after city fell to the might of the Makedonian phalanx, legion after legion destroyed and forgotten by time. Pushed out of Italy, chased into western europe, and hunted down to the last remnants hiding out in Iberia.

Spoiler for Fall of the Roman Empire: 

In the meantime, Makedonia's long time ally Pergamon suffered many rebellions and power struggles within their own vast empire to the east. Amidst the chaos, an old enemy was reborn and retook their rightful lands by force.

While Makedonia pushed west, the Carthaginians seized the opportunity to push further north into Iberia and expand their peninsular holdings. A tentative peace persists between the two powers as Carthage declared war on the newly reforged Ptolemies and moved most of their forces back down south into Africa, keeping a few roving armies to patrol their newly conquered lands and theoretically keep the ever-encroaching Maks at bay.

However, this is a peace that is sure not to last. The actions of the Carthaginians demand resolution.

Spoiler for The Carthaginian Threat: 

[tentaku]

Amidst the chaos, an old enemy was reborn and retook their rightful lands by force.

It's funny how that "old enemy" only had one province left but then manage to take over Pergamon Empire completely on its reconquista.

[Dooz]

It's funny how that "old enemy" only had one province left but then manage to take over Pergamon Empire completely on its reconquista.

Ptolemies had been completely destroyed, they reappeared as a result of revolt/faction reemergence (maybe those are two different mechanics, not sure). If you're looking at Rhodes, that's actually Koinon Hellonen who are still hanging on, having made that little island an impenetrable fortress full of many massive stacks on stacks over the course of the last 150 years or so.

It was really cool how the Ptolies came back with such a vengeance and caught Pergamon completely off guard in the area. Poor Pergamon goes through several rebellions losing and reclaiming multiple provinces to independent minded peoples every year. And the never ending wars to their far east take up a lot of attention, the borders are constantly morphing out there.

[charlieh]

Too many good pictures. RIP Paleologos.