Madness? This. Is. Spa- uh... Idiot AAR the Second!

**Xehh II** · February 25, 2015, 08:19 PM

It begins!

Well actually not yet, busy at work this week so I'll start this weekend, this first post is for various infos related to my upcoming AAR- Idiot AAR the Second.

Game Info:

DEI 1.04a
KAMs BAI Friendly Battles

Campaign Info:

Grand Campaign
Faction: Sparta
Difficulty H/M, I'm not as good as everyone else who plays DEI, medium is plenty challenge for me but for the sake of an interesting campaign I shall play hard.

House Rules:

First off, this will be a very story driven AAR. Everything I do will have a story behind it. I will try my best to instill my people and armies with character and personality.
Because I am basically writing a story here my updates might be slow, please be patient.

Second, I'll try to make realistic armies as much as I can but what if scenario armies are perfectly fine as well.

Third, no min-maxing, I hate this practice. I will try to build logically according to the needs of my people and so forth, no build just what's best.
Same goes for Character Traits, I will not min-max my generals, I will chose traits according to how they levelled up, for example, if my guy levels up after a defence battle I will give him a defensive trait, same goes for offensive battles and siege battles.

Fourth, try to role play various Spartan things to the best of my limited ability and game limits, things like dual kingship, power struggles between them and the Ephors, etc.

If you guys have anymore questions about how I'm going to play this then feel free to ask, I shall do my best to answer.

Hope you guys will enjoy this when I finally start, prepare for most excellent glory(probably)!

**Penegrin** · February 26, 2015, 06:10 AM

Nice. I like Sparta but the amount of Spartan ports is too damn low

Are you using the Experimental version of KAMs mod?

**McCarronXLD** · February 26, 2015, 09:24 AM

Really looking forward to this! Hope there will be lots of pictures too!

**valky** · February 26, 2015, 11:39 AM

yeah looking forward to that too

Sparta is really an awesome faction, with quite some nifty units (read: you don't need anything else besides your Hoplites ^^)
I think they can be easily played with whatever skills you provide to your general, since it doesn't matter, once the phalanx pushes in :Þ

(*selfslap* that reminds me at some very awesome battles I had while playing these guys....though; after some romeII time I hate that civil war

and the mod didn't reapply the changes in a running campaign. Civil war was fine in shogunII as it did fit..but somehow creative a. does seem to like that crap up to nowhere...*nostalgic* oh medieval SSII times..where you just conquered & killed crap and maybe faced the OP horde onetime)

**rjacko10** · February 26, 2015, 01:46 PM

I'm looking forward to this too. AARs inspire me to role-play, just a little bit, so that it's not just funless number crunching.

**Xehh II** · February 28, 2015, 02:41 AM

Ok, just finished work for the night, no work tomorrow. I'm going to have multiple beers and try and smash out this first chapter tonight.

**McCarronXLD** · February 28, 2015, 09:57 AM

Great! Lead on my Drunken King.

**Xehh II** · February 28, 2015, 11:08 PM

You have got to be kidding me! I was writing up the chapter and then TWC decides to log me out(this happens to me a lot! Why does it happen?) and I lose all my progress, and I was close to finishing. I just lost like an hour and a half of time for that.

Try to restore saved progress and it's only 4 or 5 lines from the start.

This has thoroughly demoralised me, I cannot continue today, my spirit is broken.

I am sorry

**Xehh II** · March 01, 2015, 10:15 PM

Chapter 1
Dreams of Revenge

Sparta, Spring 272

"We must follow him across the gulf" King Areus said, looking over a handful of youths training in the yard below him.
Eudamidas nodded, "I agree but the council will not allow it, the are fearful of Pyrrhus' strength."
"Strength!" Areus scoffed. "He failed in Italy and when he came back he conspired with traitors to take our city by treachery! How can the council be afraid of traitors and cowards?"
"He still commands a large army."
"They are not Spartans."
"True enough but look down" Eudamidas said, gesturing down at the boys training. "Fewer and fewer boys are entering the Agoge each year, we simply do not have enough men for you to take with you, you will have to build your army from our subjects."
"Even the Perioikoi are better than those half-Greeks that Pyrrhus commands, I shall leave tonight with my guard and gather an army on the way."
"I wish you luck, I shall stay and try to placate the council. You must return victorious or the old men will have you for treason."
"If I fail it is because I am dead and there are far worse fates than to die in battle." Areus gave his fellow king a nod, and left the room.

Areus' camp, Achaea 271

Areus surveyed his troops and shook his head, it had been a year and what did he have to show for it? His army was fully half made up of Helots, low men, would most like to flee than see any real battle. The other half was a mix of Perioikoi and Skirtai, Skirtai were useful ambushers and the Perioikoi could hold a line as well as any Greek. But will it be enough? Areus wondered

Later in his tent, Areus was going over maps of Thessaly and southern Epirus, a goblet of wine in his hand when a messenger burst in. "My King, we've just received reports that Larissa has fallen to the Athenians."

Areus' eyes grew wide and he threw his goblet across the tent. "Gods!" He cursed. "Have you forsaken us so that you favour the Athenians over your true sons?"
He turned to the messenger, "tell the captains to ready the men, we march in an hour"
"My King, the army is not ready, we have not enough true warriors."
"I will not be beaten by the Athenians because I was too timid. Tell them, we will march."

Epirus, 271-270

The crossing had been relatively safe and in autumn 271, Areus found Himself in southern Epirus, here, He had hired an Epirote hoplite band, happy to fight their countrymen for coin, and a band of Thracian skirmishers, with their funny hats and bright clothes.
In 270 they had made camp in a small town southwest of Apollonia but the road had been slow, there had been evidence of supply tampering and 300 men had died as a result, furthermore, the Spartan army had little time to rest before the trumpets in the distanst heralded the coming foe!

The Epirotes had more men and elephants, whereas Areus' army was mostly slaves. He prayed with all his might to Ares.
His men would need all the help they could get.

The battle started and Areus tried to position Himself on a hill but Pyrrhus spent no time in sending his horsemen and elephants to harass him.

Areus tried to ward off the cavalry with his slingers and archers and sent his javelin men after the elephants but his skirmishers were so disorganised that they melted away without much of a fight.

Areus had no choice but to march his infantry forward and hope for the best, unfortunately, the elephants made it to the Perioikoi and ran through them like butter, they did not last long.

The Spartan army was a mess when the Epirote infantry reached them. The Helots fled soon into the fray, leaving only Areus' guard and the mercenary hoplites left in battle but it did not take long for them to be surrounded and cut down.

Areus' prayers went unanswered.
The Battle was over.
Ares had forsaken them, Areus was killed and the Spartan army was utterly vanquished.

**Xehh II** · March 01, 2015, 10:19 PM

Chapter one notes:

Those elephant were far too real, they smashed me like I was nothing. Always nice to start off with a failure right? Don't worry I'm sure the Spartans will learn from this encounter.

On another note, I'm having loads of trouble staying logged in long enough to finish my posts, I assume there's an auto log out device? If so, where can I change it, I've been all over my profile looking for it but cannot find.

**Augustusng** · March 01, 2015, 10:31 PM

Ouch. Well, at least you know why all those skirmishers are so cheap to recruit. Though javelins are effective against those elephants. But yeah, Sparta has it rough in the beginning, especially if you don't manage to take Larissa.

No idea on the auto-log out, but it's probably a good idea to write this stuff offline in Word first then copy it over. And maybe use spoiler tags for those pictures.

**Xehh II** · March 01, 2015, 10:37 PM

I don't know about the spoilers, I know it makes things easier but I feel spoilers remove the pictures from what's going on if you understand what I'm trying to say.