Why Dacia is Awesome
I just want to take some time to thank the DeI team for a bit, and specifically rave about the Getae/Dacia faction. I'm going to refer to them as Dacia here, even though they're Getae in the GC. Goes without saying that HOLY HELL DeI is the best Rome 2 experience you can play. Research changes, PO changes, stances, battle changes, unit design, generals, unique factions, agent changes, all of it is amazing. Imma let you finish, but DeI is the greatest mod of all time!
If you've not played the Getae, do so. They are a very fun faction that exposes you to nearly every aspect of the game's mechanics through their roster, starting position, and culture/faction traits.
Dacia starts out in a really cool position. Within spitting distance you can find yourself fighting Successors, Greeks, Thracians, Romans, Celts, Germans, Scythians AND Sarmatians. This exposes you to an extremely varied series of enemies through the midgame, regardless of the expansion path you take. Your starting position, especially in the GC, forces you to struggle for sea access, which is quite a turning point in most campaigns. Very cool to struggle without it, especially considering your roster.
Dacia's roster, at early game, is trash. The heaviest-armored unit you can field outside your general is your peltast-equivalent. This is even true for Imperator Augustus. Your early roster is effectively Celtic plus shock infantry, minus good cavalry. Your cavalry really never gets good, but you can get poor, but accurate horse archers, allowing you to field more infantry than most foes. Even your start region's AoR is quite weak, but nearby are excellent options in Thracia, Ponto-Caspia, and Sarmatia. Thracia carries some of the best melee infantry and the best AoR selection of peltasts. Both Sarmatia & Ponto-Caspia give you extremely powerful shock & missile cavalry, alleviating the primary weakness in your roster.
Late game, your lineup rivals Macedon and Egypt in its breadth, and your infantry develops into one of the best in the game. Heavy Pikes can stand up to even Silver Shields. Your falxes are bested by only Thracians. Iceni Swordmasters, alongside Cantabri & Germanic Berserkers, are the only shock infantry that stand on par with your shock infantry elite. You have solid hoplites, which you'll find stronger than their eastern or Punic counterparts, and you have very solid medium & heavy swords, some of which carry armor-piercing sica, the one-handed counterpart to the falx. Put some armor-piercing troops up against Praetorians or Oathsworn-equivalents, you'll really like what happens.
Your skirmisher lineup is strange. Range-weak, melee-strong, most of your skirmishing denarii should probably be spent on peltasts or horse archers. The sole exception is your Daco-Sarmatian Nobles, who have high enough accuracy to stand against mid-tier archers or slingers. That said, your real weakness is your slingers, where you have t1 and nothing else.
In a nutshell, Dacia's roster transitions from chit-tier Celts to Successor-level variety & power from turn 1 through late-game reforms.
On top of the roster itself, Dacia's cultural bonus is among the coolest in the game. 50% cheaper merc hiring costs, +50% merc upkeep. Wherever you are, you have a viable reason to keep stacks of 15-18, and hire warm bodies to fill out your ranks during conflicts. This makes for awesome frontier garrisons, where you might not want to spend loads of money or may be caught off guard. This culture group is the only place in-game where anyone but Carthage has a good reason to use mercenaries regularly. Very much worth exploring.
Combo this with Dacia's faction bonuses - +PO from own culture & +melee defence, you've got good perks for both campaign and battles. +PO is especially valuable, as it's a major late-game issue for most factions. Your factional enmity with nomads can be a pain early, but expanding westward early will keep them off your back for a while. With Pannonia having weak rosters in both Dacian campaigns, you can easily grab a power base outside the reach of nomads.
God DAMN Dacia is cool. They really live up to the hype of Rome's last great conquest. Thank you, DeI team.
(Can they get trade ports now? This is literally the only gripe I have. The most cohesive 'barbarian' culture that defied Rome deserves better than fishing villages. Also, how am I gonna have baller military tech with no income base?)
Would love more discussion on favorite factions, feel free to convince me someone else has a cooler setup than Dacia. (LOLOL ROME FACTION BEST FACTION - looking at you Ivan_Moscavich)
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