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Thread: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

  1. #41

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    Quote Originally Posted by Roma_Victrix View Post
    That's an interesting assessment and you're almost certainly right about the first 20 turns of the game. While the Lugiones and Saka usually get crushed in the half a dozen full campaigns I have played for EBII, the Sweboz always build up their strength, expand like a snowball rolling down a hill and gradually develop a northeastern European empire by about turn 500 or so. In my Koinon Hellenon, Epeiros, Makedonia, Pergamon, and Roman campaigns, without fail the Sweboz were always the main enemy in Europe once I conquered the Mediterranean, Black Sea, and Western European regions. The Pritanoi would always have some holdings in continental Europe after uniting the British Isles, but I've managed to conquer the Pritanoi in each of my campaigns going into the 1st century BC. On the other hand, fighting the Sweboz is basically like whack-a-mole, because they can expand into the Baltic and Pontic Steppe regions far outside my empire and maintain a stiff resistance in northern and eastern Germania, where recruitment options become limited for Greeks and to some extent the Romans.

    A combination of the AI money bonus and the Sweboz Tribal Migrations are probably to blame. There seems to be a vicious cycle where the AI's inability to handle the economy gets them into debt, forcing the script to give them a boost, which they then proceed to blow on expensive tribal buildings and quickly replenished soldiers, forcing the script to give them a boost. If you construct 10 Sweboz Tribes, that should amount to 90+ recruitable units that also replenish in short order. On the other hand, a Sweboz player would have to earn all that money and keep a sustainable model.


    Though I agree with Adun that their weak cavalry is a fatal flaw. In my most recent Boioi playthrough, I've only needed modest strength of cavalry and infantry to mass-route up to *four* stacks of Sweboz warriors. Through simple hammer and anvil-ing, I've gotten enough slaves to jumpstart an urban revolution and many of my FMs were proclaimed Epas. My battles as the Sweboz were also more difficult on account of this, up until I conquered the Baltic. It's at the point where making war with the Sweboz is cheesier than stamping them out.

  2. #42

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    The finance script doesn't "give them a boost" when they're in debt, it merely wipes out their debt.

  3. #43

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    And limited retrain and recruit options for eleutheroi also comming in the next patch? Because seeing how half of the cities end with golded chevron hercules garrison, just waiting to be conquered by stack of superpowers( most probably of cultured faction - hellenistic or w.meditarenan), while natives struggle even hurt a man with full stack of their own, doesn't seems to me good. That is exactly why AI Seleukids in 90% of cases blitz whole eastern half of map, because they take oddly easily cities + they doesn't get more than 2 enemies at time. The change in lougiones recruitment is real and trully hurts AI - they often achieve to get 3 cities at best only to get steamrolled by sweboz asap. Carthage always take a city with bare loses in Iberia, where Lusitanian or Aureakoi lose thousands. Saka Rauka AI competitivity also decreased by a miles. To Hayastan AI in current version it also takes hundred of turns before they take even one city from caucasus three and i never saw them rebel against seleukids in current version- which slightly improves lifetime of Pontos. Romans too struggle in capturing cisalpine. All of this because of eleutheroi exaggerated capability of retrain and recruit option. Sorry for offtopic. by the way, i almost agree with difficulty rating as is directly in a game.

  4. #44

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    Quote Originally Posted by Maroslav View Post
    And limited retrain and recruit options for eleutheroi also comming in the next patch? Because seeing how half of the cities end with golded chevron hercules garrison, just waiting to be conquered by stack of superpowers( most probably of cultured faction - hellenistic or w.meditarenan), while natives struggle even hurt a man with full stack of their own, doesn't seems to me good. That is exactly why AI Seleukids in 90% of cases blitz whole eastern half of map, because they take oddly easily cities + they doesn't get more than 2 enemies at time. The change in lougiones recruitment is real and trully hurts AI - they often achieve to get 3 cities at best only to get steamrolled by sweboz asap. Carthage always take a city with bare loses in Iberia, where Lusitanian or Aureakoi lose thousands. Saka Rauka AI competitivity also decreased by a miles. To Hayastan AI in current version it also takes hundred of turns before they take even one city from caucasus three and i never saw them rebel against seleukids in current version- which slightly improves lifetime of Pontos. Romans too struggle in capturing cisalpine. All of this because of eleutheroi exaggerated capability of retrain and recruit option. Sorry for offtopic. by the way, i almost agree with difficulty rating as is directly in a game.
    All the refresh rates have been flattened in the govslave since v2.3, from a base of 0.04 to 0.03, and lower for some other regions (to 0.025 or 0.02). Can't do anything about the experience of units, that's a function of auto-calc and revolts.

    Different factions performing different in different games is fine.

  5. #45

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    @Maroslave: Not to undermine your argument, as I believe these are points to consider. That being said, although I cannot speak for the all of those factions you have noted (Lougiones, Sweboz, and Saka Rauka), my experience (approaching 150 turns) does provide some contrary evidence. Carthage has not been able to expand into Iberia, Lusitania is doing solidly and are slowly expanding, as are their neighbors. Hayastan has also expanded to a few settlements. The Seleukids are still around what they were at the beginning of the campaign, having lost and re-captured numerous territories.

    I actually like the current eleuthoroi approach. I believe that expansion rates would be too fast without it. Perhaps, further tweaks can help find that sweet spot.

    According to my personal experience, I would be interested to if anyone else has found Carthage struggling in their campaigns? That is the only faction which has significantly under-performed in my current campaign.

  6. #46

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    Quote Originally Posted by charlieh View Post
    @Maroslave: Not to undermine your argument, as I believe these are points to consider. That being said, although I cannot speak for the all of those factions you have noted (Lougiones, Sweboz, and Saka Rauka), my experience (approaching 150 turns) does provide some contrary evidence. Carthage has not been able to expand into Iberia, Lusitania is doing solidly and are slowly expanding, as are their neighbors. Hayastan has also expanded to a few settlements. The Seleukids are still around what they were at the beginning of the campaign, having lost and re-captured numerous territories.

    I actually like the current eleuthoroi approach. I believe that expansion rates would be too fast without it. Perhaps, further tweaks can help find that sweet spot.

    According to my personal experience, I would be interested to if anyone else has found Carthage struggling in their campaigns? That is the only faction which has significantly under-performed in my current campaign.
    Precisely, what is reassuring is that people give different reports from different games as to how each faction performs. It's no longer a foregone conclusion that Makedonia wins in Greece than invades Anatolia, for example.

    Carthage will have a financial boost in 2.35A from the highly productive agricultural regions they hold, which might help.

  7. #47

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    Quote Originally Posted by QuintusSertorius View Post
    Precisely, what is reassuring is that people give different reports from different games as to how each faction performs. It's no longer a foregone conclusion that Makedonia wins in Greece than invades Anatolia, for example.

    Carthage will have a financial boost in 2.35A from the highly productive agricultural regions they hold, which might help.
    I saw a while back that there were financial boosts to Ptolemy being discussed, will that be in the patch?

    Also I know that you can't give an ETA, but can you can give an idea of what's actually going to be included in the patch? Might make the waiting a little easier

  8. #48

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    I actually play a pritanoi campaign just for observing purpose.(just captured British island w/o intervention into mainland).I am aware that it would require many more games to claim something as objective argument. And what I have seen so far even reject my earlier observations regarding Seleukids, which will soon meet with their forefathers by a hands of all those dirty easterling factions. I am currently on turn 210. Macedonia captured all the Greece except ambrakia revolted and recovered Epirus. They even pushed Pergamon into Ankyra and made them city state again.(perhaps their single success so far in my 2.35 games, its always epirus or Greece who prevailed). Sweboz as always rule Germany but somehow struggle to push more forward beyond Boii and capture another rebel cities west in Celtic lands. Lugiones as always are soon to meet their fate,live on move and it will take just few more arrows for sarmatians.By the way they were already expelled by getai from their homeland. On west part of the map goes everything as usual as in my previous games. On east part though, thanks to dying seleukids, new powers begin to grow and interesting new order begin. Each faction which have fought seleukids bitten off their own piece of cake, most off it nabataea which became solid 11 city eastern empire. In anatolia ptolemais unsuccessfully try to defend against growing pontos and 1 city pergamon tremble between their conflict in ankyra. Parthia,which grew and fell in their past seleukid wars, survived in nysaia long enough ,that they could also grab few cakes from grey plague once great war against seleukids began. On eastern most corner of map baktria, which seemed sovereign successor for seleukid eastern part of empire, now struggle to preserve their 5 city kingdom and India + saka at bay. From south Sabai begin their invasion against ptolemais and already took Ethiopia,diamat and erythreia while yellows have been occupied by pontus and other minor skirmishes. They in fact collapsing already just against much weaker pontus + sabai now and they are lucky that Carthage isn't opportunist. Carthage itself fare well enough like in 90% of my games, already wiped out numidians, though they have problems with deal of killing blow to a horde. They are successfully expanding into Iberia and maintain all Sicily, sardinia and corsica. All that slowed down expansion, whatever caused that, play into Carthage Ai cards, which now has more time to transfer their armies from islands alongside all the Mediterranean sea. Very unique and interesting game I witness, being it due to my complete passivity or specific roll of the dice I don't know.

  9. #49

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    Quote Originally Posted by Aodh Mór Ó Néill View Post
    I saw a while back that there were financial boosts to Ptolemy being discussed, will that be in the patch?

    Also I know that you can't give an ETA, but can you can give an idea of what's actually going to be included in the patch? Might make the waiting a little easier
    Yes, the Ptolemaioi finance changes were in the same modifications as those that impacted Carthage. Some other factions with the most fertile regions benefit as well.

    It would take a bit of time to gather the changes into an intelligible list, it's quite long. There have been 202 Commits to the development build since the release of 2.35, but while some are a single change, others are more sweeping.

  10. #50
    Haydn91's Avatar Foederatus
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    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    I think that Boii recuitment system is too slow.

  11. #51
    Jurand of Cracow's Avatar History and gameplay!
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    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    Quintus, I've got my usual request: would there be an option to deal somehow with too much money? Like costly "Offerings to the gods" or a building "Statue" with a few stages and high costs - just for the player to sink money and to have anything out of it. I fear how a Carthage or Ptolemaioi player would be swimming in money.
    As reported, in my Pritanoi VH campaign I had a constant surplus even with recruiting everything possible and building everything possible. It came to 80k and more.

  12. #52

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    There are somethings on the next patch that will help deal with the money. I would say the biggest one is the new rebel spawn that Quintus mentioned here some months ago.
    Personally, I've developed some new events that make a great job dealing with it and if the team likes them, they will be on the next patch

  13. #53

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    In one of the recent recommendation threads we've discussed building monuments or palaces to both address this and the issue that Authority is overwhelmingly rooted in military prowess. As for swimming in money, I'd say an Am' Qarthadast or Ptolemaios can't reach that point without vanquishing their greatest foes, at which point they have essentially (and probably literally) won and are invincible.

    I don't think I've ever hit 80k+ income, how many regions do you have to conquer to get that?

  14. #54

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    Quote Originally Posted by BailianSteel View Post
    In one of the recent recommendation threads we've discussed building monuments or palaces to both address this and the issue that Authority is overwhelmingly rooted in military prowess. As for swimming in money, I'd say an Am' Qarthadast or Ptolemaios can't reach that point without vanquishing their greatest foes, at which point they have essentially (and probably literally) won and are invincible.

    I don't think I've ever hit 80k+ income, how many regions do you have to conquer to get that?
    That will definitely change in the patch. The gameplay difficulty for the Ptolemaioi isn't money, but the availability of Hellenistic units. The "garrison duty" script which randomly strips recruit pools of Hellenistic units should make that a trickier proposition, forcing a greater reliance on mercenaries or units shipped in from Anatolia.

  15. #55

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    You talk about human player ptolemais yeah? Because again, in 80% of my games they were almost dead (it means pushed out of Alexandria and Memphis,left just with those villages south of their core) before turn 200. In the rest of the cases they were established in Egypt, but terribly inactive. Their incompetence also cause easy rise of seleukid power. I don't really think this debuff should also apply for ai.

  16. #56

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    Quote Originally Posted by Maroslav View Post
    You talk about human player ptolemais yeah? Because again, in 80% of my games they were almost dead (it means pushed out of Alexandria and Memphis,left just with those villages south of their core) before turn 200. In the rest of the cases they were established in Egypt, but terribly inactive. Their incompetence also cause easy rise of seleukid power. I don't really think this debuff should also apply for ai.
    As with most special mechanics, human player only.

  17. #57
    Jurand of Cracow's Avatar History and gameplay!
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    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    Quote Originally Posted by BailianSteel View Post
    In one of the recent recommendation threads we've discussed building monuments or palaces to both address this and the issue that Authority is overwhelmingly rooted in military prowess. As for swimming in money, I'd say an Am' Qarthadast or Ptolemaios can't reach that point without vanquishing their greatest foes, at which point they have essentially (and probably literally) won and are invincible.

    I don't think I've ever hit 80k+ income, how many regions do you have to conquer to get that?
    In year 254 I have 7 provinces on the British Isles that give me 11k a turn (those 3 in the north: 800 each), there're no further possibilities to built anything (either everything for the level of settlement is built, or there's ongoing process), and all units better than Toutanakoi are recruited. I've ammased 80k and it's going up, despite the Armorican expedition.

  18. #58

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    Quote Originally Posted by Haydn91 View Post
    I think that Boii recuitment system is too slow.
    For their heartlands? Maybe. For fully colonized provinces, I have to disagree. The recruitment from a colonized and confederated Po Valley is insane, 5 Retainer units, 3 Italic Celt swordsmen units, 4 Boioi heavy cavalry units, and 6 Italic skirmisher cavalry units. The lands of the Belgae are also a good base for army building.

    Quote Originally Posted by QuintusSertorius View Post
    That will definitely change in the patch. The gameplay difficulty for the Ptolemaioi isn't money, but the availability of Hellenistic units. The "garrison duty" script which randomly strips recruit pools of Hellenistic units should make that a trickier proposition, forcing a greater reliance on mercenaries or units shipped in from Anatolia.
    That's good news. I've read in a book on the Celts that the Ptolemies occasionally had difficulties paying their Celtic mercenaries, but the way the Ptolemaic start is now is a bit much.

    Do these changes affect Sicily and the Bosporos too? The in-game descriptions also paint them as major exporters of grain, but the income was never impressive.

    Quote Originally Posted by Jurand of Cracow View Post
    In year 254 I have 7 provinces on the British Isles that give me 11k a turn (those 3 in the north: 800 each), there're no further possibilities to built anything (either everything for the level of settlement is built, or there's ongoing process), and all units better than Toutanakoi are recruited. I've ammased 80k and it's going up, despite the Armorican expedition.
    Ah, that makes much more sense. I thought you meant you were getting 80k+ per turn. You could gift that excess income to the Romans. In-game, their progress is way too slow.

  19. #59

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    Quote Originally Posted by BailianSteel View Post
    That's good news. I've read in a book on the Celts that the Ptolemies occasionally had difficulties paying their Celtic mercenaries, but the way the Ptolemaic start is now is a bit much.

    Do these changes affect Sicily and the Bosporos too? The in-game descriptions also paint them as major exporters of grain, but the income was never impressive.
    Bosporos yes, Sicily no.

  20. #60

    Default Re: Faction difficulty ratings (your help is needed)

    Version 3.5


    Pahlava (H/H), 300 Turns


    Pahlava has some interesting quirks to their gameplay that I can see throwing people for a loop. Two big factors I can see change the factions challenge by a level or two: the change to army composition from reforms (which I will detail in Army/Units*) and the Seleukid AI (which I will detail in Campaign**.) The bolded ratings is how I would rate my personal experience. A Pahlava player's experience can also vary heavily depending on how they pursue their empire-building.


    Early Game Difficulty: Challenging-Very Challenging


    Late Game Difficulty: Easy-Medium


    Army/Units: Truly, command of Pahlava's armies shall test one's worth as a Universal Ruler. The Shahrdar comes from humble, nomadic origins which shall reflect in their army. From the beginning to until you hit your reform, your armies are mostly unarmored and with characteristic nomadic skittishness. Nonetheless, you have a lot of archers and cavalry, which comes with advantages of their own. However, one can argue that post-reform Pahlava is actually a downgrade from their roots. Despite gaining an impressive command of settled life and a large pool of soldiers, you will still be wanting for truly elite, heavily armored infantry. Once you build up, the hassle will be compensated with the biggest pool of Kataphraktoi in the game, with a healthy cherry of Iranian heavy cavalry on top. With all this mind, Pahlava is a faction that rules in mobile warfare and all matters cavalry, but suffer heavily when heavy infantry truly come into the clutch...which you'll feel most keenly in the beginning.

    As the nomads, though you do have a hard tip of the spear in your General's Bodyguards and Cataphracts, the vast majority of your army lacks armor or even substantial shields. Although affording even these soldiers will be a challenge in the Early Game. You have only one sort of non-mercenary heavy infantry available for some time, the Nezagdar. As long as you can avoid substantial masses of heavy infantry, they should do well in performing the legwork for seizing cities. The cavalry heavy nature of your armies will also help with hitting enemy weakpoints and extensive raiding. Fortunately, Hellenic presence in your part of Asia is sparse, so if you play things fast and smart, you can play to your strengths and target their weaknesses.

    *Settling down...will be a rough transition. Converting your empire to your new Imperial Culture, and figuring out the new government buildings is the easy part. Once you become settled, you immediately lose access to much of your stock in horse skirmishers and horse archers in your original migratory governments. This is a massive disruption in logistics, and you better hope that your strategic situation is secure and ideally peaceful. Because I do not envy the ruler that is suddenly cut out from the bulk of their mobile forces in the middle of a war. Worse than that, if the Thureos reforms haven't come, then you're cut out of a massive chunk of your heavy infantry, the Payadag i Kardakan.

    Even after these troubles pass, not all is well in your army. To put it bluntly, unless you've made gains in Baktria and India, you will not have quality heavy infantry. Even your Philhellenic Satrapies as far west as Syria will, at best, yield one or two units of Thureophoroi or Hoplitai. Your best source of heavy infantry is the Indo-Parthian Kingdoms. Mixed with Local Garrisons, they will provide up to 3 units of Indo-Hellenic Hoplitai. That may not be impressive compared to the heights the Boioi, SPQR, or the Hellenic factions can reach, but to a Pahlava player it'll be a godsend.

    Once you've laid down the new infrastructure, your strength in cavalry will return with a vengeance. Though your large amounts of nomadic cavalry are gone, you will receive a new pool of heavy cavalry. The Aswar i Khweshawandan are, in gameplay terms, the eastern equivalent of the Hetairoi. Well armored lancer cavalry that are faster and more maneuverable than Kataphraktoi. They will provide a vital, flexible hinge in between your lighter cavalry, and the Kataphraktoi. Now, for the Varu in the room (speaking of which, you can recruit non-cataphract Elephants from India,) Zhregan, Kataphraktoi, Azaryanaka. The Parthians have the largest number of Kataphraktoi available to them in the game once the Royal Clan gets enough holdings, and that's just their native variants. They also have the most diverse variety of Kataphraktoi I've yet seen. Aside from their native variant, they can also recruit their Hellenistic copycats from the max-level Local Garrison, and can recruit the Saka cataphract as well.


    Campaign
    : Now, if you thought Hayastan was caught in a rock and a hard place, Pahlava is the real deal. Their starting territory can't support their current forces, and isn't the most impressive to start with. They are surrounded by potential enemies, the Helleno-Baktrians, hostile nomads, and much of the surrounding is done by the Seleukid behemoth. Whatever choice you make, it's a choice you should make quickly. If your rivals in the region are too far ahead of you, it's unlikely you'd survive. This particular part of the world is in disorder and turmoil, and it's likely Pahlava players will see a fair amount of variation with the world they have to conquer. Whether the Seleukid state falls apart or climbs to greater heights, will the Sakas be rooted out by the Baktrians and come your way, or whether Taksashila will make their own bid for the Iranian Plateau...

    There are three obvious points of expansion: the Eleutheroi to the north, the Seleukids to the south and west (with mild presence east too,) and Baktria further east. As the Pahlava are a Nomadic faction, you can presumably horde yourself and choose a radical relocation...though the conditions for your reform limits your flexibility should you get too creative. Since claiming the Satrapy of Parthia is required for the Settled reform, the Seleukids will likely be a prime target. Fortunately, you have a few cards to play. The Seleukid garrisons in the Upper Satrapies are sparse and spread out, and wanting for heavy infantry. If you move quickly enough, you should be able to claim multiple settlements in a few turns.

    **Now, my campaign took a strange turn after I advanced up to Media Rhagiana. At this point, the Seleukids had diverted significant forces to the Upper Satrapies. Three full stacks were arrayed against me, two in Media, one in Gabiene. They also had Agema and Hetairoi with them. Had these stacks attacked, I might have had to turn up my difficulty to Very Challenging, but for whatever reason, they were content to defend their territory. Eventually, I gathered enough money to broker a peace and hit the reforms. Once you're secure in your position as Basileus Megas, few armies can match the amount of heavy cavalry you can summon, and it'd be relatively Easy to take the next step as the Basileus Basileon.

    Pahlava's strange Nomadic/Settled dichotomy extends to management as well. Their Family members will come with Nomadic/Settled traits, allowing them to specialize in aggressive army movements or managing and defending cities. They also seem to be fairly competent and honest governors in general, a mild penchent for deception isn't much of a black mark in this game. That having been said, Pahlava also has another peculiarity that seems to be wholly unique to them. A sort of feudal system, where unless the governor of a certain province belongs to a certain clan, they will be labeled as an Interloper. This is a serious complication, as if you start running short on one branch of family member, then some potentially important territories would go without a governor. This system does come with an upside, should you adhere to this system, the governor you install will gain the Proper Governor trait, and this might explain why I've seen relatively few bad traits in governors.

    In between the Cataphracts, the conquering, laying infrastructure, and transitioning your government, there's no doubt that Pahlavan playthroughs are gonna be big spenders. If you manage you get your hands on the wealthiest parts of the Iranian Plateau, you should be able to afford it.

    The Pahlavan campaign is one of the most complex in the game, and probably one of the most rewarding for micromanagement. A solid understanding of city management, character management, and forward planning is necessary to ascend to the title of King of Kings.

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