Very hard Roman campaign at beginning

[Insanis]

Hey,

First of all, I would like to apologize for my english lvl (I'm french).

I consider myself as a "veteran" player of TW, I play since almost 10 years at differents TW games.
I played a lot Rome 2, 2 years ago, and i rememberd it was an easy game, even in VH/VH campaign/battle.

I decided to re-install the game and install DeI too, considered as the best mod for Rome 2

So I started the game, having taken care of reading a lot of guides of DeI, and informations to make a good start.
Rome campaign, H/M, as recommended.

But I had big problems at beginning of the campaign.
I see that this mod is harder than Vanilla, as expected, but some specifics aspects frustrate me.

- Diplomacy : It is incomprehensible and useless : In the 5 beginnings turns, Syracuse and Adriae declared war against me, whereas i did nothing against them... I was in war with 4 factions and really surrounded !
And as soon as I try to make trade agreements, non-agression pacts or defensive alliance, AI NEVER ACCEPT, never. So I can do nothing to deal with diplomacy, everybody is against me, making military alliances against me, and of course it is impossible to make peace.

- Army and Population system : After a battle, the replenishment rate is very low and it takes something like 15 turns for my army to be completely filled. It's just impossible to manage whan i'm at war with 5 factions whereas they can regenerate in 2-3 rounds and have 20/20 complete armies with only one province, it's even ridiculous.

- Public order : I tried everything but impossible to manage public order, it fluctuates, and as soon as I take a province, the next turn of the rebellions appear, I crush them and again it starts again ... even by regulating the rate of Imposition to 0, I am still in the red permanently.

- Economy : I have 2 armies, one with 15/20 troops (wounded) and the other one with 5/20 troops. And even with just that my economy does not hold on and I'm in the negative (with low taxes).

I know I'm a noobie with this mod, I think that if a lot of people say that this mod is the best they are probably right, but because of some points I am frustrated by my campaign start, I have also started a new campaign (always with Rome) But I was again trapped because of diplomacy, the AI ​​was all allies against me and took my cities from me without I being able to do anything, without economy, with revolts, and my army that was reconstituted only Very weakly.

So, i definitively need help, I don't understand why it's so hard.

Thank you for help !

[leonardusius]

Hey,

First of all, I would like to apologize for my english lvl (I'm french).

I consider myself as a "veteran" player of TW, I play since almost 10 years at differents TW games.
I played a lot Rome 2, 2 years ago, and i rememberd it was an easy game, even in VH/VH campaign/battle.

I decided to re-install the game and install DeI too, considered as the best mod for Rome 2

So I started the game, having taken care of reading a lot of guides of DeI, and informations to make a good start.
Rome campaign, H/M, as recommended.

But I had big problems at beginning of the campaign.
I see that this mod is harder than Vanilla, as expected, but some specifics aspects frustrate me.

- Diplomacy : It is incomprehensible and useless : In the 5 beginnings turns, Syracuse and Adriae declared war against me, whereas i did nothing against them... I was in war with 4 factions and really surrounded !
And as soon as I try to make trade agreements, non-agression pacts or defensive alliance, AI NEVER ACCEPT, never. So I can do nothing to deal with diplomacy, everybody is against me, making military alliances against me, and of course it is impossible to make peace.

- Army and Population system : After a battle, the replenishment rate is very low and it takes something like 15 turns for my army to be completely filled. It's just impossible to manage whan i'm at war with 5 factions whereas they can regenerate in 2-3 rounds and have 20/20 complete armies with only one province, it's even ridiculous.

- Public order : I tried everything but impossible to manage public order, it fluctuates, and as soon as I take a province, the next turn of the rebellions appear, I crush them and again it starts again ... even by regulating the rate of Imposition to 0, I am still in the red permanently.

- Economy : I have 2 armies, one with 15/20 troops (wounded) and the other one with 5/20 troops. And even with just that my economy does not hold on and I'm in the negative (with low taxes).

I know I'm a noobie with this mod, I think that if a lot of people say that this mod is the best they are probably right, but because of some points I am frustrated by my campaign start, I have also started a new campaign (always with Rome) But I was again trapped because of diplomacy, the AI ​​was all allies against me and took my cities from me without I being able to do anything, without economy, with revolts, and my army that was reconstituted only Very weakly.

So, i definitively need help, I don't understand why it's so hard.

Thank you for help !

For those with some history knowledge it is PERFECTLY realistic. At the start (game starting year) the roman empire was extremely fragile, only to remind the celtic victory and I think the only date in the whole roman empire history when Rome itself was sacked.

[KAM 2150]

If you want to replenish faster, use ctrl + M, it will merge units, leaving one unit to replenish. That way you can either transfer that unit or delete it and recruit new one. Each merging transfer only few soldiers so no worries that it will auto merge entire squads.

Also you need to learn the ropes, even on hard DeI can be...well hard. Also there is a lot of random stuff going, if many factions see you are weak, they will jump into the fray.

PO is super easy to manage, not sure why people so often have problems with it.

[KennyTheKlever]

If you want to replenish faster, use ctrl + M, it will merge units,

Oh my God, I never even knew Rome 2 had this feature...

[Alekho]

If you want to replenish faster, use ctrl + M, it will merge units, leaving one unit to replenish. That way you can either transfer that unit or delete it and recruit new one. Each merging transfer only few soldiers so no worries that it will auto merge entire squads.

Also you need to learn the ropes, even on hard DeI can be...well hard. Also there is a lot of random stuff going, if many factions see you are weak, they will jump into the fray.

PO is super easy to manage, not sure why people so often have problems with it.

Almost completely off thread, but I read this and remembered something that's been bugging me. I have noticed that when I disband a unit (let's say, a unit composed of foreigners), then the population of foreigners in that region or province doesn't increase after that. Shouldn't that happen, or is it intentional?

[Wolf Priest]

PO is super easy to manage, not sure why people so often have problems with it.

What? Are we speaking of same mod? -15 cultural differences -7 taxes - from slaves too, oh, and -55 instability if you take region. Oh, Epirus can go from Apollonia to your southern village, say goodbye to population and garrison, and -55 to PO again. I really like your work Kam, but now you are sprouting nonsense. PO isn't easy or hard, its unmanageable. Except patrolling PO specialized legions and governors you cant do anything without balancing political power first and researching all stuff with cultural conversion and PO. Rome beginning is broken atm, i did destroy both enemies, but only barely, I fell so low I was forced to actually play battles to win. Combined Epirus and Whatever-Italians (with insane amount of cheats given to AI, for reasons unknown, in game about steamrolling, anti-steamroll doesn't make any sense) have more gold, more manpower, more culture more everything. I am not new to mod at all, nor am I new to TW, and definitely not new to strategy. After you get politics, culture and research under control, its soundofsilence.mp3 for your enemies, because anti-steamroll breaks you in early game instead of late game, giving various interesting things like Massilia game, where I still don't have tueros in turn 80.

[KAM 2150]

You can't have any unit selected for it to work though. At least I think sometimes it does not work first time you oress it.

[Insanis]

I know this tip, I usually use it but not always, because the cost of recruitement of a unity is very high, so I prefer wait for the replenishment.
What can I do for this diplomaty problem ? AI refuses all my demands, even trade agreements, they have never accept, and the succes rate is always "low"... so sad.
With Epirus and Syracusae at the south, Ligurae, Etruskia at the north and Adriae at the east, I'm just taken in pincers.
If only there isn't that limitation of population system, I could resist to them at battle and replenish my troops for next battle, but there...
And rebellions each 2 turns...

[Dardo21]

The ai will be quicker to accept treaties once you get stronger, public order can be ridiculous at times yeah, but with arena's, temples and agents it's somewhat manageable.

[Insanis]

I think so too.
What are your tips on starting the campaign with Rome?
If someone has a complete guide on Rome I am taker.
It must also be said that there is the problem of language which makes the game a little more complicated for me, I play with a translator next to complicated words but sometimes it hurts a little to my general understanding

[TheNewKing]

Im playing as Rome on DEI 1.2 latest patch very hard campaign and normal battle difficulty.

Im doing well and have taken all of Italy, Sicily and the 2 Carths islands to the Left lol (currently 100 turns in).

My starting tip and what i have done.
1st form both armies together and attack the Italian faction as soon as possible!
Epiros will take your cities apart from Roma unless they have a full stack, so destroy buildings and raise your taxes to very high.

Do not liberate or create client states because they will ally with Epiros or backstab you and you do not want to fight on both fronts.
Chose your battles carefully and always think a few turns ahead.

[ornlu84]

My way at the start with rome (H/N) was merging the two armies togehter and build up this army strong enough to make a suprising bait (1st army with a 12/20 infantry stack and a hidden one with 5/20 skirmisher) for the epirus-army in italy. after defeating them I bring both armies into the north, strength them with some more units and prepare a battle against the italian faction in the north. You should know, that mostly the italic faction in the north will attack in turn 6 your town in the north. so you could prepare an ambush or awaiting them for town-defense - or for the sake of honour force them into an field battle, crush them and do what romans would do.
After this you could take over the north, before preparing for the battles in the south. Epirus could have landed with another full stack in southern italy and syracrus could do it too.

[Insanis]

Thanks for your answers guys.
I played a bit more, and I lost 2 more countries, Taras and Benvetium.
So I just have now Roma and Asculum... I will try to secure my land and develop my economy with that, and make peace with the others country. I'm on it.

I take advantage of this thread to ask you a question about my mod installation.
I have a lots of conflicts (242) between mod part 1 and part 2.


I've just download the crash fix from Dresden (thank you bro), and it has directly make conflict with the mod.
However I can play without problem (except crash at end of turn, which are solved now with the fix), there are just conflicts between .png it seems.
If someone knows what can I do to solve it, thank you.

[KAM 2150]

Just do not use that launcher and use normal steam launcher.

[Therm]

I use the total war mod manager. I have part 2 and part 1 swapped though.

[Dresden]

You need to load part 1 first always before part 2. And any crash fix packs in front of part 1.

Also, to answer the original poster - Rome's start is supposed to be hard now and I think thats good. DeI takes some getting used to in many regards if you haven't played it before. Also, about replenishing, garrisoning the army is the best way but you will have to suffer some PO negatives for a bit to do it.

[Maetharin]

I really enjoyed my start as Rome, IMO the best way is to at first get rid of the Etruscians before you can focus on Epirus.
In my last try I levied as cheap an army as possible and had them encamped just outside Beneventum.
This way they can hold of the Epirote army at least for some time, whilst still being able to retreat, so you have the time to deal with the Etruscians with a proper Legion.

Also, don´t bother with saving your southernmost settlement, it can buy you time to recruit and prepare.
Even just one turn can make a difference with Latium being the best recruiting ground in DeI.

[Falco]

I really enjoyed my start as Rome, IMO the best way is to at first get rid of the Etruscians before you can focus on Epirus.
In my last try I levied as cheap an army as possible and had them encamped just outside Beneventum.
This way they can hold of the Epirote army at least for some time, whilst still being able to retreat, so you have the time to deal with the Etruscians with a proper Legion.

Also, don´t bother with saving your southernmost settlement, it can buy you time to recruit and prepare.
Even just one turn can make a difference with Latium being the best recruiting ground in DeI.

Agreed, going after the Etruscan's first seems to be the way to go.

[Dardo21]

Last time I played with the Romans, i build up my forces, and the etruscans immediately agreed to confederate :p.

[Dresden]

I assume you are using the diplomacy submod because Rome should not be able to confederate.