2.3 - Choosing a faction

[F-ake]

Hi everyone,
First I would like to thanks the EB team for their great work!
Since 2.3 has been released I decided to start a campaign. I used to play EB1 a lot back then and had been waiting for EB2 a few years. Funnily enough I havent played much this new version EB2 (my only campaign was 2 years ago...).
So as stated in the title I am interested in knowing which faction are the more developed gameplaywise. For instance which has the most complete unit/building roster? What about regions description? FM biography? I think you get what I mean... I am looking for an immersive and also gameplaywise interesting campaign.
Thanks for any answers

Edit: Spelling

[myarta]

In that case, compared to hardly having played EB2, you'll find pretty much all of them fairly full of life. Admittedly the Lugiones need some more work, and that process is on-going.

But definitely Rome is very well defined, primarily missing Italic regionals, but they have some nice ones: Histro-Venetic, Oscan, Samnites, etc, to choose from in addition to the usual factional troops.
Areuakoi have been given a lot of gameplay depth, though I'm not quite as certain on lots of biographies.
Baktria has several biography characters including a child so you will have a long play time before you run out of history.

Most provinces have excellent descriptions and only a few are placeholders still.

I don't think you can go wrong with any of them, but there may be others with more detailed knowledge who can help.

[Genghis Skahn]

Biographies for most barbarian factions are out of the question(Areuakoi for eg.), for obvious reasons(lack of written records). There's a few Sauromatae biography traits though, and they have a rather complete set of traits+early game events and etc.

The Celts have recently gotten a lot of trait-love, and the Boii colonization system is simply fantastic.

The Areuakoi might be the most "complete" barbarian faction right now, save some future unit additions, with reforms, lots of different govs and a ton of Iberian/Celtiberian-specific traits, ancillaries and etc.

The Qarthadashtim are also pretty fleshed out, with even more to come in the future. They have lots of political traits, and some of the most varied recruitment by gov in the game, with lots of mediterranean mercs available in areas where they wouldn't normally be recruitable(eg. lots of Ligurians, Iberians etc.).

[F-ake]

Thanks for your reply! A lot of interesting information here. As I read in other thread Lugiones seems to be the less complete out there. Except for them, all campaign should feature interesting and immersive gameplay so that sounds nice. As it is I feel I will start with either Areuakoi/Qarthadashtim/Baktria.
Thanks again

[rhavviepoodle]

In my opinion, colonizing is a big part of the gameplay of this game, so I might suggest playing one of the colonial factions. It's true that Koinon Hellenon is just as Greek (or perhaps moreso) than the other Greek and Makedonian factions, but not being able to etch a proper Grecian stronghold out in the wilderness chafes with me a bit. In effect you have to wait for one of your neighbors to build a polis before snaking the territory from them.

Rome, Carthage, and any of the Greek/Makedonian factions (sans KH) can build colonies and have quite developed gameplay. They've also got very robust infantry, which will generally hold the line quite well. I am aware that some of the barbarian factions have got colony mechanics, but I struggle to use them because their infantry simply isn't as tough and lacks morale.

I've also got a soft spot for the nomadic factions, especially those who go through reforms and/or become philhellenic at some point. But myarta is right, most all factions are very well fleshed out and play pretty well. I might suggest playing more than one faction. Since there's 28, and they all play quite differently, picking just one can be somewhat difficult.

[Zebedee]

I had trouble choosing a faction as well, but finally settled on my Ptolemaic campaign. The units, characters, region descriptions and gameplay all seem very fleshed out, and attempting to dominate and colonize the Eastern Mediterranean has been great fun so far. The first couple of turns are somewhat challenging though, because despite having an empire you're losing money and have to fight both rebel stacks and a Seleucid doomstack with elephants. Ptolemy III (who has a bio) also turned out to be a godlike FM in my campaign.

[blackbirdgriffin]

Hello F-ake,
I've personnally recently taken a liking in the Phalav which have in my opinion a really intresting starting position having to play the rival/ally game with the sakans, sarmatians bactrians and later on pundjabi states while trying not to attract (at least early on) the fury of the Seleukids, their roster is really intresting with an early strong focus on light cav/horse archer and elite heavy cav (I name the early game catacphracts), they can have access to some elite infantry in the aryano-hellenic (if that's a word) roster of the bactrians in early game, the strong horse archers nobes of the sakan and the quite frankly refreshing indian roster. And further down the line access to the other aryan rosters (medians, farsi baloutch etc...).

Their governement option are quite intresting early game with the clan managing system and the attack on seleukids and grasping of median/parthyan/farsi territory while riding once again the glorious royal achaemenid road as the sahe sahan Eranshahr is frightningly satisfactory. Moreover, they're reforms is quite interesting and the elite cav which you get with reform is just awsome).

Sorry for the poor english and the probably high rate of mistakes but english is not my mother tongue.