Macedonia owerpowered? Greece underpowered?

[Internazionale]

Can i ask why Greece is so weak and Macedonia so strong?
Macedonia has, like, what 3-4 stacks at the pelleponessus peninsula almost constantly! Can i make them weaker? their phalanx is too strong!

[Locky]

Both have long pikes. I think Greek phalangites have one more defense point, lol. I think they're on par with each other, Macdonia gets better cavalry early, whilst The Greek city states get access to more infantry units.

[RedFox]

Greek units (imo) are a lot better, already in start greece is overpowered against the puny macedonian forces..
With care handling of tactics you can own whole of greece in just a matter of turns...
Historically, the Macedonians always had more men as the city states were often fighting for themselves rather than as a whole.

[HopliteLysander]

I have to say I like the balance between Greece and Macedonia. Those first couple turns are the most fun part of the game for me. When you are still semi scattered city states with the powerful Macedonian army right in your front yard...man, you have to plan every move!

Its pretty historical, imho and it even provides a good lead into the middle stages of the game. Had a coalition of Greek city states, Athens, Sparta, Thebes, been able to defeat Macedonia then its not unreasonable to suppose that many of the Hellenic peoples of the Agean would have rallied to join them, allowing Greece to grow powerful once again.

[Internazionale]

But i must have maken a mistake, they spamm me like the romans in vanilla! like 3-5 stacks on the pelloponessus all the time! but now i am going on the offensive Damn i cant wait until Hegemonia is released! Its maaaaaaany greek states!

[Cymera]

take the fight to them indeed, do not let up, block naval trade, assault via ship, strike constantly, with the romans, i used a unified blitzkrieg followed by an economic choke hold... hehehe.

[Dulce_et_Decorum_Est]

So you're accusing the Macedonians of being militarily competant?

I fail to see the problem.

[RedFox]

The only way to deal with Macedonia is flash-war. You have to beat him in two major battles, taking out most of his elites and most of his army.
If you delay then, you have lost the momentum. Once you've conquered corinth and beaten him back from Attica, you have to attack Larissa immediately, quickly capture it and then March on Pella.
If you succeed in that, the Macedonians fall pretty easily and the whole of Greece is practically yours...
Next i'd recommend conquering the island to east and Thermon to west. If you havent formed an alliance with Ptolemies, then you might want to attack Ambracia too.
After that I'd go on defensive and concentrate on expanding east, rather than west.

Hope it helped

[Cymera]

DEFINATLY capture all islands, they make A LOT of money in trade later in the game.

[Internazionale]

I have to use cheats! Money cheats to pay the godlike army upkeep! But i am winning the war against Macedonia as far as i can see, i have taken Corinth and Larissa.
I builded a elite army of Hypaspists, Corinthian Sacred Band, Spartan Royal Guard, Spartan Phalangites and Armoured Phalangites. And i got a general named Leonidas! ^^

[RedFox]

Wait, are you complaining about the upkeep? I acctually had to double the cost and upkeep to make it harder. Now I can't that many armies, before I could deploy 4, now I can have only 2 stacks to not injure the economy...

[Cymera]

Well keeping with the regular XGM upkeep, i have about 9-10 full stacks with the Romans. It is a mix of about 5 legionary first cohorts, 5 triarii, 6 archer auxillia, and 4 praetorian cav. I had to expand while training, at the moment, i have half of Iberia from a naval invaision, almost all of western Europe, good part of central Europe, all of Greece, and every island in the Mediterranean. With that i have a substantial profit from the trade. So take it nice and slow, start with worse units, the phalanxes in XGM are FAR more deadly then vanilla i found, use regular phalangites, (sp?) or militia ones, mixed with some archers, skirmishers and light/medium cav, that will do it!

Good luck with your campaign!

[Fallenonez]

Playing in my First XGM campaign and only my second campaign in RTW (first one was romans but didn't get past 20 turns cuz i got pissed at the unrest and rebellion from my conquered-exterminated Carthaginian towns) , I started off as the Greeks.

Not knowing Macedon was going to backstab me (noob), I just conquered the island Crete when those Macedonians attacked Athens and Sparta in one turn.

Athens I managed to hold them off with 130 men versus the Mace's 450.

Sparta I managed to hold them off with 101 of my brave Spartan Royal Guard and 2 generals versus Mace's force of 1260 men (mostly hoplites)

After the attack on Sparta, only 3 Spartan royal guards remained w/ my 2 generals and i managed to get 1000(flat!) kills.

That was so exciting......definitely made me go


All that happened last night, and this afternoon, I resumed my campaign and it's gone downhill cuz they just had stacks after stacks...Sparta just fell so I am thinking of restarting the campaign

This time, I'll get those treacherous bastards from the start!

[HopliteLysander]

Wow good stuff! Truly a heroic defense of Sparta!

I definately got pounded by Macedonia the first couple timesand had to restart. I find that the key is to take Corinth. Until you do Athens, your most important city is surrounded and Sparta, with no walls is very vulnerable. Once you take Corinth you don't have to divide your forces, and you can control that choke-point into your territory.

Oh, and keep an eye on the Macedonian navy. They like to ferry in troops from the islands as reinforcments and sometimes you can take them out in transit.

Good luck on your next campaign.

[RedFox]

This is how to start a campaign with greeks on VH/VH, have no mercy and defeat his armies right in the beginning, then after capturing Corinth quickly march on Larissa and Chalcis.

[HopliteLysander]

RedFox,

What are those units to the left of the Spartan Royal Guard, they look cool, some type of light Hoplite?

[RedFox]

Those are the Ekdromoi chasers, they serve well for taking out missile units and light cavalry, mainly because of their mindblowing running speed - they're hardy soldiers only equipped with spears, helmets and shields. They die fast in hand to hand against heavy infantry though, but their charge is nevertheless quite powerful. You only have to make sure they dont fight a phalanx unit - it will rip them to shreds in seconds.

[SpartansDon'tDie]

I think wooping Macedon's ass early in the game is one of the best parts of this mod. It gives you a challenge and puts you in combat right from the start.

I remember first starting a campaign with Greeks I laid siege on Corinth but was attacked by a full stack army of Macedon. That was one hell of a fight!
It ended up in a heroic victory. I was not only proud of the victoy because I was outnumbered 4 to 1, also cause I was fighting with Thureophoroi and Militia Phalangites and the enemy had Phalangites and Foot Companions.

So don't think the war against Macedon is too hard or something like that, it's a nice challenge in the early stages of the game in where you can check out your new units and make up new strategies to crush your enemies after the Macedonians (like those bloody Seleucids).

Good mod!

[Internazionale]

Those are the Ekdromoi chasers, they serve well for taking out missile units and light cavalry, mainly because of their mindblowing running speed - they're hardy soldiers only equipped with spears, helmets and shields. They die fast in hand to hand against heavy infantry though, but their charge is nevertheless quite powerful. You only have to make sure they dont fight a phalanx unit - it will rip them to shreds in seconds.

Why did you not include them in the downloads for XGM?

[The_Brittunculi]

I took out Macedon in vh/vh before 270. The secret is taking Larissa and Pella quikly.