Share Your Alexander Campaigns

[boblikesoup]

I'm away from my desktop and craving to hear about this mode since I've wanted it for so long.

What does the campaign run like? How are you doing and what's your strategy? What difficulty and mods do you use?

[Garbad]

> What does the campaign run like?

Seems to run smoothly and fast. OFC I'm on a much faster PC now so that may bias my answer.

> How are you doing and what's your strategy?

I don't like the starter army composition so I'm going to turtle and build up for 20-25 turns before I blitz thrace.

>What difficulty and mods do you use?

H/H. I don't think I have any mods running.

[Tjes076]

It runs great but i'm struggling heavily.. The amount of stacks that get thrown at you after Persia declares war is way too insane. Anyone else experience that?

[Iskandar]

H/N, with 12 tpy mod. I usually play with hardcore no CAI mod, too, but the long building/research/leveling times didn't sit well with me for a campaign that's meant to end in a single lifespan. So I'll be heading into uber generals and agents territory. I also normally use the Age of Hellenism as well, but I haven't checked if the creator has brought it up to date with the latest DeI patch, so I may turn it on later when it's all copacetic.

I save-scummed my way to solidifying Thrace and grabbing Crete and Rhodos before declaring war on the Achaemenids. Tried a few paths until that starting point and got the following feedback:


- It's better to nab the two islands before starting the big war, otherwise you cannot spare resources later and you need the income from those 2 regions. I probably should have done the same to Sparta, but I wanted a bit of role play, so I let them sit tight in the Peloponess.

- Fleets are essential. I need one in the Black Sea and one in the Mediterranean, otherwise I get pulled apart by sea invasions. On the other hand, now I can be pro-active at sea and raid/liberate coastal settlements. 9 Artillery Penteres (I'm now up to 12 per fleet) are sufficient for battles and settlement capture, but if I want to auto-resolve the settlement battles I'd need more in each fleet and fighting those manually is quite long and tedious.

- Simply conquering ain't gonna work, cause I face an endless stream of full stacks from the Persians and at least 3 of their satrapies. I've liberated Nikomedia and Pontus so far and will try to liberate Gordion after I somehow smash my way through 6 or 7 enemy armies. That way I will be able to focus on uniting the Lydia-Karia province, get a breather and develop resources to support 3 to 4 armies and 3 understrength fleets. In the south I liberate Pamphylia and Cyprus periodically only for the Achaemenids to take them back several turns later. But it doesn't tax my land armies so there is that.

- Carthage will declare war sooner or later, since it has a defensive alliance with the Persians (it finally did to me a few turns ago). A third fleet would be needed to defend Crete from Carthaginian (and Egyptian) invasions, while the second one continues to wreak havoc on the eastern Mediterranean and fill my treasury with loot to support the war.

- Kartli is a menace; it mostly acts as another Persian satrapy, without the formal status. In my game it wiped out everything east of the Bastarnae and marched an army in Northern Thrace, so now I am war with all of the East and South of the map. I've liberated Bosporus and the Iazyges and soon will do the same for the Roxolani and demolish all other coastal towns and delay until I get a better foothold in Asia Minor before recruiting an extra army to deliver a final solution to the northeast problem. The Black Sea Fleet is the MVP so far.

- The north and west frontiers are calm so far, preoccupied with small squabbles, but that may change swiftly if I get a land border with the Dacians. Rome is quiet.

- The factions which can be liberated are a little bit different from the main mod, so some experimenting is needed.

- The main thing is that all the armies of the East are chock-full of missiles. It's killing me and I can't fight several battles in a row, as I usually do in the main mod. My second field army has gimped replenishment to boot, since I use it to train characters for increased research and reduced empire maintenance, i.e. no proper fighting traits. With no thureos/thorax coming, it's an interesting puzzle to solve.

- The hypaspists performance is surprisingly good for having such low armor, but you have to use them smart. Same as the Companions/Thessalians. Hint: they both are a tier above their counterparts in terms of battlefield movement speed.

- I'm using the Maedi for skirmishers so far, since they have the highest armor stat among their class, but when I run out of them, I will begin deploying the default Attican Peltasts, which are also very good. I might increase their number from 2 to 4 per army just so I can have a tier 3 pop with a good shield soak up missile damage, but it's hard to decide what to cut from the army composition.

- I guess I'll be grabbing all the armor increase traits, traditions and buildings asap. Damn arrows.

So far it's quite engaging, if a bit of a slog-fest.

[boblikesoup]

H/N, with 12 tpy mod. I usually play with hardcore no CAI mod, too, but the long building/research/leveling times didn't sit well with me for a campaign that's meant to end in a single lifespan. So I'll be heading into uber generals and agents territory. I also normally use the Age of Hellenism as well, but I haven't checked if the creator has brought it up to date with the latest DeI patch, so I may turn it on later when it's all copacetic.

I save-scummed my way to solidifying Thrace and grabbing Crete and Rhodos before declaring war on the Achaemenids. Tried a few paths until that starting point and got the following feedback:


- It's better to nab the two islands before starting the big war, otherwise you cannot spare resources later and you need the income from those 2 regions. I probably should have done the same to Sparta, but I wanted a bit of role play, so I let them sit tight in the Peloponess.

- Fleets are essential. I need one in the Black Sea and one in the Mediterranean, otherwise I get pulled apart by sea invasions. On the other hand, now I can be pro-active at sea and raid/liberate coastal settlements. 9 Artillery Penteres (I'm now up to 12 per fleet) are sufficient for battles and settlement capture, but if I want to auto-resolve the settlement battles I'd need more in each fleet and fighting those manually is quite long and tedious.

- Simply conquering ain't gonna work, cause I face an endless stream of full stacks from the Persians and at least 3 of their satrapies. I've liberated Nikomedia and Pontus so far and will try to liberate Gordion after I somehow smash my way through 6 or 7 enemy armies. That way I will be able to focus on uniting the Lydia-Karia province, get a breather and develop resources to support 3 to 4 armies and 3 understrength fleets. In the south I liberate Pamphylia and Cyprus periodically only for the Achaemenids to take them back several turns later. But it doesn't tax my land armies so there is that.

- Carthage will declare war sooner or later, since it has a defensive alliance with the Persians (it finally did to me a few turns ago). A third fleet would be needed to defend Crete from Carthaginian (and Egyptian) invasions, while the second one continues to wreak havoc on the eastern Mediterranean and fill my treasury with loot to support the war.

- Kartli is a menace; it mostly acts as another Persian satrapy, without the formal status. In my game it wiped out everything east of the Bastarnae and marched an army in Northern Thrace, so now I am war with all of the East and South of the map. I've liberated Bosporus and the Iazyges and soon will do the same for the Roxolani and demolish all other coastal towns and delay until I get a better foothold in Asia Minor before recruiting an extra army to deliver a final solution to the northeast problem. The Black Sea Fleet is the MVP so far.

- The north and west frontiers are calm so far, preoccupied with small squabbles, but that may change swiftly if I get a land border with the Dacians. Rome is quiet.

- The factions which can be liberated are a little bit different from the main mod, so some experimenting is needed.

- The main thing is that all the armies of the East are chock-full of missiles. It's killing me and I can't fight several battles in a row, as I usually do in the main mod. My second field army has gimped replenishment to boot, since I use it to train characters for increased research and reduced empire maintenance, i.e. no proper fighting traits. With no thureos/thorax coming, it's an interesting puzzle to solve.

- The hypaspists performance is surprisingly good for having such low armor, but you have to use them smart. Same as the Companions/Thessalians. Hint: they both are a tier above their counterparts in terms of battlefield movement speed.

- I'm using the Maedi for skirmishers so far, since they have the highest armor stat among their class, but when I run out of them, I will begin deploying the default Attican Peltasts, which are also very good. I might increase their number from 2 to 4 per army just so I can have a tier 3 pop with a good shield soak up missile damage, but it's hard to decide what to cut from the army composition.

- I guess I'll be grabbing all the armor increase traits, traditions and buildings asap. Damn arrows.

So far it's quite engaging, if a bit of a slog-fest.

Thanks for the write-up. Very enlightening.

-Incredible you can hold out against so many stacks and enemies. I'd imagine that the hardest part is the beginning because, if you get stronger, then they are only getting weaker. There's a snowball effect where everybody teams up on the one with the most enemies, so am curious how all the neighbors aren't teaming on you.
-How did you decide when to invade Persia? Did you just max out based on what you had historically started with? Will Persia declare war on you eventually if you take your time?
-That's weird about Carthage declaring war. Feel like the focus should be East

[Iskandar]

Thanks for the write-up. Very enlightening.

-Incredible you can hold out against so many stacks and enemies. I'd imagine that the hardest part is the beginning because, if you get stronger, then they are only getting weaker. There's a snowball effect where everybody teams up on the one with the most enemies, so am curious how all the neighbors aren't teaming on you.

I suppose the diplomatic values are different from the Grand Campaign. The western borders are quite calm, I am at turn ~85 and nobody has gotten very big, I have Non-aggression pacts with all my neighbours there, except for the Scordisci, but they got subjugated early on by the Dacians and are embroiled in a war with 2 or 3 other factions, which keeps them down to one region and away from me.

As for the Achaemenids and their satrapies, their army stacks support each other when attacked, but rarely contrive to do so on the offense. Which means that if I overextend, I will get ground down by attrition, but if I let them come to me in a more controlled manner, I have a chance. Having a liberated region between me and them lets me do so. Of course, I can't replenish too long from the same regions, cause the population will go down. I held out with two stacks, replenishing from Pergamon and Ephesos for about 40 turns, and now I have managed to transfer a third one to Asia Minor, which let me finally liberate Gordion and conquer Sardeis, uniting the Lydia-Karia province. I could have done it sooner if not for the Kartli aggresion in the north. It was just about time, though, because those two cities were down to 10-11 000 each, and pop 2 was almost depleted. I guess the great fun will begin when the western satrapies are conquered and only the Achaemenids are left, which will make them attack in a more coordinated fashion. But things are looking better in Asia Minor now, and I have an army and a fleet on their way to taking Sarmatia and Cimmeria away from Kartli.

-That's weird about Carthage declaring war. Feel like the focus should be East

Dresden made an update yesterday which addresses that issue, but it's too late for my campaign. It's not so bad, my Mediterranean fleet repulsed one or two naval invasions and they've been quiet since. The got a lot going on in the west, and recently started a war with Syracuse which will keep them further distracted. I even looted 2 of their Libyan settlements to top up my treasury and I am back in the east ready to support the final conquest of Pamphylia. Things are under control.

-How did you decide when to invade Persia? Did you just max out based on what you had historically started with? Will Persia declare war on you eventually if you take your time?

Historically, Alexander conquered swiftly the Asia Minor Mediterranean coastline in order to cut off the Persian fleet and establish his own. The empire was slow to react, but in the game as soon as war begins, they have 5 or 6 stacks from different satrapies waiting for you and can send one or 2 more across the Aegean and the Black Sea.

As I said, I took Rhodos and Crete before beginning the invasion, and I'd recommend taking Sparta too, if you can manage it fast, before the east gangs up on you. They start with a defensive alliance with you, but mostly just do nothing and prevent me from having a full province and a higher income. I'd leave Epirus, which are full allies, as a buffer in the west.

I had 2 full stacks and 2 fleets with 6 lithobolos penteres each, which was my break even with high/very high taxes, so that's when I attacked Persia. I got up to 9 penteres per fleet as soon as I could and I am now (50 turns or so later) up to 12 per fleet and 4 field armies.

Perisa did declare war on me a few times in the beginning, but as I said, I save-scummed my way to a good starting position. Dresden's update from yesterday is supposed to help with that, too.

[Epanastatis]

I've had three separate attempts before finally making it past turn 20. It's really easy to just get totally overwhelmed by the seemingly infinite stacks of the Persian Empire & satrapies.

This time, I had a fortified army sitting at the Hellespont with 4 more armies behind in backup (2 of which were allied - Sparta and Epirus).

This seemed to coax the AI into naval invasions, and I managed to take out two naval stacks and 3 armies in the Aegean with a half stack of triremes (just manoevre and ram - don't engage).

Then I got my "Alexander" battle - 4 stacks vs 5 stacks in the Hellespont. It was great! Definitely felt like an epic battle of the Anabasis. (https://imgur.com/a/my8AnJf)

I'm hoping now I've drained enough of their manpower to invade Anatolia proper, and take a few cities before they manage to raise any more forces.