ok, have been practicing a bit. Had some fun with fireball-throwing Heavy Onagers, until they bombed my cohorts with their lousy accuracy. It's better to put them between enemy lines than behind your own Been trying some new tactics with creating a long distance between me and the enemy while my (increased amount of) cavalry attacks them in their rear. My infantry is no longer in a straight line when the enemy arrives, but just before they arrive I order them to move into a slightly curved line so they 'catch' the enemy, causing the enemy infantry to fight at their flanks as well. Works crap with large armies though. Btw has anyone tried to actually 'break enemy lines' (without spearmen) with heavy cavalry? Those fancy unit descriptions claim they're quite effective, but never had the urge to try it.

Good call on the infantry line-up, that's mainly how to use non-pike infantry like cohorts, makes them exceedingly powerful. And yes, depending on the type of cavalry you can very effectively break an enemy line. Especially in a wedge formation. Cavalry that's strong and versatile (sacred band cavalry, gallic cavalry, companion cavalry or even preatorian) can succesfully break a line, turn back and cause mayhem in the back of the troops. (or go straight towards to general's bodyguard in a blitzkrieg move)

The best cavalry to break a line are cataphracts, however. They wipe out a line more than break it. But, unlike the others I mentioned, they're not so fast or versatile so less appropriate for guerilla tactics.

@ Ox, yeh theres one unit of First Eagle Early Leagionary Cohort that the Senate awarded me for completing a mission.

@ Sat, Yeh, thats a bug. I tink slingers shit allover skirmishers.

@ All, Been continuing with my Julii campaign, but one MAJOR thing changed. I started getting tired of enslaving and exterminating populations (i was getting a guilty conscience) so i decided to try another approach of putting down unrest after occupying cities. My solution would be that i would besiege the city until it surrenders, then occupy it, but if it starts rioting, ill pull out comletely leaving no units in garrison. Theoretically, iu thought this would eventually (after about 2-3 repetitions) lead to the people realising that:

1. my Roman occupance is inevitable.
2. Theyre better off with me, (no riots, better living...)

There were 2 main problems with this method:

1. The senate thought that i was failing to successfully occupy territory for Rome, so it wasnt long until my popularity with the senate dropped to minimum. So much so, that they (and the rest of the Romans) have declared war on me. They are truly idiots, i was clearly the strongest of the families (with 3 operational armies) it wasnt long until i pulled them back from their fronts and marched them to the Brutii lands. There have been many epic battles and now it seems that the fate of the Brutii is sealed. I have finished building another 2 armies (1 with 12 units of URBAN COHORT) and am now moving to occupy the Brutii cities and towns.

2. The second problem what that my idea didnt work. The people kept rioting and rioting rioting and rioting rioting and rioting.

So now, im back with the old solution, but no guilt this time. Extermination is the only solution.

lol, extermination, the only solution! ACtually, I've been primarily enslaving. I've begun moving into Italy now. The Brutii are some tough bastards...huge armies and somewhat intelligent strategic moves. They're even fielding some archers now, the bastards. But anyway...

I had my most epic battle recently. I was besieging an enemy town with a full army...the town was full up on garrison (it was Brutii) and then the enemy moved in another full army and attacked me from behind, sandwiching me between two full armies. I decided to fight it out for the hell of it, to see what kind of damage I could do before my eventual annihilation.

To cut a long story short, I won. I took some serious casualities, but I absolutely annihilated the enemy.

me: deployed 2120 men
army 1: deployed 2979 men
army 2: deployed 2446 men

kills: army 1 killed 378 of my men, army 2 killed 536 of my men, I killed 4014 of their men. Absolute chaos. The battle was so big my computer lagged out on my real bad. Unfortuanetly, to the Brutii these kind of casualties don't seem to mean much, but it's got to be hurting them. They just keep throwing massive armies at me. That's ok, eventually they will be annihilated.

Good job satis

@Rinox 90% *hint*

Nice Peltz...fingers crossed.

Satis, dude...respect! Of course, those armies could have been packed with nothing but peasants, but even then. Nah, seriously, that's one heck fo a feat...and why didn't you take screenshots, you bastard? (yeah yeah, I know ) But that must have been an awesome feeling, killing off 4000 enemies with an army half that big, surrounded from both sides. Kudos. (you should try the Tresamon historical battle some time, it's a similar situation)

Anyway, i've finished my game with the seleceud empire...I conquered the greek peninsula with my more-than-awesome army, but the commanding general died (of old age) during the campaign, so I replaced hilm with a bribed Brutii general. A true Brutus, even. Then i made the final landing on Italy, crossing the Adriatic sea with my super-experienced army and its betraying Brutus general. I took over two cities, among which the Brutii capital, marched on to Rome and wiped them out, becoming supreme ruler. On a sidenote; untis with good base morale and three or two golden 'wings' are basically unroutable. They just fight to the death, which is 1) awesome and 2) very useful for your tactics because you can really keep enemies busy like that, instead of having your men run away every 5 minutes.

Some pics attached, last ones from this campaign...oh, did anyone else ever find a roman eagle? (check the pic) I hadn't seen this message before. And I'm on Derf's side in the extermination debate.

The eagle pic etc. I'm now making serious work of doing all the historical battles...I've won the first three, now I'm trying to outlive the battle at gergovia, something the Romans didn't do IRL. We'll see.

Yeh, thats the same eagle i was presented by the Senate. Obviously, i make the faction leader fight on the same army for ultra 1337ness.

I had a note on one of my guys (kinda like the drunken and lewdness stuff) that says I'd captured a Roman eagle. No clue when or how that happened. Only happened to one guy one time so far.

Must have happened during tequilla happy hour. Derf, are the first legionary cohorts much stronger than their average counterparts? Or just fancier.

heheh...something fun I started doing recently...

wall of pikes holds the enemy off. One unit of noble barbarian cavalary runs around the enemy lines and hits one of the edge-most enemy units from behind...unit breaks and runs. Hit the next unit in line, ad nauseum, until the entire army is routing. heheh. I still get a charge out of annihilating enemy armies.

As far as im aware, no. Same stats, only about a quarter more troops and the Eagle of course.

Lol what a mess. Playing the Julii family on medium difficulty. Damn most combats are just a big bloody mess. Once they charge theres no telling what happens next. Pathfinding on the otherhand is moronic at best.

Basically i leave 4 or 5 lowgrade units in cities to avoid revolting. Income makes no sense at all. Largest cities make the most deficite, Some smaller cities make 1k at low or normal tax whereas large cities make -500 on high tax.

Plague now aint that nice, had some luck tho, once i wiped out the population the plague went with them and my general didnt catch anything. more later, tomorrow or today that is

Totally agree with that youre saying Peltz. RTW is only good for the actual battles and nothing else.

yea, the world aspects of it are pretty dumb. Especially the income/city thing. What would improve it immensely:

more realistic income
ability to found and completely destroy cities (sewing carthage with salt anyone?)
ability to have sex with slaves

then the game would totally own.