Leader problem in Spartan empire, Persia scenario

[vaalen]

I am very much enjoying a game as Sparta. Sparta is now an empire and the Persians are literally in Europe, on my border, and just begging to be taken down.

But my leaderships is the worst I have seen. I have seven leaders, for an 18 provence empire, which includes all of greece save Athens and Euboia, all of Macedonia, and all of Epirtus.

I have a total of seven leaders. Only one of the seven has an attack rating above zero.

I have not seena new leader since I became an empire, and the youngest is thirty seven,

and three of them are sixty six.

Sparta has a plus seven leader pool rating, and is supposed to get an advantabe in leader quality.

I am wondering it this can be right, or if there is some bug.

Any help or insight will be very much appreciated.

[Swuul]

What stats does your ruler have?

[vaalen]

What stats does your ruler have?

He is a good diplomat. He has no tother stats. The ruler before him had poor military stats, but was a good administrator.

[Surt]

What is your military expertise? if its below 1 you get a penalty.

Also add a leader to all garrisons you think will get attacked and hope the 0-0 leaders die.

[vaalen]

What is your military expertise? if its below 1 you get a penalty.

Also add a leader to all garrisons you think will get attacked and hope the 0-0 leaders die.

My military rating is 3.5.

I lkie your idea as to how to get rid of the 0 0 leaders. I might send them off in a suicide attack with a single helot for sompany.

[Surt]

A shame you can't let the countries leader lead an army ...

[vaalen]

A shame you can't let the countries leader lead an army ...

Yes, I would really like that option at this point. However, some of my rulers have been so terrible that they would probably be a 0 0.

[Surt]

And have at least coward, pampered also.

[vaalen]

And have at least coward, pampered also.

Ah, I see you know my leaders.

My only leader with an attack rating over zero got killed in my first battle against the Persians, even though he far outnumbered the enemy. He was replaced by a fellow with an attack value of zero, defense value of one. Who is now my best leader.

[Pocus]

From memory the military academy boosts leader quality slightly. Also the higher the military expertise, the higher the quality, so create more military buildings!

[Swuul]

The generic ruler and the fact that no leaders have died is the issue here. You don't get new leaders unless old ones die or your (new) ruler has bonus to leader quantity (and quality).

Time to hire a brand new slinger, attach him to one of the crappy leaders, and assault the toughest hostile citadel you can find. It would be very unfortunate indeed if the leader happened to die, but a new one would then be generated for you

[Surt]

You mean a Helot, no one will miss them, This IS Sparta.

[vaalen]

The generic ruler and the fact that no leaders have died is the issue here. You don't get new leaders unless old ones die or your (new) ruler has bonus to leader quantity (and quality).

Time to hire a brand new slinger, attach him to one of the crappy leaders, and assault the toughest hostile citadel you can find. It would be very unfortunate indeed if the leader happened to die, but a new one would then be generated for you

Thank you for the clear explanation. Your suggestion is excellant, and I already tried it.

I did send the crappiest 0 0 leader I could find, along with a single Helot, as Surt suggested, and the unit was destroyed and the leader killed.

Next turn, I got another leader. Another 0 0.

Yet my Spartan armies, relying on Spartan Hoplites, Spartan Phalanxes, the great light infantry that is the provincial unit in greece, and a few cretan archers, are winning every battle against the Persians and Thracians, but I have not run into Immortals yet. Sparabara do not hold up atainst my troops, even if they have better leaders. And they do.

[Surt]

Time to build more Military Academies ... that means more regions with 6 military buildings first, which means some buildup of the region to build it in finite time and so on.

[vaalen]

Time to build more Military Academies ... that means more regions with 6 military buildings first, which means some buildup of the region to build it in finite time and so on.

This is excellant advice, Surt, which I will gladly follow. i do have two military academies, but more should help.

However, there has been a change. My new ruler has poor military as his only rating.
The turn after i got him, i received two 1 1 leaders. I find this puzzling, but I am not complaining.

In the meantime, Macedon, whose home province is mine, stabbed me in the back and attacked on two fronts, while the Persian invaded Thessaly, and won naval superiority,
which has left my best army cut off in Asia Minor. I need even more troops, and it is the ability to get manpower for metal or money which is keeping me going. Great fun, and now I have some mediocre leaders!

[Surt]

Trading away MP or metal doesn't feel too bad, but using money to buy the other 2 always hurts me

[vaalen]

Trading away MP or metal doesn't feel too bad, but using money to buy the other 2 always hurts me

In my current game, I am doing both, kind of alternationg. It is actually quite well. I have a huge metal industry and make a lto of money through trade, and by deliberately conqueiring rich areas.

In order to maintain enough troops to compete with and actually drive back the Persian hordes, and they are hordes, sometimes sending armies with one hundred forty units, I have to have a per turn deficit of about one hundred manpower per turn, despite massive effots to increase manpower production and reduce usage. Using both metal and money to buy manpower is actually keeping ahead of that. I have driven the Persians out of most of modern day Turkey and am working towards somehow reaching and conquering the Persian homeland. It is the only way I can possibly win, as the Persian empier is still huge and generating more legacy points than I can.

How does using money to buy manpower hurt?

[Surt]

You get war exhaustion after 10 or so turns at war (longest current war I think, so make peace with as many of the opportunists as possible) increasing with time. As just marching from Sparta to Persepolis takes that long the task is problematic, and just wandering through without controlling the territory behind you is problematic as any defeat causes that army to be wiped out.
Taking the searoute to Tyres, shortens it a bit but not enough, going via the red sea without having any holdings along the way weakens the army too much.
So the tactic I usually do is either attack through Asia minor and try to grab as much territory as possible per war, and start early around turn 100, but generally this takes too long.
Alternatively take Tyrus, Phoenicia, and start from there.
Asia minor gives you a strong infantry and 3-4 sources of archers, Tyrus gives only 1.
I think I have only taken Persepolis as Babylon(not sure if I did it in my AAR on this site) and Egypt the others were stopped shortly before when time ran out.

As Egypt:
Be sure to be in the top 3 of the chart.
Don't take the province where your isolated region is they suck.
Fight Babylon get all the coastal provinces up to Cilicia from them and the regions that fills them out.
When Persia attacks, either fight them for a long time till you can get a cheap peace or just hand them over the lowest level of humiliate and a a single desert region.
Parking a large defensive army on Tyres usually does the trick, the Persian armies have it as their target it seems, though some wander into Egypt, where a 2nd army is needed.
After your "surrender" build up your country, don't take the provinces.
The Egyptian infantry sucks, but your Chariots are the PzVI of ancient warfare, a bit on the costly side also having 8-14 archers on the 2nd row really helps in battle. Fill up your army with whatever you feel is missing, I really missed the Galatian infantry and Armenian cataphracts! but the Persians had them. Having units of the correct terran helps a lot.

[vaalen]

I want to thant Surt for the extremely helpful comments he made on this issue, and on playing against the Persians as Sparta and Egypt.

I learned a lot, and I thought I really knew this game. The leader problem was solved a while ago, and I am haing one of the best games ever. The Persians may end my attempt to stop them by getting enough legacy points, but there is still some time for me to take their homeland, if I can get there fast enough.

If I van win, it will be great, but I have had a superb game regardless of the outcome.

Surt, thanks again for the knowledge you shared, which has really helped me understand what is going on better and to plan for it.

Regards,

Vaalen

[Surt]

You don't have to take their homeland to win, just select humiliate in each victory condition and they don't get a knockout victory.