Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

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Blathergut
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Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by Blathergut »

Your Beginnings:

1. Ignore who you are at war with. They probably won't come at you right away.
2. Don't target the two small states up in the mountains. It takes forever to get there, that will cost endless resources supplying the armies, and they give you very little.
3. Think historical. The Romans expanded on the western plains for a reason:
...Latins provide wood...focus them on that and growing the city larger
...Hernici provide iron...same
...don't grow more farms at Roma...you need the space for troop improvement/types...Roma recruits your armies...so build here to improve your troops and get the population up (leave people NOT working so they...uh...well...spend their idle time effectively! 8) )
4. So...target Caere (closest,easiest target) and Falerii...main product...food
5. Once you have these two (and you first need to build some troops...don't be in a rush) then expand north or south but not west...south is probably easier, but be warned, the states will have large armies!
6. You can eventually move east, but it becomes more dangerous (harder for you to transfer troops about).
7. Don't be in a rush.
8. Build only in winter (unless resources are piling up). At the beginning of every spring, check each city and set workers/population as needed. Keep armies in cities until the time you are set to invade.

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Move on to Summer 367BC and see who is at war with you. This time around it's the Caeretans, Aequians, and Volscians. Definite squeeze! We will just sit tight and build up resources. Check each city and make sure production is worked to the max! By winter, nothing much has happened. We build a FORT at Roma, and we increase the size of production at the other two cities to large versions. You could pass on the FORT and just increase FOOD production at Roma. If you are feeling nervous about your neighbours, you could shift some troops from Roma.

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Winter 366BC: Large Farm at Roma, Outcrop Mine at Hernici + 2 Auxiliaries. My lack of FOOD production is showing! Perhaps that should have been first at Roma. :oops: We have also moved some troops from Roma to Latins in case our deluded southern neighbours get early ideas.

Winter 365BC: Farm at Roma, Lumber Mill at Latins. Hopefully next winter sees building of new legion at Roma and preparations for war.

Winter 364BC: 2 Legions recruited at Roma. The forces at Latins had moved back to Roma. We will send excess troops back to keep the southern enemies cautious.

By Summer 363BC we are moving on Caere. Are we too early? Should we have waited at Roma and upgraded before invading? We shall see! (I saved!!) :wink:

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On the battlefield, we keep our best troops on the left, aiming for the open ground. Our centre/right is given orders to hold and then advance, hopefully with the left flank coming down to help. Unfortunately, they do just that!

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And the actual. Lesson learned even though we win: Build up those troops and bring more than 1 Auxiliary along! :oops: We will spend the next few years upgrading troops and cities in preparation to invade our second initial target. We've captured Caere in Winter 363BC just in time for builds! :D

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Winter 355BC:

Phase One of the unification is complete: Caere and Falerii have been taken. The army that captured Falerii will remain there as protection against invasions from the north or east. We will spend the next few years ramping up production and building a second army to head south. Production is already coming along nicely (see last screen shot below).

We assume there are not too many of the enemy this time.

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Left flank surges forward and overwhelms.

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Remainder of enemy encircled and routed.

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And production at this point:

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Last edited by Blathergut on Sun Mar 17, 2013 5:28 pm, edited 18 times in total.
Blathergut
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by Blathergut »

Second Expansion Phase

I played this out in two paths. Path One: Capture Carsioli in the mountains to the east. Path Two: Original plan to capture the two major cities to the south, Anxur and Aurunci. Path one saw me capture the city but war was then declared by the North Oscans and things would have been tough. Path Two is what is shown here, ending in 348BC.

As planned, Roma built to improve troops (we were able to build/upgrade large squads). The other cities pushed their particular production as fast as possible. Food production went through the warehouse roof and there was a fair amount of waste some turns. Iron and wood hovered around +150 a turn. Eventually an 8 strength army was assembled at Roma (3 Legions, 2 Cavalry, some archers and auxiliaries). Once upgraded, it moved south and took the first city with some difficulty. We rested and refitted. Eventually we moved south again and ran into a Volscian army which, while defeated, mangled us a bit, but instead of waiting, we attacked the city on the next turn. It was a hard-fought battle, but we won, with substantial losses (3 of 8 units eliminated, the rest badly mangled).

But by 348 we are in an excellent position to decide where to move. We will probably continue south, but it will require some troops to garrison the newly-captured cities so that the neighbours to the east can't easily pounce.

This is the battle against the Volscian army that caught us on our approach to the southern Volscian city. To give you some idea of the tried-and-true Roman tactic of encircling the enemy.

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After the battle, as we prepare to take the city.

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And the diplomatic screen upon conquest. We now control a large chunk of Italy and can enlarge the cities and production to prepare for Phase Three: Conquest of one section (probably south) of the Italian peninsula.

Image
Last edited by Blathergut on Sun Mar 17, 2013 9:22 pm, edited 2 times in total.
Blathergut
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by Blathergut »

(Reserved for Further Conquests)(Coming! :oops: )
Blathergut
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by Blathergut »

(Reserved for Something!) 8)
Blathergut
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by Blathergut »

(And One More in Case I End Up Needing It!) :wink:
Blathergut
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by Blathergut »

I'll see what I can do with this. Comments/alternate strategies/tactics welcome!
Blathergut
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by Blathergut »

Phase One complete.
VPaulus
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by VPaulus »

Great AAR! :D
smmoulder
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by smmoulder »

Excellent AAR and the screenshots are big help. I am still unclear on small/medium/large squads. You mention that forts let you build larger squads. But then every once in a while, a barracks will show up that seems to do the same thing. And I guess I can upgrade barracks to quartermaster for even bigger squads? Any help sorting out the build tree for larger squads is much appreciated. Thanks!
Blathergut
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by Blathergut »

From the HELP:

Village/Town/City Hall: ...increases the size of squads raised in that city...

Training Ground: ...allows you to raise higher calibre squads...

Fort (Small/Medium/Large): ...provide extra squads to fight in city defense (but not by themselves)...forts allow medium-sized squads...

Barracks: ...allows large squads...

Quartermaster: ...may create huge squads...

Now, just exactly what is meant by "higher calibre" is not defined or stated. I've never counted how many figures in a small squad on the battlefield compared to next size up, etc.
smmoulder
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by smmoulder »

Blathergut wrote:From the HELP:

Village/Town/City Hall: ...increases the size of squads raised in that city...

Training Ground: ...allows you to raise higher calibre squads...

Fort (Small/Medium/Large): ...provide extra squads to fight in city defense (but not by themselves)...forts allow medium-sized squads...

Barracks: ...allows large squads...

Quartermaster: ...may create huge squads...

Now, just exactly what is meant by "higher calibre" is not defined or stated. I've never counted how many figures in a small squad on the battlefield compared to next size up, etc.
I think you need Training Ground to be able to raise Legions (as opposed to simple Auxilia). Similarly, you need the Imperial Residence to raise Pretorians. Now to my eye, Pretorians are basically bad-ass Legions, so even though they are more expensive to raise and maintain, it appears to me a waste of a slot to make Training Ground when you can save up and make an Imperial Residence.

I didn't realize village/town/city affects squad size too! I have been pushing hard to upgrade to Cities, so that's good. I had been ignoring Forts, but obviously that was a mistake. Do these squad size affects compound? Or is squad size dictated by the biggest effect?

Thanks for your help and for posting the AAR. Very illuminating.
Blathergut
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by Blathergut »

I didn't realize village/town/city affects squad size too! I have been pushing hard to upgrade to Cities, so that's good. I had been ignoring Forts, but obviously that was a mistake. Do these squad size affects compound? Or is squad size dictated by the biggest effect?

No clue!! :)
smmoulder
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by smmoulder »

Blathergut wrote:I didn't realize village/town/city affects squad size too! I have been pushing hard to upgrade to Cities, so that's good. I had been ignoring Forts, but obviously that was a mistake. Do these squad size affects compound? Or is squad size dictated by the biggest effect?

No clue!! :)
OK, I mis-read what Ian had written about Forts. Forts only affect your Garrison size. They have nothing to do with Squad Size. Squad size is based on Village/Town/City (apparently) plus Barracks/Quartermaster. I think!
Blathergut
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Re: Unification of Italy: AAR (with Photos)

Post by Blathergut »

The unification is on pause for a bit. (Madly trying to paint up Italian Guards for a FoG Napoleonic demo game at the local convention here on Saturday coming up!) We will continue.
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