Need help for Black Cave on Brutal

[KSB]

I watched several youtube guides but nothing seemed to work. I have all governors and advisers unlocked. Any help would be greatly appreciated please!

[thebadman]

Highway 1+ Healthcare + Police metaspam. Because its Black Cave its more likely you will need airstrike/double coalition rush for earlygame stability too. You do not want any red zones close to HQ or lack of stability murders you.

[KSB]

Tried using Banker plus advisors (doctor, religious leader, celebrity, reporter, chef and censor) plus healthcare spam and coalition troops but i got overwhelmed by red pockets all over.

[thebadman]

Do you try to destroys pockets? Do not if yes.

[KSB]

Finally did it after watching K2 on youtube (link below - fast forward to the 1 hour mark)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZVdW9GbbzY&t=124s

Apparently, the trick is to use the stronger coalition troops to block the rebels' attack (red arrows) and to "retire" the earlier blue troops and then to build the III and IV blue troops.

I tried and i made it, thanks to all who helped!

[Gandarf Rex]

My big tip is to emphasize the early game with your advisers. I tried like 15 different times in a row and failed about the time the coalition soldiers withdraw. So instead of my usual strategy of boosting my early game engine-building and mid-game supremacy (i.e. more support, anti-corruption, logistics and combat optimizers), I went all in on the early game.

Town planner (tons of cities, and two right next to each other in the optimal starting area), celebrity and realist to make it easier to get those first few zones stabilized before rep-loss kills you. For the military side, I went with militia chief so the insurgents didn't get so out of control early on, chef so not so much pressure to spend on national soldiers, and censor to prevent the initial insurgency from killing me before I could build up power.

It made my mid-game longer, definitely, but it let me at least get to the mid-game. The one risk I would say, is that you will need to be VERY careful to not let corruption get out of control with this approach, especially if support events pop that boost your corruption level. I lost 61 rep to corruption, and had to pop both purges to prevent a mid-game corruption loss. I used the Civil Servant and had luck with that; my previous attempts had all been Economist, but the extra corruption just made it nearly impossible to balance everything.

I would also say that this map practically requires Regional Census, early Main Roads 1 and Highways 1. Aggressively hunting down insurgent camps will be critical until you can stabilize most zones, so you'll need both speed and intel in top shape, as well as keeping a close eye on unstabilized zones for that dreaded ? icon.

[*Stonedge.]

At the early stage of the game, buy fewer soldiers and allow the insurgents to have fun in the mountains, and focus on stabilization plus road building ( looks like you have beaten brutal; hopefully this advice helps you in mega-brutal )