Hardest faction to play ?

[Ignacivs]

I want a real challenge, but not some meme ♥♥♥♥ with rebels or spqr, an actual faction. Which one should I take ?

[Sebasta]

I'd say Seleucids.

Parthia or Gaul can also be hard in the beginning, but become easy quite quickly. Also, you can try winning the game by simply not making any alliances whatsoever and playing on hardest difficulty.

[Ignacivs]

Originally posted by Sebasta:

I'd say Seleucids.

Parthia or Gaul can also be hard in the beginning, but become easy quite quickly. Also, you can try winning the game by simply not making any alliances whatsoever and playing on hardest difficulty.

Thracians and Scytians arent hard ?
I was thinking Iberia was hard as well.

[Ëvïlnïck8 ゴゴゴ]

Numibia and Spain seem like hard factions in my option.

Both have a pretty bad unit roster. With their best cav being the average long shield cav, no archers and not so great inf.
Numdia gets onagers and elephants, witch are decent. And spain gets Bull warrios that are also nice, but other then those 3 units, their roster is not so great.

Furthermore their starting position is bad. Both start with a bunch off small towns everywhere meaning you are stuck with bad units and low income. Numidia can have a good shot vs carthage if you can suprise attack them and Spain can suprise attack Gaul witch helps somewhat. But still I think these 2 are the hardest. Thrace and selucids atleast get phalanx units at the start.

[hoonii]

Seleucids, by far margin.
Egypt from south and southwest, invading from sea, barbarians from north, Parthia from east, Armenians from northeast, later Romans from west. A war between Seleucids and Egypt is evenly matched, Seleucids a little bit stronger, but because there are other nations attacking at the same time, its really hard to survive all of that.

[ImperiusDamian]

Originally posted by hoonii:

Seleucids, by far margin.
Egypt from south and southwest, invading from sea, barbarians from north, Parthia from east, Armenians from northeast, later Romans from west. A war between Seleucids and Egypt is evenly matched, Seleucids a little bit stronger, but because there are other nations attacking at the same time, its really hard to survive all of that.

And generally within about 15 years Egypt splatters both the Seleucids and Numidia and starts expanding in every damn direction. Almost every RTW campaign I've played has ended in a massive brawl between Egypt and the strongest Roman faction. (With the exception of one very odd campaign where I played the Scipii and found Britannia had swallowed up the Gauls and the Julii by 240 BC...)

[Ignacivs]

Originally posted by ImperiusDamian:

Originally posted by hoonii:

Seleucids, by far margin.
Egypt from south and southwest, invading from sea, barbarians from north, Parthia from east, Armenians from northeast, later Romans from west. A war between Seleucids and Egypt is evenly matched, Seleucids a little bit stronger, but because there are other nations attacking at the same time, its really hard to survive all of that.

And generally within about 15 years Egypt splatters both the Seleucids and Numidia and starts expanding in every damn direction. Almost every RTW campaign I've played has ended in a massive brawl between Egypt and the strongest Roman faction. (With the exception of one very odd campaign where I played the Scipii and found Britannia had swallowed up the Gauls and the Julii by 240 BC...)

Hahaha, yea the damn Egyptians always steamroll everything, it appears chariots are amazing at auto-resolve, so they just slam dunk on everything...

[ImperiusDamian]

Originally posted by Ignacivs:

Originally posted by ImperiusDamian:

And generally within about 15 years Egypt splatters both the Seleucids and Numidia and starts expanding in every damn direction. Almost every RTW campaign I've played has ended in a massive brawl between Egypt and the strongest Roman faction. (With the exception of one very odd campaign where I played the Scipii and found Britannia had swallowed up the Gauls and the Julii by 240 BC...)

Hahaha, yea the damn Egyptians always steamroll everything, it appears chariots are amazing at auto-resolve, so they just slam dunk on everything...

It's even worse when YOU'RE Egypt. The entire south and eastern two-thirds of the map quickly become a massive sea of pale yellow. LOL

[Aux|CTG]

Imo, it'd say Numidia, Scythia, or Seleucids. Numidia has a mediocre starting position, but it can make a few enemies which could run the faction into debt or just losing territory, the enemies I speak of is Carthage, Rome (Scipii Rome to be specific), and Egypt. But overall if you're a skilled commander you should be okay, as Numidia has access to archers, which can be deadly for early game if you are good at using them.

Scythia is a great faction especially for early game, but it has terrible territory economically, and somewhat strategically terrible too. You may go into debt pretty quickly, even despite how cheap their units are, because the provinces really don't generate enough income, so you will kinda have to migrate into Greece, or the East if you want, but Greece will be easiest. As for its positioning strategically, it will take a few turns for someone to get to one of your settlements, but it will also take turns for you to send out fresh troops here and there. But Scythia has the best early game unit, Horse archers. Deadly and cheap.

For Seleucids, well everyone already mentions it, but basically they will be attacked from everywhere, or atleast their neighbors have the potential to attack them from everywhere. It kinda puts fear into you, even if you're a skilled general, full stacks of armies will be tough to beat, just being one faction against 1-4. And even if you are skilled, you could go into debt for having a high upkeep. But if you survive, the Seleucids should be just fine, they have some great units.

So play Scythia for a challenge but easy to win once you get settled in a proper place.
Numidia for a challenge, but only if you are a really good at battles.
Seleucids if you are a campaign genius, and a great military general.

[A Disappointed Horse]

If you're feeling particularly masochistic then edit the files so the Rebels are playable. Absolute nightmare.

[Sebasta]

Originally posted by A Disappointed Horse:

If you're feeling particularly masochistic then edit the files so the Rebels are playable. Absolute nightmare.

Rebels are quite interesting actually. Mamy cultures, may strategies, no revolt though so you cant lose settlements that way. Plus there can be rebel family members. I find it fascinating!