FOR SPARTA! Legendary Campaign guide

"Words without meaning is just a flapping tongue. Be like a spear, get to the point! Haha"
(Funniest line from one of the diplomacy NPCs in the game LOL)

As you can see, this guide is separated into many sections, to make it easier for everyone. If you're here for the gameplay tips, just jump to there. If you're here for the Sparta Legendary mode tips, jump there. If you're here to listen to my ranting/opinion on the game, feel free to read that also :)

A little about myself, the author:
- This is my first total war game (I've briefly played on my friend's Shogun 2, but I wanted something more European...more Roman-like. Must have been after watching Spartacus, Rome, Game of Thrones, and Viking...that I desire to slay muhaha).
- I have completed the Intro Campaign, Rome Julii Campaign on easy, and now on Sparta Legendary.
- I have browsed the forums for many guides and references, so I learned pretty quickly.
- My weaknesses: On field combat (I tend to abuse auto-resolve, I'll explain why later), seldom upgrading military buildings & units pass III-IV (i'll explain why later also)

Apologies in advance
- It's getting late and I am multitasking, so I may have butchered some of the spelling :)

This section is purely just to express my opinions & thoughts on how the game can improve, no guide here (so skip on if you want only guidance)

I have NEVER been a fan of turn-base gameplay until now. I think overall CA does a pretty great job incorporating multiple-multiple aspects and dimensions of the gameplay. However, it does feel very Jack-of-all trades, and lacks focus in many areas.

Pros
- The audio (watching the making of video, shows how much effort was put forth here, I applaud them cause this is certainly a CORE of any game/entertainment as music/sound effects can stir emotions)
- The visuals (stunning. This is the largest game I've ever played, 30gb+ i believe?)
- Complexity (So many things to learn when picking up this game, albit certain things seem unnecessary)

Cons
- Still more bugs than bedbugs!
- Slow processing at times (although not as bad as people say, though I did start after many patches so I may have miss 90% of those terrible lags)

My Observations
- The game loads MUCH smoother in Rome on easy mode than in Sparta on Legendary. I am not sure if it's because of the Greek DLC or because of the Legendary mode & how it auto-saves, etc. In either case, this is my BIGGEST COMPLAINT!
- BUGS BUGS and more BUGS (I swear playing Sparta Legendary was where I noticed a ton of glitches
- I won TWO defensive battles in fortified towns, I should have never won due to bugs. In one game, my men that came from the boat landed on the shores and then swiftly got stuck in my castle walls. They could not finish me off but keep trying rather than taking the 2nd victory point, and eventually i won out due to time. In the second game, their ladder was stuck on a building outside of town. I managed to kill off men holding the other 3 ladders, and eventually time ran out and i won.

Overview
- General tips
- Obama or Bush? Clinton! (Diplomacy broken down into Alliance, Trading, Going to War)
- Rules of Engagement
- Economic Prowess
- Spies/Dignitaries/Champions
- Note: While these tips are geared towards the strict demands of Legendary, they can be loosely interpreted for other difficulties (on a lesser scale of course)

General Tips

- Patience is virtue. The tiger stealths, carefully observing and waiting for the prime moment. This is probably my BEST advice. A rash decision in Legendary could cause you to pay dearly.
- Don't focus too much on expanding too quick. Your best bet is to play the diplomacy game & build up your economy.

Diplomacy
(Alliance)
- Diplomacy is a prudent factor in Legendary, it's your key to success.
- Starting out, I always scout to see who I am already hated by, who is neutral and who are "in the green". I also mouse over them to see who they're at war with and who their allies are and how I am positioned in this mess. That way you can position yourself at an advantage, because almost every diplomatic move you make will affect how other factions perceive you - the question is by how much and in a negative or positive fashion. (For an example, goto the beginning of my Sparta Legendary section)
- I try my best to favor diplomacy with someone in the green / green (Aggressiveness / Reliability), where reliability is more crucial. The problem is, these guys stay small, usually one or two towns so its so appealing to just confiscate their lands. However, I advise to ally them (initially) even if it means you can't take the entire province. For example, Ardiaei is Caution / Loyal. He will basically sit on his camp, unless his allies ask him to help with war. This decreases unnecessary hatred from other factions if he's your ally, while hes there to send his fully stacked 1-2 army to assist you when needed.
- Factions will tend to ally with you if YOU are in the green (steadfast, etc.).
- Wealth appears (this may or may not be true) to affect their decision to ally with you also. For me, every turn I have several factions begging for a minuscule amount of gold and wanting to be defensive or military allies with me. Of course these factions are already in the green, but I decline them because well....this happened at around 120ish Turns and I am already VERY powerful, expanded, wealthy, and have 3 strong allies so I didn't care for more.

(Trading)
- Factions will tend to trade with you if YOU are in the green (steadfast) AND they are positive neutral or greater. The only exception I see is if they are at war with a ton other factions, in which trading with them might cause you to lose several points with the other guys.
- The longer the trade has been establish, the more return you get from the trade (ie Trading with Libya for 99 turns will get you 1k gold/turn rather than the measly 300g/turn when first initiated)
- At the beginning of the campaign, take a Champion and run him along all of the coasts. As you run into these factions, this opens up trade routes.

(Going to War)
- BLESS THE GODS, TONIGHT WE DINE IN ROMAN BLOOD! (Unless you're Roman...then shame on you.)
-This is where patience is important. You need to observe who's at war with whom, and who are allies. Then assess if it would benefit or be annoying based on your location, power, etc.
- The red/yellow power indicator is kind of a good assessment of overall power, rather than just military power. While it does not necessarily indicate that you are screwed or gaurantee you victory, it does help gauge how you fair. I would never go up against a strong Faction early on without any allies, extra money for quick army rebuilding, etc.
- ***A CHEAP tactic that grants you favorable diplomacy OR free gold: keep an on a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ crazy warring faction (Looking at you Egypt and Selucid). These nations will usually engage war with multiple factions early on, before even gaining any allies. Make sure they are not your neighbors, then go to one of the factions they are at war against and diplomatically JOIN them in fighting these ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ crazy factions...for a small fee. If they agree, you just gained free diplomacy points, free gold...and you don't even have to do anything cause they're so freakin far away :) Usually, in a few turns that ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ crazy faction will ♥♥♥♥ themselves and offer a peace treaty with some gift of gold because they bit off more than they can chew. Win-Win.
- When warring with other nations, don't forget to look at their neighbors. Try to make military accesses so you don't gain negative points for bringing troops across their lands. Definitely Try to make some non-aggression pacts, it's a swing towards the right path. Diplomacy is always progressive. You can't run to a Neutral -20 Faction and be like "yo homie, let's cuddle"

Rules of Engagement
- Ping your allies before you go fight. Why? Because they move like drugged sloths. It will be several turns before they get there. Make sure you don't get there and position yourself too close, your allies with conveniently charge in with YOU as the backup and then conquer the town for themselves. WHO DA FOOL?! Instead, work it out the opposite way to your advantage :)
- I almost always auto-resolve the battle. What teh efff?! Is it cause joo sucz0rs and not l33t? Probably. But, I don't engage unless I KNOW I will win a fight. My biggest exceptions are if I am ambushed (biggest difference compared to easier difficulties, you get ambushed and NONE of your reinforcements show up) and if I am defending a town. Also, auto-resolve doesn't seem to care too much about how LEET your units are, just that there are a ton of them and a bit of variety (as long as you don't have 5,000 plebs you should be good)
- NEVER auto-resolve and give away a Capital. Your walls are amazing vs AI. Bring your ranged units onto the top of the wall where you think they will attack. Place your infantry to block and cover that gate. You are good as gold. I've defeated NPC armies of 2k with like 300 dudes. They just charge linearly, die in the fray while trying to break down the gate. When they DO make it through the gate, they're so bottlenecked that your 2 units of infantry can sit and defend a lifetime. (and if you read my silly rant comments earlier, there is a chance it's glitched and you win anyways LOL)
- A strong twig is never stronger than a bundle of twigs. ALWAYS, ALWAYS send armies out in groups of 2-3. What I do is tend to sweep. So if I am attacking a Faction, I sweep 2-3 on one side, and 2-3 nearby. If one side is in trouble, I FORCE march some allies over and cover and vice versa.
- Fleet? More like fly. Just kidding....kind of. I do feel that fleets are handicapped in the game. I usually have like a 4-5 army to 1 fleet ratio, and even then my fleets are rarely fully stacked. Why? Cause they're expensive, limited in what they can do, and die fairly easily. Pathetic as it sounds, i tend to leave my fleets in docks to babysit newly conquered towns more than anything. Sometimes I send them in for backups, but I don't do a whole lot with them.

Economic Prowess
(Building Construction)
- Always build to only level 2 at the beginning, so you don't have the extra penalties from the higher levels.I start building Lv 3's when I am economically stable, solid income, and not in ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ crazy warfares.
- Make more food than a chinese buffet, build more temples than a religious nazi. This will be crappy initially, cause you will have like 50 food surplus and sacred grove temples out the arse. You'll be wondering...what the eff, this guy tells me economic wealth is success but this gimps it so badly...I wish I could send my spy to conceal blade his arse! No worries, think of it as just the foundation for your economic empire. This sets the foundation so that you can truly build your economic empire with less worries later on when the going gets tough and you have to calculate -food, -squalor, -blahblah. When you can make Lv 3 towns...ta da, BOOM. Donald Trump will ask you for gold.
- When you're ready to make Lv 3 buildings, prioritize Lv 3 capital villas (more garrison army strength, and biggest bonuses). Also Prioritize Lv 3 temples and food sources to help meet the demands of the Lv 3 villas! After that, I try to do it for villas of other cities that have trade sources (wine, wood, glassware, etc.) before just doing all random villas.
- Don't go ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ crazy on military buildings. Throughout the game, I would have no more than 3 provinces with upgraded military buildings, and 1-2 military shipyards. Forced March is your friend. Build them and send them out! Military buildings are a waste of squalor and slot of income!

(Trading)
- Trading is VERY handy. The earlier you can establish long-term trade, the more profit you gain.
- Refer to my diplomacy for some trading tips
- Before you agree to ANY kind of diplomacy, check to see the likelihood of success. If it is HIGH, then you may be able to milk some payments from them. Moderate is usually sufficient if they are Neutral (with positive scores) and if you are in the GREEN (refer to diplomacy section if you don't understand)

Spies/Dignitaries/Champions
(Spies)
- The Boondock Saints to your empire. They do the dirty, and they do it well! lol. I tend to increase their cunnings, cause they poison and manipulate so well with it.
-Before engaging another army, you can use spies to assassinate their leader (morale decrease) or to poison their provisions (minor damages to a few units), or poison provision for minor damage to town garrison.
-Spies are also good at manipulating Dignatries (or anything if you get their levels high enough).
-They are GREAT at checking to see what nearby armies have
(Dignitaries)
- They are great at lying. JK, not as useful as the others, but still pretty useful
- Great at seducing champions. Can assassinate pretty well.
- Also useful as an income booster. Just set them next to a prosperous province and they will increase your tax rates. This is a cheap way to level them up if you're taking any military actions
(Champions)
- Scout the lands! (Check diplomacy section, also provides a small income)
- Join the armies for morale boosters! (I don't use this much)
- Great at slaying, esp assassinating spies.
(In general)
- I always make as many of these guys as possible, they're all useful and worth well beyond their price.
- I usually send these guys out with my armies, to DO THE DIRTY (except scouting champion & tax increase dignitaries)

Sparta Legendary Campaign
-SPOILER ALERT-
Just cause..Who doesn't love sparta?! If anyone's to survive legendary, its 300, right?! AMIRIGHT?!

(From the Beginning)
- So you're an elite Spartan leading a group of bloodthirsts who have been born and bred for the simple mechanics of war. You launch your campaign and ....WHAT THE EFF?! You find youself stuck on an island isolated from the rest of the world LOL.
- To juke thy neighbor or not to juke. I saw a few youtube vids for Sparta Campaign, and they seem to all take Athens really early on. I decided it wasn't the best way to go, so I actually built my alliance with them and went straight for Epirus since I was already enemies with them.
- Athens is a client-state of macedon, whom I really hated but remained allies with for MUCH longer than I cared for lol (at least 150 turns). Following methods in my other section, I quickly built to take alliances with Ardeiei. Keep in mind that Macedon is VERY self-serving, and they actually tried to finish off Athens later on when I was warring with Athens LOL (and they juked me of a couple of towns through our alliance - learned the hard way).
- I then took another small faction, and then moved on to Rome because they were already at war with so many. I noticed that they sent their armies elsewhere, so I just marched right in and settled down. (Of course there was several turns where I just waited to get some gold and slowly build my armies before attacking anything. Didn't really attack Rome until I had almost 2 full armies of cheapies - half spearmen, half ranged). I also enlisted Estrucean Leagues to help me demolish Rome.
- Settling in for a while, I helped my Hellenic allies fight their enemies while waiting diplomacies between factions. Slowly stabilizing my towns, and building my wealth/armies.
- My next big attack was Estrucan League, and therefore gained my first complete Province over Rome.
- I moved on to help my allies attack other small factions, while being careful to avoid diplomatic issues. I had previously ended my alliance with Knossos, and the deductions for declaring war too soon was complete so I took Knossos (another reliable turtling Faction, probably could have left them but meh I was bored).
- I then watch all of my Hellenic allies move on to attackng Royal Scyth. Athens leaving their base bare...I just juked them. This caused a temporary decrease in my diplomacy status, which I just recouped and did nothing of military significance for a bit. Then I followed my allies NE and finish off Royal Scyth, earning some diplomatic points with many factions (and a couple of lands).
- Taking over Athens at this point was the highlight of the game. By the time I conquered all of Athens and recoup'd my poor diplomacy....i was already ni good standing with MANY factions, and I had already ventured around the entire coast. I was able to immediately form trade agreements with a handful of factions.
- During this time, I also slowly build diplomatic points with the SW factions, the triumvirate of Libya, Carthage, and Nova Carthage (except Carthage was the Subjugator of the other two LOL). Accidentally, I also gained enough favors with Pontus to be close as well (I didn't like Pontus, but might as well since they owned a huge chunk of land and were a force to fear)
- I continued to just build my empire without attacking for a while, working on trade and diplomacy and next thing I know....my income tripled in a matter of about 10-15 turns.
- By the time I started attacking Egypt (it was either Egypt or Selucid), I already had 100k, income of around 8k per turn.
- With good diplomatic standings, abundance of money, stable/upgraded lands, and strong army....I had a ton of diplomatic requests from the other factions.
- This concludes this portion of my guide...because if you followed the advice from the previous sections...the rest is pretty easy. From this point, chasing enemies is just tedious and menacing rather than being severely crippling. Unless you make any huge mistakes, you should be able to follow through :) FOR SPARTA!!!!!!