How to take on the Carthaginian navy as Rome?

[Will Steel]

Not complaining, I had fun losing to Carthage, but I am looking for strategies.

It began as a standard Rome game on normal difficulty, and I quickly expanded to cover a large area, and integrated all but one of my starting client states.

I fought a war against Carthage (they attacked first). The size of my Rome and AI Carthage were roughly similar starting positions to the real-life 2nd Punic War with a few differences, and also around the same time as that historical war. I owned all of Italy, Sicily, Massalia, Narbonensis and the Tarraconensis/"Aragon" area. They owned entire Africa west of Cyrene, southern Spain, Sardinia and Corsica (owned by their ally Etruscans). Our borders were adjacent in Iberia, where the invasion began.

They had 400+ ships while I could barely maintain a fleet of 70-80 ships. I used most of my money to build 3 powerful 15-unit legions that I kept on double budget, so land warfare wasn't a problem...at least in the beginning. But I could get no warscore without trying to land on their islands, which means I was on the defensive the entire time.

There is also the massive Carthaginian vassal swarm. It is Phrygia levels of insanity. For every Carthaginian army I would defeat, 5-6 more would appear from their client cities and defeat my soldiers, or siege down forts faster than I could liberate them. Then two of my armies got stackwiped trying to hold back constant landing attempts, and they were about to siege Rome. In desperation I hired a mercenary company from the little money I had left, attached it to my last existing legion, boarded the fleet at Lilybaeum and sneak-landed on Carthage before they stackwiped my entire fleet in a single battle. Then I assaulted and sacked Carthage and ran around burning provincial capitals and jumping away from incoming enemy forces, hoping to force them into a white peace before the siege of Rome finished. Barely managed to beg for a white peace.

I ended the war with my territory intact, but a lot of my population dead or starving, loads of dead characters, nearly bankrupt, halfway out of manpower, with a massive slave revolt (89 units) in Rome itself and another revolt brewing in Iberia....and only a single legion left. Carthage managed to rebuild its army within months. I would never be able to face them again unless I could capture their islands, so I decided to quit and reload to an older save.

Unlike my older Rome games where I have been very successful, this time Macedon and Phrygia are allied and have taken over almost all of the Balkans (with over a hundred thousand soldiers both), so eastward expansion is impossible. Taking on Carthage is the only way left.

So here is the essence - How do I keep up with that number of ships? What is the best way to take on an opponent whose fleet is four times larger, and is composed entirely of unbeatable doomstacks? Do I just take the AE hits and keep stomping Gallic tribes until I earn enough money to build equally large fleets?

 

[Denkt]

Obviously your issue is the economy so you should build it up better Before war with Carthage. For navy you can pick up the two national ideas, -25% ship cost and +20% morale to help you defeat their navy, also there is a military law which buff ship damage.

 

[MohawkWolfo98]

Tbh? I don’t bother. I just build enough ships so that I can ship my armies across in one swoop, like a commando raid. A must is also attacking a part of Carthage that has a harbour: I tend to just land just south of Carthage itself.

Once the land troops disembark I park the ships in the harbour until either I win the war, or my troops were defeated and I have to rush them back to Sicily to allow them to reorganisation. The AI isn’t that good at the navy.

I never double pay my armies, to me numbers is more important in imperator. I often leave a reserve such that when I do need to have mercs I can.

I approach defeating Carthage the same way the Romans did irl: in the first Punic War, conquer the Sicilian Islands and Sardinia etc, but you should
Also attempt to seize Mallorca from Carthage. This gives you the naval range to attack and keep their Spanish holdings in the next war. Cut them off all possible sources of income, and then use the 3rd Punic War and your huge manpower base to grind them to submission.

My only problem with this strategy is when I finally beat Carthage, Phrygia is just too strong to fight... WW1 battles keep being fought from then on and then I give up cos honesty it’s just so unrealistic. Because the battles take so Long, it ends up being 500k stack vs 500k stack and it keeps growing as more and more come. Merc spam, manpower too large, unrealistic battles etc.

I hope the manpower and battle issue gets sorted soon, like a levy and stuff we talked about before.

 

[Denkt]

If you make a war of conquest you can Always annex the territory after holding it for a few years which can work against Carthage if you have a stronger army so you can occupy them for the time needed.

 

[Ffc]

You don't need to go at war with Carthage early on, you're the one expanding and gaining more and more power.
At some point, you can build a huge fleet, way bigger than Carthage's one.

 

[Denkt]

You don't need to go at war with Carthage early on, you're the one expanding and gaining more and more power.
At some point, you can build a huge fleet, way bigger than Carthage's one.

Mindless blobing is probably the strongest strategy in Imperator: Rome as of right now and solution to many problems.

 

[DystopianAlphaOmega]

Annexing your client states early is probably a mistake. You’ll really miss the extra armies of your own miniature “vassal swarm” for comparatively little gain.

As others have said, the key to win is winning on land (be it in Italy, Sicily, or Carthage). So long as you are careful and semi-lucky your main fleet will never engage theirs (or if it does, run away!). Win the war through ticking war score from occupying the wargoal. Also remember that you can try to buy off their mercenary armies. Them eventually annexing their own vassals will help too.

The Carthaginian Navy is often the largest in the game. Not just that, but they also get considerable bonuses to it, so even if you can match their numbers you will likely lose. As you take land from them, you might eventually be able to wear them down over time (likey after annexing Carthage proper), but it’s still a daunting prospect (especially since once you own part of Africa the fleet isn’t needed to fight them).

 

[Tarquinius Superbus]

The trick is to just completely ignore it. You can annex Carthage without fighting her navy once.
In the first punic war you try to get all the islands from Carthage through sending your troops in some ships (30-50) to their islands when you see that their navy is somewhere else. This is pretty easy because the carthaginian navy is moving around all the time so you just got to wait for your opportunity.
In the second war you try to get all of her spanish possessions and a bit of western africa and after that you dont need any ships to get to their capital.
I aim to declare the first war against them before 500 a.u.c.

Extra Tipp: Try to fight carthage's vassal swarm. Sinking their small fleets allows you to capture a lot of ships that otherwise would be really expensive to build yourself.

 

[Limbojack]

Ignore their fleet. Gain a CB on Sicily and Sardinia, and move your troops to the straits between Magna Gracia and Sicily, and Corsica and Sardinia,. Declare war, move your troops across before the AI can block the straits, siege down the wargoal and destroy whatever armies Carthage can throw at you. Just make sure you keep the straits open so you can reinforce, and you'll gain enough warscore to seize their islands. Have a fleet consisting of nothing but light ships, and dock it at a port until you've beaten up Carthage's armies enough to sneak an army down to Libya (your fleet will be faster than theirs). Make sure to grab a province during the peace treaty in order to have a beach head for later.

 

[tribunus_plebis]

Not complaining, I had fun losing to Carthage, but I am looking for strategies.

They had 400+ ships while I could barely maintain a fleet of 70-80 ships. I used most of my money to build 3 powerful 15-unit legions that I kept on double budget, so land warfare wasn't a problem...at least in the beginning. But I could get no warscore without trying to land on their islands, which means I was on the defensive the entire time.

There is also the massive Carthaginian vassal swarm. It is Phrygia levels of insanity. For every Carthaginian army I would defeat, 5-6 more would appear from their client cities and defeat my soldiers, or siege down forts faster than I could liberate them. Then two of my armies got stackwiped trying to hold back constant landing attempts, and they were about to siege Rome. In desperation I hired a mercenary company from the little money I had left, attached it to my last existing legion, boarded the fleet at Lilybaeum and sneak-landed on Carthage before they stackwiped my entire fleet in a single battle. Then I assaulted and sacked Carthage and ran around burning provincial capitals and jumping away from incoming enemy forces, hoping to force them into a white peace before the siege of Rome finished. Barely managed to beg for a white peace.

I had a similar campaign recently testing 1.4 with Rome, Normal on Ironman. After unifying Italy I was going for the South of Gaul and Cathage seized the moment to attack me. I was obliterated without a chance. They had a fleet of +400; and landed 4 armies of +25,000. Managed to get 3 of those maneuvering my 4 15,000 legions (budget all-in). Then they got even more reinforcements. I had to make peace by giving up my foothold in Sicily and Apulia.

I've fought Carthage before, and is a great challenge. But this Carthage on steroids was a bit too much unrealistic considering the budgetary constrains as a player.

 

[ReadeB]

I'm in the don't bother fighting the navy camp. I built battlefleets of heavy ships and they still get stack wiped by the 1000+ Carthaginian navy.

Go through Spain. Use your main fighting units to take out the armies and use single unit light cav to conquer territories in between. I usually head the light cavs with disloyal/low stat characters. Losing them just gets them out of my hair.

Improve the economy to the point that you can spend on very high martial 12+ mercenaries. Always consider stealing troublesome mercs rather than fighting them.

You will need some all Cav guard armies to ward off invasions. Don't forget to force march them and try to have roads built to make them quick.

 

[Wethospu]

The best way for taking down a supeior navy is to lower your naval morale and use Tetreres.

To avoid getting stack wiped you need to have enough ships and avoid losing too much strength. This means heavier ships are out of the question because of high cost. Heavier ships also have reduced morale damage taken which means they end up taking more strength damage.

For material losses, you don't want to use light ships because they get captured easily and are not good at capturing. So Tetrere is the best option.

Lowering your morale is important to avoid taking too much strength damage. With 400 Tetreres vs 100 Tetreres there is ~90% chance for defender getting stack wiped. If defender reduces morale by 25% (reorganize armies to briefly have no admiral) the chance lowers to 0%. Attacker also loses 2x gold because of their ships sinking.

Then there is also the bug that if a ship sinks it won't get replaced by a reinforcement (above calculations don't include this bug). So by sinking enemy ships you will also win the fight, even against superior fleet.

 

[Will Steel]

Sorry for the very late reply, I was away from my PC past few weeks. Thank you all so much for helping me.

I reloaded the save and after reading this thread, I tried a different approach - waiting and building up. I reduced my army to a single legion on normal funding (to defeat barbarians) and immediately improved relations with Carthage so they wouldn't attack me in a few months.

With all the spare money, I built up Rome as a metropolis with lots of tax offices, followed by major building programs in other large cities like Syracuse and Tarentum. I also built up every single rural territory in Italy proper. I also destroyed and rebuilt forts in better places, while building up roads where historical ones existed. The entire thing took over 30 years, but I had more than doubled my income from that.

I also cancelled the ongoing annexations of the few remaining clients I had, as you suggested. I rebuilt my army back to 4 legions and an extra one as a reserve.

Unfortunately, it is impossible to ignore Carthaginian fleet because they prevent any attempts at taking their islands while also constantly landing troops in Italy. So I built a gigantic fleet of 400+ cheap Liburnians with 50 more ships to act as transports, also taking a few years for that. No use wasting money on powerful ships if they can't match Carthage even after that. The sole purpose of my fleet was to bog down their navy in suicide maneuvers while my transports sailed by.

Epirus had rebelled against Macedon, so I decided to annex them as a way to test out this new military. Carthage, as expected, annexed half of Iberian peninsula. Their army was over 150,000 soldiers (double compared to mine) and they had 600+ ships.

By around 180 BC, I as ready. This time, I attacked Carthage first (i.e. attacked their ally in Hispania in Tarraco). Because my armies often have to operate independently and away from each other, I had to keep them on max funding the entire time or else they would be destroyed. Impossible to avoid max funding, especially since I was a bit behind on tech.

Won the first few sieges in Hispania, then decided to land in Sardinia. As expected, they wrecked my Liburnian fleet pretty easily but I managed to land a legion in time. I managed to overrun both Sardinia and Corsica (and finally annexed Etruscans), although eventually they landed a huge army there and my legion had to escape back to Italy. It was during this time that I first started running into money problems, although I just kept pumping

Although I lost a few major battles in Hispania, the years of manpower buildup paid off and they simply replenished. With max funding and picking off some isolated armies, I sieged more and more forts until Carthage began landing huge armies in Sicily and southern Italy. By the time they got to sieging Rome, I had captured much of their lands in Hispania and also sneaked my reserve legion into Africa (which got stackwiped by an unending vassal swarm) - but this was enough to make them agree to give up just two small provinces. It all ended around 175 BC, more than a decade of war.

In essence, I won the war, although it would require fighting over 20 such wars to whittle them down. The only issue is that it took too long and delayed my other conquests (and AI is really stingy about accepting peace treaties for some reason). Arverni and Phrygia have become extremely powerful now, but in the end I can at least go against Carthage on equal terms now.

I'll try a new game now, this time by preparing for Carthage from the beginning. I thank you all for your help.

 

[evilcat]

I do not fight Carthage Navy.
In 1st war i conquere sicilly, and part of of Sardinia. I do not need much navy for that just move my troops on Corsica before the war starts.
However it could be good idea to save one of Carthage vassals on Sicilly for future casus belli and warscore.

Also you can wait for carthage to be at war with Iberians (far far away). or Ally some of them just for distraction, or ally this big tribal Meassylla?
And of course you can ally or try to diplo client state Syracuse.
In 2nd Punic war we want wargoal on last sicilian province we left in last one. And do a landing in one of African ports. Ally inI Iberia helps as distraction, other option is to hire navy mercs and send them as red hering (they will die for rome) while real forces will land on the african coast. But... all you need is single port in africa, could be one city.

3rd Punic war, land as many troops as you can on your foothold in Africa, and just conquere provinces 1by1.
Other notes:
Beware if wargoal province has lone island. Conquering that island could be more harder than whole Africa.
Main power of Carthage lies in Sicylly, Sardinia and Carthage city, take that and they are left with wrong culture land.
For Rome it could be better to focus on Hellenic land (macedone, thare, greece) since same religion helps with happiness.
Release subject is cheaper in warscore than take the vassal. You can try to diplo tribute it later so it will not part take in war.
You can also demand releasing nation, just to cut Carthage power with 0 AE.
Keeping feudaories and making some more (from cisalpina) is useful, group of 4k stacks roaming and capturing land is helpful.

 

[arctus]

in my current rome game i build a 500 ship fleet and hunted down every single punic ship. It was very satisfying to stack wipe their 80 ship size fleets. I allways lost to them in seabattles if numbers where even, thats because of their superior navy buffs in their focus tree. But usually its not worth it, just land your troops on their soil, but be carefull as they will do the same with their bigger navy. Also sometimes my 400+ navy lost to their 50 ship size fleet, which was really annoying. Also naval battles seem very buggy, sometimes single ships tickle in on after annother and fight against 20 enemy ships for like 5 months

 

[delra]

I think the trick in the 1st Punic is to not get dragged into this whole naval exchange where you are forced to build a navy to match theirs while having less money and higher cost per ship than they have. Fight land wars in Sardinia and Sicily, try to use allies to attack their holdings in Africa and Spain (Sardinian tribes, if they didn't get annexed by Carthage, make excellent allies able to take the island all by themselves and hold it), keep defeating stacks that they land in Italy. Rather than paying for hundreds of ships, buy a good mercenary stack to help you with the whole manpower situation. Eventually it'll start taking its toll on them. If you are lucky, you probably can sneak some armies into Africa, land in Libya if you must, one war I marched armies from Cyrenaica because after many reloads it turned out to be the only place where my ships could go without getting killed. And most importantly, the sooner - the better. The quicker you blitz through Italy and diplo annex your feudatories who can't project their power overseas (aren't coastal), the better chances you have. So be quick with Italia and Magna Graecia, don't wander off to Greece or Cisapline Gaul, unite Italy proper quickly, annex Syracuse, make sure you have a good fort in Ostia and then pounce on Carthage first chance you've got. If you can take some of their core Tunisian lands in the first war, by some lucky fluke (their armies all being deployed in Iberia at start of war kind of fluke), that'll cripple them forever, but it's very hard to do in the first war. Oh and remember, support rebels.

 

[Herennius]

(…) Also naval battles seem very buggy, sometimes single ships tickle in on after annother and fight against 20 enemy ships for like 5 months

Yes, there is a bug with reinforcing, when a ship gets destroyed (insteads of fleeing because of low morale before):

I:R - I always almost all naval battles

Description of problem I almost always lose naval battles What platform are you playing on? Steam What game version are you running? 1.4.1 Please select any/all DLC you have enabled. Hellenistic world flavor pack, Epirus flavor pack, Magna...

forum.paradoxplaza.com

The good news is that the devs were able to reproduce it, so there is hope for a fix one (hopefully soon) day