Hello there
I'm new to the game (in fact I havent even bought it yet, but will probably do tomorrow)
My question concerns the sandbox campaign's length.
Is there a time limit in it, or some date/year that you cant pass, something that would force you to stop playing at some point?
How is the game if you "turtle" and ropeplay it, during hours? Does the game remain stable? Becomes dull? Or is it simply undoable?
Finally, at those who like to play that kind of "eternal campaigns", what's your longest campaign?
Thanks a lot for your replies.
Regards,
Kryptó

Hello there
I'm new to the game (in fact I havent even bought it yet, but will probably do tomorrow)
My question concerns the sandbox campaign's length.
Is there a time limit in it, or some date/year that you cant pass, something that would force you to stop playing at some point?
How is the game if you "turtle" and ropeplay it, during hours? Does the game remain stable? Becomes dull? Or is it simply undoable?
Finally, at those who like to play that kind of "eternal campaigns", what's your longest campaign?
Thanks a lot for your replies.
Regards,
Kryptó

Hegemony is not Total War! As discussed in the topic "Is it possible to lose a campaign?", the AI will probably not attack you in your homelands except for some raiding, but "only" try to defend and recapture their own lands. So it is not really a game for "turtlers" (and roleplaying it is also quite difficult - Philip of Macedon has governed Macedon and conquered lands for 23 years - well I wouldn't try that in Hegemony Gold...)

AFAIK the sandbox mode has no ending (well if you conquer the WHOLE map, there won't be anything to do for you anymore... ;-) ) nor has the Philip campaign, but the Archdamian War and the Ionian War aren't intended to be continued after your victory...

Thanks for your reply! ich danke Ihnen sehr! ;)

And what about limiting yourself to a certain amount of territories/cities, and then stop to only defending them for ever?

In fact in TW it is very difficult to turtle, because most the time your foes continue to defeat themselves and you end with one or a few VERY TOUGH opponents which control huge areas of the map, with a huge income, and sending your infinite waves of elite troops... at some point you collapse.
If you say that if, for example I play Athens, and take only the north of Sparta's areas, Spartans wont become the supreme power of the map and will concentrate on taking bakc his own homeland.
Maybe that way I can "turtle" or try to dot it?!
(without taking in account if it's fun or not... just if it's viable?)

Let's ask it differently: if I conquer, let say...10 cities, and then stop my advance, all together, only defending what I have.
What will happen?

Let's ask it differently: if I conquer, let say...10 cities, and then stop my advance, all together, only defending what I have.
What will happen?
Let's say you take your main city with its nearby farms. It can take a garrison of say 100 so you put in 120 spearmen.

You can pretty much leave the game forever, the AI will never be able to take such a settlement. (It can't use catapults and doesn't rotate infantry, they go to the walls and stay there until they die). Also, your city will generate recruits fast enough that you won't die.

Most likely the AI will take your mines, occasionally burn the farms and destroy watchtowers. That's about it.

----

In terms of defending, it's pretty easy. I'm playing the third campaign, having wiped out Persia. You can hold back just about anything with a city that has walls and a decent garrison. Really annoying enemies like the horsemen spammers or the thracian peltasts are unable to do much at all against walls.

Great thanks for your replies!

I guess that the other cities never expand (at the expense) of each others, meaning that they keep roughly the same regions/cities even if the game last for very long, right?

In Sandbox the AI will not expand but will try and retake what was lost. You cannot lose the game since the enemy wont expand. Sandbox mode is 100% conquest for only you. Can roleplay for fun with the console commands rather nicely :).

Yes, the downside of Sandbox mode is that there is no real 'Campaign-AI'. They don't war with each other and the only time they will fight is if they both attack you at the same place and accidentally collide with each other. A bit of a bummer BUT they are apparently designing an actual campaign ai for Rome. Looking forward to that!