Hm... wondering a bit what the AI is doing as I've only used conventional troops thus far, no special tactics or tricks (not even using elephants just hypaspists, mercs, archers and the starting light infantries). Arco is leading in provinces by two over nearest competitor and top in income also even with turmoil 1. We are a little behind in research which is surprising, I thought with an awake Great Sage we'd be leading easily but that's not the case at least. I'm also finding it disappointingly easy to pick up all the mercenaries I want - the AI algorithm for hiring mercs seems not to have changed (from Dom 2).

Oh well! We'll have to see if the AI picks up a bit as we go along. It's AMAZING the amount of troops you can amass in Dom 3 compared to Dom 2. I have sloth 3 and am buying all the conventional troops I want, and could afford lots more but am holding off for now (prefer to buy mages). Will probably build another fort on one or both of the farmland provinces to jack the income up even further.

Check out the current map here. The two green dots are the farmland provinces. I think Arco (or maybe everybody?) gets a Fortified City on farmland terrain so that's 50 admin - BIG bonus to income which should repay itself fairly quickly, as well as allow us to recruit more mages.

The red dot is the capital (starting province), while the light purple dots already have labs and temples and I'll be hiring one of those wolf shaman mages every turn (1N, 10% chance of 1E or 1A). Although with the amount of troops it's possible to buy I'm wondering if a super-research strategy is even needed. It seems like - SO FAR - that we'd be able to walk all over the AI just with conventional troops! (We're also among the top in troop counts, although we have been hiring mercs.) Hm, maybe jumping the gun here, we'll see.

I'm already thinking forward to NEXT GAME where I'll try the opposite strategy - MASSIVE CONVENTIONAL WARFARE with 3 order, 3 productivity and either a supercombatant pretender or maybe an ASLEEP pretender with awesome scales. ULM would seem to be the natural choice! Pretty fun to think about!