What’s Gus Playing? Field of Glory 2 – Part 3

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The thrice-stricken thimble-rider returns to Field of Glory 2… again ~

Lloyd Sabin, 14 May 2018

Am I working in to overkill territory here? Is three weeks covering the same game too much?

The name of this column references what I’m playing directly. And I haven’t played anything in the last three weeks except for Field of Glory 2. Truth in advertising here. And I’ve barely scratched the surface of possible factions and eras available.

At some point I should probably try something, anything, else out…just to not fall in to monotony. That said no one has really grumbled much about it so far, so maybe I just keep going until I get bored? Perhaps it’s too late already. I don’t know…

Still knee-deep in Alexandrian Greek/Macedonian history, this week’s set of shots cover the epic Battle of Gaugamela. Besides being damned fun to say, Gaugamela was an epic, history making event, pitting the forces of Alexander vs. the army of Darius III.

Supposedly the Persians had about three times as many troops as Alexander (close to 120,000 according to some estimates) but were still defeated, resulting in Darius fleeing to Babylon and Alexander capturing his wife, his mother and his daughters – all of whom he treated with respect and dignity.

I played as the Macedonians…which at the very beginning struck me as a possible mistake, because the Persian army was massive and dripping with cavalry. Witness the screen shots below.

Descriptor screen. I’m also still playing on the 2nd (out of 6) level of difficulty, Tribune. I’ve bumped the difficulty up early on when I started playing and got trounced. I may attempt again to make it more difficult soon now that I have a reasonable amount of time put in.

 

As you can see, the sheer weight of Persian cavalry arrayed against the Macedonian forces is off-putting.

 

Each army advances, and the Macedonians are bloodied first.

 

As blind luck would have it, my elite heavy infantry (Foot Companions) wheel in to Darius’ bodyguard, the Apple Bearers. If I can kill Darius maybe the whole Persian army will fall apart! I also begin to draw some Persian blood.

 

A Persian elephant approaches my troops and my chance at killing Darius is lost for the moment.

 

The battle lines crash in to one another…but the Macedonians hold! This bodes well…for Macedon. You can also see that Persian losses continue to climb even though Darius got away. In actuality I don’t even know if it is possible to kill Darius outright. Some scenarios in larger campaigns can end if important figures are killed, and in some other scenarios generals and others can only be wounded, and they return later.

 

Darius fate notwithstanding, I was able to fend off his monstrous, massive cavalry army, and I was also able to minimize my own casualties. I took down Darius’ army with 49% casualties, versus only 8% of my own.

 

And true to history, Alexander was victorious.

 

I will attempt to pull myself away from Field of Glory 2 and try something else…Domina has really been beckoning to me. But it’s a dangerous combination when you find a game system that really interests you, combined with history you don’t know much about. You know how it goes.

See you next week!


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