Easy. In MP all you need to do is to pick Brittania and get 20 Heavy Chariots and Charge! Those Cataphracts, Horse Archers and Eastern Infantries will be cut down like reeds

Chariots are excellent against any form of cavalry. Alternatively, use a faction with elite archers, and out-shoot them with your greater range.

Maybe go hire some Cretan archers?

One way to counter the horse archers is to use a long-range archer unit and put them in loose formation, foot archers usually always beat horse archers in a shoot-out. Another way that you can attempt to fight these horse archers is to form up your infantry line and hold fast, make sure that you face the direction of the arrows to gain full defensive bonuses against them. Horse archers run out of ammo alot faster than foot archers and eventually all they'll be able to do is charge in with them.

I've tried with Cretans but the amount of cav. archers was just too big.

And since i lost most of my cav. it was poinless.

Things improved though with the "Light Lancer tactic" but stil they give me hard time.

If you where to use loose formation then you could cut down on losses.
once you have developed a proper stratagem I sugest that you use groups of unit combs that work against hors archers "screen" you main army of pikemen and the such, so they can be used when the situation suits them.
(that last bit on the campaign map).

Oh, one more thing. Rhodian Slingers are amazing against cavalry, they are accurate enough that loose formation doesn't help anywhere near as much as it does with Archers.

I would recommend fighting them with their own weapons. Play as Scythia. I find it nigh impossible to beat Parthia with only 0 to 15% casualties in competent hands when playing as a phalanx based faction. More than that I class as a heavy amount of losses.

Rome is also good against them.

On 10k, get 10 early cohorts(or 9 early and one early first), 2 roman cavalry, a general, 2 auxillia and some archer auxillia. Arrange the cohorts in a similar formation to the one at Carrae.

^..^..^..^..^^
...A.....A....
<............<
..............
^..^..^..^...^
C.....G......C

^ - cohort
^^ - First cohort
A - Archers
< - Auxillia spearmen
C - Cavalry
G - General

Now it is difficult for you to be flanked. They can circle you, but they have to keep their distance, AND spread their troops out. They can't send all their men around to your rear, as you can simply turn with them, so tehy have to spread their soldiers out. The Auxillia spearmen can be brought up to counter cataphract charges and to provide reenforcements. If the enemy fires arrows, testudo. If they try to circle your army in small numbers, send your Roman cavalry(or whatever) to meet them. The Archers will be able to force the enemy to keep their distance or use cantabarian circle. If they circle, they get tired, and your cavalry can catch them, if they stay away, they pose little threat. Simply beat their heavy cavalry, then wait out their arrows in testudo.

If you insist on using Macedon, Illyrians can be used to soak up arrows and to lay ambushes. Companions are wasteful on low budget, you would be just as well off with Macedonian cavalry. The Light Lancers are good, but a risk. They are vulnerable to missles, but have better morale than greek cavalry. Depends on how well you think they are working.

Against some nations, I've found it's easier to resist the siege, then when they've wasted their army, go on the offensive. That can save you a lot of ugly field battles.

The Parthians are cowards who rarely fight like men unless pinned down. Thus, in the field, I avoid battle for the most part. I merely move in on their cities and force them to fight like men. After I kill them there, I take the city and kill or enslave all within it.

He's talking about LAN battles.

Mmmm...20 Scythian Horny Maiden units=GG.

the best way to counter the chariots is to have light cavalry. have light lancers they will cut the chariots to peices as i am also playing the macedonian campaign . i have faced the chariots many times and have countered them very well . never use the companions they are a waste . macedonian cavalry is far better than the companions.

After the 1.2 patch Companions are really good, but not as good as i'd really like them.

I have a similar question, how do you deal with chariot archers? Even at the times that my heavy cav reaches them, they get killed while not causing the enemy any big losses, so I don't have that good hope for my light cav in close combat against them. Right now I'm trying to simply get alot of my own archers and simply outshoot them, but I'm wondering if there isn't a better way to do it.

Slingers and Javelineers will do the trick.

i am quite sure that light cavalry will do the trick. i have tried and tested it

Quote:

Javeline trowing units have a shorter range then the chariot archers (atleast the egyptians, don't know about the other) and are slower too, so how are they supposed to be able to beat them?

And slingers, even if slinger has app. the same range as the chariots, if you don't place infantry in front of them the chariots can just charge, and if you do, then your infantry will also be shot by your slingers, so I can't see how that should work either.