Correction, Fatkid, one fourth of your entire population is fighting Athens. You would have just a few troops on Cyprus you could spare, unless you wanted to open up Sparta for invasion... EDIT: AND AGAIN, your population would be struggling to make war materials, and bring in the harvest, with so much of your people gone for so long. Anyone else wanna back me up on this?
An Athenian victory would promise peace and safe trade, without the threat of Spartan warmongering and hegemony. Also, I want those damn islands.
Fine native population of Cyprus. (How much is that lol) 1/2 are raised. They will farm until you get there. (Every citizen of Sparta has training at this point.) I satrted training Women today but there training isn't complete.
Levantine troops quickly make it to the largest city on the island, which is the Settlement from Sparta. The commander of the Levantine troops steps forward, and yells out, "Spartan settlers! This is your chance to surrender. If you do not, we will slaughter all the men, and sell the women and children as slaves!" He had 5,000 men at his back, with another 3,000 combing the countryside for food, and the other 2,000 at the beachhead, fortifying it.
The native population would be the thousand settlers you brought from Sparta. The most amount of troops you could have was 2-300. I think that would be reasonable, since each settlement only brings in a thousand people.
300 spartans who would be vastly outnumbered, and many of them would not be the best age for military service, me thinks. Anyone else want to weigh in on this?
"Fine. We will kill you with glory, i'm sure." The Commander said, laughing a deep laugh at the end. "Archers!" he yelled, back to the army behind him. Immediately, 3 rows of archers stepped forward, bows strung up and in front of them. "Ready!" He said, while the archers nocked arrows, and pulled. "Fire!" He said, while the 800 Archers released, firing arrows into the settlement. Even while the last of them were firing, men were moving up with bundles of arrows with tar wrapped around the end. They were given to the archers, who lit them with torches passed around, and fired the second volley.
Oh, is it? I would think not. It's been about an hour since I first started to land, which would be a week or two in game, wouldn't it? You used this same logic when you said that Athenian forts had been attacked for a few hours.
It's called logic. Since your city is backwards, all you have are most likely a group of dejected old Spartans sent to grow crops for the city, or gather other simple resources. Since most of your army is massing in Sparta and near Athens, the garrison will be a token force and thus simple for any invading force to take. This is God moding.
