I finally managed to win campaign playing Odryssian Kingdom at legendary and since I suffered trying doing that for years..  :/ :P what better way than to post it on the new  forums.

If people still are frustrated by playing the Odryssi here are some tips that I learned it the hard way. Also to add no mods used except one of mine that changed the appearance of the Spears from Dacian barbarians to proper hellenized/thracian units. ( Thracian helmet some,thyreos shield some,greek skins). Stats remained the same.

So how to enjoy playing as the Odryssi:

The things that should work ,they dont; 

Thracian peltasts cannot hold the line no matter how many upgrades through armor, general in tactics and army traditions.Cause they are less than their opponents 90 vs 120.

Thracian cavalry has separate traditions in the army tradition tree and someone might be tempted to go and build an army after them; It will not work .

Noble Infantry has high upkeep and almost zero defense and armor. You can win in auto battles bu vs heavy infantry they will be on par.While few and precious.

You cannot build a mercenary permanent host the upkeep price is insane.

And what are you left with ? 

Noble cavalry is surprisingly easy to obtain and forward in research tree. You need timber though for their IV stables. Noble Cavalry has high charge ,heavily armoured while also very good in melee and relatively affordable upkeep ,150 coins.

Spears are the lowest of the low but have descent defense and somewhat adequate armor. Low morale but if you hold the line and not flanked they should be fine. 

Lot of options to upgrade them,armory, traditions in defense and infantry and general upgrade in tactics. Extremely cheap and readily available with very low upkeep.

Totally expendable their mission is to hold the enemy line and cavalry untill archers clean the enemy skirmishers and guarding flanks units ,so you Noble Cavalry can charge from the rear.

Thracian archers take advantage of the Odryssian trait and start with 2 silver crest experience .Lot of options to upgrade them aswell.

So after countless trial and errors and trying various builds that some ,somehow worked but it  was a chore to play and frustrating ,I ended up with a basic noob build.

One general Noble Thracian cavalry, 3 Thracian Noble cavalry ,10 Spears ,6 Thracian Archers. The stack is easy to obtain except the Cavalry and have very low upkeep cost.

And you need just two buildings of it tier II woodwork and tier IV stables.

When ever I could ambush or fortify but preferred method was fighting in the settlements cause i would take advantage of the garrison and I could find points to choke the enemy infantry while simultaneously leave space for my cavalry to outmaneuver. 

Spears take care of cavalry,archers clean fast enemy skirmishers and then hope for  AI to make mistakes so to bear my TNC stack into their rear.

Now this will work quite well vs the eastern factions cause of their game play; expensive cavalry and horse archers ,low killing infantry. It will struggle against Greek factions cause of their armored spear men. And it will be somewhat ok vs germanics and it will be a bloodbath against Rome.

In any case your upkeep is 30-50% of your AI opponent and probably you can bring two armies or ambush him,sack its cities and starve him through spies. In the long term you can bleed AI enough to win the war.

So diplomacy wise you need to turn your attention east ,obtain timber ,hope the Greek balcan factions kill each other ,Kimmeria gets into a war with Pontus ,Pergamon stays neutral.

Hope Tylis stay alive to shield you from the west.

To sum it up:

Army composition: 4 Noble Thracian Cavalry ,6 Archers,10 Spears.

Diplomacy : As good as you can get avoid exploration they will instantly declare war on you.

Reserach: Public order and income are first priorities.After you obtain Tier IV cavalry ofcourse.

Gameplay strategical, sack enemy cities, send spies to starve ,diplomats to steal income.

Tactical,ambush,fortify and fight in the settlements.If you anticipate a siege spawn mercenaries with a second expendable general.

These. A lot of fun campaign playing as Hellenized barbarians with the Phrygian greek looking generals was fun, the moment you finally manage to bear your cavalry onto the rear of the elite enemy infantry was pure joy . If you are lucky and the initial starting conditions are met ( as said balcan geek factions vs each other, Tylis holds,Pontus weak,Perganum neutral) you will have a lot of fun game play and experience.

Turning Near East ,eastern europe ,Arabia and italia into thracian land was fun.

GL o/  

Kudos for you, Odrysians are really difficult - especially now, years after big nerf of Thracian warriors with falx swords

Thanks for sharing the experience. Could you do the Getae/Dacian campaigns? I find they are really difficult as well.

Krwawy_Baron#9023 wrote:

Kudos for you, Odrysians are really difficult - especially now, years after big nerf of Thracian warriors with falx swords

Thank you Baron! They should not be ,if CA had presented us with what we were expecting and teased through previous Rome I. The current roster is extremely lucklaster , and not even historicall accurate. Most history researchers point out that Royal Thracian armies had kind of battle line infantry.

Two indications : The permanent leg injury of Philip II happened cause of a thracian long spear,so some kind of more heavy peltast with spears did that,probably.

Second, closed type of greek helmets, Phrygian,Thracian continued to be exported or made up there,which offer extreme protection but limited visiblity.

Not a type of helmet a peltast/skirmisher would wear. Heavy cavalry?Could be but still the Hellenistic norm was the attic and the boiotian open helmets.

At that time Thracians were fully incorporated into greek armies as mercenaries ,hard to go ito their own they would go with the fashion.

So we have heavy long spears and heavy closed helmets. I guess a more heavily armoured peltast older in age would hold the line ,while the nobles and the prime warriors would skirmish en masse before it.

Gameplay wise I tried to go with what seemed the logical way ,Thracian warriors battle line and  Thracian Nobles plus archers. It works but it is a chore to play. In autobattle AI will give you easy victories but if somehow you are cornered and need to fight ,good luck. Thracian Nobles cannot reliably overwhelm the enemy stacks cause most of the times you will be vs 2 stacks. They just cant while their pricing ,upkeep is very high. And if you lose them you are in trouble.

Any skirmisher unit can bleed your elite battleline. i did not liked that :/ 

But you can win the campaign with that style just is not so easy or enjoyable with the spears/archers/cavalry approach.

Another problem is the insase military victory conditions of the campaign that do not count your allies settlements. So you will need a lot of armies and you will overextend.

chainsawdd#9659 wrote:

Thanks for sharing the experience. Could you do the Getae/Dacian campaigns? I find they are really difficult as well.

Hi o/

I tried to; As you said they are really difficult cause you are surrounded by enemies and your economy is awfull. Nobody likes you and you have to go aftet two distinct AI style enemies the Gauls with sword stacks and the Nomads with a gazzilion horse archers. So early none of your armies will be optimized and you will have a shitty economy.

I tried twice but I gave up :/ .

I dont like their appearance also, ( but it is historical the flame ,elongated helmets are found in archaeology and so on) ,they look too barbarian to me.

I guess if you manage to survive enough and go to the ports things should be easier ,but yeah i failed at that  :/

Player#500028 wrote:

Krwawy_Baron#9023 wrote:

Kudos for you, Odrysians are really difficult - especially now, years after big nerf of Thracian warriors with falx swords

Thank you Baron! They should not be ,if CA had presented us with what we were expecting and teased through previous Rome I. The current roster is extremely lucklaster , and not even historicall accurate. Most history researchers point out that Royal Thracian armies had kind of battle line infantry.

Two indications : The permanent leg injury of Philip II happened cause of a thracian long spear,so some kind of more heavy peltast with spears did that,probably.

Second, closed type of greek helmets, Phrygian,Thracian continued to be exported or made up there,which offer extreme protection but limited visiblity.

Not a type of helmet a peltast/skirmisher would wear. Heavy cavalry?Could be but still the Hellenistic norm was the attic and the boiotian open helmets.

At that time Thracians were fully incorporated into greek armies as mercenaries ,hard to go ito their own they would go with the fashion.

So we have heavy long spears and heavy closed helmets. I guess a more heavily armoured peltast older in age would hold the line ,while the nobles and the prime warriors would skirmish en masse before it.

Gameplay wise I tried to go with what seemed the logical way ,Thracian warriors battle line and  Thracian Nobles plus archers. It works but it is a chore to play. In autobattle AI will give you easy victories but if somehow you are cornered and need to fight ,good luck. Thracian Nobles cannot reliably overwhelm the enemy stacks cause most of the times you will be vs 2 stacks. They just cant while their pricing ,upkeep is very high. And if you lose them you are in trouble.

Any skirmisher unit can bleed your elite battleline. i did not liked that :/ 

But you can win the campaign with that style just is not so easy or enjoyable with the spears/archers/cavalry approach.

Another problem is the insase military victory conditions of the campaign that do not count your allies settlements. So you will need a lot of armies and you will overextend.

Thracians are really fascinating from historical perspective, I agree that they are very poorly made in vanilla Rome 2. All Balkan barbarians are missing sica swords (basically 1hand falxes), while Thracian armies should be full of "thureos spearmen" imitation units, as well as the ultimate peltasts and troops with sica and shields, even some lancer cavalry

True,the whole DLC was rushed. Thureos Spearmen as you mentioned plus some antique heavy version of Royal Peltasts. Let's hope in Rome III....... :)

I attempted the challenge you mentioned, and it's indeed incredibly tough. You find yourself in a precarious situation, surrounded by hostile forces with a struggling economy. It feels like nobody is on your side, and you're forced to face two formidable AI opponents: the Gauls with their formidable sword-wielding armies, and the relentless Nomads armed with an overwhelming number of horse archers. Early in the game, your armies are far from optimized, and your economy is in shambles.

I made two attempts, but unfortunately, I had to give up. It's disheartening. Additionally, I'm not a fan of their appearance, although I understand the historical accuracy behind the flame-elongated helmets, evident in archaeological findings. Despite that, they come across as excessively barbaric to me.

I speculate that if one manages to survive long enough and expand to the ports, the situation might improve. However, I personally failed at achieving that. It's a challenging scenario, to say the least.