With great pleasure and anticipation I recently decided to play another, already third solo scenario in Ancient Civilizations of the Inner Sea (ACIS). That time I will not be in  a defensive position, like when protecting Western or Eastern Roman Empires from barbarians, or trying to deter the Darius / Xerxes Persian invasion of the Greek world. No, this time I am going to be on the offensive, running against the time, Achaemenid Empire and trying to recreate feats of the greatest Macedonian general in history – Alexander the Great!

My ACIS campaigns:
Fall of Rome II (West and East version)
Greeks & Persians
Alexander the Great

Set-up

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I am playing as Greeks, against Land Persians and Sea Persians. The ultimate goal – destroy all cities with Gold on enemy side (eight in total). At the same time, Greek mainland should be protected (four gold provinces) (click to enlarge)
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I have pretty decent civilization and three very important combat cards, one refreshed each turn and two which I can easily “draw” (click to enlarge)
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My opponents are formidable and their both special abilities are active (as opposed to “Greeks and Persians” scenario) (click to enlarge)

Turn 1 

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Turn 1. Let’s the game begin! I immediately attack in first turn – almost the whole Asia Minor is under siege (click to enlarge)
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Persians are slow to respond as per rules and the Battle of Granicus River is decisively won! (click to enlarge)
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The situation at the end of Turn 1. I had some losses due to cards in mainland Greece, but other than that the progress is good!

Turn 2

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The Turn 2 will be very difficult for me. To the breaking point. First, Persians will receive massive reinforcements due to events (from draw phase)  (click to enlarge)
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Then I will be really hard-hit by the enemy events, especially “Bread &* Circus” – which in order to still have enough talents / cards for combat, I had to resolve by losing 5 VPs…  (click to enlarge)
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Not much change after Turn 2? Yes, and this is really not good for me. Instead of crossing to Syria, I had to repeal the counter-attack in Asia Minor as well as Persian landings in Attica and Laconia (click to enlarge)

Turn 3

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Turn 3. Time to take the things seriously. Alexander crosses Strait of Al Mina – even at the cost of losing the fleet. Last stronghold in Asia Minor has to fall as well as a foothold in Syria created. Of course, the persistent Persians will again land in Greece! (click to enlarge)
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A close-up before the combat resolution. Many good warriors will perish (click to enlarge)
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And so it happened – the Persian empire lost all but the naval battles. A relief… (click to enlarge)
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Close-up on the Asia Minor and Syria. I like how does it look like! (click to enlarge)
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Just as the turn ended and we were drawing cards, another set of reinforcements arrived for Land Persians. Great… (click to enlarge)
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Turn 3 final picture. The progress is good but a little slow. I have 1 to 3 turns (depending on the rolls) to finish the conquest. Will I manage? (click to enlarge)

Turn 4

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Time to hit, and to hit hard again. All Phocian cities are under siege. All will be razed to the ground (click to enlarge)
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Great, Syria is free of enemy presence and Sea Persians are out of game! Only one piece – Egypt- awaits. What can possibly go wrong?…

Summary

…and here the game ended. Yes, Alexander run out of time. There is a possibility to continue one or two more turns but it hinges on a “die roll” – if you get even card number from deck you continue, if not – Macedonian army is too tired to continue and refuses to fight. That what they did exactly when I was planning last step of conquest – Egypt.

It was close, it was satisfying and challenging. Definitely the bots / AI plays much better in defensive than when has to execute attack. I will have to play once more that scenario to try to repeat the feats of great general. But this is for another time… As always, great fun with ACIS.