The Bandit Armada (Elite)

This is the final of a three part series of posts on the Greek capital city repeatable quests which you can do in Elite mode.

This is the bigger and grander of the three repeatables, but it's not any more difficult.  Once again, there's a smart way to complete it efficiently, including the second objective, which requires you to produce no military units.  The quest can be, and should be, completed by focusing on ships.

Start Game

Let's remind ourselves of what the quest looks like from the start.

I've just started aging up to Age III, I have one dock ready to go

Open the book to find out more!

You start on an island with plenty of resources.  The idea is to get up to Age IV as quickly as possible because you will use the ballista triremes to destroy the bandit fortress.  In the meantime, start pushing out a few fireships.  The dock in this bay will get attacked, and you'll need at least three fireships to fight them off.

After that initial attack, there will be no more attacks on your base - it's smooth sailing from here on in.

My fireships have just fought off the first and last attack on my base

Middle Game

I find two docks are enough, but obviously you can build as many as you want, the more you have, the quicker you complete the quest.

Generally I'll aim to get around 10 ships out quickly, mostly fireships, I might include some triremes amongst them.

Gathering my fleet to attack the enemy ships

Once I've gathered around 10 ships, I'll start at the far right and sweep across to the left in an arc and destroy all the enemy ships which are out and about.

While I'm doing that, I'll gather 3 or 4 ballista triremes near the entrance to the harbour, and they will destroy the two guard towers to be found either side of the entrance.

I've conducted my sweep with my fireships, and I'm just bringing in my ballista triremes

End game

With the guard towers destroyed, my fleet of fireships enters the harbour to attack the mother ship and destroy the docks.

I've just sunk the champion trireme - resistance is futile

Everything mopped up, I take my fireships out, and allow my ballista triremes to enter the harbour unimpeded, where they will destroy the bandit fortress and wreak havoc on the rest of the enemy base.

My ballista triremes enter the harbour, the bandit fotress will be destroyed within 10 seconds

Once all the objectives of the quest are achieved, you are free to do whatever you need to do to get the chests from the bandits.

Generally, I'll soften up the bandits nearest to the entrance to the harbour with my ships, bring over a group of villagers, and build some military buildings to attack the three groups of bandits found on the enemy island, two to the right and one to the left.

Just killed off the first lot of bandits with my ships, my villies come to collect

Advisers

Given this quest is all about ships, you want to focus on those advisers.

Ship related advisers are the obvious choices for this quest

Age I:  Closet Organizer Irene (storehouse upgrades) or Apprentice Mason Philon (quicker building)
Age II:  Seafarer Horus (ships trains quicker, better health)
Age III:  Councilman Onesiphoros (costs less to get to Age IV)
Age IV:  Ship Engineer Tryphon (ships have more damage)

If you have the Norse civ, and have seafarers as one of your milestones, useful having that one ticked for all ship related quests because of 10% extra damage.

Every little bit helps!

Brawny Polecat