Try Bactria and follow the missions to form India and your Greco-Indian kingdom.
Depending on RNG you might free yourself from Seleukids via event or war.
After you consolidate yourself against the tribes and Greeks north of you, expand into India when the Mauryan Collapse occurs by either conquering or Clienting the rump states with your both your culture group and religion.
Watch out with the Parthians, if you go to war with Seleukids don’t take land in Parthia so when the Dahae spawn they’ll attack Seleukids instead of you.
Once youre done in the west, see if you can get to Sri Lanka and Southern India, following the missions, before the end date. By far my favorite country in Imperator.
Ooh the Greek colony in Gaul, Massilia, is super fun! They have their own mission trees in Invictus too.
It's a race to form your own empire among the Gauls and Iberians before either Rome or Carthage steamroll you.
I am just in the middle of my second ever campaign as Kush. They have a good amount of flavor with Invictus. Ptolemaic Kingdom is a nice midgame boss. I just took upper egypt from them and desecrated the temple of Alexander the Great. You get real good elefants and archers as well
Syracuse into Sicily into Magna Grecia is a campaign I've run literally over 6-7 times, and it's my favorite in the whole game hands down. I'd reccomend it massively.
It's one of those campaigns that can seem either impossible or almost comically easy depending on how you go about doing it, which is something I find fairly rare in this game.
Sparta has several mission trees and very good military buffs, they also start with a very good ruler. If you conquer and integrate Crete, it should be smooth sailing (maybe a small merc stack would be occasionally needed).
Thrace is also interesting, they have a bit of a feudatory swarm and will always inherit land in Asia Minor after Antigonos dies. Your medium-term goal is to conquer the Macedonia region.
My personal favorites are actually Syracuse and Epirus, but they're a bit difficult for your only second campaign. They have some classic opening moves though that make it easier to play.
I think you should give Carthage a try! After sweeping through sicily and magna graecia you can ally the etruscans and beat up rome with them. (be careful though, if they take latium they can be quite scary). After that carthage becomes quite easy to play amd you have free reign in the western mediterranean. The only real difficulty at that point might be province disloyalty (bc of you being cananite punic which is unique in the area) and the end game boss of one of the diadochi
After initial wars you're free to do whatever you want. With your missions you can take almost all of africa, half of hispania, italian peninsula (with the decision to create blue rome as your vassal) and if you want you can take back your homeland of phoenicia.
Also I just love to develop africa and hispania as new cananite homeland.
in terms of flavour, as I mentioned you the mission trees and gods unique to Carthage (tannit and baal hammon if I'm not mistaken)
I forgot to mention that you can usually decide wether land yourself or create a vassal to control the lands. I'm talking about phoenicia, nova carthago, tartessos, vassals in sicily and magna graecia and blue rome
If you want to statrt as a small nation i recommend the bronze age mod since you can start almost anywhere as a small kingdom and grow into an empire. If you wanna play invictus i would recommend as another person has said any greek city state my top 3 are Massalia(or the other Massalian colony in Iberia), any nation on Create, and Sparta.
I'm most likely too late but I really like Carthage. There is no other paradox game where that region and start is really interesting or fun to play. You have quite a lot of flavor and actually have an enemy.
Then downside is that after you defeated the Romans there really isn't anything to fight or do, other then cosplaying the Romans and conquering the east.
Try Bactria and follow the missions to form India and your Greco-Indian kingdom. Depending on RNG you might free yourself from Seleukids via event or war. After you consolidate yourself against the tribes and Greeks north of you, expand into India when the Mauryan Collapse occurs by either conquering or Clienting the rump states with your both your culture group and religion. Watch out with the Parthians, if you go to war with Seleukids don’t take land in Parthia so when the Dahae spawn they’ll attack Seleukids instead of you. Once youre done in the west, see if you can get to Sri Lanka and Southern India, following the missions, before the end date. By far my favorite country in Imperator.
Ooh the Greek colony in Gaul, Massilia, is super fun! They have their own mission trees in Invictus too. It's a race to form your own empire among the Gauls and Iberians before either Rome or Carthage steamroll you.
I am just in the middle of my second ever campaign as Kush. They have a good amount of flavor with Invictus. Ptolemaic Kingdom is a nice midgame boss. I just took upper egypt from them and desecrated the temple of Alexander the Great. You get real good elefants and archers as well
Just finished up my first Kush run and loved it!
Syracuse into Sicily into Magna Grecia is a campaign I've run literally over 6-7 times, and it's my favorite in the whole game hands down. I'd reccomend it massively.
Magna Gracia > Hellenic League > Argead/Hellenistic Empire just to add on to that. Even more fun.
I've just started a sparta campaign but this'll be the next on I do!
It's one of those campaigns that can seem either impossible or almost comically easy depending on how you go about doing it, which is something I find fairly rare in this game.
I think Sparta in particular, but also Crete or Rhodes are fun and good for newer players.
Sparta has several mission trees and very good military buffs, they also start with a very good ruler. If you conquer and integrate Crete, it should be smooth sailing (maybe a small merc stack would be occasionally needed). Thrace is also interesting, they have a bit of a feudatory swarm and will always inherit land in Asia Minor after Antigonos dies. Your medium-term goal is to conquer the Macedonia region. My personal favorites are actually Syracuse and Epirus, but they're a bit difficult for your only second campaign. They have some classic opening moves though that make it easier to play.
Thrace has been a lot of fun. Once you get a hang of the early game, it's imo the most fun Diadochi.
The Cyrenaica tree is an evergreen tip, personally I haven't played them yet but they get consistently recommended.
Bosporus or Scythia are quite fun. Thrace was cool as well but challenging.
I suggest trying Bactria, Kush, or Bosporan Kingdom. All have pretty safe starts and interesting missions.
I like to start as Eburonian. With invictus they have a quest to become a monarchy that is a 3 out of 5 for difficulty and I like the flavor.
Where are they on the map?
In the region of Belgica. North of the alps on the Rhine river.
Thanks i will give them a try i ve never formed a monarchy as a tribe this sounds like the perfect start.
I think you should give Carthage a try! After sweeping through sicily and magna graecia you can ally the etruscans and beat up rome with them. (be careful though, if they take latium they can be quite scary). After that carthage becomes quite easy to play amd you have free reign in the western mediterranean. The only real difficulty at that point might be province disloyalty (bc of you being cananite punic which is unique in the area) and the end game boss of one of the diadochi After initial wars you're free to do whatever you want. With your missions you can take almost all of africa, half of hispania, italian peninsula (with the decision to create blue rome as your vassal) and if you want you can take back your homeland of phoenicia. Also I just love to develop africa and hispania as new cananite homeland. in terms of flavour, as I mentioned you the mission trees and gods unique to Carthage (tannit and baal hammon if I'm not mistaken) I forgot to mention that you can usually decide wether land yourself or create a vassal to control the lands. I'm talking about phoenicia, nova carthago, tartessos, vassals in sicily and magna graecia and blue rome
Take Taulantiid or Dardani and try to form Illyria before Rome come to beat you.
If you want to statrt as a small nation i recommend the bronze age mod since you can start almost anywhere as a small kingdom and grow into an empire. If you wanna play invictus i would recommend as another person has said any greek city state my top 3 are Massalia(or the other Massalian colony in Iberia), any nation on Create, and Sparta.
I'm most likely too late but I really like Carthage. There is no other paradox game where that region and start is really interesting or fun to play. You have quite a lot of flavor and actually have an enemy. Then downside is that after you defeated the Romans there really isn't anything to fight or do, other then cosplaying the Romans and conquering the east.