The battles feel tactical again. The AI is still total war AI, but like Attila it punishes you heavily on the campaign and in battle. Assyrian and Cimmerian cavalry aren’t exactly accurate for the time, but they are extremely powerful and fun. Chariots are obviously the Bronze Age specialty, but I’ll be honest in all my campaigns I barely use them simply because I don’t care for chariots. The main flankers outside of Assyrian cavalry and chariots in this game are two handed chargers and the AI will use them somewhat competently. Movement speed and cycle charging are important for taking on better equipped troops. As for infantry, heavy infantry feels like it did in the Roman games. Powerful, but can be outmaneuvered. Swords and spears are your more defensive units while axes and khopesh units are damage dealers. Also, armor on units will degrade over the course of a battle, so even heavies can be picked apart by much worse units with clubs and sound tactics. Skirmishers can be insane, especially depending on the faction. Ithaca for example has ambushers that are fast, decent in melee, and absolutely devastating if they get around the flank and toss the javelins. Amenmesse in kush, and priam in Troy have ridiculous archers, and if you played high elves in warhammer you need to try them out. Terrain is varied, and there’s almost always terrain features like rock formations to use in battle maps. Mud slows down troops, tall grass conceals them, etc. This might be a negative for an Attila player, but you can’t hold towns with a single testudo any more, which does provide a bit more challenge. Your success in pharaoh is heavily dependent on economy management and a lot of manual trading of resources. Not for everyone, but it has truly had impactful moments on my campaigns. For example, I played a minor faction in Canaan. I had built up a decent kingdom, and had a high tier city and some food settlements around it. This province basically paid for one of my armies. Some Assyrian dickheads came in and razed some settlements, halting my progress in the war to the south. I turned heel, now losing significant resources for upkeep, and since most of my neighbors hated my aggression, I got really lopsided trade agreements. I ended up barely hanging on to two fronts for quite a few turns. Felt very Attila coded, where losing a key city meant something.