my understanding is the main attacker has to consist of triremes and hoplites from the same city

my take is no

for the allied box, I believe you can pile on the forces from as many cities as you want so long as you follow the rules on what you can and can't do..... e.g. player 1 controls Sparta and Megara. P1 can't attack Megara with Spartan forces, or something like that. I'm pretty sure you canNOT have more than one main attacker/defender. Only the main attacker/defender gets the VP for the battlefield, and having 2p as the main means splitting/equally sharing those VPs up which isn't mentioned in the instructions, save for when multiple players control Persian forces

I agree with the post above. I think, however, that filling the Main Defender boxes with units from two cities you yourself control is probably not a problem. As far as I can tell, the Main boxes are to designate who gets the location tile and thus the points. So if you will get the points regardless of which city technically is defending the location, I think it doesn't matter. I haven't given it that much thought though.

Well, its not really clear for me yet. Mister Wallace said that: "All of the counters in the Main Attacker box must belong to one player, the same with the Main Defender box. Of course, there may be different coloured units in the box as a player may control more than one city."

My specific doubt is: in the box of main attacker/deffender I can put together Hoplites from different cities? Or: The Wallace's assertion means that I can put hoplites from one city and triremes form another city fighting together as the main attacker/defender?

Examples: which example is right:

1 - I control Sparta and Athenas. I am going to attack Argos. I put 2 hoplites from Sparta and 3 Triremes from Athenas as main attacker.

OR

2- I control Sparta and Athenas, I am going to attack Argos. I put one hoplite form Sparta and one from Athenas in the main attacker hoplite box and one triereme from sparta and 2 from athenas as main attacker in the trireme main attacker box.


Have I been clear enough?

Thanks for your patience

I think it doesn't matter. Both of your examples are valid in my opinion. That is to say, if you control both Athens and Sparta, you can mix-n-match all you want in the Main box.

I recently played this again. It seems to matter if you lose, because whichever force is designated as the main force should take the casualty.