Re-unification – an epic, themed WRE PBM

[econ21]

********************EDIT: THE SHORT VERSION *****************************

Game settings: VH campaign, M battles. Large units. Timer on. Patched to 1.6. Bugfixer 3.02.
Optional setting: brigand_spawn_value 50 pirate_spawn_value 60 [1]

House rules

1. The campaign ends when we conquer all starting WRE and ERE provinces[2], plus Tingi (43 target provinces). The game will award victory sooner (34 provinces), so choose to play on. Game ends in Summer 476 AD though.
2. Non-target provinces cannot be garrisoned at the end of a turn.
3. Target provinces cannot be enslaved or exterminated.
4. The following factions should not be eliminated: Celts, Berbers, Allemanni, Saxons. But if their last province is a target one, they are fair game.
5. Only full strength units, first cohorts or ships can be retrained.
6. The only buildings in target provinces which may be demolished are religious ones.
7. Play a full reign and try to choose a faction heir in his 50s, where possible following the hereditary principle.

The Order of Play
(Apologies for bumping people down one)
1. Simon Appleton
2. Mount Suribachi
3. TinCow
4. Dutch_guy
5. Zomby_Woof
6. Simon Appleton
Tricky_Lady (TBC)
The Emperor (TBC)

Explanatory Notes:
[1]Edit the file descr_strat.txt in:
C:\Program Files\Activision\Rome - Total War\bi\data\world\maps\campaign\barbarian_invasion
to change "brigand_spawn_value" to "50" and that for pirates to 60.
This will reduce the spawn of rebels and pirates to 20% of the original version.
If individual players don't want to do this, they don't need to. But I hate fighting smelly rebels.

[2]WRE provinces: Eburacum, Londinium, Tarraco, Salamantica, Carthago Nova, Corduba, Carthage, Lepcis Magna, Burdigala, Avaricum. Samarobriva, Arles, Massila, Colonia Agrippina, Augusta Treverorum, Augusta Vindelicorum, Mediolanium, Ravenna, Rome, Tarentum, Syracuse, Caralis, Carnuntum, Aquincum, Salona
ERE provinces: Thessalonica, Sirmium, Constantinople, Ephesus, Ancrya, Caesarea, Tarsus, Sinope, Antioch, Sidon, Philadelphaea, Jerusalem, Alexandria, Cyrene.
Tingi is the Berber capital and used to be part of the Empire; we want it back.

********************EDIT: WHAT FOLLOWS IS OLDER INFORMATION***************

Anyone want to play in an epic story-heavy WRE BI PBM? The emphasis will be on trying to produce good write-ups rather than blitz the game. Ideally, I’d like the thing to run close to the maximum length of a BI campaign (100 years?).

Anyone can sign up, but it is not necessarily first come, first served – I will oversee the campaign and may give priority to those who have produced good write-ups in the past. If people do not take up their reigns promptly, they may lose their position in the ranking in order to keep the show on the road.

Here are some suggested rules:

1) Play a full reign: To allow people to get into character, players will play for the entire reign of an Emperor. To stop this being too onerous and to allow more players to participate, I propose players ensure the faction heir is in his 50’s when the faction leader dies. To this end, players may want to save every turn so they can reload their last turn and chose a new heir if the designated one was too young or too old when the Emperor dies.
2) Have fun!: Players are encouraged to role-play the game and exploit story-telling opportunities. They need not always write from the perspective of the Emperor – they could follow a specific general who catches their eye or even an ancillary. They could get their generals to do something quixotic if it is in character for that general (or seems like fun). But they should not to leave successor players in very difficult situations (e.g. by disbanding the entire army or withdrawing entirely to Britain etc) and should work towards the general theme of the campaign, re-unification.
3) Re-unification: The overall theme of the campaign will be re-unification of the Roman Empire. To this end, players should aim to conquer all the ERE starting provinces and hold every last one of their starting WRE provinces. I am not sure if holding all WRE and ERE provinces alone is sufficient for a WRE victory, but it is close. I will check later on and produce a specific list of the provinces needed to meet WRE victory conditions.
4) Respect the frontier: As a corollary of the re-unification theme, players are not to try to hold any provinces that were not originally parts of the WRE or ERE. They may pillage them, but should not leave a garrison there. The idea here is to work within the frontiers of the Empire. Historically, there were presumably reasons for the frontiers being where they were – logistics, guerilla warfare etc. – and a WRE campaign that is won by just picking up some weak barbarian provinces would be too short to get an epic PBM going (someone won in 380AD on VH/VH).
5) Friends, Romans, countrymen!: Players should not exterminate any towns that start under Roman rule (WRE or ERE). The theme is re-unification, not fratricide. Players may exterminate barbarian towns, but may not hold them. Even these exterminations should be done sparingly, for role-playing reasons (e.g. to avenge the loss of a city or army) – not as a quick exploit to pre-empt the AI building up its armies or to get some easy money.
6) Don't kick the underdogs: Players should not wipe out the weak non-horde barbarian factions – IIRC, Celts, Berbers, Allemanni and Saxons. This is to better simulate the ever-present “frontier” and the threats posed by smaller tribes neighbouring Rome.
7) No Vandals here!: To try to keep the economy tight, players should not disband any buildings for cash. They may freely dismantle religious buildings in order to manage religious discontent or convert populations to a favoured faith.
8) No dirty peasants: No peasant units may be recruited or retained. They are too cheap as garrisons and anyway, that is what the limitanei and foederati were for.
9) Game settings: The campaign will be on VH campaign, M battles. Large units. Timer on. Patched to 1.6. I think we should probably adjust the settings to reduce the rate of spawn of rebels and pirates, as they are tedious to fight – I’ll look into this.

List of players (in no particular order):

Simon Appleton
TinCow
Mount Suribachi? (TBC)
The Emperor? (TBC)
Dutch_Guy? (TBC)
Tricky_Lady? (TBC)

Please post if you would like to play and also give a preference for your order in the list of reigns (first turn, early, mid-game, end-game).

I think TinCow is happy to go second. I am happy to go first, but someone else might enjoy that too – the first few turns of WRE are very tense and fun, especially under the above rules.

We all have real lives to attend to, but ideally I’d like people to play out their reigns within a week of coronation and to post write-ups at most a few days later. If they cannot do that, they should ask for a later reign and let someone else take their place.

Any volunteers?

[TinCow]

As mentioned, I'm definitely in. A few comments:

1) What is our policy on enslavement? I would say forbid that in Roman settlements as well unless there is an extremely good storytelling/roleplaying reason for it. Part of the reason for the no extermination, no building destruction, no abandoning provinces and no peasant garrisons is to make the game harder in addition to more entertaining and realistic. I think heavily restricting enslavement of fellow Romans would apply here as well.

2) Would we be allowed to engineer defeats? Part of the problem with many PBMs (and pretty much any TW campaign really) is that we never lose. Frankly, we've all played this game so much that we're damn hard to beat, even when outnumbered 4 to 1 and have inferior troops. It might be exciting to intentionally fight a few major battles badly. For instance, if an emperor got too old and it fit his character, it might be fun to have him die and lose a massive army in a major blunder. This could leave the empire vulnerable, provide excitement in the story and provide a challenge for the next player who would have to deal with the immediate aftermath. Late Roman history was certainly not an unending string of victories; I think ours shouldn't be either. That said, I wouldn't want such things to be clichéd or to have every emperor die on a spear.

3) Similar to the above, can we intentionally cause religious chaos if it fits? Say most of the empire is Christian, but for whatever reason a player is given a Pagan emperor who is very fervent in his beliefs; would it be acceptible for him to try to reconvert some provinces even if we all knew it would cause internal problems and revolt? I could see an emperor like this spending his entire reign just fighting rebellions over his Pagan reconversion. I would love to read about something like that.

4) Heirs. While I agree with choosing someone who is in their 50s to make the reigns keep revolving, I think we shouldn't just pick new heirs at random. Unless the Emperor has a very good reason for doing so (or if his sons are all in their 20s), I think we should try to stick to hereditary rule. Even in those circumstances, I would say you MUST pick the closest relative to the emperor who is in the proper age catagory. This would allow people to play reigns of very bad emperors in addition to the military and economic geniuses. Since so much of the Roman drama came from the mix of good and bad emperors, I think this would be a positive move. We could use a ranking system as follows to make it easy for people to choose which person inherits. An example would be:
1 - 50 to 59 son
2 - 50 to 59 grandson
3 - 50 to 59 brother
4 - 50 to 59 nephew
5 - 45 to 50 son
6 - 45 to 50 grandson
7 - 45 to 50 brother
8 - 45 to 50 nephew

Under no circumstances would a someone be allowed to inherit if they had been adopted into the family or married into the family unless there was an extremely good storyline reason for doing so. An example would be an extremely religious Christian emperor whose legitimate heirs are all Pagan, and a major battle is won against a pagan horde by another fervent Christian who is then adopted.

I guess the majority of what I'm interested in is just making an interesting history. We need to actively struggle with this and while the rules will by no means make this easy, I think a few more realistic aspects would help. If we want to make it really hard would could even forbid retraining.

[econ21]

All good suggestions, TinCow, I agree.

On (1) "No enslavement" is within the spirit of the "no extermination" rule, so yes, I agree with that.

On (2) and (3), I think they go under the heading of my "have fun" rule. If there is a story-based reason for doing something that has adverse consequences, then fine. The only caveat is don't leave something too horrible for the next player to sort out (we had that once in a MTW campaign - I think it was England and we had got to the steppes to face the Huns, then a player withdrew all armies to the British Isles, so we lost the Empire in wave of rebellions - it sucked the life right out of that PBM).

On (4), I was hoping for some input on how we should choose heirs and your thoughts on this are good. Are they currently chosen by the game on hereditary principles? Regardless, it does sound like the best way to go about choosing the heir, unless there is a good story-based reason to deviate as you say. Hopefully, the hereditary principle will tend give heirs of the right age but I have not paid much attention to it in the past to confirm this.

I'll give other people a chance to make further suggestions and then revise the rules to take on board these great comments. :2thumbsup:

[Dutch_guy]

1) Play a full reign: To allow people to get into character, players will play for the entire reign of an Emperor. To stop this being too onerous and to allow more players to participate, I propose players ensure the faction heir is in his 50’s when the faction leader dies. To this end, players may want to save every turn so they can reload their last turn and chose a new heir if the designated one was too young or too old when the Emperor dies.

This sounds good and as the title says : Epic.


2) Have fun!: Players are encouraged to role-play the game and exploit story-telling opportunities. They need not always write from the perspective of the Emperor – they could follow a specific general who catches their eye or even an ancillary. They could get their generals to do something quixotic if it is in character for that general (or seems like fun). But they should not to leave successor players in very difficult situations (e.g. by disbanding the entire army or withdrawing entirely to Britain etc) and should work towards the general theme of the campaign, re-unification.

agreed.


3) Re-unification: The overall theme of the campaign will be re-unification of the Roman Empire. To this end, players should aim to conquer all the ERE starting provinces and hold every last one of their starting WRE provinces. I am not sure if holding all WRE and ERE provinces alone is sufficient for a WRE victory, but it is close. I will check later on and produce a specific list of the provinces needed to meet WRE victory conditions.

Again, this sounds epic. I can imagine it to be great fun reading - or perhaps writing - about the great final battle before the gates of Antioch...:2thumbsup:


4) Respect the frontier: As a corollary of the re-unification theme, players are not to try to hold any provinces that were not originally parts of the WRE or ERE. They may pillage them, but should not leave a garrison there. The idea here is to work within the frontiers of the Empire. Historically, there were presumably reasons for the frontiers being where they were – logistics, guerilla warfare etc. – and a WRE campaign that is won by just picking up some weak barbarian provinces would be too short to get an epic PBM going (someone won in 380AD on VH/VH).
5) Friends, Romans, countrymen!: Players should not exterminate any towns that start under Roman rule (WRE or ERE). The theme is re-unification, not fratricide. Players may exterminate barbarian towns, but may not hold them. Even these exterminations should be done sparingly, for role-playing reasons (e.g. to avenge the loss of a city or army) – not as a quick exploit to pre-empt the AI building up its armies or to get some easy money.

I can see this producing some good ingame moments, especially if that frontier tribe eventually becomes a superpower, we'd be hard put.

as for the last 4 points:

6) Don't kick the underdogs: Players should not wipe out the weak non-horde barbarian factions – IIRC, Celts, Berbers, Allemanni and Saxons. This is to better simulate the ever-present “frontier” and the threats posed by smaller tribes neighbouring Rome.
7) No Vandals here!: To try to keep the economy tight, players should not disband any buildings for cash. They may freely dismantle religious buildings in order to manage religious discontent or convert populations to a favoured faith.
8) No dirty peasants: No peasant units may be recruited or retained. They are too cheap as garrisons and anyway, that is what the limitanei and foederati were for.
9) Game settings: The campaign will be on VH campaign, M battles. Large units. Timer on. Patched to 1.6. I think we should probably adjust the settings to reduce the rate of spawn of rebels and pirates, as they are tedious to fight – I’ll look into this.

Well exept for point 8, I usually play this way anyway, so no big deal to make these above quoted rules official -

So I'm in, though preferably as ...say player number 4.

Do want to play, but spare time is getting harder to come by now a days so I don't want to disturb the earlier fase of the campaign.

That's all for now, If I get any flashes of inspiration I'd let you guys know.

:balloon2:

[Mount Suribachi]

Yep, I'm definately in. Been a while (too long) since I did this.

Simon, if I may make a request about my position in the order. After this Monday (30th Jan), the way my shift pattern falls I will be off work for 5 of the next 7 days, giving me plenty of time to play BI ~:)

So, depending on when you start, could I go first or second?

A word of warning though, I've only been playing RTW since Christmas and I've not played a BI campaign yet...then again, I'm not like to tear up the map so maybe thats a good thing ~;)

[Tricky Lady]

I would be interested to play, as you've so kindly added me in the To Be Confirmed category.

I must add that I've hardly played RTW, leave alone BI, recently so you shouldn't expect too epic wins from me. But as TinCow mentioned, losing some battles every now and then might bring some life into the PBM again, as everyone usually steamrolls over all opponents quite easily.

Due to (or should I say: thanks to) real-life issues I haven't been playing any PC games recently, so I might not really fulfill the request to play within one week and post a write-up and pictures at most two days later, I suggest that you complete the list first, determine the order (I'd prefer not to play the first or second turn), and then I'll try to make sure that game life gets priority over real life again (just for once :2thumbsup: ).

I do agree with all of the suggestions made by both Simon and TinCow. I should make a short memo when I start playing as I do tend to play many rules that you're now explicitely ruling out (peasants for instance). :shame:

And also one thing: I am a very (very!) cautious and slow player (no blitzing for TL) so perhaps my 'reign' would become a bit boring. Perhaps I can engineer a smashing defeat at one of the Western borders... :juggle2:

So, yes, count me in. I'll try to do my best to play and write within the 'requested' time-frame.

EDIT:
Oh, I just realise that my current RTW-BI installation might not be up-to-date... I play ....errrr... what do I play? Hmmm, better check, but I can't remember having installed patch 1.6. I have installed player1's bugfixer and professorspatula's Unlock All Factions and Horde mod. Are these two no-gos? Just RTW-BI, patch 1.6, no mod, modlets or bugfixers?
Perhaps I should reinstall RTW completely anyway, as I'd like to try EB too.... :thinking:

[econ21]

Great to see some quick interest here (maybe the Throne room is escaping its wintery period since VI).

From the responses so far, I propose the following order of play:

1. Mount Suribachi
2. TinCow
3. Tricky_Lady
4. Dutch_guy
5. The Emperor (TBC)
6. Simon Appleton

We can switch around to fit people's real life commitments as required.

Let's keep things open for more players and suggestions for a few more days, then we can confirm the groundrules and Mount can start on Monday or whenever suits him.

BTW: In my reply to him, I missed one of TinCow's proposals - no retraining. I guess the idea would be to stop depleted veteran units miraculously regrowing new veterans and also impose some logistical constraints on conquest. I confess I like it, maybe with the proviso that you can merge units together and retrain full strength units to get the full benefit of better armour and weapons (e.g. from Rome). I suspect if we are conquering ERE, it might be very easy to keep retraining and so maintain a killer army as we conquer because the ERE cities will often have the necessary troop building infrastructure. The no retraining rule would bring the game closer to the RTR/EB/MedMod geographic restrictions on unit recruitment.

PS: TrickyLady, I think bugfixer will not cause any problems but I am not sure about the professor's mods. A reinstall might not be a bad idea - the EB beta is definitely worth tasting as it is amazingly ambitious. But, at least on my rig, it crashed a bit too much for it to be much fun playing long term.

[TinCow]

BTW: In my reply to him, I missed one of TinCow's proposals - no retraining. I guess the idea would be to stop depleted veteran units miraculously regrowing new veterans and also impose some logistical constraints on conquest. I confess I like it, maybe with the proviso that you can merge units together and retrain full strength units to get the full benefit of better armour and weapons (e.g. from Rome). I suspect if we are conquering ERE, it might be very easy to keep retraining and so maintain a killer army as we conquer because the ERE cities will often have the necessary troop building infrastructure. The no retraining rule would bring the game closer to the RTR/EB/MedMod geographic restrictions on unit recruitment.

Yeah, the general idea would be to make battle losses significant. With retraining we all know we can lose 75% of our forces and still have a formidable army in one turn. I think exceptions to this would be allowed of course. Like you said, full strength and general units could retrain to gain armor/weapon bonuses. I also think we should allow retraining at any time for First Cohorts. I'm fond of giving these things unique names for my legions and it would be hard to keep the 'named' legions around if I couldn't replenish that unit. That wouldn't be that unbalancing though since few cities would have a barracks highly developed enough to retrain them anyway. Maybe allow retraining of ships as well, since naval combat is such a pain as it is.

[Mount Suribachi]

I guess the idea would be to stop depleted veteran units miraculously regrowing new veterans.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought experience was tracked on an individual soldier level - the experience on the unit icon is an average across the whole unit. I'm certain this was the case in MTW and STW (thinks: swordsman event), have they changed it for RTW?

So when you retrain a unit to re-stock the numbers, the new recruits will only have the valour/experience that their training centre buildings and/or commander provide, no?

BTW I have no problem with any of these rules, but before I start, can we have a little crib sheet with all the rules on them - just the rules and game details. With all the explanations and stuff above, it becomes hard to keep track of them all, thx.

[econ21]

Yes, they changed the re-training in RTW from that in MTW/STW for some reason. In RTW, if you retrained a unit, it retains its experience (chevrons). I don't know how that squares with experience tracked at the level of the individual soldier - maybe the new soldiers are assigned individual vet status equal to the unit average?

OK, I'll make a short crib list of houserules in a couple of days time when the dust has settled.

[TinCow]

Yes, experience is weird. It IS tracked individually, however when you retrain a unit, the new men all receive the average (displayed chevrons) of the remaining men. This means that if you have a unit that has been depleted to 1 man, but that man has three golds, when you retrain the unit the entire unit will have three golds. Ironically, this makes retraining better than combining veterans since combining has them retain their individual experience, even if lower than average.

[econ21]

OK, I've got another possible houserule - we should use our diplomants to seek out AI factions and trade maps with them. It appears that if the AI has your map, it will be able to target your less well defended cities:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showpost.php?p=1046583&postcount=30

I think map trading will make the game more challenging and also historical (the barbarians were perfectly aware of the attractions of the Roman hinterland). But I don't want to make Mount Suribachi's reign impossible. What do people think?

[Dutch_guy]

To make that a house rule would go to far in my opinion.

I mean, did the Romans trade their maps to their sworn enemies ?

I'd say no, maybe to say Egyptians, but not to neighboughring barbarians.

For game play reasons we should do it, for realisms sake I'd say we shouldn't - I prefer realism in this case.

:balloon2:

[econ21]

OK, I see your point & maybe we are in danger of descending into masochism!

[Tricky Lady]

Yes, please let's not drive it too far as I'd lose my head before we even get started :dizzy2: :sweatdrop:

[Zomby_Woof]

Personally, I like the idea of always giving map information to the other factions. Quite simply, the Western Roman Empire was preyed on historically and usually is in-game; if we can make that more dramatic, all the better.

Another thing I'd like to adress is the reconquering of once Roman cities. For instance, if the Celts or Saxons were to take Eburacum and completely de-Romanizes it over a course of time would it still be okay to go ahead and repossess that territory?

Lastly, are our reigns to be in-character? For instance, if we have a devout Christian emperor should we play the game as if he was actually in charge by attempting to convert the Empire soley to Christianity or if we had an emperor who had the "Fears Barbarians" trait should we make our frontier border well-defended?

Lastly, I'd like to ask about the raids against barbarians. From my understanding one is allowed to take a barbarian settlement but one cannot leave a garrison of any type in that settlement? So in theory you can send an army as deep into the frontier as you like just so long as you don't leave a garrison in any conquered territory? That seems like a good way to bring in easy revenue, even if you're not allowed to completely wipe out some of the "one-territory-non-hordeable" factions like the Alemanni or Burgundii.

Anywho, as the hoplites used to say, "You can sign me up for the back."

[econ21]

Good questions, Zomby_Woof, I'll deal with them in turn.


Personally, I like the idea of always giving map information to the other factions. Quite simply, the Western Roman Empire was preyed on historically and usually is in-game; if we can make that more dramatic, all the better.

I agree but given the responses, let's leave this to each reigning Emperor to decide.


Another thing I'd like to adress is the reconquering of once Roman cities. For instance, if the Celts or Saxons were to take Eburacum and completely de-Romanizes it over a course of time would it still be okay to go ahead and repossess that territory?

Absolutely. The aim of the game is to re-unify the Empire as a whole - if WRE starter provinces are lost, they should be targeted just as ERE starter ones.


Lastly, are our reigns to be in-character? For instance, if we have a devout Christian emperor should we play the game as if he was actually in charge by attempting to convert the Empire soley to Christianity or if we had an emperor who had the "Fears Barbarians" trait should we make our frontier border well-defended?

I think we should have artistic licence. Sometimes, I find a game writes itself in a certain way - for example, in my turn in the ERE PBM, I decided to focus the story (and action) on a group of up and coming generals, sidelining the Emperor (I think in-game I was worried he would become disloyal and cause an inexplicable civil war). TinCow suggested one idea of telling a story through the eyes of an ancillary. So, I would say try to make your reign into something with a good narrative, but it does not have to be told from the perspective of the Emperor. He could be an "Old King Log" as was Graves' Claudius.


Lastly, I'd like to ask about the raids against barbarians. From my understanding one is allowed to take a barbarian settlement but one cannot leave a garrison of any type in that settlement? So in theory you can send an army as deep into the frontier as you like just so long as you don't leave a garrison in any conquered territory? That seems like a good way to bring in easy revenue, even if you're not allowed to completely wipe out some of the "one-territory-non-hordeable" factions like the Alemanni or Burgundii.

A deep raid was another one of TinCow's story ideas - he was thinking of a general searching for an Amazonian princess or something. So if it is done for a story-based reason, fine. Personally, I would not do it to amass a war chest in the first few turns but even that could be a legitimate motive if the whole thing falls apart and we desperately need money to survive a calamity (not that I expect it with our present list of players).


Anywho, as the hoplites used to say, "You can sign me up for the back."

Good stuff. I'll add you to the list and produce a shortened list of the houserules in the morning.

[Zomby_Woof]

Absolutely. The aim of the game is to re-unify the Empire as a whole - if WRE starter provinces are lost, they should be targeted just as ERE starter ones.

Well that brings up another question. The point of this PBM is not just to finish the Western Roman Empire's campaign but to unite the starting Western and Eastern Roman Empires?

[econ21]

Well that brings up another question. The point of this PBM is not just to finish the Western Roman Empire's campaign but to unite the starting Western and Eastern Roman Empires?

Yup, to win the WRE campaign you have to hold some key provinces plus a certain number in total. In our campaign, that number should be from the WRE and ERE starting provinces. I'll make a list of those and check whether they are enough (or too much) to be recognised as a win.

[Mount Suribachi]

I've just fired up BI as the WRE to see what I'm up against and....Aye Carumba!!!

With the above house rules I'm thinking "how on Earth am I meant to sort this mess out?"

Across the empire have low loyalty provinces on the verge of revolt, mainly pagan with a Christian Emperor, no money, army wage bill is greater than my income, my Caeser has a slew of income vices, my christian governors think earning money is a sin....now, my response to this would be to disband a load of troops, burn down and abandon outlying unproductive provinces and go raid and exterminate some neighbouring settlements for a quick cash injection.

All of which I'm not allowed to do! ~:)

Seriously, with the Empire in this state, I don't know how I could turn it around, let alone start conquering the ERE and there's a very good chance that #2 on the list is going to inherit an even bigger mess than at the start of the game.

So Simon, may I suggest that you go first? The first in a PBEM game often sets the tone of the whole game, and you can imbue the whole thing with the spirit that you are trying to achieve. The Emperor is 62, so it shouldn't be too long a reign. If you could play it over the weekend and get it to me next week that would be ideal.

OTOH, you might want a leader who hasn't a clue how to turn things around (me) as Emperor of Rome. Kinda realistic eh?

Either way I have no probs with what you decide.

[TinCow]

I wouldn't worry about the empire erupting into chaos. We know that's going to happen and that's one of the reasons for the rules. This is meant to be hard and I fully expect more than one emperor to lose territories or simply hold the line.

A few more questions/comments from me though:

1) Is elimination of a non-horde faction allowed if they only hold former Roman provinces? Say the Alemanni conquer some WRE territories but lose their starting city to a horde, can we take back our provinces and eliminate them? Would it be better to take their starting province for them and then donate it to them before taking back ours?

2) We should ignore the game winning message and continue playing. I haven't counted, but I'm sure we will easily win the game just by conquering the Balkans with Constantinople and maybe a few more here and there. At this point the emperor will get the win message. Just ignore it and keep playing with our own goals until the entire empire is reunited. The only way to avoid the win message would be to leave Constantinople for last, but that won't fly from a story perspective.

[econ21]

Ok, I'll take the first reign and get it done by Monday. The second turn as WRE is a bit of a shock if you have not encountered it before, even without any houserules. I think it's a bit unfair to have to struggle with that and have to keep in mind the many houserules. Age 62 means I hopefully won't hog too much of the campaign.

The houserules are a bit of a challenge - I don't think I will make a start on the ERE. Rather the other way, I fear. :embarassed:

[econ21]

OK, I've updated my initial post at the start of this thread to give the short version of the rules.

TinCow, I think if the "protected" factions are reduced to a single one of "our" provinces, they are out of luck. You are right on the second point - we must play on after being awarded victory. I've adjusted the houserules to reflect these clarifications.

I'll be starting the first reign soon.

[Mount Suribachi]

*rubs hands in anticipation*

[Dutch_guy]

Good to hear we're on our way. ~:)

:balloon2:

[TinCow]

/me plots to murder Mount Suribachi's Emperor and sieze the throne.

[econ21]

TinCow, I think your plot got my Emperor instead! :oops:

The Emperor is dead after a mere 3 seasons. The WRE is in tact, in the black (but only making 5000 gold per year), there are no red faces and we have about 4 half-decent armies to play with. The new Emperor is 46.

I think you might want to take over now, Mount? You'll have a good long innings and I don't think it should be too problematic. Don't feel you have to start conquering ERE. At this stage of the WRE campaign, with the hordes about to burst upon us, I rather like to follow Dakkon's advice from PST: "Endure. In enduring, grow strong."

I'll load the savegame up as WRE_364W.zip.

I'll do a write-up soon, but it won't be the Shakespeare obviously. I'd rather like to plagiarise Demon of Light's classic:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showpost.php?p=410985&postcount=270

[Mount Suribachi]

Ah yes, I remember DoLs classic ~:D

I don't know if every game starts the same in BI, but the one I looked at the other day, the ERE Emperor had a historian in his retinue. Perhaps an ode to his patron....

Anyway, yes I am ready to go for this. I'm on the late shift the next 3 days so I'll not be able to do much other than inspect my new Empire and formulate grand strategies at work ~:) But come Tuesday I'm all over that sucker like a rash ~:)

[Tricky Lady]

A great write-up, as usual, Simon. And the old emperor's end really made me laugh :laugh:. Good find!

[Mount Suribachi]

OK, d'loaded and installed Simons save. Liked the story using my "exotic slave" ~:) Now to try and figure out in which way I should role-play Augustus Leontius Flavius...

[TinCow]

It's a shame he passed away so quickly. In a test run I did with these rules, he got up to at least 68 and was still kicking when I stopped playing. Perhaps we can slot you in again somewhere if someone winds up with a really old heir.

[Mount Suribachi]

Simon, how do you get the full map revealed for your screenshots?

I know .matteosartori. from MTW, but RTW...?

[Zomby_Woof]

Type "toggle_fow off" in RomeShell.

[econ21]

Type "toggle_fow off" in RomeShell.

Yup, IIRC, you get RomeShell by hitting the ` key (the one to the left of the 1 key, above tab).

[TinCow]

You dont even need the "off" bit. Just "toggle_fow" with flip it back and forth. I always do that on the first and last turns of PBMs for kind of a 'state of the world' shot.

[Mount Suribachi]

Just a quick update. Currently played up to 373 AD and things are...interesting. This is certainly the most challenging TW game I have ever played, even without our self-imposed restrictions playing as the WRE would be hard (oh how I long to go and take the Alemni capital and burn it to the ground).

[econ21]

This is certainly the most challenging TW game I have ever played, even without our self-imposed restrictions playing as the WRE would be hard (oh how I long to go and take the Alemni capital and burn it to the ground).

Well, if they are giving you a hard time, you could do that. The rules are against occupying a rebel province and against wiping out a faction. If the Alemanni have another province, you could raid their capital. I suspect it's the kind of thing the Romans would do to a tribe that caused them a lot of grief. I may have discouraged nobbling the neighbours in that way because I did not want the campaign to be too easy, but it does not sound like that is an issue here. ~;)

[Tricky Lady]

Errmmm, guys, I think it's best if you could remove me from the list for this PBM. It looks like I'm going to be quite busy due to some real-life stuff and I know already for sure that I won't play RTW much the next few weeks. I prefer to tell this now than completely neglecting the campaign during my turn. Perhaps I can step in again later on, if the campaign lasts longer than normal. I hope you don't mind too much. :shame:

[econ21]

No problem, Tricky_Lady - I'll take you out of the playing order but PM you when the other players are all done just to check your availability.

If we are ever short of players, we'll probably recycle through the playing order again but I doubt that will be necessary with a BI campaign where everyone plays a reign.

[Mount Suribachi]

Well, if they are giving you a hard time, you could do that. The rules are against occupying a rebel province and against wiping out a faction. If the Alemanni have another province, you could raid their capital. I suspect it's the kind of thing the Romans would do to a tribe that caused them a lot of grief. I may have discouraged nobbling the neighbours in that way because I did not want the campaign to be too easy, but it does not sound like that is an issue here. ~;)


lol NOW you tell me :laugh4:

Seriously though, its, um, a bit late now. Between keeping my own cities under control, fighting the Saxons, WRE Rebels, Berbers, Celts and ERE, and bracing myself for the Huns and the Vandals who are milling around my border provinces, I am no longer in a position to raid the Alemni. :help: My troops there have been worn down by their constant raiding and with no retraining I'm getting very weak in Germania....

[econ21]

Well, good luck with it, Mount Suribachi. :sweatdrop: One hint - if you are worried about the Vandals and Huns, they are typically cavalry-heavy with weak infantry. So if your border towns have stone walls, you can often easily hold them off if you have enough good infantry to man the walls. Each stack only tends to build one siege tower, so you don't need that many infantry[1]. Be careful of the towers themselves though as they mount ballistas and if you have large stone walls, can decimate your wall defenders before contact. It's often best to deploy your wall defenders out of range of the towers and then rush to the breach at the last minute (the towers stop shooting when they reach the walls). It's all a little cheap - stalling vast hordes with a few good men in a walled city - but it may help free up some men to replace losses in Germany.

[1]On the other hand, a seemingly weak border garrison will encourage neighbouring hordes to target you rather than the ERE or someone else, so it's swings and roundabouts.

BTW: you did bring over that chuirgeon I had put on a boat in Carthage? They are a godsend in dealing with attrition.

[TinCow]

I like how this campaign sounds! It seems like our rules are working well.

[Mount Suribachi]

Yes, the Chirugeon is in the care of Nero Flavius, who is turning into something of a Roman military hero. This afternoon I fought my first ever RTW "epic" battle, of the kind so beloved of MTW. 1200 Romans against 2700 Vandals...

Augustus Leontius Flavius is now 60, so might not be long to go - but I'm getting the "are you sitting with me tonight?" speech from Mrs Suribachi...

[TinCow]

I've played a little ways in a campaign with these same rules, except with battles on VH. Keeping a massive revolt from occurring still isn't much of a problem, but it's nearly impossible to keep the settlements happy, build economic improvements and create field armies to hold the borders and fight the hordes. I've played a good 15 turns so far and the very idea of actually attacking the ERE is something approaching a black comedy. So I'm definitely looking forward to watching the PBM unfold.

[Dutch_guy]

So I'm definitely looking forward to watching the PBM unfold.

seconded.

From what I've read while scanning this thread and the write-ups the rule of take an emperor's reign is working out great, really adds some flavor to the write ups.

EDIT : TinCow, I see you have been promoted to senior member, well at least I only noticed it just now !

Congratulations none the less !

:balloon2:

[TinCow]

EDIT : TinCow, I see you have been promoted to senior member, well at least I only noticed it just now !

Congratulations none the less !

:balloon2:

LOL, thanks. I didn't even notice until you pointed it out. I wonder how long it has been like that.

[Mount Suribachi]

Hey, congrats Tin Cow :2thumbsup:


Holy Schnikey!!! I've been promoted as well! Wow, never expected that.

*wipes tear away*

I'd like to thank the members of the academy etc etc.

Anyway, back to the PBEM. Was hoping to get stuck into the game on Sunday, but then I was struck down by the stomach bug that both the wife and the little un have suffered with the last week, so I spent all day either in bed or in the bathroom.... :no:

Anyway, enough yakking, I'm off to play BI :2thumbsup:

[Tricky Lady]

...and Dutch_guy too :smiley:

[Strappy Horse]

Between all the promotion celebrations, I just wanted to let you guys know that other people (at least I am) are reading this PBEM as well.
It certainly looks to become an epic campaign, the WRE is no walk in the park, especially with the added houserules.
Great start, excellent usage of the ancillaries and keep up the good work!

[econ21]

I've enjoyed Mount's two write-ups so far - shame about Gratianus, although it could not have happened to a more characterful general. I'll be very interested to read how things develop.

I've never encountered WRE rebels before - how many troops do they tend to spawn with? Do any of your generals join them like in a MTW civil war or do they just appear out of the blue like respawning MTW factions?

[TinCow]

I've never encountered WRE rebels before - how many troops do they tend to spawn with? Do any of your generals join them like in a MTW civil war or do they just appear out of the blue like respawning MTW factions?

What they spawn with depends on what cities revolt. They tend to get a smattering of the various things that their settlements can make, along with anything of yours that was with a general that also revolts. I don't know what the formula is, but the lower the loyalty, the higher the probability of them turning. Pretty much anything that is 0 to 2 loyalty seems to be in serious danger. Also, it seems to me to have a snowball effect... the more generals that revolt, the more likely that higher loyalty generals will revolt; that could just be my imagnation though.

Regardless, if the computer doesn't 'revolt' enough generals to create a large family for the WRE Rebels, they seem to get more just like any other faction. If they're low, the AI will adopt in many from the ether. The faction leader of the rebels always seems to be the oldest family member that revolts.

[Mount Suribachi]

I've enjoyed Mount's two write-ups so far - shame about Gratianus, although it could not have happened to a more characterful general. I'll be very interested to read how things develop.

I've never encountered WRE rebels before - how many troops do they tend to spawn with? Do any of your generals join them like in a MTW civil war or do they just appear out of the blue like respawning MTW factions?

Echoing what Tin Cow said, it appears that they get whatever your settlement can build - I've only seen Peasants, Limitanei and Foederati Spearmen & Cavalry + Generals bodyguards. Thankfully my big troop producing cities (Rome and Ravenna) have stayed loyal. As for generals joining - yep, Carthage went over to the WRE Rebels and took my governor with them :wall: Thessalonica has changed hands several times, and I only ever got the above.

This is turning into a very challenging, yet very fun game. Although if I didn't have Nero Flavius, it wouldn't be quite so fun as I would be getting a serious spanking from the barbarian hordes (but you'll have to wait for the write-ups to find out all about him ~;) ). As it is I am grinding them down - though at the expense of the rest of the Empire.

Interestingly the game's starting Emperor had 4 sons, who all had 4 more sons (and a more wretched hive of scum and villainy I have yet to meet). But those 16 men have produced barely a boy between them - nowt but girls! But I am getting some nice solid, christians marrying into the imperial family now :2thumbsup:

Anyway, its 379 AD and Leontius is now 62. Takes a while when you have to fight 2-4 battles every turn against 1000+ Barbarians with those damned Horse Archers! :wall:

[econ21]

Interestingly the game's starting Emperor had 4 sons, who all had 4 more sons (and a more wretched hive of scum and villainy I have yet to meet). But those 16 men have produced barely a boy between them - nowt but girls!

Apparently 4 is the maximum number of sons a general can have. There's also a cap on how many generals you can have based on provinces which you have probably hit. I'd be curious to know what the cap is precisely - maybe players can keep an eye on the number of generals plus boys they have (and whether that equals their number of provinces).


Anyway, its 379 AD and Leontius is now 62. Takes a while when you have to fight 2-4 battles every turn against 1000+ Barbarians with those damned Horse Archers!

I know, that's one of the downsides of playing out full reigns. But you should have a good tale to tell. Try to leave some barbarians for your successors. :2thumbsup:

[Mount Suribachi]

Try to leave some barbarians for your successors. :2thumbsup:

No probs there. The Huns are milling around the Eastern borders, and the Saxons are sweeping across northern Gaul.... :skull:

[TinCow]

I've got this whole week off, but I'm going out of town this coming weekend and after that I will have less available time for a significant period. If it would be possible for me to start my turn sometime before this weekend, I should be able to turn it back around pretty quickly. Otherwise it may take me a week or two.

[Dutch_guy]

I won't mind TinCow, I've got exams this week anyhow so I would not have been able to play this week, next week however will most definitely not be a problem considering I've got a week off starting this friday.

:balloon2:

[Mount Suribachi]

Hi guys, sorry for the delay, but for the last week I've hardly had any time to get to the PC. Played a few hours today, its winter 382 and the old boy is 65 and hanging on... ~:D

Oh, and I recommend the next player reads up on Nestorian theology ~;)

[Mount Suribachi]

Aargh!! Got in a good 4 hours play today - wanted to get my turn done as I'm going away for the weekend but Leontius just won't don't die!!

Its now 386 and he's 69.

[Zomby_Woof]

I think when I play my turn I might use my Emperor as the head general; that way when I get sick of playing and just send him charging to a fray and let him die.

[TinCow]

No point in rushing. I'm off skiing in the morning and won't be back until Monday, so you can take all weekend and it won't slow things down.

[Mount Suribachi]

I. Am. A. Muppet.

:help:


went away to the in-laws this weekend. Thought it would be a good opportunity to get stuck into my write up in the evenings when everybody was sitting around chillin'

Took Mrs Suribachi's laptop. Took my references - A History of Byzantium, The Early Centuries, Handbook of Medieval Warfare Volume 1 (Western Europe), The History of Christianity. Even took a thesaurus.

Only problem was I forgot to take my games notes!!!

:wall: :wall: :wall: :wall: :wall:


Hope to get stuck into the game a bit more on Tuesday :book:

[Mount Suribachi]

Augustus Leontius Flavius the Harsh finally kicked the bucket in summer 387 AD. Save game has been uploaded as WRE_PBM_387S.zip

Just so Tin Cow and others know were we are whilst I do the write up

The Bad News

We've lost Brittania Inferior, Brittania Superior, Sicilia, Africa and Tripolatania to the WRE Rebels. Belgica currently belongs to the Saxons.

We have no navy (if the AI knew to blockade ports we'd be screwed)

We conquered Macedonia, but then lost it again.

The Huns are still in horde mode, taking on the Franks to the north atm.

The Good News

The Goths have been eliminated

The Vandals have been eliminated

We lost, but then regained Narbonesis and Ilyricum et Dalmatia.

The economy is (just about) keeping its head above water. The loss of Narbonesis was crippling for the few turns we were without it.

We've conquered Moesia from the ERE

All the empire is now Christian and stable with the exception of Iberia and bits of Gaul. Spurius Flavius the Evangelist with his splinters of the One True Cross has been a Godsend if you'll pardon the pun.

Nero Flavius, saviour of the empire is 1 year younger than his brother, Augustus Marcus the Gambler, and is very disloyal (-4 loyalty!)


So there you have it. This has been tremendous fun to play - so much so that I will carry on this game by myself once I've done the write-up. I think the worst is over for the WRE, and the Empire is about to relive its glory days ~;)

[econ21]

Well done, Mount. Having just finished an exhausting 10 year stint in the Seleucid campaign, I started to remember why we moved away from whole reigns in RTW PBMs. But you perserved and it sounds good like the empire is now in a decent position. :2thumbsup: I look forward to the rest of the write-ups.

[TinCow]

I've downloaded the save and will probably start playing tomorrow. A brief peek at the save shows an interesting position with possibilities and threats scattered about with equal regularity. The old guard of corrupt starting family members is getting long in the tooth and hopefully the large new crop of young 'uns will not follow in their fathers' footsteps. The new Augustus is a Liar, Politician, and morally Flexible... namely the perfect Roman. This should be an interesting turn.

[TinCow]

Update: My emperor is 60 and this game is HARD. As bad as the restrictions are, it's really the no-extermination/enslavement and no peasents that makes it bad. It's extremely difficult to keep many cities from rebelling when they are pagan due to the population size and the lack of a large and cheap garrison. The retraining isn't really a big deal since I don't have the income to retrain anyway. I haven't been able to improve on Suribachi's 5k per turn and even that dips lower on a regular basis. I've made some gains in the east, but the Huns have taken one of the Gallic cities and settled it and my attempts to regain Sicily/North Africa have been totally frustrated so far. The good news is that I have managed to dispose of most of the useless family members and Spurius Flavius has continued his ridiculously important work in Gaul and Iberia. Nearly all territories should be Christian by the time I'm done, which will at least be something.

The goal of taking all WRE and ERE starting provinces + Berber coast will be VERY difficult. I haven't counted, but I'm pretty sure we don't control as many provinces as we started with and I think it unlikely that I will be able to improve on this much during my turn.

It's damn fun though. :)

[Mount Suribachi]

Tin Cow, I'm sat here with a smile on my face ~:) 5k only happened a few times in my games, and then only after I'd lost Britain and its large garrison.

Like you said, good fun though.

[TinCow]

Ok, I am done with my reign. Marcus the Gambler passed away at the age of 65. Unfortunately there's a major age gap in our family. All of the starting family members are very old now, but the new people have not reached an age that qualifies them for inheritence by our rules. As such, the new faction leader is Spurius Flavius, the fanatical Christian and he's 59. The next youngest family member was in his early 40s and was a great nephew who was adopted into the family and has no traits whatsoever. Most people below him are 20-30. Sorry Dutch_guy, your reign might be a bit short. I would have switched the inheritence to the 40ish guy, but Spurius still qualified first under our rules. Too bad Marcus didn't live just one more year.

That said, even if Spurius dies quickly, you'll still have an exciting reign. I've managed to convert every province to Christianity except for Augusta Treverorum. Spurius was on his way there when he inherited, so please note that the faction leader is alone out in the field. You might want to protect him. I've also managed to retake Syracuse and Carthage, which will be beneficial financially in the long run. A dockyard is being built in Carthage that should be a significant boost to income. I also managed to take the entire Balkan region, though that was VERY difficult at times. Athens revolted against me no less than three times and I only got it to stop rioting one turn before Marcus died. Please note that Constantinople was actaully taken during the AI's turn when he died, so it is in disorder and nothing has been done to deal with that.

Unfortunately, on my last turn the newly horded Sarmatians declared war and besieged Salona, which will not be able to hold out unless you're some kind of tactical god. The Huns have also been attacking Augusta Treverorum every year and it's currently under siege by their largest force yet. I'm glad I don't have to deal with that!

Three final notes. First, there is a very large army of extremely good troops in Carthage. It is currently maintaining order there after taking the city, but it is far and away the best force we have. Second, the last two pagan family members are standing alone in southern Britain. I was planning on 'Death by Saxon' with them to go along with a plotline that I've been toying with for my write-up. Obviously I didn't have time to do this, so just be aware that these guys are out there if you want to use them, since the plots obviously died with Emperor Marcus. Third, there are a few extra young family members with next to no traits in both Ravenna and Rome. I put them there recently to try and farm good retinues for them, but it hasn't produced much yet.

Good luck... you'll need it!

The game is saved as WRE_PBM_398W; direct link:

http://www.totalwar.org/patrons/pbm/WRE_PBM_398W.zip

[TinCow]

I'm half done with my write-up and will probably finish the rest by this weekend. However, I'm reluctant to post it without Suribachi's in case some of the event assumtions I made about what occurred in his reign were wrong. What's the ETA?

[Dutch_guy]

Just posting this to keep you updated :

Going to start playing soon, in about a day or 2.

Couldn't start earlier since my PC needed to be removed from my room, due to some needed refurbishing of my room.

Anyway, I'll keep you posted !

:balloon2:

[Mount Suribachi]

Sorry about not updating you guys, but I'm on the 3 week half of my shift pattern where I don't get much free time to do my own thing. My write up is about 40% complete, though thats only a first draft.

[Mount Suribachi]

Tin Cow, you really should be more careful with members of your family ~;)

[Avicenna]

Amazing stuff Tin Cow!

Now someone has really got to start a campaign in Africa.

By the way, was the WRER faction leader a former Flavian, former legionary or former merchant?

[Dutch_guy]

Think I'll be able to finish my reign tomorrow since my emperor is 66 years old and is about to be attacked by a couple of sarmation horde stacks.... which are Really wreaking havoc in Northern Italy !

Keep you posted

:balloon2:

[econ21]

Only just read the write-ups, TinCow - epic stuff! I thought we were in trouble when I saw the opening position and read the story of our generals seemingly dropping like flies, but you staged a great come back. Excellent writing too! :2thumbsup:

[TinCow]

I'm sure you figured out that the deaths were all intentional. Nero simply had to go, the guy would have turned eventually. Oppius was also pretty disloyal and I liked the sstoryline idea of killing off all of Marcus' brothers. The riverboat trio were just horribly corrupt and very strongly pagan. I couldn't have converted Iberia with them around. Of the other deaths, the one to the Huns was unfortunate, but there was nothing I could do about it. I simply had no forces to spare to relieve the siege. The only death that was really bad was the guy in Syracuse. He was a decent general, decent governor and had a bonus to christian conversion. I was highly annoyed when he bought it along with 4 turns worth of expensive troop production.

As for the WRER leader... I must not have made it clear who I was referring to. The centurian and merchant were just backgrounds I made up for the leaders of the two Athens rebellions... not the leader of the whole WRER. I think that was either the Eutropius guy who died in Syracuse or the Titus guy who died in Carthage. I extinguished so many WRER generals, it was hard to keep track of. For the story I pretty much just assumed it was the family member with the earliest defection date (Eutropius I think). If Suribachi's write-up turns out to be inconsistent with my assumptions, I will edit mine to make them fit.

[Mount Suribachi]

TC, the only "continuity errors" I can forsee are Spurius Flavius - I didn't quite imagine him burning pagans, he's more a man of the Word (but more in the write up). And Nero gets a few extra names for all his victories - but that can only contribute to his decreasing loyalty as his ego swells with each victory.

[Dutch_guy]

Ok I'm done.

Uploaded as WRE_406 be sure to DL the .rar file, I uploaded a non packed file too, ignore that.

The new emperor is aobut 55 years old, so the next one in line might have a relatively short reign although that doesn't mean it won't be challenging !

Hope I haven't left to much of a mess, had some very very misfortunate events take place during my campaign and managed to lose 2 provinces and take 1.

I did however manage to fill out state money bag, when the emperor died we had about 9 K in out war chest.

Needless to say it was the most challenging campaign up to date.



:balloon2:

[Avicenna]

Simon,

I have done some surfing on the net to see the largest extent of the Roman empire. This is the largest it has been:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/34/Roman_empire.png

So you would have to conquer all the starting Sassanid provinces and the starting Goth province (the Goths are the orange faction right?)

Just a way of lengthening your campaign if you feel like continuing.

[Zomby_Woof]

Yay! I'm quite excited for this...

I think I'll re-read the rules to make sure I know what I'm doing and then get cracking.

[econ21]

Thanks for the quick turn around, Dutch_guy :2thumbsup:

Good hunting, Zomby_Woof!

BTW: interesting idea, Tiberius. I'm not quite sure how we are doing in terms of time, but it seems like we may have some room for maneouvre. Depending on how it goes and what other people think, I'd be happy for this campaign to be extended to rebuild the Roman Empire at its height.

[TinCow]

What is the end date on the BI campaign? If my counting is right then after Dutch Guy's reign, we are actually still two provinces short of our starting number... we haven't even maintained parity yet. I would be more concerned with actually achieving our original goal than with finishing too early. This game is HARD. Perhaps it will ease up when the hordes are all dead, but I doubt it. God help the man who has to deal with a horded Frankish faction.

[econ21]

What is the end date on the BI campaign?

Summer 476, I think. If Dutch_guy finished in 406, we have a fair amount of time left. But yes, let's not count our chickens...

[Dutch_guy]

Just giving you all a heads up on the write up following my reign, I have no idea when I'm able to write them and post them here, got a pretty ruff 2 weeks ahead of me...

the notes are here, but the time to write a nice story isn't.

PS : the assumptions considering then time we have left are correct Simon.

:balloon2:

[econ21]

Just giving you all a heads up on the write up following my reign, I have no idea when I'm able to write them and post them here, got a pretty ruff 2 weeks ahead of me...

No problem, I suspect this campaign will last for more than another 2 weeks. (Although I've found if I don't write soon after finishing, some of the muse dries up along with my memory).

I wonder if you would like to post a few placeholders in the write-up thread like Mount did? Then if Zomby_woof wants to write before you find the time, it won't disrupt the flow of thread.

[Dutch_guy]

yes that's a good idea, will do.

However the thing with place holders is you might end up putting down to few or too many...

:balloon2:

[Avicenna]

Too many can always be deleted ;)

Too few is annoying though.

[Ludens]

Too many can always be deleted ;)

Too few is annoying though.
Actually, only forum staff have the ability to delete posts (and AM's are limited to deleting their own posts). But don't worry about posting a few placeholders. I really doubt anyone is going to complain.

[Avicenna]

anyhow, extra placeholders are always better than too little to complete the story with.

[Zomby_Woof]

Alright I've run into two technicalities with the rules and figured I'm come here to try and get some help clearing them up.

I've recently taken two provinces from a non-Roman opponent but both of them are on the list of needed provinces to gain victory. The first is Samarobriva, which has been controlled by the Saxons since Suribachi's reign, and the second is Tingi, which of course has been a possession of the Berbers the entire the game.

My question is, do I have to treat both of these as Roman provinces and not enslave or exterminate them? I suppose I can understand not harming Samarobriva but Tingi is a completely different culture held the entire game by a completely different faction. If I don't do something with those Berbers I'll lose the settlement by the end of the turn too...

[econ21]

I think you can go ahead and enslave Tingi - since it starts out Berber, unlike the other target provinces which are Roman, it is rather different. It's not really a Romanised province and if it is going to rebel if you don't...

Samarobriva really should be liberated, not enslaved though. If you can find a role-playing reason to enslave it (e.g. if you were to occupy it and then it rebelled), then maybe.

[Zomby_Woof]

So far, so good. I think things are finally turning around in our campaign from what I saw some of you guys had pretty difficult turns but I can say that with the disappearance of all but the Sarmatian hordes things have been getting a lot easier.

Anywho, I just wanted to say that I'll be out of town over spring break (which is next week) so I won't be able to get back to the PBM over that time.

[econ21]

How are you getting on, Zomby_Woof? I'm intrigued to see where this PBM has got to.

BTW, for anyone wanting more of the WRE, you might consider trying Goth's mod for BI:
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/index.php?showtopic=15076

It greatly improves the look of the units, as well as livening up the AI. If you like RTR or EB, this is a comparable major mod but for the later time period.

[Zomby_Woof]

I've been having trouble finding enough time to finish up my reign. I think I'll be able to wrap it up by Saturday though.

[Avicenna]

So.. umm.. have all the PBMers just forgotten about the writeup?

[econ21]

So.. umm.. have all the PBMers just forgotten about the writeup?

Not all - the write-up thread is:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=60372

Zomby_Woof, any progress? How old is your ruler?

[TinCow]

My Oblivion addiction has prevented me from playing RTW for a long time now, but I'd be willing to do another round on this PBM if we run out of people to play it.

[Zomby_Woof]

I'm afraid I'm not going to have time to finish this PBM and rather than stall it any further I'll pass the baton on. I'm sorry for the delay I've caused.

[econ21]

I'm afraid I'm not going to have time to finish this PBM and rather than stall it any further I'll pass the baton on. I'm sorry for the delay I've caused.

OK. Is it possible for you to upload your latest savegame? We could just go back to Dutch_guy's savegame, but it seems a shame to waste what progress you've made.

[Dutch_guy]

uploading your latest save would indeed be the best thing to do, no need to waste numerous years of play, would be a waste.

Of topic,

Did you by any chance get the PM I sent you Econ ? If not, then please empty your PM box ~:)

:balloon2:

[econ21]

I've e-mailed Zomby_woof to see if he will upload his savegame. I would like to keep this PBM going and am grateful for TinCow's continued interest. :2thumbsup:

Off-topic: thanks Dutch_guy, I PM'd you in reply yesterday - I hope you received it. :bow:

[econ21]

OK, I've gone back to Dutch_guy's savegame and am going to play on from there. Hopefully TinCow and some other players will want to take another bite at this PBM too.

It's 406 and the situation is grim. Africa is lost. Britain is lost. The Huns are in Gaul, the Saxons in Belgica and the Samartians maraude around Italy. The Eastern Empire is by far the most powerful in the known world and its fleets rule the seas. We have no field armies to speak of in the West and most of our generals are imprisoned in towns, quelling potential disloyalty. Our Emperor is a nonentity, trapped in Syracuse under an Eastern Roman blockade.

However, there is some hope. We have a powerful army in Constantinople and are making a modest profit each year. And our enemies seems as exhausted as we are.

Under cover of darkness, the Emperor slips across the straits of Messina and begins to raise an army in Italy.

This is going to be fun.

[TinCow]

I look forward to seeing what happens and to getting another crack at this incredibly interesting campaign. I just hope the revised turn order for this and the Carthage campaign don't drop both in my lap at once!

[econ21]

OK, I've played out a reign. The savegame is uploaded as WRE_420S.zip.

We're in good shape. Gross income has gone up from 52000 gold to 87500. Provinces are up from 22 to 30. We have retaken Carthage, Lepcis Magna, Salona, Londonium, Samarobriva and Colonia Agrippina as well as welcoming Ancrya and Ephesus back into the true Empire. We have decent armies in Gaul, Africa, the Balkans and Asia Minor. Our navies are starting to contest the seas.

However, ERE is still powerful and has pushed the Sassanids into the steppes. The Slav horde have arrived in our lands in the Balkans, while the Celts have landed a strong army in north Gaul.

A couple of minor pointers, TinCow: we've been deprived of churigeons for my reign but there's a family member coming up from Spain with one that might be useful merging with our star general, Rufinus Victor. Also, we have a superb nine-eye assassin out in the open after a hit in Bulgaria. It would be good to pull him back to the safety of a city (Constantinople) and keep him paired up with a spy (his eyes), as the ERE is spawning a lot of assassins.

Toggling off the fog of war, it struck me that the logical conclusion of this campaign would be to take out the ERE and all its lands. That would be more than we targeted. However, if it starts to get too tedious, we could stop short of that. Conquest is a slow process due to loyalty problems in highly populated cities.

[TinCow]

Downloaded and started playing. Amazing to see how far the game has come since my last round. 16k income on my first turn! My previous emperor could only dream of such an amount. Those assassins you left me are the most honored men in the Empire. The two in the east knocked off several Slav family members. Right before the first major battle was to begin, I sent one on a suicide run against the Slav faction leader, expecting him to fail and be killed (13% odds). He didn't fail and to my surprise the entire faction was eliminated.

Since we've secured our max territory in Europe, I am going to try and re-construct the old Imperial border legions with forts at every single crossing garrisoned by a single unit. I will then build seperate armies that will be kept a ways back from the forts for deployment to any fort that is threatened. I figure this can be accomplished with 4 legions, each placed to cover about 3 forts.

I definitely won't be the last player on this PBM. ERE is going to take a LONG time to conquer.

[econ21]

Sounds good, TinCow. :2thumbsup: I tend to use assassins very conservatively, only targeting other assassins (I kill these on sight after a very bad experience in one EB campaign when a Macedonian assassin started systematically killing off my generals).

I hope you hunted down the last of the Huns? I let them get away once and they rehorded, so I had to kill them all twice. :sweatdrop:

I've posted my write-ups - not very inspired, but the reign was great fun to play out. I was sad to pass the savegame on. ~:mecry: Given money was so tight, for the first time in a RTW game, I checked the city screen how much extra income I could get from each port or forum building. Many investments were very high return, whereas a few had negligible or no return. Happiness buildings also have a very high return - changing tax rates often brings in more cash than economic buildings. I kept ploughing the money back in to the economy, broadly defined, and was pleased with the result. Started to splurge a little on troops and mercenaries towards the end, though. I wanted the Emperor to see some action, but he never did. :skull:

[TinCow]

Well, my Emperor is seeing action. I used his army to take Tingi... and my god that is a sweet province. The trade between Tingi and Cordoba alone is 3k/turn. Once that city is secured, I'm going to march him east towards the ERE via North Africa.

Yes, I did manage to kill off the last Hun. He besieged one of my border forts and the legion responsible for that area dug him a shallow grave. Rufinus Victor has retaken Eburacum, but the Celts have besieged him inside it with 2 full stacks. In Asia Minor, the lead general there has taken two ERE eagles. I've never had a single general take more than one before. Every single city over there seems to have an Urban Barracks!

[TinCow]

Second update:

My emperor is nearing the end of his reign. He's almost 60 now and I await the familiar death scream with each click of the turn button.

We reached the 'offical' win stage (40 provinces) a while ago but we still have some ways to go for our own victory conditions. There are still 8 more provinces to be conquered to complete the original re-unification goal (6 in the middle east + crete + cyprus) and another 7 beyond that if we want to take everything that the ERE has. Either way, I won't be able to finish it and we'll need at least one more player. Do we have anyone lined up?

[econ21]

Given the lack of write-ups from other players, I'm inclined to finish this campaign off quickly between us, TinCow. I'll take the next reign and try to wipe out the ERE. If I fail, you can have the option to finally wrap things up.

PS: You've probably already done so, but please can you make sure the faction heir is deployed near the frontlines in the east? If it is still Rufinus, he would definitely want to be in on the action. Cheers.

[TinCow]

Rufinus died of natural causes on Hadrian's Wall (went down to 0 loyalty after taking Eburacum!). I'll make my main general in the East (Asterius of the Eagles) the heir. I think (can't check at the moment) that he'll be a bit young for an heir, but he's a great commander and he should live long enough to finish off the ERE in one last reign. Plus, it will fix his inreasingly lax loyalty.

Shouldn't be difficult though. The way I've organized the European frontiers allows for effective defense without much work. I have 4 "Border Legions" assembled. Each has responsibility for one area of the front (Gaul, Alps, Dacia, Balkans) and they are based in a city or fort from which they can reach every choke point in their area of operations in one turn. Each one is composed of a first cohort, at least 8 Plumbatarii/Comitatenses, 4 Archers and 2 Sarmatian cavalry. Two have their own family member generals (who do more harm than good when stationed in a city). There is also a strong, though less organized force in Eburacum to deal with the Celt and Saxon threats that threaten that area every once in a while. The Berbers are not strong enough to worry about doing anything with beyond the garrisons of Carthage and Tarsis. Watchtowers give plenty of warning for them anyway. That leave the two armies attacking the ERE. One is with the Emperor in the south and attacking via Egypt and the other is in the north with the Eagles fellow, attacking via Asia Minor.

I've built highways and academies everywhere and the empire seems to almost govern itself. Far more efficient than any other large empire game I have played. That said, I'm not done yet and I'm sure I'll improve it a bit more still in the short time left to me.

[TinCow]

So, of course now that said all that my Emperor died on my second turn this evening. The new Emperor is in his mid-30s and a FABULOUS general. He's personally taken 4 eagles and wrecked at least half a dozen other ERE first cohorts whose eagles somehow disappeared. Good thing too, since he's currently besieged inside Antioch by a huge ERE army.

http://www.totalwar.org/patrons/pbm/WRE_PBM_436S.zip

Things to be aware of:
The old emperor was mounting an attack on the ERE via North Africa. He died just west of Egypt and his army is still located there, now led by a captain.
Ignore the financial screen. For some reason it has given me estimates of 1-2k profits each turn, but we actually receive more along the lines of 15k/turn. Nearly all important infrastructure and military has already been produced, so you can go crazy with the cash on special projects. I was trying to turn Rome into a 'perfect' city and relocate the capital there, but the Empire isn't quite ready for that yet. More investment in happiness structures in Iberia and Britannia is needed first.
The Alemanni were killed off the season before my Emperor died. Strangely, their faction leader died of natural causes (I assume, since they weren't fighting anyone) and they didn't have any heirs (not my doing, I swear). Their only province is now rebel and I'm sure will be gobbled up by someone else soon.

I consider the 'Border Legions' to be the crowning achievement of my second reign. As I mentioned before, I have established four Legions to guard the European borders. They are certainly not necessary for gameplay, since there hasn't been much action in all of Europe outside of the Gaul/Germany border area. That said, I think it's pretty historically accurate, we're more than wealthy enough to support them, and they may prove themselves very useful if a faction gets horded and pushed towards us. I have detailed how they are organized below. Of course, feel free to do with them what you wish... every Emperor is different!

On the pictures, the Legion's home base is outlined in red, the border crossings for which they are responsible are outlined in blue, and the general border area they are responsible for is the yellow line. All blue border crossings are within one turn's march from the home base and each is manned by a single Limitatenses unit.

Moesian Legion (aka Legio V Claudia Pia Fidelis)
Based in a fort along the Danube and responsible for two border crossings. Led by Syagrius Flavius - A horrible governor who is better left outside of cities. For plot purposes he was appointed by his fellow Nestorian Heraclianus the Mad, who has governed Constantinople for years.
https://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b203/TinCow/WRE%20PBM%202/Moesian-Legion.jpg

Pannonian Legion (aka Legio VI Claudia Pia Fidelis)
Based in Aquincum and responsible for four border crossings (one of which is Carnuntum). Led by Nepotianus Flavius - A totally indistinguished commander, but young and is not yet totally irredeemable.
https://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b203/TinCow/WRE%20PBM%202/Pannonian-Legion.jpg

Alpine Legion (aka Legio II Italica)
Based in a fort east of Mediolanum and responsible for two border crossings (one of which is the city of Augusta Vindelicorum). Led by Ardabarus Mamaea - Young, with some command experience. A blank slate with potential.
https://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b203/TinCow/WRE%20PBM%202/Alpine-Legion.jpg

Gallic Legion (aka Legio I Italica)
Based in Augusta Treverorum and responsible for four border crossings. Led by Tertius Atinius - Just came of age, but with great potential.
This Legion is the only one not in perfect condition. It has seen far more action than the others and has had to be supplemented by locally trained and supplied troops, rather than the elite from Rome or Constantinople's Urban Barracks, like the other three. Just one season ago it was relieved of garrison duty in Colonia Agrippina (which had revolted) and returned to its home base in Augusta Treverorum. It could do with some 'repairs.'
https://i20.photobucket.com/albums/b203/TinCow/WRE%20PBM%202/Gallic-Legion.jpg


There is also a strong garrison in Eburacum to defend against the Celts, but that's more of a motley collection of local recruits who were used to take and secure Britannia. It could be formally turned into a 5th border legion if you were so inclined to role-play it.

Anyway, have fun! Hopefully I'll get the write-up done in a couple days. It won't be as long as my last one since my reign was relatively uneventful (hence the liberties I took with the Border Legions). Good thing too, since I've got to deal with that Carthage PBM now too!

[econ21]

Excellent work, TinCow. Impressive progress in taking more provinces.

I like the borderforts and legions. I had not realised how completely the Roman lands were protected by chokepoints - I guess that's the reason the borders were kept where they were.

Good idea about moving the capital back to Rome - I'll try to do that. I know Iberia is a headache, though.

[Avicenna]

Impressive stuff there TinCow! The positioning of the Legions is perfect to defend from the barbarians! How does the empire manage to keep the Eastern provinces though?

Also, will you consider taking former Roman land back, such as Campus Frisi and Colonia Dacia? The Belgae were historically part of the Empire, as was Dacia in Trajanus' period. But I'm guessing you'll choose to go for the Byzantines instead?

[TinCow]

Oh, there are active armies and large front-line garrisons in Asia Minor. That's where the major warfare is currently taking place. Nearly every city out there seems to have an Urban Barracks though, so it's easy to train whatever we need right at the front line.

As for the other provinces... we decided to stick to these provinces when we set the parameters for the game (check the first page). I think econ21 may be going for the extra provinces the ERE has gained since the game started, but that's a lot more gameplay as it is. The real struggle was salvaging the empire under the strict rules we set ourselves in the beginning. Now that we have strong armies and a healthy economy it's just a question of playing it out to our victory conditions.

[Avicenna]

By the way, why don't you conduct a raid on a particular faction that the Empire has a history with? It's within the rules, and it'll give the Emperor a bit of character.

By the way, SA/econ: you misspelt Sarmatians in your writeup.

[econ21]

Raids were certainly within the spirit (and I think letter) of the rules. I did not want players demolishing their own (Roman) buildings for some quick cash or knocking out weak factions by taking their provinces. But raiding - taking a province, stripping it and then vacating it - was supposed to be ok, if there was history. No matter - if people played more conservatively, then it probably made for a more challenging early game. (Apologies for any headaches so caused :sweatdrop: ).

Expanding the target province list to include other Roman territories is also within the spirit of the PBM. The Allemanni homeland seems to be one such, in addition to Dacia and Freisland. They are not a great priority at the moment though, as TinCow has provided such a wonderfully defensible frontier, I am happy to rest behind it.

At the moment, I'm gunning for the ERE. I don't think we can claim to have reunified the Empire if the ERE still exists. I had not anticipated them taking the Sassanids' lands, so I am adding them to the target list.

As TinCow indicates, the campaign seems to be more or less over now. It's just mopping up.The barbarians seem weak and intimidated by TinCow's border forts. The ERE are still strong on paper, but don't seem to be able to concentrate there forces to provide much of a threat. I am not sure how much energy we will want to devote to the campaign, but I'm going to try to bring it to some kind of conclusion.

Thanks for the catch with the spelling mistake, Tiberius. :bow:

[econ21]

Outstanding write-up, TinCow. "Celts don't bath" - I liked that. You told the story of what happened very well. I had not realised it would be so much fighting in the East, but I guess leaders like Asterius are made, not born.

[TinCow]

To be honest, I think he's the first high-star-through-traits general I've ever created in BI. Command is so hard to come by in the expansion, but the Eagle line becomes almost guaranteed when every battle includes 1-3 first cohorts.

As for the Rufinus story... I just kept thinking of Col. Kilgore while writing him, so I couldn't resist tossing that in at the end. I suspect the reference may be a bit too thin for a lot of people, but I felt compelled.

[Mount Suribachi]

Hey everyone, just a quick note to say sorry I've not been round here lately, RL has been a bit crazy and Mrs Suribachi has been hogging the PC (she works from home) so I've not played RTW in about 6 weeks. Hopefully in the next week or so I'll get a couplw of free evenings which I hope to devote to finally getting my write-up done.

[Avicenna]

There's nothing to be sorry about, MS. You've already done half of a great writeup. How's the baby now?

[Mount Suribachi]

Thanks mate, but it should only get better, I've not even told the story yet of Nero Flavius Vandalus Gothicus Venator Nocte ~;)

Oh, and Isaac is 2 next week!!! ~:eek:

[Avicenna]

An early congratulations from me!
:balloon2: :elephant: :dancinglock:

Tincow, great writeup! What makes the diplomat so scared of Asterius? Is it his heretical beliefs? Or because of your previous turn when using Marcus? Anyway, it's going to be interesting to have a non-pious leader now. ~:thumb:

[TinCow]

Oh, well that came partly from econ (doesn't abbreviate as well as SA). He seemed to have run one of the first actually 'nice' Emperors in the game and was specifically outside of the hereditary family. My guy was in the family, but he had pretty much no distinguishing traits to give him any personality nor was he closely related to any former Emperor or otherwise famous person. As such, I wrote him as a selfless guy trying to work for the communal good, just as his predecessor had. So, at the end of his reign we're now at a point where we've essentially had two 'good' Emperors, neither of which was a traditional 'Flavian' at heart. Since the 'good' guys were non-Flavians, and the Flavians themselves had caused a lot of strife and reigned in times when lots of territories had been lost, it seemed reasonable that there would be a little angst about restoring them to power.

It would have been nice if Asterius had also had a 'True Roman' trait or something else to give him an 'entitlement' attitude, but we can't have everything.

[Avicenna]

Kill a few people to make him get the 'Roman Hero' trait ~:thumb:

By the way, if you haven't installed a patch in BI, is it actually possible to have a faction leader revolt? Because in my ERE campaign, Theodosius was losing loyalty points even when he was emperor.

[econ21]

I've lost loyalty in leaders too - it worried me at the time. But later player1 said in his patch that he removed (dis)loyalty traits from leaders and heirs because he said they were irrelevant - ie they could not revolt. Nowadays, I rely on this alot - letting the leader and heir do the fighting where possible.

[econ21]

Just to say, Asterius reunified the Empire in the Winter of 451AD:

https://img123.imageshack.us/img123/9445/reborn1ee.jpg (https://imageshack.us)

At Tiberius's prompting, we also seized the provinces lying on the eastern side of the Rhine-Danube border as apparently they were held by the Empire at some point. Write-up to follow.

[TinCow]

Excellent! I've never even seen that message before. Good job everyone on this PBM. I'm very happy that we were able to complete the whole thing, despite the epic size.

[Avicenna]

Wow, congratulations on all who worked hard to achieve this incomprehensible (to me) goal! Long live Rome!

Edit: they were held by Trajanus, who captured them for the money-making mines of Dacia.

[Braden]

Whilst I wasn't involved in this I have to say a huge well done to all concerned.

I have to say that I'm not sure I could have carried this one off as the WRE is difficult at the best of times..

fantastic! :2thumbsup:

[Strappy Horse]

Congratulations from me as well, I had a great time reading this!
Looking out for a new, 'epic' project, although I think the Western Empire is one of the greatest challenges.

[Dutch_guy]

Just to say, Asterius reunified the Empire in the Winter of 451AD:

https://img123.imageshack.us/img123/9445/reborn1ee.jpg (https://imageshack.us)

At Tiberius's prompting, we also seized the provinces lying on the eastern side of the Rhine-Danube border as apparently they were held by the Empire at some point. Write-up to follow.

Congratulations on finishing this up Simon, must say I'm proud to have been part of this :yes:

Is that message authentic by the way ? I'm asking because I've never seen it before, although I've also never completed let alone played a WRE campaign ~:)

On a nother note,

Concerning my write up, I know I'm taking a long time ,and I really want to apologize for that !

The thing is it's a pretty important period for me at the moment - school wise - meaning a lot of tests, presentations, essays and exams. And it won't exactly be getting any easier as the end of this school years approaches.

But I do promise it'll get done, would not let this epic miss a pretty eventful chapter !

EDIT: a belated thank you to you Simon for answering those questions I sent you :bow:

:balloon2:

[econ21]

Is that message authentic by the way ?

Yes, it's authentic - I too was surprised by it. I saw the "ERE destroyed" message and thought "well, that's a wrap then", but then up came the re-unification one. A nice end to this PBM.

Good to know you are still planning to do a write-up, Dutch_guy. I understand real life takes priority - all the best with the exams. :2thumbsup:

[Piko]

Impressive!

[Mount Suribachi]

Congrats guys, when I've got a spare 2 hours I might sit down and read everyones write-ups. As for my own, I did a bit more the other night, but I have yet to edit it, and it is the centre-point of my reign, the siege of Salona by the Vandals, so I want to really concentrate on it story wise. Writing takes me such a long time!

[Ludens]

Very impressive write-ups, Tincow and econ ~:thumb: !

[Avicenna]

Nice, writeup, econ! Interesting to see the personality change from Asterius originally being at least a little bit of a thinker, and then once he gets powerful becomes a loudmouth and arrogant. Becomes kind of a rebel who doesn't even use correct grammar :laugh4:

EDIT: btw, interesting new names for the Roman generals. I especially love the rebel from Briton having more of a celtic than latin name. Olympias? Isn't that female?

[Mount Suribachi]

I have added more of my write-up, post number 5 (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showpost.php?p=1073064&postcount=5)

[TinCow]

I have added more of my write-up, post number 5 (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showpost.php?p=1073064&postcount=5)


Great writing! I feel somewhat guilty for offing Nero now!

[Mount Suribachi]

Thanks, but don't feel too bad. Nero is only warming up, but as he gets a great reputation as a general, so his loyalty goes down......

[Avicenna]

Read your post, Mount Suribachi, I've got to say that it's great, and the different style of writing without much need of loading is perfect for this slow connection. ~:thumb:

I'll have to bear in mind the need to retreat in my WRE campaign that I plan to start next week when it's a break.

[econ21]

I've finished my last two write-ups for this campaign. I had been wondering whether to stop with Attalus, but the sad tale of the priests was too juicy to leave untold. And Asterius just had to bulldoze his way in to get the last word.

[Avicenna]

Top stuff as always, econ! Thanks a lot for including me into your writeup. :happy: Is there any chance that you have a screenshot of Asterius now? I'm interested to know how low his loyalty's dropped now. By the way, did your reign involve having to deal with Frankish hordes?

[econ21]

Here's Asterius as the end of the campaign:

https://img510.imageshack.us/img510/8755/asterius4fe.jpg (https://imageshack.us)

His loyalty is low, but according to player1, loyalty does not affect faction leaders and heirs (hence I try to get them to do the lion's share of the fighting).

The Franks did not horde. We just created a buffer zone north and east of the original Rhine-Danube frontier. We could have tried to knock the remaining factions as they often had only one or two provinces left, but the aim was re-unification, so we stopped there.

[Ludens]

Excellent work, econ. However, by the looks of it a wrong screenshot has gotten into the last post (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showpost.php?p=1147788&postcount=37).

[Avicenna]

Anyway, econ, I've corrected some errors present in your last post. You can quote it and then copy the sections in the CODE brackets. Anyhow, enough with the talking. Here it is:


Asterius’s story, Part II

“So, you thought you could mess with me, you little worm!” Asterius shoved the terrified scribe against the wall.

“”We are over-reaching ourselves and God is punishing us for our rapaciousness.”” Earthquakes and floods. Where do you get such sanctimonious tripe?! Do you really think God spends his time fooling round with our weather, like a kid kicking down an anthill? You say you are a Christian, but your God is like those fool gods of our ancestors, who delight in tormenting mortals. And if God did want to muck about with our lives, why on earth would he want to stop us? Every conquest we have made, west or east, we have torn down pagan temples and built churches. My men have been through fire to re-unify this Empire and to spread our faith!”

https://img47.imageshack.us/img47/6927/wre1161am.jpg (https://imageshack.us)

A depleted Asia legion assaults Philadelphaea - with only one siege tower reaching the walls, it is a close run thing.

“I marched my men from Antioch to Jerusalem; from Philadelphaea to Hatra; from Ctesiphon to Arsakia. For Christ's sake, I even made some of the poor SOBs ride camels. Have you any idea what one of those things smells like? Do you? But the horses - they hate it even more than we do, so they have their uses”

https://img20.imageshack.us/img20/2451/wre848dn.jpg (https://imageshack.us)

Asterius trains kataphract camels to assist against the heavy Eastern horse.

“Well, I guess it’s better than being charged by an army of them. We faced five squadrons of the beasts outside Ctesiphon. Apparently, Galenus Treboruanus liked ‘em even more than I did.”

https://img101.imageshack.us/img101/6945/wre1051pz.jpg (https://imageshack.us)

The moment of decision at the battle of Ctesiphon, 446 AD. Surrounded on three sides, the flank of the Western army endures while the first cohort rushes to relieve them.

“Galenus Treboruanus. Are you making a note of that name? Oh, I’m sorry - seeing as how I am pinning you against this here wall, I guess it’s rather hard to take notes, huh? Well old Galenus, he was one of the last Eastern Emperors. I reckon you’d have known that, being a scribe and all. But heck, I kept smacking those Eastern Emperors down so hard, I can see as how you would lose track.”

https://img57.imageshack.us/img57/5530/wre1074yg.jpg (https://imageshack.us)

Asterius leads his bodyguard into hand-to-hand combat with the Eastern Emperor Galenus Treboruanus.

“Yeah, I reckon I was wiping out them old Eastern Emperors just as fast as they could elect them. The last I saw was… awh heck, who cares who he was? He’s just a stiff in Arsakia now”

https://img93.imageshack.us/img93/6373/wre1389az.jpg (https://imageshack.us)

Asterius storms Arsaka in 448 AD. The last Eastern settlement, Dumatha, will fall without a fight three years later, after a prolonged siege by the Caesar, Olympias Flavius.

“All you need care about is that I did it. I re-united the Empire! All your self-doubt and blathering can’t change that. Now you listen up and you listen good. You are going to write the most glowing account on this godforsaken earth of my victories. You are going to be praised as the greatest historian in this land. You are going to bathe in the reflected glory from my achievements. And you are absolutely, positively, definitely, never ever going to bother me again. Have you got that? Are we clear on that? Now get out of my sight and never come back!”

https://img123.imageshack.us/img123/9445/reborn1ee.jpg (https://imageshack.us)

EDIT: done it for your new post as well, Mount Suribachi. Added some missing commas and apostrophes, Anglicised your spelling and corrected the Centurion's speech. (you forgot to give him an accent in the sentence where he praises Nero.


Caius Flavius put down the scroll. His face was stony, his countenance resigned.

“Well, what does the Emperor say?” asked his senior legate, Constans Heraclianus.

“He says we have been sat outside the walls of Mediolanium too long. He says that his son Marcus has fought 2 major battles in the last year against the Alemanni, and although he won both of them that his losses have been heavy, and that not only does he have no troops to spare, Marcus has priority over any reinforcements he does manage to raise. He says that not only have the Eastern Empire cancelled our alliance, they have the gall to ask for 6000 denarii tribute every year or they will attack! To reinforce this threat they have a large army milling around the eastern part of Illyricum et Dalmatia. He says that the loss of Mediolanium has been a serious blow to Imperial finances and it is only the financial genius of ***** Flavius in Rome that is keeping the economy going and there is no money to spare”

Caius sighed.

“Our request for funds to be released so that we may hire mercenaries has been denied. We are to assault the city as soon as possible”

“Does he not realise that we are outnumbered by the defenders of Mediolanium? We have only 400 men to their 600! And they are disloyal rebels, they will fight with a fury, for they know they cannot expect mercy! It wouldn’t be so bad if we could recruit some cohorts of Foederatii - they are so much cheaper and easier to recruit than Roman troops!”

“You know the Emperor's orders. No more Foederatii. No Foederatii infantry, no Foederatii cavalry. Flavius hates barbarians, and he thinks that the reliance on them to fight our battles has weakened the character of the Roman Citizen. Not to mention the fact he thinks barbarians stink. You know I think he has a point, about the weakening of Rome - the greatness of our Empire has always been built on the warrior spirit of the Roman man. We must cultivate that warrior culture amongst our people once more.”

He paued and grinned at Constans, “But I’m not denying a few cohorts of Foederatii wouldn’t come in useful right now.”

Caius took a deep breath

“Still, did Gaius Julius Caesar complain about lack of troops or funds at the great siege of Alesia? Or Scipio Africanus outside the walls of New Carthage? This is what makes Romans great, the ability to win great victories against the odds. And Augustus Leontius will be grateful for our success”

“I doubt it” thought Constans “too busy counting the gold he’s stolen from the treasury, gold that could be used to hire some much needed mercenaries.” But he was wise enough to not say it to the Emperor's brother.

“Inform the other officers, make the preparations to assault the city.”

******************************************************

Not enough troops, not enough troops, thought Constans, not enough troops. They’d got over the walls well enough, but once inside the city the rebels' resistance had stiffened. The remnants of the defenders had gathered for a last stand in the cities main plaza, and it wasn’t going well. Andragathius Velerius, the rebel leader with his bodyguard of heavy cavalry was wreaking havoc amongst the assaulting troops. Caius Flavius had to lead his cavalry into the melee, but Constans could see it was too late. Outnumbered to begin with, they’d lost too many troops getting to this point and Constans began to look to rally the troops around him, hoping to execute a fighting withdrawal. It was then he saw a sight that was to break what was left of the army. In the thick of the fighting, Caius was pulled from his horse and disappeared into a throng of rebel troops who set upon his body. The Roman army ran for the gates.


********************************************************

At the end of that year, 368 AD, the great and the good of the Flavius family were gathered in Rome for the marriage of the Caesar Marcus. The celebrations were muted by the failure to re-take Mediolanium, and the death of Caius, a Roman of the Romans, beloved by his family and the people. The bad news continued to come thick and fast. A large army of the Eastern Roman Empire had got bored of living off the land in Illyricum and laid siege to the city of Salona – and trapped inside was the Empire's best general, Nero, the nephew of Augustus Flavius. But even his military genius would not be enough to drive off the besieging army which greatly outnumbered his garrison. Aquincum was the latest in a long line of cities to riot, the arrival of Spurius Flavius and his powerful Christian preaching upsetting that pagan city. It was only a matter of time before his ability to teach others of Christ, and the miracles that his holy relics were capable of brought the people of Aquincum to the Lord, as all the other cities Spurius preached in eventually did. But for now, the pagans were in uproar. To the north the Alemanni, undeterred by being badly beaten twice in the last couple of years had crossed the Rhine and laid siege to Augusta Vindelicorum.

The newly-wed Marcus the Gambler headed straight north, collecting what troops he could along the way, and with his archer heavy army annhiliated the besieging Alemanni.

That winter, using reinforcements drawn from the garrison on Sicily, Appius Flavius landed to the north of Salona, trapping the Eastern army between his army and the besieged city. The battle when it came so nearly ended in disaster. The armies of Appius and Nero needed to hit the army of Manius the Mean from front and back at the same time to take advantage of their superior position and numbers. But due to a command mix-up half of Appius’s army was sent way out to the left when battle was joined. Luckily for Nero and Flavius these troops managed to run back to the fighting in the nick of time. The Eastern army was routed, losing 600 men, the western Empire only 150. Salona was relieved, and more importantly for the future of the Empire, Nero Flavius and his army survived.

But this success was the exception rather than the rule, as the Empire continued to struggle. 370 AD was another bad year. The rebel army in Mediolanium sallied out and caught 2 cohorts of reinforcements heading north, forcing them to withdraw – reinforcing the fact that as long as Mediolanium was in rebel hands, the route north from Italy into Germania was dangerous. The Eastern Empire, undettered by their defeat outside Salona, sent another diplomat to Leontius, demanding that he submit to the Eastern Empire as their protectorate. Not surprisingly, the demand was turned down. Desperate to end the fighting with the Eastern Empire (at least till he was stronger) Leontius decided to send a diplomat by sea to Asia Minor, but the small flotilla of Triremes carrying him and his entourage was caught by succession of Eastern fleets, and harried round the Mediterranean before finally meeting its end off the coast of Macedonia, thus ending Leontius’s hopes for peace, and sending the last of his Mediterranean fleet to the bottom.

By 372 Leontius had managed to scrape up enough troops to lay siege to Mediolanium once more, but they were outmanoeuvred by the field army of the rebels and forced to withdraw, hoping to meet up with an army coming up from Rome, but before they could make contact Captain Romulus and his 485 men were cut off by 890 rebels. Romulus found a hillside where he hoped to make his stand, he wasn’t expecting to win the day, merely hoping to take as many rebels with him as he could before the inevitable happened. In classic formation with his spears in front and archers behind and a wood protecting his left flank the men charged down the hill towards the advancing rebels more in hope than expectation of victory. Yet somehow, and the survivors of the battle never knew how, they won the day. Nearly 700 rebels lay dead on the hillside, 200 Romans, and Captain Romulus was hailed as a hero throughout the Empire.

Following this decisive defeat of the rebels in northern Italy, 2 years later Decimus Flavius was able to storm the walls of Mediolanium – this time no chances were taken with using an undersized army, an army of over 900 men had been assembled to take on the 400 defenders. 250 men were lost taking the city, but as 200 of these were Foederatii Infantry recruited by previous Emperors, Leontius was quite pleased. In fact he was very pleased, Mediolanium had been re-taken from the rebels, and most of the blood that had been spent to re-take it was barbarian.

To the North, Marcus the Gambler continued to fight battle after battle against the Alemanni. It was almost tradition by now that every summer they would cross the Rhine, and every summer they would be soundly defeated by Marcus who was growing to hate Barbarians almost as much as his father. Sick of fighting defensive battles he decided to launch a raid into Alemanni territory and met and routed an army led by King Suomar, a mighty warrior with a fearsome reputation.

More good news came from Greece. Nero Flavius, relieved and reinforced by Appius Flavius had set out from Salona looking to take the fight to the Eastern Empire. In the winter of 373 he assaulted Thessalonica, and for the first time Nero fought at night, a feature that would come to characterise his great military career. He had a large army of 1400 men at his disposal, and the 250 defenders stood little chance - although Nero lost 170 men, half of them valuable comitanses, caught on a part of the wall which collapsed when it was successfully undermined by sappers. It was a costly mistake which Nero reproached himself for having made. Having taken the city Nero left a small garrison and marched out to meet an Eastern Empire army coming to the relief of Thessalonica. His 850 troops destroyed the 640 strong enemy army for the loss of only 40 men.

*******************************************************

Augustus Leontius Flavius gave up trying to sleep and sat up on the edge of the bed. Sleep was hard to come by these days. Food was of little interest to him and what little food he managed to eat normally went straight through him. His wife kept telling him he needed a rest, a nice relaxing trip to one of his villas on the Tuscan coastline. She didn’t understand – couldn’t be expected to, being a woman and all. She couldn’t grasp the concept that the reason he couldn’t sleep or eat was the same reason he couldn’t possibly leave the capital and get away from it all. When Nero took Thessalonica, Leontius began to think that the Lord was going to bless his reign after all, but since then it had been an endless litany of bad news.

First it was those damn Alemanni! Where on Earth did they get all their troops from? Every year Marcus would rout them, and the next year they would be back on the offensive again. Following the death of King Suomar in 374, the new King, Hrodgar was back the following spring with an even larger army, nearly 500 men. Marcus, his legion worn down by the constant fighting and lacking reinforcements had no alternative but to retreat back to Roman territory, evidence of Roman weakness that angered and embarrassed father and son in equal measure.

Then came news that those Eastern pretenders to the Roman throne had made an alliance with the rebels in the west! To make matters worse they even came to an arrangement with the rebellious faction in the east that claimed their own throne in Constantinople. So whereas Leontius was surrounded by enemies and traitors, his main rival seemed to be able to make alliances at will.

In Brittania, the rebels struck again, taking over Londinium. The garrison there fled for its life, double-timing it north to Eburacum and safety.

Then the Saxons, long a fear lurking in the far reaches of Leontius’s mind declared war. A large army, over 1000 men marched into Gaul and laid siege to Colonia Agrippina, and a Saxon fleet blockaded its port.

Meanwhile Thessalonica had never gotten used to being ruled from Rome instead of Constantinople and despite Nero’s balanced and just governorship they kicked him and his army out (the fact that up to a third of the city’s income disappeared in Nero’s purse never occurred to Leontius as a possible reason for the rebellion, as far as he was concerned that was one of the perks of office. Rank Has Its Privileges, as he liked to say).

Then came news that the rebels had taken Lepcis Magna. Another city joining the rebellion. With every city that switches sides we grow weaker and they grow stronger, lamented Leontius.

And though they weren’t causing trouble yet, Leontius was sure it was only a matter of time before he was at war with the Vandal hordes milling around Sirmium and Huns swarming round Campus Lazyges.

Leontius had difficult decisions to make, and he decided to take as many troops as he could spare from Brittania, load them into what was left of his northern fleet and land them in the rear of Saxon territory. His plan was that these provinces should be lightly defended given the large Saxon army camped outside Colonia Agrippina. This army would be able to loot and pillage the lightly defended settlements and draw away the besieging Saxon army.

That was the plan anyway. The small fleet got as far as the Saxon coastline, but as they searched for a suitable landing point, they were caught by Saxon warships. Although they lost the battle, the Roman fleet managed to escape, but they sailed straight into a Pirate fleet who they were in no state to resist. The entire fleet was lost, the entire army drowned or sold into slavery by the pirates.

What little hope the small garrison of Colonia Aggripina had of holding out against the Saxon Army that vastly outnumbered them was gone, and in the spring of 376, the city fell. The Saxons moved onto Augusta Vindelicorum and put it under siege. The hatred of Barbarians that burned inside Leontius had become a roaring furnace, yet it seemed there was so little he could do to stop it. He rubbed his tired eyes and shivered in the cold night air. Why could he never sleep at night when he was so tired in the day? He was already awake when the officer of the night watch came into his room to tell him that a messenger had arrived from the Eastern frontier with urgent news. Leontius felt his stomach turn to ice, urgent news was never good news. Not during his reign. He found some clothes and went down to meet the messenger as dawns first rays were piercing the night sky. “Why does it always get colder just before the Sun rises?” he wondered.

“What is your message trooper?”

“Your Highness, I bring urgent news from the East. The army of the Eastern Emperor has besieged Aquincum. I was about to leave Salona with this news when the Vandal hordes arrived outside our city walls, with a giant army, maybe 5000 or more, mainly cavalry. I managed to sneak out of the city at night using a secret exit and have raced here with this news”

“I see” said Leontius “And what of my kin, what of Spurius? Is he still in the city?”

“Yes Sir, even as I left the city, he was speaking to a large crowd of citizens, assuring them that the Lord God would not abandon them to the Godless barbarians, that as long as they put their trust in Him who saved their souls, He would not abandon them.”

A weak smile broke across Flavius’s careworn and tired face “Good old Spurius,” he grinned, “never misses an opportunity to preach the Gospel. Well, we will not and we cannot abandon him! More importantly we cannot afford to lose the fragments of the One True Cross to those stinking barbarians! Who knows what they will do to them? I doubt they shall even realise the significance of what they possess and will probably use it as firewood! I shall not let that happen!” Suddenly, all the tiredness, the world-weariness seemed to have left Leontius, the thought of losing this most Holy of relics had filled him with a new passion, a new zeal. He turned to the messenger. “Do you know where my brother Nero and his army are camped? I want you to ride there as fast as you can, tell him I’m sending 6 cohorts of troops under Captain Attalus to reinforce him, and that he has first priority on all new troops that we raise. Tell him he must, he MUST break through to Salona and relieve Spurius. We cannot, we cannot, we MUST not lose the fragments of the cross on which our Lord died. Go, go! You have my authority to commandeer as many fresh horses as you need to get to Nero” He turned to the duty scribe. “Scribe, write a letter to my nephew Decimus in Rome, tell him to start raising as many troops as he can afford in Italy, and that as soon as they are trained they are to be marched to Dalmatia to reinforce Nero’s army. And make them good troops mind, troops Nero can use, comitanses and the like. And NO BARBARIANS. I don’t want good Roman legions contaminated by Foederatii scum”

**********************************************************

“Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid or discouraged because of the King of Assyria and the vast army with him, for there is a greater power with us than with him. With him is only the arm of flesh but with us is the LORD our God to help us and to fight our battles”

Spurius Flavius paused in his reading from the book of 2nd Chronicles and looked up at the vast crowd before him. It was a constant theme in his preaching in the besieged city of Salona, the Vandals as a kind of modern day Assyrian army, vast and ruthless. And if the Vandals were the modern Assyrians, that made King Gondegusulus a kind of modern day Sennacherib. But as he repeatedly assured the people of the city, if they put their trust in the Lord God, just the people of Jerusalem had in Hezekiah’s day, then God would save them. And the inhabitants of this previously pagan city were flocking to the city's church in ever-increasing numbers. There they prayed to the bones of Martha the Martyr, there they knelt and prayed in front of the reliquary that held fragments of the One True Cross. Already many miracles had come to pass, blind people had regained their sight, cripples had walked. Spurius silently thanked God for His goodness and returned to his sermon.

“So let us pray the prayer of Hezekiah, as recorded by the prophet Isaiah “ O Lord Almighty, God of Israel, enthroned between the cherubim, you alone are God over all the Kingdoms of the Earth. You have made heaven and Earth. Give ear O Lord and hear; open your eyes O Lord and see; listen to the words Sennacherib has sent to insult the living God.

It is true O Lord that the Assyrian kings have laid waste all these peoples and their lands. They have thrown their Gods into the fire and destroyed them, for they were not Gods but only wood and stone, fashioned by human hands. Now O Lord our God deliver us from his hand so that all Kingdoms on Earth may know that you alone are God””

And the crowd stood before Spurius spellbound. Wherever he went, his powerful preaching and the power of his relics had won a great many converts for Christ, but here in this besieged city, with the threat of annihilation so near, they had flocked to hear him like never before. To the people of Salona, only Spurius and his God could save them from the Vandals.

Just as the God of Spurius had used an Angel of Death to save the children of Israel when they were in slavery in Egypt, just as He had used an Angel of Death to save the people of Jerusalem when they were besieged by the Assyrians, so He would answer the prayers of the people of Salona with another Angel of Death. Only this Angel had a name, and it was Nero Flavius.


*********************************************************


The scout dismounted and marched towards Nero, “Report” the general barked.

“Sir, as you thought, there are 2 Vandal armies in this valley, but they appear to be separate from each other, we saw no evidence that they are in contact, and they appear to think that we will not attack now that it is dark. I estimate the first army has just under 1000 men, the other just over. Mainly horse archers, but some spearmen as well.”

“Very good, prepare your men to move out again.” He turned to his legates “Well then gentlemen, just as I thought, lets show these barbarian scum what dangers lurk in the night”

Just as Nero had planned, in the darkness the 2nd Vandal army was unable (or unwilling) to come to the aid of the 1st army under attack from Nero’s legion. In the darkness Nero had outmanoeuvred the enemy, and instead of being outnumbered 2 to 1, the numbers were roughly even. The large numbers of enemy horse archers had inflicted over 300 deaths on the Roman army, but unsure of themselves in the darkness, and threatened to be over-run by the Roman Infantry, the Vandals had withdrew before Nero could win a decisive victory. But to the Vandals, un-used to being forced to withdraw by a smaller army, it sure felt like a defeat, and it started to sow the first seeds of doubt in their soldiers' minds. And those seeds were watered and nourished 2 weeks later when Captain Attalus, coming down from Italy with Nero’s promised reinforcements out-manuevered and annihilated a Vandal blocking force of 650 men before meeting up with the General's legion.

His Legion brought back to full strength by the reinforcements, with enough left over to form a reserve, Nero launched a 2nd attack on the Vandals camped east of Salona. To his dismay, over 1000 enemy troops led by the Princes Gildo and Marobodulus slunk away into the night, leaving the 100 troops in their outpost to be massacred by Nero. Lacking large numbers of light cavalry, his infantry heavy army had been unable to pursue and engage the retreating enemy. Not for the first time Nero rued the lack of horse archers of his own. And again he had failed to win a decisive victory, yet as before the Vandals had been forced to retreat at night feeling that they had been defeated once more. Confident that under the leadership of Spurius that Salona was secure for now, Nero withdrew to the foothills east of the city as the year 376 drew to a close. Close enough that the Vandals and the people of Salona knew he was there, far enough away to be safe from Vandal attack. Or so he thought.


**********************************************************


“TO ME!! TO ME!!!” Nero cried. He wheeled his horse around, covered in sweat, breathing hard, the noble beast had run itself into the ground, but Nero knew he would have to coax some more running out of it yet. Over there was a group of half a dozen Foederatii, he made his way towards them “Reform in that wood!” he yelled at them, pointing with his bloodied sword towards a small copse on top of a small hill. A bit further behind them he spotted about 20 comitanses, clearly exhausted by the days killing and dying. He repeated the command to them, and they wheeled round towards the trees, clearly encouraged by the sight of other Roman troops using those woods as a rallying point.

Nero was starting to feel a little better, perhaps all was not lost after all, when he spotted maybe 200 yards away some more of his troops, just a remnant of what had started the day as a full cohort of Roman Comitanses. They were being pursued and whittled away by Vandal cavalry. “FOLLOW MEEEE!” he screamed, and charged towards the enemy, his loyal bodyguard following in his wake. The Vandal horsemen, so caught up in chasing down their rabbits never saw the Roman Cavalry till it was too late – they were smashed to pieces in seconds. The centurion leading this band of stragglers didn’t even have time to thank his general for saving them before Nero was barking out the same orders “Reform in those trees over there”. In this way, Nero shepherded what was left of his army to the comparative safety of the woods. When he was sure there were no more of his men left to save he too entered the woods, the last Roman to leave the battlefield that day. The surviving centurions had done a fine job of reorganising the stragglers into some kind of fighting line. All of them could see the Vandal horse archers tentatively approaching the woods, firing off their arrows as they came in range, but unlike out in the open, most of these arrows were filtered out by the thick canopy overhead. The senior centurion marched over to Nero, exhausted by the days fighting, grief-stricken by the losses, but proud that his men had fought like Romans of old. Julius Caesar, Scipio Africanus, Pompey the Great, they would have been proud to have these men in their legions he thought. “Centurion, prepare the men to withdraw through the woods in an orderly fashion”

The centurion looked at him aghast “Sir? Retreat? But sir, we can ‘ave em! We’ve given ‘em a right good kickin’ today, there can only be a few ‘undred of ‘em left sir! An' the men ‘ave given everyfink fer you today sir, I’ve never seen Roman soldiers fight an' die like this sir, this is just like it must ‘ave been in the old days like, sir. We can ‘ave em!”

Nero looked at him “I don’t think so Centurion. They may only have a few hundred left, but they’re nearly all horse archers, and me aside, we just don’t have any cavalry left. If we leave these woods we’re easy targets for their arrows. And like you say, we have given them a right good kicking today. Better to withdraw now, it’ll soon be dark and we can meet up with our reserve back in the foothills. We’ve got more reinforcements coming in the new year and we can have another go at them then. They thought they would crush us like a fly today, instead we’ve given them one hell of a bloody nose and we’re withdrawing under our own terms. Let their survivors struggle back to camp and tell of the courage and fighting prowess of the Roman Legions”

“An' the courage and leadership of Nero Flavius. We couldn’t 'ave done it wivout you Sir” grinned the Centurion.

And so, the remnants of Nero’s Legion silently made their way back off the battlefield. Most of the men were thinking of their dead comrades they had left behind on the battlefield who even now would be being stripped and looted by the Vandals. Nero on the other hand was ruminating on how it had come to this. To his alarm, that Autumn the Vandals had sent 2 armies in a pincer movement towards him. With the mountains behind blocking any retreat, Nero was forced to meet the Vandals who outnumbered him 2,800 to 1150, his reserve too far away to join the battle. He found a small ridge upon which he lined up his infantry. On his flanks he placed his precious Sarmatian Cavalry. Though not as fast as the Vandal light cavalry, they were tougher and stronger, and if they could close to fight hand to hand, they were vastly superior. As was proved when battle was joined. The Sarmatians fought heroically, time and again charging the Vandal mounted archers, and his infantry played their part too, destroying the Vandal infantry. But the Vandals just had too many archers, and eventually he had run out cavalry. Unable to drive off the horse archers, his line began to break in places and Nero had had to order a retreat, knowing full well that he would lose many more men as they were chased down by the Vandal cavalry. Although he had lost nearly 1000 men, he reckoned the Vandals must have lost over twice that. The Vandals may have won the battle, but he had forced them to pay a huge price, and he had survived, as had enough of his army to form a core around which to re-build his legion. If only I had more light cavalry, he thought, and resolved that when he sat down to write he report to the Emperor he would emphasise his need for horse archers of his own.

Some points I've noticed: why did Italy flood at some of the few tiles which was not actually connected to the rivers shown on the map? And how on earth did such a massive flood only kill 7000 people? By the way, I've checked a few other posts, seem to have no problem.

I noticed the same thing as Ludens. Most definitely not a siege tower there :tongue: Also, MS, you've starred out a Flavian's first name. Another little pointer: Caesar and Scipio both used barbarians, using Gallic cavalry and Numidian cavalry respectively. Also, you should mention Scipio at Carthage itself. Far more famous and important, the defeat of Hannibal :2thumbsup:

[Reverend Joe]

Wow... I have been silently following this one from the beginning, and I must say, the write-up was wonderful to read.

I just have a small suggestion:

Why stop now? Why not try to unite the entire map under Roman rule? It could be very interesting.

On the other hand, if you are all too tired of this one, I understand. I just hate to see the end of a game that involved so many good writers.

And yes, I know it isn't historically accurate. But then, neither is managing to reunite the Roman empire. I seriously doubt they would have had that many good Emperors in a row. So, maybe give it a thought.

[econ21]

Why stop now? Why not try to unite the entire map under Roman rule? It could be very interesting.

Um, that's an interesting idea. What do past players think? On the one hand, this campaign had a clear theme and has played that out. But I don't want to stop anyone else having fun.

It is now 451 AD - the game ends in 476 AD. Conquering the map in the rest of that time would be a big challenge. It's not the enemy armies - it's the sheer distances involved and I have not left the armies in the best positions for such a rush. And I suspect the remaining cities are pagan and quite large, so maintaining order might be tricky (although we could enslave them).

I am a little exhausted with this right now. But Asterius is 51, which is still young enough for someone to have a reasonable reign with him. There's probably space for two more players before 476 AD. One to finish Asterius's reign; the other to take on his successor.

Any volunteers to play the rest of Asterius's reign?

[Mount Suribachi]

Tiberius, the restriction on Barbarians is because Nero has the "hates Barbarians" trait, so I wanted to make a concious decision to move away from a Foederatii based army. Caeser's Gallic & German cavalry were an addition to what was an infantry heavy army. I mentioned in the story Nero's use of Sarmation Cavalry, don't know if they're classed as Barbarians or not.

[TinCow]

Any volunteers to play the rest of Asterius's reign?


Not I. There isn't much of a challenge when you're reigning over an empire this large. Frankly, I've written three somewhat detailed writeups in the last month or so (two for WRE, one for Carthage) and I'm somewhat tired. With the Senate thing going now and my desire to play my own RTR game, I simply don't have the time.

[Avicenna]

All foreigners are barbarians, so I guess they would be classed as such.

[Mount Suribachi]

I always thought that Barbarians were people who weren't civilized? The Greeks were foreign, but they weren't classed as Barbarians by the Romans.

[Avicenna]

Well, the original Greek word 'barbarian' meant anyone non-Greek. I think that even the Makedonians would have been classed as such until Philip got them accepted as Greeks. I doubt everyone would change their minds though, so it's just the 'real Greeks' that would be non-barbarians. Your current meaning is quite a new one.

[AntiochusIII]

Wow. I have been following it silently from the beginning. All I could say is: Epic!

The Empire has been united at last. Though it's a little sad that Asterius the Eagle-collecting arrogant Roman turned a little barbaric himself in the end. Though admittedly it's full circle, and no other characters could've been a better candidate to end it all. I haven't seen a general like that in BI, ever.

I'd think the high part of the game is the "Fall of the Flavians" period in the middle, when the star of the Flavian generals, particularly Nero, rose and then fell en mass, together with the massive losses of the Empire, and then the death of Marcus. Though admittedly the new reign turns out to be surprisingly successful. That Spurius sure is a bad-guy-turn-good kind of Emperor.

The Border Legions are also a nice touch: a representation of the restored stability of the Empire, and the restored Flavian Emperors...

Particularly nice is the final advance across the former frontier. So it's not "and they live happily ever after" ending, but "what will come next? Will the Elbe got to be the new frontier?" kind of ending.

Congratulations to all the participants!

[Silver Rusher]

Well, the original Greek word 'barbarian' meant anyone non-Greek. I think that even the Makedonians would have been classed as such until Philip got them accepted as Greeks. I doubt everyone would change their minds though, so it's just the 'real Greeks' that would be non-barbarians. Your current meaning is quite a new one.
I thought the term Barbarian came around because the people referred to as barbarians all had huge beards.