Can I make the game harder?

I am new to these forums but have enjoyed reading Frogbeasteggs strategy guides. Well done love!

My questions is: "How can I make this game harder?" I can finish the short campaigns quite quickly and the long campaigns just get boring. I miss the STW horde that always seemed to appear after you had conquered half of the island.

Some things I would like to try is to give all the factions extra money like 500000 denarii. Or boost their population. Or give them extra units or extra buildings. I usually advance so fast that sometimes there just isn't anyone who has developed their trade enough to make it worth trading with them.

Well any suggestions would be nice or if there is already a thread on this please direct me. Sorry if I seem lazy but there are a lot of threads on this site.

Ty

Slicendice

You are on the right way, also you can read the thread about fable units in the colosseum.

but how do I do the things I suggested?

I think I have found the right difficulty level for me:
(1) Very hard campaigns/medium battles - gives the enemy more resources, but keeps the battles balanced.
(2) Rome Total Realism Mod - certainly makes it harder for the Romans, my favorite faction.
(3) Restrict recruitment of non-auxiliary units to your capital. This slows down expansion and gives the AI a numbers edge.

The long campaigns are still very long, but tightly contested.