Being the underdog in a Roman civil war

Hi,

I had the idea of a slightly different style of playing a Roman faction in RTW vanilla. Example:

I´ll start as Julii, but instead of the usual expansionist strategy, I only occupy those few gallic provinces in northern Italy and southern France. After that I restrict myself to upgrading the settlements as far as possible and keeping my borders clear of invaders, even if the senate demands me to attack somewhere else. My goal would be to keep a small but very efficient empire.

In the meantime, the Brutii should have conquered most of eastern europe or hopefully even beyond that. The idea is that they will reach a level of powerthat makes them challenge the senate. (I hope this can happen indeed and that there are no restrictions in the game which prevent this to happen).

I imagine it would be quite interesting, to fight as an underdog (and heroic defender of Rome instead of being the bad guy) in the Roman civil war instead of being the superior faction from the begining.

Any comments are welcome!

Bastard Operator

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I'm pretty much doing it in a non Roman campaign, for and against non Romans. ~;) As Greeks, I'm steadily paying off any Pont or Ptolemaian army besieging the only remaining Seleukeian settlement, Sardis, isolated from the far away Seleukeia. Come the time, it will have a price for my noble allies. ~:)
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Originally Posted by Bastard Operator

Hi,

I had the idea of a slightly different style of playing a Roman faction in RTW vanilla. Example:

I´ll start as Julii, but instead of the usual expansionist strategy, I only occupy those few gallic provinces in northern Italy and southern France. After that I restrict myself to upgrading the settlements as far as possible and keeping my borders clear of invaders, even if the senate demands me to attack somewhere else. My goal would be to keep a small but very efficient empire.

In the meantime, the Brutii should have conquered most of eastern europe or hopefully even beyond that. The idea is that they will reach a level of powerthat makes them challenge the senate. (I hope this can happen indeed and that there are no restrictions in the game which prevent this to happen).

I imagine it would be quite interesting, to fight as an underdog (and heroic defender of Rome instead of being the bad guy) in the Roman civil war instead of being the superior faction from the begining.

Any comments are welcome!

Bastard Operator

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That would be nice. But the thing that if you don't listen to the Senate wouldn't they come after your throat like start imposing heavy fines or do investigation on 'certain' family members? Then soon you will receive a message on ordering your leader to commit sucide. The Senate demands that you obey and subject to their whims completely. I tried in R:TW not listening to them at all, I mean, only doing certain missions for my benefits and the rest just ignoring them. Then Bam! Around turn 120, I was outlawed.

But that's a nice idea to play as an underdog. Have a lot of challenge. I tried that in RTW (h/h) and phew, nearly got slaughtered. But go ahead, do it if you think you can survive. ~D

Thank you for your comments.

In my experience ignoring the senate´s orders is only dangerous if your faction is already near the "critical point", i.e. you control 30 or more provinces. Before that you only lose some popularity, but that´s all.

My major concern is just, if an AI controlled Roman faction can actually become the outlawed one. Has anybody of you ever seen this happen?

(to idea itself)hmm it might be a good idea but maby give your generals experiance by doing the senate misions then letting the settlement.. whatever taken go rebel that way you get profit from looting and stuff and maintain the senates happyness

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Originally Posted by Rilder

(to idea itself)hmm it might be a good idea but maby give your generals experiance by doing the senate misions then letting the settlement.. whatever taken go rebel that way you get profit from looting and stuff and maintain the senates happyness

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Thanks for your interest, Rilder!

Well, of course you could go for a little oversea plundering while waiting for the Brutii to get outlawed. But remeber the real goal is not to get liked but to be a little lesser hated than the Brutii. I ignored dozens of senate missions and I still have 6, sometimes 7 popularity points with the senate. It appears to me, you are best appreciated if you look harmless to the senate.

But in my game I chose to ignore all orders to attack Carthage for two other reasons: The steady trading income in the mediterranean sea is more valuable than a single plundering of a city in the long run. And the need for battle hardened troops isn´t that high when you can build Urban Cohorts with 5 exp from the start. ~;) Watch my posting in the Julii guide.

And the commanders can earn their stars by knocking out rebels/gauls/britons that dare entering your realm. Just make sure that the troops used for this are not overwhelming cause such victories gain no command stars for the general.

Bastard Operator

I played once as the Scipii following this very strategy. I decided that as i was after precious first cohorts i would try and accomplish every senate mission. I nurtured my heartland, but pretty much everything else i give to the brutii to encourage them growing to the point that they woud be outlawed.

The brutii found it very difficult to hold on to their empire and i kept on having to put down their rebellions for them, but after a very long time (perillously close to game end) they were finally declared outlawed. I got a message from the senate saying that i had to declare war on the brutti or be investigated by the censor. i had one turn to comply.

I enthusiastically did exactly that, only to be told that i did not have the required popularity to declare war on another roman faction. Luckily, as the censor was from my own faction i survived the investigation, but i still had to wait a further 10 precious years before the brutii got round to declaring war on me before i could attack them and capture their empire.

It would seem that the designers didn't actually think what might happen if the player didn't start the civil war

Thank you very much for this info, Marcus Caelius! As far as I know, the popularity with the people can be raised by holding games & races in all the settlements. I´ll do this and keep on waiting for the civil war. :duel:

Bastard Operator

It actually got weirder. As there were only Roman factions still active in that game, the senate missions started asking me to blockade the Julii, who were still allied to the senate.

I'm trying this tactic now for the thousand time.
Problem is ,that I can't control my need to conquer urges.

It's like a drug; just 1 more city, one more, one more, one more,...

OUTLAWED!

Oh come on, UPXL! Only a little bit self-control and discipline is needed. Don´t forget: Conquering is BAD. It takes hard work to conquer and after that the administration of the new lands mean even more work! Break out of this vicious circle! I know you can do it! ~;)

Has anyone succeded in killing off the barred faction in this scenario? Seems impossible. My civil wars were sometimes tough enough when I was the one being banned.

this may be off topic but in my Bruttii Campaign I was using the julii and scipii as my "Assasain Training Grounds" and i decided to try out my "near graduation" asssasain on a julii general... 79% chance not bad , and i failed... "OUTLAWED DUDE!" screamed the senate which didnt happen to knotice that i had 100,000 Denarii in the bank and getting 10k a turn ( i had greece and only 2 armies) so i sent my diplomats and bribed 90% of the juliis army including a general and am sending them back to my starting cities to get ready to bash thru Italy... this happend quite early in the game to as in 233 BC , no marius reforms either mwhahahah, man 37 years after the game starts , were i'm still using hasati as a backbone in my armies and am at civil war. I rock! the turn after i got outlawed tho the 2 other factions got outlawed... and the scipii being insanly weak for some reason as in there army was probably down in carthage defending that one settlement south of carthage with there life so they quickly declared a ceasfire with me...my first legion is in Asia Minor dealing with seclucids my second was happenly in segestica after taking what i thought was the Macedons last town but they musta got an army out with there leader got another before i took Segestica and my 3rd legion is now prepping for war after being bribed from the julii and the 4th is in forming up ...

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I know you can do it!

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It's good to know someone still believes in me ~:)