The Will of the Senate - out of character thread

I'd prefer timer on, in case your defending a bridge and the enemy just sits on the other side forever. Thats really annoying. And I'd prefer VH/M or VH/H, VH battles is just unfair, a veritable instant rout for anyone not a pro (me). And, sorry if I seem a debby-downer, but Large is best I think, since almost everyone can do large, but not everyone can do huge. I would hate drive anyone away because of something as trivial as unit sizes.

In all fairness, I think we should simply put it a vote, which I have another question about. People in the upper house don't have avatars, correct? so does that mean we all have one vote, since we wouldn't have an influence value for our character?

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Originally Posted by Glaucus

People in the upper house don't have avatars, correct? so does that mean we all have one vote, since we wouldn't have an influence value for our character?

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Eventually, they will have avatars. As we expand, we should get 30+ faction members and I doubt we will have 30+ active participants in this PBM by that stage!

Early on, not all Upper House members will have avatars as we have only 7 family members and 10 confirmed Senators.

If you don't have an avatar, you are a "ghost" Senator with 1 vote, same as a Senator with Tiberius Coruncanius or one of the 3 under-age members.

In allocating avatars, the rule will be Lower House trumps Upper House. And within the Lower House, candidates for Consul will get priority. Seniority will be used as a tie-breaker criterion.

Keep in mind that at the game start there is one unmarried daughter and one daughter about to come of age. That's another two avatars that will be adopted in relatively quickly. I expect we should have 8-9 avatars by the end of the first consulate.

Hi everyone,

I've been lurking in this forum for a while now and figured that this campaign would be a good way to introduce me to PBeM-ing. This sounds extremely interesting and I'd like to be a part of it.

Sign me up for the Upper House (#3) please.

Ok, I finally got my RTW installation sorted out. So I am ready to confirm for myself Option 1, Lower House with possible Consulship.

I've had word from Braden confirming that he is entering the Upper House.

Right now I am only waiting confirmation from Xiahou Liao and shifty157, then I can allocate avatars and we can open the Senate floor for motions.

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Originally Posted by econ21

Very important issue. Patching our games is a potential nightmare with such "work in progress" mods. (Hence my earlier inclination for RTR Gold). There's a trade-off between messing about too much, involving potential compatibility and coordination problems, and being stuck with bugs. I agree let's update on Friday. Whether we update beyond that, is a bridge we will cross when we get to it. Would you be willing to keep an eye on progress with Platinum and Metropolis, and field tech queries about them? If you are, I will appoint you Senate Fixer and see pass a vote that your avatar be rewarded with a suitable ancillary.

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I would be honored to accept this responsibility :bow: . I will make a post thursday night with information considering how to get the best possible out of RTRPE as the situation is then. I am not a professional modder, so don't hesitate to correct me if I'm wrong :)

I can live with the current campaign settings. In metronaval mod there are a lot less cities with walls anyway, so the point is a bit moot. If the unit size is large there is enough time to kill them all, but if we'd played huge the timer on can be a real problem. It takes a lot of time to kill 5000 barbarians :)

I agree with the split of rules in sections. Historically, the senate almost voted to move to Capua once, so a Senate rule would be appropriate there :). I see that you already marked some rules inviolable, you work fast :)

You can put me in the Upper House. But can someone please explain the role of an Upper House Senator to me more, because all this information is making my mind boggle. Also, when does the Senate sit? Could someone tell me in AEST (Australian Eastern Standard Time.). And as a #3, I don't need to play the actual campaign or anything do I?
Also, why not use diplomats for senators in the upper house? You could still use generals for those who might chose to go into the lower house later, but it could provide actual characters for those who just want to remain in the upper house. And the Roman diplomats were nobles historically weren't they? That way, the upper house senators could lobby the consul to give them dimplomatic ancilleries in order to gain influence in the Senate for voting.

Edit: I just discovered that 6 pm UK time is 4 o'clock in the morning here in Australia :help: , so what are you going to do about people who don't live in the UK?

Welcome aboard, Ignoramus. The function of the Senate - Upper and Lower House combined - is to elect Consuls (ie players) and to pass motions commiting them to key actions.

When Senators have avatars (faction members) assigned, they will also want to lobby for favours for them and speak in character.

The main difference between the Upper and Lower House is that only the latter must have installed the game, because they will be called upon to fight battles that their avatars get into (although on the strategic map, their avatars are controlled by the Consul). If faction members from the Upper House are in battles on the map, then at the moment the combat will be autoresolved (so Upper House members may prefer their avatars to be given behind the lines duties as governors).

Also, the Consuls will be elected from candidates from the Lower House.

People are free to move between the Upper and Lower Houses, although I expect the Lower House members to try to stick it out, real life willing. If they move to the Upper House, I may have to re-assign their avatars to Lower House members without avatars.

We are not going to have real time meetings of the Senate. There will be protracted sessions for deliberations and continual voting on motions. There will be some deadlines though - for example, voting for the first Consul will begin on Wednesday am and end on Friday pm (UK time). This will also be the interval for voting on motions. In future Senate sessions we will have more time (a full 7 days, instead of 3). But right now, I'd like to assign the avatars before deliberations start on the Senate floor, so people can be in character.

I've created a separate thread for Consuls' reports. I've noticed that some write-up threads become a pain to load because of all the screenshots in them (please reduce the jpgs to 75% before posting, everyone). I would like the reports to be gloriously technicolour.

But the Senate deliberations thread will be largely text and there's no reason to clutter it up with graphics. Plus it might be nice to read the Consuls reports uninterrupted by external commentary.

This thread will remain for out of character discussions.

On the Senate library, I've been wondering about keeping the character mugshots to there. Also it might be good to keep a record of all Senate motions (laws) there, for easy reference. What do you think, TinCow? If you agree, do you want to oversee both or shall I do the mugshots and you the motions? I think we can just keep the mugshots on coming of age - the Consuls should update the Senators about new vices and virtues in their periodic reports.

Reading the notes on Roman Leadership, in the Senate library, I realise there is an in-game office of Consul, so referring to the incumbent player as Consul may be confusing. I propose we switch back to my original terminology of "First Consul" (there are, afterall, potentially two Consuls but we can only have one incumbent player at a time).

I've also been wondering what to do about the titles of Faction Leader and Faction Heir - Marcus Camillus renames them Princeps Senatus and Future Princeps Senatus - ie Senate leader and future Senate leader. They are titles that come with valuable bonuses, but I don't want us to mess about with them unduly - lots of disinherited Senators will not be good for Rome; also we can't change the Leader easily.

So, I propose that when the Faction Leader dies, we have a Senate vote on who should be the new Faction Heir and not change that decision unless there are extreme circumstances (e.g. impeachment). We are stuck with Quintus as Leader and I propose we keep Publius Laevinus as heir, being the second oldest character with better bonuses than his juniors. When Quintus dies, we'll vote on who should be the next Princeps Senatus, after Publius Laevinus.

I have not read the leadership notes carefully, but my impression is that they automate a lot of the assignment of other titles and the intention was that titles not be traded. If that is true, I would like to keep them non-tradable as Marcus intended them to be.

Yes, if that's the case, I guess we'll have to live with the scripted appointments of offices. For the leadership of the faction, should we give it to the character with the most influence? Of course, no heir can be a nut, eg. someone with the 'hooting' trait or any other form of fear. If the character is related to the former faction leader or current faction leader, pretend he has a higher influence than he actually does. ie. if he is son of the former faction leader, add +2 influence. If he is the son of the current faction leader, add +3 influence. Brothers gain one less than both respectively, and nephews should not gain much at all, just +1 for the nephew of the current faction leader. Historically, marriages strengthened alliances, so there should be a high boost if the character in question is the son-in-law of the current or former faction leader, with around +3 boost and +2 boost respectively. If there is a deadlock, the priority should be given to a son, son-in-law, brother and then nephew. Grandsons should count as sons, but when there is a deadlock, sons take priority over grandsons. Grandsons-in-law gain no boost. Uncles should gain the same as nephews, as there's a very low chance of passing on the power to your uncle.

Right now, I'm quite anxious to decide upon a course of action: should our two legions take the rebel towns, or should they combine and take down Pyrrhus first? The first fight(s) is going to be easy, and the risk of losing to Pyrrhus when our ranks are thinned by rebels is quite high. I'm recommending the immediate destruction of Pyrrhus and his army, and the expulsion of the Greeks from the Italian peninsula. Then, we will have time to decide which rebel cities to take, and face no immediate threat while we build up our core cities and army. I also propose that the Roman legion, when the two armies join, be led by Quintus until a suitable candidate for generalship, which is usually presented in the form of a suitor, appears. I also advise that we build up a reasonably strong fleet, to protect our interests in the sea against foreign interference. We should also obtain trade rights with the Gauls to the North and the Illyrians to the East for now, and perhaps even Carthage if the other senators think it appropriate.

On the faction heir, let's just have an election when the faction leader dies - we can debate criteria for election in the Senate at the time.

On the issue of what the First Consul should do, your second paragraph is exactly the kind of thing I hope to see in the Senate deliberations thread. Let's open the Senate for deliberations now, as time is short if the First Consul is going to start playing on Friday evening (ie please repost your second para in that thread tomorrow after 6pm UK time). It's not ideal, as I had wanted to wait until avatars are assigned but at least the debate may be less self-interested, since we will all be behind a Rawlsian "veil of ignorance" for one day.

More generally, I think we should have two kinds of posts in the Senate deliberations threads - general musings, such as yours (Senate speeches if your like) and specific motions that are to be voted on. If you would like to propose a motion, I suggest the following format:

MOTION 1This House:
(a) agrees to reward the Senate Librarian (TinCow with a Librarian Ancillary in acknowledgement of his office.
(b) agrees to reward the Senate Fixer (DDW) with a Scribe Ancillary in acknowledgement of his office.[/b]

Motions should be capable of being voted "yes or no". We could also propose ammendments.

Both motions and ammendments would require seconders (unless your avatar has 1 influence)

We'll collect motions and then have a set interval for voting. Given the rather compressed schedule to get ready for a Friday start, I suggest Wednesday 6pm UK time as the cut-off for all motions and ammendments. We will vote on motions and for the First Consul between then and Friday 6pm. So two days drafting motions; two days voting.

There's an interesting issue of how much we want to tie down First Consuls by motions and how much we want to be decided by elections. So with your proposal, we could either try to mandate the First Consul to attack Pyrrhus or we could simply elect the candidate who we believed (from his manifesto etc) most likely to do that. Personally, I favour the latter approach but that can be something we can debate about in the Senate.

Now that I have moderating powers here, I am thinking of using the "poll" option to manage voting. I will make the polls public and then look at the names to exclude any non-Senators who try to vote and to augment votes by avatar influence. I'll want to avoid too many polls, so I may have to consolidate motions so we only a few votes per session.

If it's not too late yet, you can count me in for the more passive role of member of the Upper House; option 3, right?

Cool idea, btw. :2thumbsup:

You're probably going to be accepted, Tricky Lady. The PBeM hasn't started yet, and Upper House members should be allowed to join any time anyway. Welcome to the Senate!

Im up for the lower house and hell ill run for consul as well. What mods are we playing with exactly? Links would be convenient as im short on time for the next few days.

OK, I'm definately in. D'loaded and installed both mods and it seems to be working and stable. Only took me 2 full evenings of uninstalling and re-installing.....

Only thing is the battle map is a bit jerky. RTW & BI run smooth as silk for me, even on huge units and med-high graphical settings. Is this common with RTR?

Tricky Lady, glad to see you made your way here ~:)

RTW, v 1.5, then RTR Platinum.

Welcome Tricky Lady ~:wave:

(* Do they allow women in the senate these days ? :) *)

I have no problems with RTR and I have been running various setups for quite some time now. Then again, I have a 3 gig machine and a pretty decent graphics card. Actually, RTRPE seems to run 2-3 times as fast in campaign mode (don't ask me why, it must be the leap from RTW 1.2 to 1.5). It only gets slightly jerky when I have 4500+ guys on screen with all the graphic settings to max. Perhaps you can experiment with other graphics settings. You can alos check your task manager to see what other processes are labouring for your CPU's attention and get rid of a few obvious redundant programs.

I will post a link with all the relevant downloads and instructions on thursday evening. Be warned, RTR PE is a 450 MB download, so you might get that sometime this week.
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...howtopic=19682

The poll system sounds good, but how will you take influence in effect there ? Voters must post to show who they are and what they voted too I guess.

Hello everyone, and thanks for the welcome. :smiley:

A question.
When "discussing" in the Senate, I assume we don't have to think about gameplay reasons to attack this or that faction, do we? It's just that I liked to put forward another opinion than the rest :tongue2:

The senate deliberation thread is a great addition to this affair, great way to keep the players ( or should I say senate members ) interested.

I realize that was way off topic, but it had to be said.

Also welcome Tricky Lady, good to have you here :2thumbsup:

:balloon2:

Gah, all you unreasonable people! Listen to me, I've taken Italy twice in RTR so far :wink: The safest strategy is to rid the Greeks. Then, proceed to take Paestum and Corfinium. By this time, you'll have the finances to support your already created third legion, which then quickly and efficiently takes the weakly defended provinces that the kind Gauls have captured for us. We then sweep the Gauls back to the North, and secure our holdings from there. While the Gauls are dying, the Greeks are following their example in the south. Finally, Rhegion is taken, and the whole peninsula belongs to Rome. What happens next is up to you all :2thumbsup:

Tiberius, good Romans aren't supposed to have time travel machines... :wink:

Nor are we supposed to discuss strategy here.

Im running DSL so im cruising at a smooth 200 kbps download rate. 40 minutes total download time.

I thought we were playing with a minimod or two as well?

Off topic :
Out of character I would crush Pyrrhus like a fly, but in character my reasoning is sound :)
Back on topic :
Yes, also metronaval mod (which includes 4PTY) and perhaps some tiny, but crucial, modifications involving rebalancing and strange phalanx behaviour. I suggest making a vanilla RTW 1.5 install and storing that in a backup, and storing the mods seperately. This will save you a lot ofpain in case of a flawed install or corrupted mos. The rest of the mods I'd advise installing at the latest as modifications and improvements are continuing.
To prevent more confusion RTRPE 1.0 final = final BETA 1.4
More technical details follow thrusday evening

I'm interested in taking part in this, although I won't have much free time for the next two weeks or so.

Im not sure where to get these mods. Could you provide a link?

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Originally Posted by shifty157

Im not sure where to get these mods. Could you provide a link?

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The link to the mods and lots of other technical information about this PBM are in the second post of this thread:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...29&postcount=2

I am continually updating this second post, so participants don't need to wade through the whole thread to get the key information they need.

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Originally Posted by econ21

On the Senate library, I've been wondering about keeping the character mugshots to there. Also it might be good to keep a record of all Senate motions (laws) there, for easy reference. What do you think, TinCow? If you agree, do you want to oversee both or shall I do the mugshots and you the motions? I think we can just keep the mugshots on coming of age - the Consuls should update the Senators about new vices and virtues in their periodic reports.

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I was thinking of making a post for each of the avatars which is being played. For each I would post the mugshot and a full shot of the retinue and traits at every point at which a save game is uploaded (assuming they have changed since the last). I'll crop all the photos and compress the .jpgs so that they won't be too big. I think this will help people to see how their avatars are progressing in-game and to allow better roleplaying.

We should definitely keep a record of successful legislation, perhaps with dates enacted and the number of votes on each side, if it doesn't become overwhelming.

Cheers, TinCow! I'll leave the mugshots in your capable hands then. :bow:

On the motions, as I've indicated in an in-character post as speaker in the Senate, I'd like to keep motions short and few. It would be good if we can coalesce on some really big issue ("Carthage must be destroyed!"), vote yay or nay, and leave the First Consuls to work out the details.

That's not to say all the detailed discussion of mechanics in the Senate at the moment is off-topic. It's great and a primary function of the Senate (ie to be a talking shop). But I would be sad if we end up having hundreds of votes each session, not least because I have to organise the mechanics of voting! :sweatdrop:

I agree, varied debate is fabulous, but let's keep the actual voting options relatively simple. I ran across this thread on the RTR forums this afternoon and thought it was a great example of complex Senatorial debate on a relatively simple vote.

http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...howtopic=19710

I would like to join.

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Originally Posted by Destroyer of Hope

I would like to join.

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Welcome!

And welcome to everyone else who has recently joined. ~:cheers: Tricky_Lady, Zomby_Woof and GeneralHankerchief... apologies if I have missed anyone.

Destroyer of Hope please can you read post #2 in this thread and choose one of options (a), (b) and (c)? Cheers.

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Destroyer of Hope please can you read post #2 in this thread and choose one of options (a), (b) and (c)? Cheers.

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option b

Major edit: just noticed I made an error in not spotting shifty157 is a candidate for Consul. Apologies to TinCow and Mount but this bumps them down one in the order for avatars. List has been revised to reflect this.

OK, a provisional update on the assignment of avatars. At the moment, everyone has chosen their House except, ironically, the person who started this thread, Xiahou Liao. If he passes by before the Tuesday 6pm UK time deadline, then things may change, as obviously he trumps everyone in seniority (which I am reading from the order in which people first posted in this thread or otherwise expressed interest). But given the Senate deliberations are heating up, I think it might be a good idea to let people know what is likely to happen about avatars. However, it's probably wise not to assume your provisional avatars name and personality until this is finally confirmed.

Recall that we have only 4 adult faction members at the start of the game. We have also have four candidates for First Consul and they will each need an avatar. So at the moment, this plus seniority implies:

Quintus => econ21 (it's not a stitch up, honest :sweatdrop:)
Publius Laevinius => shifty157
Tiberius Coruncanius => FLYdude
Lucius Amelius => DDW

We have four under-age family members. I am going to assign them to members of the Lower House to allow for role-playing development. Obviously they are too young to be Senators per se, but their votes can represent those of allies of their families. And they can be pretend they are precocious kids - think Octavian in the BBC/HBO series Rome (ok, very precocious in the case of Marcus...)

Amulius Coruncanius => TinCow
Manius Aemilius => Mount Suribachi
Decius Laevinus => Glaucus
Marcus Laevinus => Destroyer of Hope

Note - these kids are young and other faction members (e.g. suitable husbands) may appear as adults earlier. In that case, I will give people the opportunity to ditch their kid and pick the newcomer instead (e.g. if they want to stand for First Consul or fight battles etc).

So at the moment, we have a match of 8 faction members and 8 Lower House Senators. (The Lower House senators should note that all this is on the condition that they have successfully loaded up the mod.)

I have also agreed to the interesting request from Ignoramus that he be assigned Sextus Antio, the diplomat, as his avatar. (TinCow, please can you add Sextus's mugshot to the Senate library?)

Apologies to the other Upper House Senators - you will be assigned avatars as soon as they become available. (As I've said before that gives you an incentive to be as expansionist as Rome was in history - due to the cap on generals, more provinces = more avatars). It was important to prioritise the Lower House, as these people will be expected to fight battles on demand if their avatars get involved in them.

People can always freely switch between houses, although this may lead to some re-assignment of avatars. I'd like to keep reassignments to a minimum, of course, as no one likes to lose a character they have come to identify with. I only really want Lower House members to go to the Upper House if they have a work/travel/other real life crisises. And ideally Upper House to Lower House moves should imply the player wants to stand for Consul in the near future.

Let me know if you think there are any errors in the above provisional assignments. Otherwise, I will not update them until the final confirmation at 6pm UK time today.

Hmm, econ, would it be possible that I stand for the lower house for a few days next week when there's a break? Or would that be just a waste of time?

Also, what about an avatar for Tricky Lady? The daughter of Quintus is an ideal character, being of the correct age and having the connections needed to have any influence in the senate. We can just pretend that she speaks through a male-friend of hers. ~:thumb:

Unlucky for picking Decius, senator Glaucus. He always seems to end up getting the worst traits out of the eight starters.

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Originally Posted by Tiberius

Hmm, econ, would it be possible that I stand for the lower house for a few days next week when there's a break? Or would that be just a waste of time?

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I think it would be a waste of time. But do you have a longer break over Summer we could work around? If you let me know the dates, I will try to ensure you have an adult avatar in that period and so can productively join the Lower House. IIRC, you are the most senior Senator, so it won't be a problem.

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Also, what about an avatar for Tricky Lady? The daughter of Quintus is an ideal character, being of the correct age and having the connections needed to have any influence in the senate. We can just pretend that she speaks through a male-friend of hers. ~:thumb:

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If this were MTW or M2TW then Princesses would be suitable avatars for the Upper House. But one problem with Rome is that the daughter does not have a representation on the map. Tricky_Lady may prefer a conventional Senator, as then he will have more to do e.g. be a governor. But if she wants a daughter, I am happy to oblige. If so, she should have a veto over suitors. I might even let her control the husband - some wives do that :ballchain:

I think I've worked out the mechanics for Senate voting.

I'll post two seperate polls, each in their own thread. They will both be public, so I can check if the voters really are senators and I can take influence into account.

For the motions votes, I will just list every motion and allow multiple votes. Then you can vote yes to as many motions as you want.

I'll post the First Consul voting thread when avatars are confirmed 6pm tonight (henceforth all my times can be taken to be UK ones) and the motions 6pm tomorrow. I'll get them to be open for 3 and 2 days after opening (ie Friday), but will count the votes a little early on 6pm Friday, so the First Consul can start play Friday night if they want to.

It might be appropriate for us to check with the Senate Fixer,DDW about the current status of patches to the mods we are using.

At the RTR forums, I have found this:

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Originally Posted by Marcus Camillus

...here is the order I would recommend installing in to use the Metro&Naval Mod for RTR Platinum.
1. Install RTW and patch it to v1.5.
2. Install the RTR Platinum Final Beta full installer.
3. Add the files of the "Corrected_RTR_Platinum_Files_v2.0.zip".
4. Install Shos' latest Updated EDU file.
5. Install the "Metro&Naval Mod for RTR Platinum".

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Quote is from:
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...=18768&st=140#

The Corrected_RTR_Platinum_Files_v2.0.zip, last edited 19th May, can be downloaded from:
http://www.beaglepc.net/storage/rome...Files_v2.0.zip

Shos’s EDU file, last updatd 21 May can be found at:
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...e=post&id=5603

Both are discussed on page 7 of:
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...=18768&st=120#

Marcus may consolidate 3 & 4 into a single 2.1.zip. But that's not a substantive change. He will be going on vacation soon, so perhaps there will be no further changes apart from anything done to the EDU by Shos and Shanky. However, changes to the EDU are rather easy to patch.

It is rather awkward to have step (5) after (3) and (4), as it means that those of us who have already installed the Metro&Naval mod have to unpick this step. However, this is only really an immediate issue for the First Consul.

I'm not clear why (5) comes after (4) - does Metro&Naval mod not have its own EDU?

If DDW confirms Marcus's information, I will put it and the links on post#2 of this thread.

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Originally Posted by econ21

I think I've worked out the mechanics for Senate voting.

I'll post two seperate polls, each in their own thread. They will both be public, so I can check if the voters really are senators and I can take influence into account.

For the motions votes, I will just list every motion and allow multiple votes. Then you can vote yes to as many motions as you want.

I'll post the First Consul voting thread when avatars are confirmed 6pm tonight (henceforth all my times can be taken to be UK ones) and the motions 6pm tomorrow. I'll get them to be open for 3 and 2 days after opening (ie Friday), but will count the votes a little early on 6pm Friday, so the First Consul can start play Friday night if they want to.

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I don't mean to try and dictate Org policy, but perhaps it would be best to create a sub-forum for The Will of the Senate. I agree that using seperate voting threads will be the easiest to track votes (though I think all discussion should remain in the original thread). However, we're already in danger of overhwelming the Throne Room with Senate material. Too much more and we'll drown this place and start to lose track of our own threads as well. Is a sub-forum a possibility?

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Originally Posted by TinCow

Is a sub-forum a possibility?

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Given that I now have moderator powers here, I don't think a sub-forum will be necessary. We now have four "permanent" threads for this PBM: - two interactive ones - this one and the Senate deliberations thread; and two "reference" ones - the Senate library and the First Consul reports. I don't think this is too much, given that the forum page is not even full when displayed with the default "show posts made in the last 2 weeks".

I am going to create two temporary poll threads for voting - one for the first First Consul; one for all motions submitted this session. No one need post in them - just choose your polls options. After Friday, the threads will be irrelevant. As we have more and more sessions, to avoid such temporary threads cluttering up the forum, I will "age" them, so they slip off the front page.

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Originally Posted by econ21

It is rather awkward to have step (5) after (3) and (4), as it means that those of us who have already installed the Metro&Naval mod have to unpick this step. However, this is only really an immediate issue for the First Consul.

I'm not clear why (5) comes after (4) - does Metro&Naval mod not have its own EDU?

If DDW confirms Marcus's information, I will put it and the links on post#2 of this thread.

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I looked into it last night, and will make a definite post late this evening, a bit early due to popular demand. I suspect the order of 3-5 is not relevant and can be modified and 3 and 4 be done at a later time. Nevertheless, I advise everyone to keep backups of a Vanilla RTW 1.5 edition and the mods. I will look into this later, but I'm at work at the moment :)

Out of Character post:

I propose having an EB Romani campaign just like this when the full version is released. :2thumbsup:

Who's with me?

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Originally Posted by Tiberius

I propose having an EB Romani campaign just like this when the full version is released. :2thumbsup:

Who's with me?

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Absolutely! EB is my favorite mod, but I have held off starting a PBM with it because it is still terribly unstable on my computer - it crashes so often, I've stopped playing it. If the port to 1.5 fixes that problem, then it would make a great PBM. I'd be inclined to let this campaign play out first, though, so we could learn lessons and not dissipate people's energies.

All that said though, I've been impressed with what I have seen of this mod. As TinCow noted, the scripting of Roman leadership traits by Marcus Camillus is lovely for role-playing. Also, just loading it up and fighting a battle, I noticed that the Roman rank and file infantry in RTR are much prettier than their Camillan equivalents in EB (this is not a comment on the modders abilities, just on the actual uniforms of the troops).

Wow. I'm offline for, what, 24 hours, and look at the discussions I've missed! :dizzy2: I just spent half an hour reading the two main threads. :book2:

Anyway...

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Originally Posted by econ21

If this were MTW or M2TW then Princesses would be suitable avatars for the Upper House. But one problem with Rome is that the daughter does not have a representation on the map. Tricky_Lady may prefer a conventional Senator, as then he will have more to do e.g. be a governor. But if she wants a daughter, I am happy to oblige. If so, she should have a veto over suitors. I might even let her control the husband - some wives do that :ballchain:

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As you mentioned HBO's Rome series, it would be great if I could play a "Servilia" or "Atia" who's controlling a puppet senator. So I'd get a female avatar (just the standard "wife" avatar will do for me, it's not that important), but it will be linked to a male senator, who will speak for me. :whip: Lol, sounds like fun.

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Originally Posted by Tiberius

Out of Character post:

I propose having an EB Romani campaign just like this when the full version is released. :2thumbsup:

Who's with me?

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Tempting, but EB still needs a lot of work, amazing as it is already.

Of course, you could always go one step further, and be one of those little aliens in a robot in the form of a human, like in MIB. Or would that be going too far?

DDW: that's why I said after it's finished :2thumbsup:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Tiberius

Out of Character post:

I propose having an EB Romani campaign just like this when the full version is released. :2thumbsup:

Who's with me?

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Aye Carumba! Give us chance man, we've not even started this one yet! :dizzy2: Hopefully the fact that everyone continues to have an input will enable this PBEM to maintain its momentum into the late game.

I've played a few turns of the mod, and have been impressed by the professionalism of it. Fought a battle and after playing vanilla RTW for 6 months it....seemed.....so.....slow :laugh4: I'm there drumming my fingers whilst waiting for surrounded hoplites to die. Guess I'll have to get used to no more insta-routs ~:)

I'm planning to do this over the summer holidays, when I actually have time. No problem with planning ahead though, is there? :tongue:

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Originally Posted by Mount Suribachi

I've played a few turns of the mod, and have been impressed by the professionalism of it. Fought a battle and after playing vanilla RTW for 6 months it....seemed.....so.....slow :laugh4: I'm there drumming my fingers whilst waiting for surrounded hoplites to die. Guess I'll have to get used to no more insta-routs ~:)

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There is a problem with morale being way too high for everyone. The last minute fixes I will explain later on reduce moral for everyone by 25 % and give a more realistic battle. Still, hoplites are not know for giving in quickly, we're not talking gaul swordsmen here :)

Personally I don't find the morale too high, in fact the RTR is more enjoyable, getting to kill more without actually having to have masses of light cav for chasing purposes.

Anyway, if two pila volleys can rout a unit, it's not actually that much higher morale-wise.

Tricky_Lady: ok, I will assign you Marcella, who is 18. I am not sure how she is related to the rest of the family tree, as - like Quintus - she has no family name.

She will pretty quickly get an offer of marriage and the family member she weds can be your avatar by proxy. On reflection, I think giving you right of refusal may slow things down too much, so this will have to be an arranged marriage. However, you can let the First Consul know the desirable attributes you will look for in a match and what things you would like to veto - ie age, stats, traits etc.

Mount: morale is about the only quibble I have with RTR. IIRC a unit of hastati has a morale of about 6 in RTW, 13 in EB and 24 in RTR Gold. Shos's EDU file I posted earlier cuts it down to 18 or so, 25% as DDW said. I think the implication is that breaking the enemy's morale is even more important - try to go for the flanks, prepare the ground with missiles, threaten with cavalry etc. Total War has lots of pretty big morale modifiers hidden under the engine - you need to bring them into play. Just fight a frontal stand-up battle and the enemy can often fight to almost the last man - taking a lot of yours with them. Given that we have a no retraining rule, a couple of big battles can wreck your army (we'll need a fairly constant chain of replacements to top up depleted units regardless).

As promised, here are the final instructions. This has been tested by me and seems to work fine.

For the people that have already installed metronaval mod (step 4) :
After reviewing the files I'd say it is possible to do step 3 after step 5, but then I would like someone who does that to send me the final resulting files that are included in 3. So what you end up with after step 7. Then I can compare them with what I have and see if everything is correct, and otherwise send you the correct files. If this is unclear let me know and I'll go into excruciating detail.

Step 3 : the Corrected_RTR_Platinum_Files are just what they say.
Step 5 : The update of the metronaval mod includes Marcus his 4PTY mod 1.9.1. which is especially compatible with metonaval mod.
Step 6 : Shos latest EDU for RTRPE with Metro&Naval Mod contains various essential fixes.
Step 7 : It fix solves the problem that the ptolemaic empire gets wasted by Carthage while its fighting the Seleucids. No more crossing the endless desert of Libya.
There are more fixes and tweaks, but none I considered absolutely vital. This seems like the best setup as of 24/05/2006 00:56. I do not own BI and so this has only been tested for RTW1.5 !

RTR Platinum Edition install instructions
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...howtopic=19705

1. Prior to installing Rome Total Realism Platinum, you will need a fresh install of Vanilla RTW(v1.0).
Download and patch RTW to the following patch versions, in the order listed.
a. RTW v1.2 patch (this is probably unnecessary, but do it anyway)
b. RTW v1.3 patch
c. RTW v1.5 patch

! Test if it still works, and if so make a backup !
! And for the sake of the gods save all your mod files so you can recreate this install later !

2. Download the full installer v1.0 and install it to your fresh RTW directory.
RTR Platinum Edition 1.0 (=BETA 1.4)
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...howtopic=19682

Included in this mod are :
Darth Vader (DarthFormations: added to patch_v0.3.rar)
Archer (SkyMod: included in beta 1.0)
SignifierOne (Animations pack v0.8, without which it would have taken much longer to make this)

3. Install the Corrected_RTR_Platinum_Files_v2.0.zip
Files belong in \Data
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...c=18768&st=120

4. Install METROPOLIS & NAVALMOD by Snake_IV
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...pic=20000&st=0

5. Install Update1 for METROPOLIS & NAVALMOD by Snake_IV
Unzip these files and add them MANUALLY in \Data
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...pic=20000&st=0

6. Shos latest EDU for RTRPE with Metro&Naval Mod
Install this in \Data
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...c=18768&st=120

7. parthia/bactria landblock + africa landblock
Install this in \Data\world\maps\base
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...c=18768&st=140

8. Delete map.rwm from
c:\Rome - Total War\data\world\maps\base
c:\Rome - Total War\data\world\maps\campaign\base
c:\Rome - Total War\data\world\maps\campaign\imperial_campaign

CRITICAL WARNING FOR ALL PLAYERS !!!
As you load the game, wait for the advisor to pop up (you do not need to have advice on, it will show up anyway). Click on the show-me-how button to activate the 4TPY mod. If you forget to do this, you will probably mess up the savegame and at the very least mess up the 4PTY mod. Now you can start playing. You need to do this EVERY TIME you load or start a game.

9. Now get out there and kick some ass !

I've earned a beer, me thinks...

With regards to Tricky Lady, how should I represent her in the Biography? Clearly we cannot assign her future husband to another player and her 'influence' will be via manipulating the man. As such, would it be appropriate for me to simply include the husband's biography with an additional note that gossip in Rome indicates that it is really Marcella who wears the... toga... in the family?

Yes, unless she indicates otherwise, I would present Tricky_Lady's soon-to-be husband and Senator as the public face of her character, but note the rumours.

On other business, now that some of us have avatars assigned, I think it would be good if we could use their Roman names in deliberations in the senate, e.g. "Quintus (econ21)" for clarity. There was also the idea of changing user titles to have your PBM avatar's name, so people can remember who you are roleplaying - I will put Quintus in quotation marks as my user title. If you can find your avatars picture, you can use that too although you don't have to - I won't as Org convention dictates mods keep their robes.

I can't find Sextus Antio's avatar.

It should be under Roman_Dips.

econ, don't you mean rags?

I've looked, but strangely Roman_Dips is not there.

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Originally Posted by Ignoramus

I've looked, but strangely Roman_Dips is not there.

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It's there - go to "show avatars", press the rightside arrow and RTW_Roman_Dip is one screne you can select.

I think you want: Roman Diplomat000

Ach, I need 600 posts.

Start visiting the Entrance Hall and Frontroom. Also post in the forum games. Rome must have a civilised diplomat!

I must have been having premonitions by sorting out all the technical stuff yesterday, as today I will not be home before midnight due to overwork. Luckily I have tomorrow off and then I will continue my political campaign with a vengeance :)
It's not possible to upload an avatar is it ? I suspect posting 600 'Hello World' posts will get me banned :)
I conquered Corfinium yesterday with just 41 casualties, just getting in a bit of practice. The AI played pretty well, retreating back to he square with his last two spearmen units. If not for that, I'd probably have gotten him with under 20 casualties. I really have to get used to playing large size again, I keep wondering where the rest of my troops are. At least I will not have the problem with overflow at the bottom of the siege towers.
When I look at the posts I feel most people do not understand how vulnerable you are with 1.5 and metronaval. Most of your cities do not have walls and the AI WILL make naval invasions. It is quite capable of blitzing half you cities while your troops are fighting over the border. Last trial camapign I played, the greeks managed to slip past my armies and take Ancona. And while I was hanging out near Tarentum, Carthage managed to blitz the west coast and I only caught up with right next to Rome itself.
Well, I hope I have not been too off topic. Back to work.

I will raise the issue of avatars with the admins, but I'm not hopeful. People can be rather petty and I suspect they won't want to field queries of "how come he gets to have a cool avatar with only 25 posts" or whatever.

Ignoramus asked me about what units we can recruit, so I posted a few notes on our unit stats in RTR in the Senate library. I may update it with the stats of our enemies (e.g. the Greeks) over time.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Death the destroyer of worlds

...people do not understand how vulnerable you are with 1.5 and metronaval. Most of your cities do not have walls and the AI WILL make naval invasions. It is quite capable of blitzing half you cities while your troops are fighting over the border.

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This sounds excellent! To be honest, many folk complain how easy Roma is in RTR Gold, so it will be good if we have to keep on our toes in this mod.

Displaying a given Avatar doesn’t worry me by the way, we’ll just deal with it. As long as we remember to use our Avatar’s given name in our In Character postings (I can’t yet, haven’t got one).

As to the vulnerability – I’m playing purely to Character….as a archetypal, scheming, arrogant, Roman senator of the Upper House…..as such I couldn’t even consider that the greatness that is Rome could be vulnerable, even if I could consider such an ignoble act as a marine landing!

…..landing troops by ship! Unheard of! :laugh4:

This is an intersting post about what playing with (almost) the same config is like :
http://forums.rometotalrealism.org/i...howtopic=20310

I've been wondering about the mechanics of a mid-term session of the Senate. Given how well the current session is going, I definitely want to insist that we have a compulsory mid-term one.

However, I don't want it to slow down the campaign unduly. So I am wondering about:
(a) after 10 turns of play, the First Consul suspends play;
(b) before that, he gives two days advance notice of when his mid-term report will be submitted;
(c) as soon as the report is posted, the Senate will open for one day (24 hours) for the tabling of emergency motions;
and (d) it will remain open for another one day (24 hours) for voting on those emergency motions.

So basically, the incumbent will only have to take a 48 hours "time-out" from the game. That seems to strike a reasonable balance between the need to keep momentum going and giving the Senate a (small) window to intervene in the reign.

I don't want to put this to a vote, Senate-style, but would welcome reactions and hope we can come to a consensus.

I should also say that the Senate will always remain open for debate, but to avoid over-legislating, I want to restrict the tabling of motions to interregnums but with the safety valve of emergency motions in mid-term.

I was also wondering about some kind of "opinion poll" option, to rate the First Consul's performance in the first term. But on balance, I think that would be out of character for the Senate (too much like modern day opinion poll dominated politics) and anyway Senators can always propose motions of acclaim or censure if they want to.

PS: The admins initial response over Org avatars was encouraging - I'll keep you posted.

I was going to write it thought it was a bad idea, but halfway through I decided it was a pretty good idea actually. I'm with you. 24 hours is not much, but the debate should have been continuous since day one, so more time isn't necessary/

Also remember that the senate may dismiss the consul if they wish and appoint a new one.

I do think that it may be a good idea that the consul should post a screenshot every four turns (1 year) to show the current state of the empire. Its boundaries and the locations of its armies. This would not require any commenting by the consul though he can if he wishes. Just a single screenshot to show the current state of affairs. It will also help the senators to prepare for the midterm session.

If not this then the screenshot should be posted in his two day warning post. Again to give the senators time to think and prepare.

By the way, how many senators are there?

Some interesting ideas - I like the idea of posting screenshots. I'm expecting reports every two days of real life, so including a screenshot in them would be nice.

I'm starting to cool off on the 2 day advance warning thing - the problem is that, with the possibility of other players fighting some battles, the incumbent can't actually control or predict how long it will take to play his reign. It depends on how quickly other senators answer the call if their avatars get into a fight. So a 2 day warning just means adding an extra 2 day hiatus in the middle of a reign.

Instead, how about:
(a) report every 2 days (minimum - one-liner; ideally a screenshot; everything else is icing on the cake)
(b) pauses after 10 turns & produces mid-term report (reasonably detailed)
(c) mid-term Session: two days for Senators to debate and draft emergency motions & one day voting
(d) player continues & we're back to (a)

Ideally, I'd be hoping a 20 year reign would span 2 weekends (with the incumbent trying to blast through 10 turns in each weekend), with a mid-term Senate imbetween.

Then we'd have a full Senate session lasting 5 weekdays, ending with a Friday election and on we go.

In the early game, we might be covering 5 years every two weeks.

Is that an acceptable pace?

I think it's actually the full Senate sessions - rather than the mid-terms - that will slow things down. But a slower pace is a price worth paying to get all 19 of us Senators involved in this PBM at the same time.

That's a fine pace, although I'm not certain we can always do 10 turns over 2 days. While certainly possible to do normally, battles by lower house members other than the consul would slow things down. If the consul and the senator involved in battle are both online and can play when the battles occur, then the delay would be minimal. But we have people from all sorts of different timezones, and if a battle came up at a bad time, it could delay things by several hours. I can see delays of more than 12 hours in really unlucky cases. And then if there are several battles, it might take a while to get through them.

Of course, that's not really a problem. But depending on what happens during a half-term, the time it takes to complete could vary wildly.

Oh, and by the way, there are 18 senators. There is an error in the senator list on the first page of the senate thread, where item 7 is missing.

I have a query

since were using the 4 turn patch thing, would the consul still have 20 turns, 5 years? or do we want him to have 10 years as was the original plan?

Quote:

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Originally Posted by FLYdude

That's a fine pace, although I'm not certain we can always do 10 turns over 2 days. While certainly possible to do normally, battles by lower house members other than the consul would slow things down.

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Yes, it's going to be a challenge. We've never tried anything like this before. It could make the experience really fun for those directly involved. Or it could really bog things down. Fingers crossed.

Quote:

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Oh, and by the way, there are 18 senators. There is an error in the senator list on the first page of the senate thread, where item 7 is missing.

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OK, I'll send the Senate Speaker to shout at the scribes. :laugh4:

Just a request. Could we change all the maps in the library to thumbnail links? They are large and a pain to have to continually scroll through and at this point the majority are not entirely necessary.

Also something ive jsut noticed. It is entirely possible that motions 6, 7, and 8 are all voted no. I assume that if this happened then the ruling would stand and the consul could deal as he pleases with the provinces in question. But it may be pertinent to decide whether or not if this were to happen there will be a runoff vote between the two motions with the highest approval (or the lowest disapproval). I believe there would be time if we decided to.

BTW, does anyone know anything about Quintus? Tiberius said he was just "some randomer". So is he fictitious? DDW wondered about role-playing him as the father of the faction, but the ages look wrong. I'd prefer it if he were just leader of the Senate and we let the 4 houses[1] grow up organically and independently.

[1] ie the parts of the family tree headed by the 3 other adult faction members + I guess the house TrickyLady's character will soon start.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Glaucus

I have a query

since were using the 4 turn patch thing, would the consul still have 20 turns, 5 years? or do we want him to have 10 years as was the original plan?

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No, it's 5 years - 20 turns. 20 turns is usually long enough for anyone to handle - especially mid to end game, when you might have 3-4 battles a turn.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by econ21

BTW, does anyone know anything about Quintus? Tiberius said he was just "some randomer". So is he fictitious? DDW wondered about role-playing him as the father of the faction, but the ages look wrong. I'd prefer it if he were just leader of the Senate and we let the 4 houses[1] grow up organically and independently.

[1] ie the parts of the family tree headed by the 3 other adult faction members + I guess the house TrickyLady's character will soon start.

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Id say this is the best bet. I think itd be rather odd otherwise.

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Originally Posted by shifty157

Just a request. Could we change all the maps in the library to thumbnail links? They are large and a pain to have to continually scroll through and at this point the majority are not entirely necessary.

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Done. I would actually like to arrange the thumbnails in a table somewhat in accordance to their positions on a map. This would spread them out horizontally as well and further decrease the scrolling, but I don't know how to do tables in here.

Thank you very much. Its much better.

No i dont think tables are possible in the forums. How you have them now is fine though.

Thanks to therother, I just found out how to do tables here. There's a tag for them, just like for quotes etc.

For the gory details, look at the end of the FAQ in the entrance hall. It is all explained in a link to a post by Tosa.

For example to create:

I typed:
{table=1 2 2}3^A|B|C
7^econ21|TinCow|shifty157
7^4|5|6
{/table}

but using [ and ] instead of { and }

Holy crap that works well. Check it out; it's not perfect due to screenshot alignment, but I think it looks decent and takes up almost no room.

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...93&postcount=2