Really need help in the game!!!

[ReluctantSamurai]

Culture penalty is mostly hard-coded. The greater the difference between your culture and the one you're fighting (Romans vs. an Eastern faction, as an example) the greater the penalty. A small amount of that can be alleviated by building temples from your culture, and new buildings and upgrades to existing ones help lessen the difference. But you cannot completely get rid of it. That's why I stress law & order temples when faced with a growing distance-to-capital, and inherent culture penalties. As long as you get to ZPG, you will not have any rebellion problems from even a vastly different culture.

The amount of fleets needed is quite variable. As a barbarian faction, I never build a single boat other than what may be required to shorten troop transport distances. Since fleet battles are auto-resolved, you obviously cannot fight them yourself. Sea battles are another area in RTW where the designers chose to ignore all basic rules-of-engagement that have been used since the Avalon Hill & SSI board games days. It's frustrating to attack a fleet loaded with army, only to have it retreat in the direction it was headed anyways, and right through all ZOC's (Zones of Control).

Winning control of the seas is another reason for building shipyards and dockyards as soon as you can afford them. If your ships are larger, you stand a better chance of winning. Early on, when my enemies fleet sizes are quite large, I attack with multiple fleets from different directions, trying to isolate one fleet at a time. This usually results in victory and a follow-up attack will further reduce the enemy fleet size. Try to surround an isolated enemy fleet. If you can catch one up against a land mass, it won't require as many ships as having to place a ship at all eight points of the compass in the open sea. If you win, the fleet has nowhere to retreat and is destroyed, no matter how many ships are left in it.

Also, if you get an armory in a port city, immediately upgrade the armor rating on all of your ships. This will give you an advantage in battles. The Scipii get two types of quinquireme not available to any other faction...the Corvus, and the coolest-looking, and deadliest quinquireme in the game...the Decere. Playing with those two dreadnoughts is the only reason I ever play the Scipii.

Getting the Corvus requires an awesome Temple of Neptune, and the Decere requires the Neptune temple at pantheon level. Both are worth the expense, as they capable of sinking other ships outright. With gold armor upgrades from the Vulcan temple, and a pile of experience chevrons, they are unstoppable. The Temple of Neptune has the added possibility of giving one of your admirals the Priest of Neptune ancillary which grants 2 command stars. I have, on occasion, gotten the Shipwright, Seamaster, and Priest of Neptune for a new admiral, giving him 5 command stars!

In any case, armor up, and gang up on enemy fleets. Good luck, admiral

[TosaInu]

I sometimes recruit peasants in fast growing cities and migrate them to small cities, there I disband them. This keeps fast growing cities smaller and accelerates development (1st population raise) in the small cities. The downside is that it costs some money.

[Morgoth101]

I usually do that peasant disband thing for cities which grow really slow(or, at least they grow very slow in my game) like Salona or Segestica. This also helps reduce population in overly populated cities like Carthage and Syracuse, from where I get the peasants. I board 20 units of peasants on a fleet, sail around to cities where I need more population, disembark the peasants, and disband them once they are in the city.

Once again, thanks TosaInu, ReluctantSamurai, and Lord Reid of Britannica! I didn't expect the thread to come this far! I think you guys have cleared all my questions in this awesome game!