Mini Guide: Getting started with Rome II

[zizzurry]

"Prepare for civil war from the senate loyalists by destroying the military buildings in the capital to prevent them from having elite units, and keep an army or two stationed nearby to keep them from taking too many regions."

I see in other forum this... Is that true?!... My military buildings are in Magna Grecia, I do not building any of these in Rome. So, when civil war erupts (in Rome???), I'll need to destroy my miitary buildings to have a weakness senate armie?...

[Monthar]

Thanks for the reply.

After starting over a few more times I finally managed to get the finances under control. It seems to work better with Julia instead of Junia, because it's easier to get trade routes with a lot more civs.

I have a few more questions.
1) Do ya'll try to complete all the objectives for each chapter mission for the bonus cash from them?
2) Is it better to ignore the most of the bonus objectives and just complete the main chapter mission? In other words, will I make more money from just conquering my way across the globe taking the provinces I want and expanding my armies as I go instead of trying to complete all the objectives first?
3)After reading some other threads I've started just razing every settlement after taking out the Etruscan League (I occupied theirs because they already had roman buildings). Do ya'll do this too, or are there times where it's better to occupy? Is there ever a good reason to loot a settlement since it just damages all the buildings, but doesn't give enough cash to pay for the repairs/conversions, has the highest unrest from the initial, overtime and all the added slaves?
4) Is there really any point to having fleets with more than just the admiral and maybe a unit or two set to patrol?

[Bad213Boy]

These province builds are busts. I don't know what you've done, but I'm pretty sure you've confused yourself with some of the training and workshop buildings having -10 PO and -10 food. If you move your Workshop buildings to new province all together, this will work then. You can't have all barracks, 2 training, and 2 workshops in one province. No matter how you do, it's impossible.

[Myth]

These province builds are busts. I don't know what you've done, but I'm pretty sure you've confused yourself with some of the training and workshop buildings having -10 PO and -10 food. If you move your Workshop buildings to new province all together, this will work then. You can't have all barracks, 2 training, and 2 workshops in one province. No matter how you do, it's impossible.

Sure you can. Two training fields in the capital. One barracks and one aux camp in two minors. Two workshops in two minors. Minors get 2 slots each. Having 3 minors means you get 6 slots, so you have 2 to spare for temples.

The numbers were tweaked in the patches, I might have to do a revision again.

[AntiDamascus]

Is this still considered up to date?

[Stuie]

Is this still considered up to date?

You can't 10-turn-rush to Cohort Organization any more because it is much later in the tech tree. The rest of it still holds true for the most part I believe. Even without a rush to legionaires, you should be able to steamroll Carthage with a mix of Hastati/Principes/Triarii/Equites/Velites... I like 5/5/3/2/4 plus your general; nice balanced somewhat historic army.

[Myth]

You can't 10-turn-rush to Cohort Organization any more because it is much later in the tech tree. The rest of it still holds true for the most part I believe. Even without a rush to legionaires, you should be able to steamroll Carthage with a mix of Hastati/Principes/Triarii/Equites/Velites... I like 5/5/3/2/4 plus your general; nice balanced somewhat historic army.

I did it on patch 10. What changed?

[Bramborough]

Thanks for the reply.

After starting over a few more times I finally managed to get the finances under control. It seems to work better with Julia instead of Junia, because it's easier to get trade routes with a lot more civs.

I have a few more questions.
1) Do ya'll try to complete all the objectives for each chapter mission for the bonus cash from them?
2) Is it better to ignore the most of the bonus objectives and just complete the main chapter mission? In other words, will I make more money from just conquering my way across the globe taking the provinces I want and expanding my armies as I go instead of trying to complete all the objectives first?
3)After reading some other threads I've started just razing every settlement after taking out the Etruscan League (I occupied theirs because they already had roman buildings). Do ya'll do this too, or are there times where it's better to occupy? Is there ever a good reason to loot a settlement since it just damages all the buildings, but doesn't give enough cash to pay for the repairs/conversions, has the highest unrest from the initial, overtime and all the added slaves?
4) Is there really any point to having fleets with more than just the admiral and maybe a unit or two set to patrol?

- No, I very rarely complete all objectives for a given chapter. In fact, I only remember doing that once, and it was a pretty early milestone. For that matter, I don't really try to complete the main chapter objective either...it'll come eventually. I do, however, often look at the secondary objectives just to see what's easily attainable (say, building a few more ships that I probably would've eventually built anyway).

- I almost always occupy. Less of a P.O. hit than raze. And costs less money to dismantle/rebuild intact buildings than it does to repair/dismantle/rebuild damaged ones. And I strictly avoid looting...slave population is just more trouble than it's worth.

- I build several full-size fleets, but usually later in the game. Early on, yep, I just have the starting fleet (if the faction has one...most do) for exploration purposes. I sell superfluous units, leaving only the admiral flagship plus one extra. Then I send it cruising through the Med and Atlantic to discover factions (i.e., trade partners). The reason for the extra ship is that when the admiral dies, the fleet stays in being and you can just replace the admiral instead of having to build a new fleet at home. Pretty handy when the little fleet is up near Ireland or in the Baltic.

Later on, I find fleets very helpful. AI armies tend to go to sea a lot whether it really makes sense for them to do so or not. Having a few fleets helps to round 'em up and eliminate. In addition, fleets are quite capable of capturing coastal minor settlements on their own, without land army support.

[Monthar]

Sure Occupy is less of a PO hit initially, but in the long run Raze is less.

Occupy -25 initially and -10 -9 -8 -7 -6 -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 for a total hit of -80
Raze -50 initially and -5 -4 -3 -2 -1 for a total hit of -65

I can see the cost difference for converting some buildings, but if I have to completely dismantle a building to build something else in its place it'll cost the same as it would if I had just razed and not take the extra turn to dismantle before replacing. With Razing the city center and port are the only buildings the remain. All others are blank if the AI had built on them.