State of the Game

[Slaists]

Run of the mill Roman campaign. Normal no less, haha

OK, I won't post a screen of my legendary Junia campaign (started in version 13.1, vanilla): there's plenty of green around me. Usually, I don't pay (much) for diplo agreements. Just pick opportune moments when the faction is more likely to be agreeable (beaten up by some other faction, you just killed captives of an enemy of theirs, etc.)

Anyway, Junia are meant to be a difficult faction play with diplomatically. Junia and the other one like them is Barcids for Carthage.

As to "grains of wisdom": starting with a NAP is usually the way I go. Also, watch out for friends of the faction you are interested in. Often it is easier to secure some agreements with remote "friends" which in due course improves relations with the target for "having agreements with x".

Another trick is to break an agreement with an enemy of the target (if it suits your situation). You'll get a bonus with the target "for breaking an agreement with x".

Agent actions on enemies of the target frequently work wonders too. So does raiding.

Being steadfast in diplomatic reliability is important too. Much harder to secure anything even one notch below that (on very hard, legendary difficulty at least).

Example form my Junia campaign: Volcae, and Massilia start red with Junia. By the time my armies got to Cisalpine Gaul, Arverni had crept in there already. Arverni were at war with Massilia. The latter allied with Volcae.

Joining Massilia in their war against Arverni secured me trade, nap and eventually a defensive alliance. Meanwhile, having all those arrangements with Massilia made Volcae like me (a lot). Carrying out further hostilities against Arverni raised Volcae opinion of Junia to an extent that they also agreed to trade, nap, military access and DA (in that order).

No money paid for any of that, just grabbed Mediolanum from Arverni and beat up their militia armies a few times while killing captives.