Marian Reforms

**m4rt14n** · 02-09-2005, 09:04

Sometimes I want my old uber legions back....

ah well. They should at least come up with different time periods. I hate to wait until 220 BC to do some serious ass kicking.

Anyone finds that Britain is now impossible to beat with auto-solving? I had to lead all my battles now as the Scipii to gain any of their cities... even with 10:1 advantage and on M/M.

**Octavius Julius** · 02-09-2005, 11:03

I think the idea of building an imperial palace to trigger a Marian reform is stupid. In reality, the Marian reforms happened about 100 bc.

I think the trigger should be that if one of your family (or other Roman family) is called Marius, and he has won a few "epic" battles, then there should be a Marian reform. What's the point having a Marian reform if you have a huge temple?

**Kaldhore** · 02-09-2005, 13:03

Maybe it was in the halls a a huge temple or walking the corridors of the imperial palace that he found the inspiration (or the courage) to propose the changes.....

**Sinner** · 02-09-2005, 14:52

Octavius, judging by a commented out entry in the events file it seems that the original intention was that the Reforms would be date triggered, just like the plagues in Macedon, etc.

I would presume that playtesting showed that campaigns were often being finished long before the required trigger date, so they had to come up with a new idea, one that would allow the player to experience the benefits of the reform without being too easy to acquire.

Unfortunately - or fortunately, depending upon your point of view - the use of the Imperial Palace as the trigger is open to what some might consider abuse of the spirit of the game. I've read strategies that will boost the population of a city to the required 24000 in just 8 or 9 turns as an extreme example.

The idea of linking the reforms to battle results is a good one

. I wouldn't require it to be a leader with the surname of Marius, but any that had achieved a certain status, whether it be number of heroic victories, epic battles and/or command stars. Personally, I think it'd be a nice touch to see the Reforms event crediting your general after some massive victory, I'd find it would really add to the immersion factor.

While I like the post-patch method of limiting the reforms to being triggered only at an Italian city, I would have prefered to have the earliest date configurable rather than being fixed at 220BC. Extending that, I would have added a latest date as well, which forces the event even if the Romans haven't been able to build an Imperial Palace, and perhaps even being able to set what building or buildings are the trigger, including allowing none at all so that only the date has an effect.

Unfortunately, the game is written and we won't be seeing anymore changes. The expansion will likely concentrate on the new setting, presumably long after the historical reforms, so we'll just have to play with what we've got.

**Akka** · 02-09-2005, 15:25

The date is NOT fixed at 220 BC. I had my Marius reform some years later. It's most probably fixed at a certain event, with 220 BC being the SOONEST it can happens.

**Sinner** · 02-09-2005, 15:33

Umm, that's why I said 'earliest date'. Post-patch the requirements for the reforms are to build an Imperial Palace in an Italian, with the date 220BC or later. So the earliest allowable date is 220BC, and it is fixed since we cannot mod that date.