Why can't Pontus construct roads!?

[We all need someone]

There's no substantial evidence that poor, lower class grunts were ever promoted to the rank of Centurion. More often they were middle class people, or upper middle class, which seems to make sense, considering these people could have afforded some education, thereby being better able to grasp tactics, discuss tactics with superiors before battles, and display said tactics to their men.
So despite the common image, in reality they were much more like the junior officers than sergeants, in their role and their background.

[QwertyMIDX]

There's no substantial evidence that poor, lower class grunts were ever promoted to the rank of Centurion. More often they were middle class people, or upper middle class, which seems to make sense, considering these people could have afforded some education, thereby being better able to grasp tactics, discuss tactics with superiors before battles, and display said tactics to their men.

Well during at least half of EB's time period there were no really poor people in the legion anyway. Until the Late Republic you had to moderatly well off to serve in the army. So thus 'the grunts' of the legion were during that period not members of the lower class. In the Late Republic they started being enrolled in the legions (even before Marius qualifications had been getting lower and lower) and at that point they could indeed advance to the rank of Centurion, but as Wig notes not the offices such as Military Tribune, which is an office rather just a rank.

As Wig notes any citizen could become Consul, and sometimes men who began in modest circumstances eventually became consul, but they had to break into the ranks of the elite first. Joe Roman yeoman farmer couldn't expect to just decide one day to run for consul and win

[nikolai1962]

Most of history generals were generals because of influence not command talent.

My favourite roman house rule is to make my consuls the guys with the most influence despite how crap they are as generals. I can't wait to try this out when EB is all down and i finally play my fave faction instead of the ones as far way from rome as possible :)

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

Actually that makes me think. Roman Command stars should probably add influence at higher levels. Infact since the Romans lived such public lives and were so judgemental almost every Roman trait should have an effect on influence.

[We all need someone]

Guys, guys, guys I know all about what you're holding my hand through. However, I know the common conception if that the Centurions were "promoted upwards", and there were no barriers (technically) to that happening. There's just such a lack of any solid evidence of such things happening(and Centurions were fairly well documented, since their commanders treasured them so well) and on closer inspection the overwhelming majority of Centurions were middle to upper middle class people, for the reasons I've already mentioned, and for the reasons you boys have mentioned(aka any post in Roman Republic required relatively vast sums of money to acquire).

[GodEmperorLeto]

Actually, it was possible for "general infantry" legionnaires to get promoted to generalships. But those generalships were political appointments. But to get political appointments, one often needed a military record.

For example, Plutarch records numerous men from our time period as having served as young men in the ranks, like Cato the Elder, and Coriolanus (alright, he predates our time period, but still). When running for office, Romans wore a plain white (no stripe) toga and no tunic, for multiple reasons, among them to display scars earned in battle.

[Dayve]

But why can't Pontus build paved roads? Game accident, they should be in? Or did the Pontic people never build anything more than dirt tracks?

[QwertyMIDX]

If I remember correctly, Plutarch never says Cato actually fought as a common soldier. in fact I think the mentions that Cato was remarkable for only bring one servant with him. Also Plutarch says his great-grandfather lost 5 horses out from under him, so at that time at least Cato's family was of the equestrian class. He was certainly humble for a Roman aristocrat, but he does seem to have been at least a backcountry elite of some sort, having the renowned Manius Curius as patron. Poor and common relative to the great aristocratic families of Rome, but not a yeoman.

[We all need someone]

Guys, guys, guys I know all about what you're holding my hand through. However, I know the common conception is that the Centurions were "promoted upwards", and there were no barriers (technically) to that happening. There's just such a lack of any solid evidence of such things happening(and Centurions were fairly well documented, since their commanders treasured them so well) and on closer inspection the overwhelming majority of Centurions were middle to upper middle class people, for the reasons I've already mentioned, and for the reasons you boys have mentioned(aka any post in Roman Republic required relatively vast sums of money to acquire).