rome total war should be nicknamed siege total war.

sieges in rome total war become boring rather fast. once you figure out the layout of the towns they are all the same. once you figure a basic pattern they aren't dangerous like assaulting medieval total war castles.

in rome assaulting stone wall cities:
1- build 2 siege towers for the assault
2- in the setup pick a wall tower object of your assault one or two towers from the gate, clockwise from the objective gate. this is so if they have archers up on the gate they aren't hitting the siege towers and the 2 units pushing the siege towers
3- let the siege towers attack either side of the object wall tower
4- run the two units back counterclockwise on the wall to kill any units near the gate
5- with the gate secure run one of the units on the wall counterclockwise around the wall top about 1/4 the city circuit to capture all towers that can shoot up the main army.
6- march the rest of the army thru the gate and march counterclockwise 1/4 or so the circuit of the city to the street going to the city center and then take the city center

boring........

once you learn how to win sieges you have mastered 3/4 of the game as field battles are rarely big and decisive.

in medieval total war most of my battles are field battles and are often decisive.