The imperial reforms were done after the empire was actually done, and for the explicit purpose of creating a "professional" force with standard armament that could fight any/all of Roma's enemies, with the aid of local auxilliaries (which were sometimes as many or even double the size of Romani professional trooops). The auxilliaries were mainly skirmishers/archers and deffinitely cavalry.Originally Posted by blacksnail
I said it before I will say it again, however many times I will have to. Imperial reforms and the soldiers that these will bring you are actually the MOST ACCURATE units that EB has, for the exact reason that they are the most documented. "Golden eras" tend to have a lot of people talking/writing about them, and Octavianus Augustus and Perikles had that thing in common. Too many things are known of their time, in contrast to previous or later ones.
I do believe they were "upped" up historically, as much as they could have been without distorting history. Any higher up, and you might as well give the Romani tanks and rockets, because Imperial units at the beginning of EB timeline, might have had guns and ammo. YES, they were that good! YES, they could fight any/all enemies of Roma at the time. And if you know them of one defeat at Teutoburg forest, then you forget 100 victories which aren't as well documented as their one defeat.
In fact, I must say that it isn't EB you should be worried about, (we really DON'T NEED the unit space that IMPERIAL REFORMS take), it is the fact that most people can't persevere long enough to have them. While I understand the "urge" to move on to another faction, put it plainly, if they can't wait for the Imperial reforms for the Romani, well people may very well not need them, BUT THAT DOESN'T CHANGE THE FACT THAT THEY ACTUALLY DID HAPPEN, WERE UBERCOOL, AND IF YOU CAN'T TAKE THE TIME TO HAVE THEM, THEN YOU PROBABLY NEEDN'T HAVE JOINED THE ROMANI.
Yes, I am mad, and I am one of those people who have spent a lot of time double/triple checking some trivial facts for many units, some of them you will not see. I understand firsthand the actual pain the Romani crew went to verify if the Pugio was 8.7 or 8.6 cm's long at the beginning of the Imperial time.
Some of you may consider me a UBER ROMANI FAN. I don't think so. In fact when I was younger I hated them with a passion, having seen first hand the amount of devastation that Epiros suffered in 167 BCE (In 3 different archaeological sites in Epeiros). 10 nuclear bombs would have left more survivors in Epiros then the Romani did. But that doesn't change the fact that they were the best army of their time. (And that was prior to Imperial reforms). Post them, they were basically invincible.
This is what the Imperial reforms are all about. Historically "cheating". Having some troops so good that you can basically throw them at anyone/anything and not worry. Is that bad? No, you persevered through Roarri and hastati for a long tome. Is it ahistorical? Hell no, this is JUST how it happened. Should it happen earlier? Well if it does, I think we at EB can give the Romani assault rifles and Cevlar because those two will have less of an influence on the Romani devellopment than Imperial legionnaires at 272 BCE.
Thanks for reading thus far.
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