Depiction of imperial reforms

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

But keeping the imperial reforms as they are seem to invalidate the statement of Lorica segmentata not being in the time frame... I mean it appeared more or less in time of the emperors (not widespread use of course) but still I find this argument incoherent with not implementing LS and then making the imperial happening so early. I do not agree they should be on the exact historical date. I much prefer the dynamic system.
But this is just something I'd like someone to explain...



Cheers...

Lorica Segmentata comes in just 23 years before our end date and doesn't become anywhere near widespread until around 25AD. By contrast the Imperial Reforms happened around 30 BC when Augustus emerged as the sole Roman ruler. Added to which, we consider the reforms to be a logical step in Rome's developement as a power which had a demonstratable effect on her society.

By contrast Lorica Segementata had no demonstatable effect on the performance of the Legions.

[blacksnail]

The consistent justification for adding LS is "but it looks kewl" rather than any actual historical basis. That, I'm sure, reinforces its complete absence from the mod.

[mAIOR]

I'm not saying it's because it's cool and franqly, I don't care if it's in or not...
I only stated that as Philipvs Vallindervs Calicvla said, the LS came 23 years afer the "imperial reforms" and the imperial reforms didn't strike until 30BC. So, if you can have them quite earlier, why the argument that LS wasn't introduced because the historical time-frame doesn't match doesn't that mean the Imperial reforms shoudn't happen as well (not in this time frame at least)?
THey were a tech development not as steep in it's changes in the legion as the reforms but it just buggs me.


Cheers...

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

How about because they would add nothing, barely feature in the time frame and the resulting unit woulf have lower armour than the current legionary?

[Geoffrey S]

The consistent justification for adding LS is "but it looks kewl" rather than any actual historical basis. That, I'm sure, reinforces its complete absence from the mod.

But to be honest, to me that exact same reasoning seems to be the basis of adding Imperial reforms to EB rather than cutting the game short by some fifty years to allow for a more accurate depiction of the first hundred years or so.

Most posts (not necessarily by team members, mind) argue that the units are now there, they look nice, they are a reward for the few Roman players who persist for that long, the most is known about them rather than "yet another barbarian tribe MIC, or yet another phalanx unit, or yet another random spear-unit or horse archer from the east"... but thus far, little in the way of justifying their inclusion on the basis of EBs design philosophy of a more equal depiction of all factions on the map, not just those about which the most is known.

The further into history we go, the more speculative the units become- with few exceptions. Therefore, we know that the units around 272-200 are bound to be the most accurate, while later on they are all 100% speculation. How can anyone know what kind of troops Carthage or Macedon would have fielded if they were around in 50 BC? If we knock off the legionaries, then by the 1st century AD, we're in TOTAL improvisation-land in terms of units. So lets keep the legionaries- the mod is about accuracy, so let's keep those units we know to be accurate (and cool) and speculate only when necessary.

Speculative, yes. But to a certain degree that is inevitable. No, there isn't as much evidence for equipment around the Baltic as for Imperial legionaires, but that in no way means the team shouldn't attempt to fill in the gaps in some way. Not depicting troops native to certain regions, certainly around the start date, is to me a greater crime than some speculation based on what little is actually known. Thus far I think a very good balance has been struck overall, this particular exception notwithstanding.

Note, I'm not proposing hypothetical units for factions who survive past their historical enddate as you implied, rather freeing up unit slots for areas which right now are less developed unitwise. Members of the team have mentioned previously that the tight limit is awkward, because it makes it difficult to represent all areas on the map as much as they would like: this implies that there is good evidence for other units, not pure speculation.

The fact that the EB team is reserving slots for factions for EB2 is promising, in my opinion.

[The_Mark]

Eventually the celtic reforms will become dynamic like the roman reforms (hopefully - I'll bring it up with Anthony), so time will be less of an issue.

Foot

Foot, see our reform scripting thread - they're all but done, no need to pester Anthony about them.

[Watchman]

...and the resulting unit woulf have lower armour than the current legionary?

I've a kind of hard time accepting that claim, unless it is in the context of crappy metallurgy or somesuch (which would seem somewhat odd given that they were starting to make wide use of good solid iron helmets around that time...). Overlapping lames were what replaced mail and lamellar and such in quite a few corners of the world a while later, after all...

[Imperator]

How about because they would add nothing, barely feature in the time frame and the resulting unit woulf have lower armour than the current legionary?

I've a kind of hard time accepting that claim, unless it is in the context of crappy metallurgy or somesuch (which would seem somewhat odd given that they were starting to make wide use of good solid iron helmets around that time...). Overlapping lames were what replaced mail and lamellar and such in quite a few corners of the world a while later, after all...

Uh-oh...I smell an all-out, no-holes-barred, no-quarter-given "Segmentata vs Hamata" arguement stewing!

[Geoffrey S]

Which is not the idea. Discussions on which armour is better can go get a room. I'm genuinely interested in the views among the EB team on this matter, as I can imagine opinions would be somewhat split.

[mAIOR]

So am I. Altough I agree with watchman on this.
But, like Geoffrey said. It'd be better to cut the game short and better represent some other factions than to have imperials. I just asked because it seems inconsistent. Doesn't it seem logical that if the reforms happened 100 years earlier the bases for further development would be there earlier??


Cheers...

[keravnos]

As I said before, the thought of losing absolutely correct, historical and well documented units, WITHIN our timeline is dead wrong. I am totally against it, and this is my own, personal opinion.

If you want conquer the world with pedites extraordinarii, roarii and hastati Nobody stops you. Yet if you persevere you should be awarded with some of the best of the units ingame. Historically they also were too late. By the time they were introduced, most of the empire was already in place. That didn't stop them being introduced. Professional soldiers, standardized equipment and training, better weapons and armour, THE WORKS. How could we miss that? And this, especially for a mod that takes pride in the research done (and still continues) on its Romani, well, it would be a major fault.

[Philippus Flavius Homovallumus]

I've a kind of hard time accepting that claim, unless it is in the context of crappy metallurgy or somesuch (which would seem somewhat odd given that they were starting to make wide use of good solid iron helmets around that time...). Overlapping lames were what replaced mail and lamellar and such in quite a few corners of the world a while later, after all...

I'll deal with the second part of your point first. Iron helms were never in widespread use during the principate. The fact is that most iron helms are recovered from rubbish tips whilst most bronze ones were lost. Bronze was usually recycled, as evidenced by the satripping of bronze fittings, and silverering, from iron helms. In other words it's an archaeological mirrage.

As to the level of protection it basically has to do with the poor design of the armour. Reduced overall coverage in adition to lames that don't really overlap and outright gaps in places make the armour considerably less effective than you might think. It has also now been shown that you can get a dagger up between the plates and into the belly.

[Watchman]

I'll deal with the second part of your point first. Iron helms were never in widespread use during the principate. The fact is that most iron helms are recovered from rubbish tips whilst most bronze ones were lost. Bronze was usually recycled, as evidenced by the satripping of bronze fittings, and silverering, from iron helms. In other words it's an archaeological mirrage.

Bronze was also AFAIK relatively valuable, and unlike iron doesn't suffer overmuch from the "march of time". Iron was and is conversely quite abundant and relatively cheap. Guess which would have had the priority for recycling ?

Anyway, that's beside the point. The point is that they had the technological savvy to make good single-piece iron helmets; that's certainly enough to make the lames in decent metallurgical quality (especially as the manufacture of the LS was tricky and demanding enough to have to be left to the "higher tech" manufacturing centers), unless of course some subcontractor was again trying to pull a fast one.

As to the level of protection it basically has to do with the poor design of the armour. Reduced overall coverage in adition to lames that don't really overlap and outright gaps in places make the armour considerably less effective than you might think.

Unless I'm entirely mistaken the lames were leathered to each other in the virtually universal fashion of laminate armour (the sliding-rivet alternative isn't relevant here AFAIK), which would seem to require at least a slight overlap at the edges. Regardless, even a single layer of smooth worked iron plate is anything but easy to get through; and leaving aside the detail I'm somewhat sceptical of the extent of the gaps, actually aiming an attack so it could exploit them ought to have been difficult indeed in battle.

As for the extent of coverage, it's no worse than what you have with solid breastplates and most other cuirasses and corselets, and seems to have been regarded as largely sufficient in most instances (the practice of adding pendant defenses for the upper legs and hips having never been universal).

It has also now been shown that you can get a dagger up between the plates and into the belly.

You can also bypass full plate by stabbing a dagger through the visor or the armpits, and indeed these were among the more common ways men so equipped were actually killed... after first being incapaciated by other means. Doing it while the other guys is still up and fighting back is rather a lot easier said than done however.

Moreover the claim that the LS was a poor piece of armour runs into a bit of a logical problem. Armour design is a field where evolution is rather literally cutthroat, and ideas that don't work get weeded out damn fast in practice. It seems very difficult to believe a culture as pragmatic as the Romans would have expended so much resources and effort equipping as many of its soldiers as manufacturing capacity allowed with these complicated, expensive and logistically troublesome high-tech corselets if there had not been a valid reason to. They were later abandoned as too costly and too troublesome for the needs of troubled times, certainly; but that is a developement of the strategic and logistical spheres that does not as such have any connection to the actual battlefield performance of the item.

[Ludens]

Gentlemen, although I always enjoy reading your discussions on military equipment, would you please create another thread for discussing the effectiveness of LS? Let's keep this one on-topic.

[Watchman]

Yes officer.

[blacksnail]

The consistent justification for adding LS is "but it looks kewl" rather than any actual historical basis. That, I'm sure, reinforces its complete absence from the mod.

But to be honest, to me that exact same reasoning seems to be the basis of adding Imperial reforms to EB rather than cutting the game short by some fifty years to allow for a more accurate depiction of the first hundred years or so.

The Imperial reforms have no actual historical basis? I'm very confused.

[Imperator]

The Imperial reforms have no actual historical basis? I'm very confused.

No, the Lorica Segmentata (ie that stuff you see on hollywood legionaries) doesn't become widespread until after 14 AD, so it's out of EB's timeframe. The Imperial Reforms are 100% accurate, but some people think it's silly to include units that late in the game when they could chop them out and add more content to the early game. I say, why not move the end date back to about 50 BC if we're going to give such low priority to late-game units?

[Geoffrey S]

The Imperial reforms have no actual historical basis? I'm very confused.

I was referring more to the "looks kewl" than the historical basis section of your post; although what I'm trying to argue is that, considering the goals of EB, the Imperial reforms have just as little place in the mod in my opinion. They are historically accurate due to the large amount of evidence, yes, but are they historically relevant to the period EB represents? That I doubt, and like Imperator I wonder if the mod goals would be better served by ending the game before such reforms and focusing on earlier units elsewhere in their place.

What I do find an interesting and more agreeable reasoning is that they do represent the standardisation of a whole army for the first time. But again, I believe its too far out from the centre of attention of EB and beyond what most players ever reach to be included over more relevant content nearer to the starting date, certainly since it means areas of the map and other factions may remain underdeveloped as a consequence.

[keravnos]

The Imperial reforms have no actual historical basis? I'm very confused.

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.

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.

[Foot]

That has never been the argument here, neither that the imperial reforms make the romans too hard nor that they are unhistorical. The question is neither whether the units have had a lot of work put into them, nor whether the reforms a "ubercool". The question is entirely, given the limitations of RTW with regards to resources, and given the imperial reforms use of a few of those resources are the arguments for the inclusion of the imperial reforms strong enough to overcome the need to better represent many areas at the start of our timeframe?

There is no question that the height of the Roman Empire is one of the best documented periods of our historical timeperiod, but this fact does, in my opinion, does not strengthen the argument, to any degree, for the inclusion of the imperial reforms. If we were to take this argument to its absurd conclusion, namely that those factions and areas of the mod with the most historical evidence get the most resources, then factions such as the Sweboz, Hayasadan, Saba and the like would be left with very few troops indeed. In fact, counting from the direct evidence, both archaelogical and textual I would only be happy with a light cavalry unit, a heavy, armoured cavalry unit and one unit of spearmen. Whether or not the imperial age of the Roman empire is well documented or not is neither here nor there when it comes to the question at hand, namely "given the limitations of RTW with regards to resources, and given the imperial reforms use of a few of those resources are the arguments for the inclusion of the imperial reforms strong enough to overcome the need to better represent many areas at the start of our timeframe?"

Perhaps listing the arguments for and against the inclusion of the imperial reforms would be a good way to go. Oh, and we are short on unit slots so to free up some more, especially given that Romans are not even close to being under-represented, is a legitimate enquiry. So far all I have seen for the "pro Imperial Reform" posters have been fanboy posts, with a slight hint that to denounce the Imperial Reforms is some sort of blasphemy.

Foot

[keravnos]

I completely understand that "blasphemy" you speak of but the answer here is "Please CA, give us more unit slots" rather than "chop off what we have so that we may plan for tomorrow".

Besides, it isn't set in stone that M2TW should absolutely/positively have 500 units top, or is there?

This way, both the factions that feel left out, will be completed and the Romani will keep their magnificent war machine.

[Centurio Nixalsverdrus]

Hmmm, here my brief opinion:

I'm not a fanboy, and I say, keep the reforms.

Since I watched Gladiator, I was a big fan of the Romans. But with reading Tom Holland's Rubicon. The Triumph and Tragedy of the Roman Republic, this opinion changed, and it changed even more with playing EB. I'm just not that fan anymore, seeing what great civilizations, kingdoms, dynasties were annihilated by the glory-seeking juggernaut from the Tiber river.

So I'm even a bit anti-Roman, but I say let's keep the reforms in place. Why? Because of the same reason that Lorica segmentata won't be included: It wouldn't be historical to let the IRs out. The IRs are the logical consequence of the evolution of the Roman state from an italic power to a global superpower, with all it's internal struggles and the final change from a republic to despotism. The Roman res publica just couldn't function anymore, because the glory and power (basically all a republican Roman ever seeked) that could be achieved by a single person was so gigantic that the res publica was inevitably to collapse.

Bearing that in mind, we see that the collapse of the res publica is the consequence of the player reaching near the victory conditions. The victory conditions for the Romans are well known, they can be summarized "conquer the known world". So the Imperial reforms are not only logical, but also a reward for the player who achieved such and spent such a great amount of time.

So please keep the Imperial reforms.

[Foot]

I completely understand that "blasphemy" you speak of but the answer here is "Please CA, give us more unit slots" rather than "chop off what we have so that we may plan for tomorrow".

Besides, it isn't set in stone that M2TW should absolutely/positively have 500 units top, or is there?

This way, both the factions that feel left out, will be completed and the Romani will keep their magnificent war machine.

That is not an answer, that is evading the question. Let me give an example:

A hospital in a poor nation at war does not have enough medical supplies for the wounded in its care. What is the best way, given that there is a limited number of supplies, to ration them out to the wounded. Your answer, it would seem to me, is to pray to God for some more medical supplies. Well let us work on the premise that no miracles will be occurring to solve our problem. Do we hand them out on a first come first served basis? Do we hand them out on the basis of who needs the most care? Do we hand them out on the basis of a utilitarian principle, so that we use the supplies to help the most number of people?

Your answer is about as much use to us in this situation as some doctor in that hospital praying to God for more medical supplies. Lets do the best we can with what we have.

Also this discussion is about EB1 not EB2. We can be relatively certain that RTW won't be having any of its hardcodes lifted or increased, but we still need to make a decision, not for the franchise, but for this particular version of the mod that is made for RTW and RTW's hardcoded restrictions.

Finally, in the highly unlikely event that MTW2 does get more than 500 units slots, then we can open up the question of how to spend them, but lets first answer the question with the materials and supplies we have at hand. There are 500 unit slots in total and 255 model slots, are the inclusion of the imperial reforms really the best way of utilising these meagre resources for the betterment of EB as a whole. I say no, and I have still to see any strong arguments from the "yes" side.

Foot

[Foot]

So I'm even a bit anti-Roman, but I say let's keep the reforms in place. Why? Because of the same reason that Lorica segmentata won't be included: It wouldn't be historical to let the IRs out. The IRs are the logical consequence of the evolution of the Roman state from an italic power to a global superpower, with all it's internal struggles and the final change from a republic to despotism. The Roman res publica just couldn't function anymore, because the glory and power (basically all a republican Roman ever seeked) that could be achieved by a single person was so gigantic that the res publica was inevitably to collapse.

Your argument is that it would be unhistorical for the Imperial Reforms to be left out. But then we could apply that argument to many other things that have been left out from EB due to hardcoded restraitants; provinces and cities, units, ships, factions, buildings, etc. The list is endless of what we chose not to include, we would have loved to but we had to make hard decisions and leave some areas out. If you apply that argumnent to the Imperial Reforms, then you must allow me to apply it to other areas as well - and so we meet an impasse. If you respond, that the difference is that the Imperial Reforms are already in the game, then I have to say that that is not response at all. We have made changes to things in game far more radical than this because our priorities changed, or situations changed. That the Imperial Reforms are already in game has no weight in the argument of whether it is justifiable for them to be included or not. On the matter of whether we can be bothered to put in the effort ... well that is another matter entirely.

Furthermore, I would certainly not suggest that the player could not make one of his Family Members into an emperor, you are right that this is an important point in roman history, but does it follow that they would require a number of new units to follow. Could not the units that were made avaliable from the Marian Reforms be used just as well in place of an almost completely new line-up of roman infantry and cavalry. And if not, then I would still question the necessity of the Imperial Reforms. If the requirement for making a roman senator "emperor" was that we need to keep the Imperial Units then I would have to say scrap the Imperial Reforms altogether and use those unit and model slots for the benefit of some neglected region or faction. The Romans have more units and models than many other factions put together, most of which they don't share amongst their fellows, I say that this no more should be spent on them and that the Imperial Reforms are a step to far, whose resources are better spent elsewhere.

Foot

[gran_guitarra]

Bub, if you want to go with total historical accuracy for the Romans you have a ****load of work to do.

1) Remove the Polybian Reforms. They were a gradual process taking well over 30 years during which all of Italy was given Roman citizenship and the equipment of the Legions was standardized. For historical accuracy make it several reforms (one for each unit change and one for the added citizens).

2) Remove Antestignai (Light Infantry) from the Marian Period. Legionnaires were never Light infantry, only auxiliaries functioned as such. During the early Augustan Period several Legions had cohorts which were trained to function as light infantry, to counter-raid germanic and parthian territories. For historical accuracy remove them.

3) Add First Cohorts, which were basically Cohors Evocata with double the size of regular cohorts.

4) Give Triarii the phalanx formation.

5) Either downgrade Velites to 42 (same as hastati, Principes, Triarii) or raise those to 50, since their numbers were even in Legions.

6) In the Marian Period, make it so auxiliaries are the same as Cohos Reformata, as historically they were trained and equipped to the same standards, leave the spear auxiliaries as well, since they existed.

So, if you are going to use historical accuracy as the argument to remove the Augustan Reforms I can use it to say do all that stuff, even though it serves no real purpose and adds nothing to the game.

Just leave the Imperial Reforms, since they remove nothing from the game.

Oh, as an aside, the elite Light Legionnaires were an Augustan (not Marian) trend, as in the Marian Period only Auxiliaries functioned as such. If you could add one for the Augustan Period I would really like it (make the Marian one an Auxiliary), and add an Auxiliary which is a Legionnaire with slightly lesser stats. (say one more than spear auxiliary in each?)

[Geoffrey S]

I must echo the views contained in Foot's posts, which is a much better attempt at representing the same view as mine. I like the idea of a pros/cons list.

1) Remove the Polybian Reforms. They were a gradual process taking well over 30 years during which all of Italy was given Roman citizenship and the equipment of the Legions was standardized. For historical accuracy make it several reforms (one for each unit change and one for the added citizens).

2) Remove Antestignai (Light Infantry) from the Marian Period. Legionnaires were never Light infantry, only auxiliaries functioned as such. During the early Augustan Period several Legions had cohorts which were trained to function as light infantry, to counter-raid germanic and parthian territories. For historical accuracy remove them.

3) Add First Cohorts, which were basically Cohors Evocata with double the size of regular cohorts.

4) Give Triarii the phalanx formation.

5) Either downgrade Velites to 42 (same as hastati, Principes, Triarii) or raise those to 50, since their numbers were even in Legions.

6) In the Marian Period, make it so auxiliaries are the same as Cohos Reformata, as historically they were trained and equipped to the same standards, leave the spear auxiliaries as well, since they existed.

I don't know about 1, 2, 4, and 6, but points 3 and 4 have been adressed before: First Cohorts are available at least in Cunctator's mini-mod and in future EB versions, and the phalanx formation as applied in RTW is simply not correct for hoplite styled units. Further discussion on these matters I'd rather see in its own topic, since it is not particularly relevant to this subject.

So, if you are going to use historical accuracy as the argument to remove the Augustan Reforms I can use it to say do all that stuff, even though it serves no real purpose and adds nothing to the game.

Just leave the Imperial Reforms, since they remove nothing from the game.

I'm sorry, but where are people using historical accuracy as an argument to remove the Augustan Reforms? No-one denies they are as historically accurate as possible. What is being debated is whether the resources they use are disproportionate or not, and if the changes were significant enough in history and in the context of the mod to warrant a seperate reform over the Marian units. In my opinion they do remove something from the mod, namely the fullest oppurtunity to more accurately represent the period the mod focuses on.

[MarcusAureliusAntoninus]

I don't see the point in this argument. If the Imperial Reforms were actually removed, I could see many members of the team quitting and the mod being torn apart.

Though to be honest, some factions are quite shortchanged. Armenia has what, 6 units?

[Redmeth]

Why not pursue a mini-mod approach, for the player who wants to play the Romani there should be a .bat file that replaces the relevant files and puts the Romans with Imperial reforms in place removing some units from the other end of the world, some regionals, some units that wouldn't imbalance the game too much.
The units and script for the Imperial reform are in place and it's not like the AI ever gets the Imperial reforms.
That way everyone stays happy
What do you think?.
I don't want to sound pathetic, but please don't let this argument lead to members leaving or something it would truly be a shame.

[Foot]

I don't see the point in this argument. If the Imperial Reforms were actually removed, I could see many members of the team quitting and the mod being torn apart.

Though to be honest, some factions are quite shortchanged. Armenia has what, 6 units?

Because 1/4 of their faction's reform periods are lost. If it was decided that it was for the good of the mod's representation of the period then I don't think anyone could complain - they might disagree, of course. We do discuss these kinds of things and we do vote on them.

Using Armenian names, Hayasdan has 8 factional units in total + 1 Georgian unit. All of these share models, and many of them are recruitable by other factions. The Romans are necessarily far more wasteful and share far less, yet they still feel the need for, in my opinion, superfluous reform that doesn't really add much, comes very late (both in game and in history), is hardly ever seen by the player (and don't attack those players who finish before the imperial reforms, they have every right to stop the romani game when they get bored of it!).

I have already suggested a mini-mod approach, which seems perfectly reasonable. The main game would focus its attention from things happening very late in the game and improve things happening much earlier for other factions and for other regions. A mini-mod could be installed for players who wanted to play the romani to their conclusion as a state ruling the world and ruled by an emperor.

Foot

[Geoffrey S]

I don't see the point in this argument. If the Imperial Reforms were actually removed, I could see many members of the team quitting and the mod being torn apart.

There's no need to be quite so dramatic. Personally I'm genuinely interested in the reasons behind the inclusion of this reform over adding more units to less well-represented factions. At the very least clarifying posts might enlighten people such as myself about why what the reforms represent are so important. I can understand the inclusion if the Roman campaign was the flagship campaign of the mod, which is the way it looks right now: Rome is easily the most fully developed faction in the campaign. But if it is to the detriment of other factions doesn't that fly against the stated goals of EB?

Foot's suggestion of some kind of Roman mod sounds appealing, which would allow those interested in a complete Roman campaign with the Imperial reforms as grand conclusion to have their fill, and would allow other factions to be fleshed out that little bit more. Perhaps even as a seperate install option akin to the Gaesatae patch? Although that comes close to RTRs 'counter faction' feature using batch files, which I think EB said they wouldn't want to use.