RTW noob questions

[Quirinus]

I have taken the campaign up to 220BC. Its slow going, with battles one turn takes upto an hour and I cannot squeeze more into a day :(.

Haha, that happens. I usually play only five to ten years in a weekend, and sometimes less: I only played one year this weekend! D:

1.
The senate standings now are:
Julii: Senate 7, People 10.
Brutii: Sen 8, Pop 6.
Scipii: Sen 6, Pop 4.

So civil war seems unlikely. The Senate gave me missions against Germany so my popularity recovered. Now they have told me to attack Egypt but combined with threats instead of gifts as before. I have Halicarnussus and am on the way to Sardis and Pergamum and so should get to the 50 province mark soon. Will this trigger Civil War, whatever the Senate standings?

Nope, but to win the game you will have to attack Rome, and since Rome doesn't rebel when at low public order, the only way is to take Rome by force-- i.e. initiating the civil war.

Your popularity with the Senate is impressive, considering that you mentioned that you have 44 territories now. Senate standing generally increases as you gain territories up till 35, after which gaining additional territories, even at the Senate's order, will make you lose popularity.

2. I used spy who accidentally caught teh plague when I sent him to spy on Rome to conduct bioligical warfare against Egypt. Alexandria, Memphis and Thebes have populations of around 14,000 down form 30,000. I combined this with an assasin destroying temples and execution squares. But despite the popularity levels in the cities dropping to 20% they wont revolt, though rebels did appear.

Even 0% loyalty doesnt seem to trigger revolts, I have had three assasin-spy team murdering and commiting arson everywhere south of Rome, one assasin destroys the Temple, another the sewers and the third the Ampitheatre. Two spies infiltrate and voila loyalty is down to zero. Scipii/ Brutii garrisons are tiny (6 units max), but no revolt.

Is this an AI aid - that no AI city will revolt, however low the loyalty? Has anyone actually tried to bring the AI to its knees using sabotage? I loved doing this in Shogun with shinobi and with imams in MTW (Turks were my favourite faction). Also I have noticed, initially the Scipii and Brutii would fix the damaged buildings straight away, but now some are left unrepaired. I hope this means they are low on funds!

That's odd, actually. I've succeeded a few times in creating civil unrest in a rival faction's city by planting spies and destroying their temples and other happiness buildings. I've also seen Alexandria (and then Thebes) revolt from Egypt and Tanais from Scythia before without my intervention, presumably from population pressure. And yes, I guess after repairing it a few times they figured: ah, it's going to get blown up again the next turn anyway, what's the point.

3. Are there no "arsoninst", "skilled saboteur" etc line of traits for assasins? Its a shame if the only way they can improve is by murder.

Yes, I was quite annoyed by this too-- though apparently you can get trait decreases or negative traits if you fail in sabotage. =(

4. You know how the player can see everyhting the Roman allies can see, does this include what their spies report?

Yes, and curiously, this continues even after civil war is initiated.

5. In training my assasins, I have slaughterd may 15-20 Scipii and Brutii captains and a bunch of family members. So far none have been caught but doesnt the AI become suspicious and take countermeasures and hire its own spies? I have come across Gallic, British, Carthaginian and German spies but no Romans.

Haha, yeah...... well, I've noticed it too. I mean, if there's always a suspicious guy in red when your promising young sons start to pop off, a connection should've been made.

6. In Shogun, killing a captain reduced the unit size by one. This doesnt seem to happen in RTW. Is this right? Is there a reason?

Yes, this is very annoying. Captains seem to appear out of nowhere. Which isn't usually a problem on large unit scale, but if the captain happens to be in an elephant unit, he gets an extra elephant (IIRC). How unfair! Also, in those cases where the assassin wants to whittle down the size of, say, a lone unit of gladiators, this is not possible. Bleh.

7. Also in Shogun ninja's levels went up after 1, 2 , 4, 8,16, 32 etc succesful jobs. Is there a similar pattern in RTW (I havent noticed it)? Does the status of the victim and likelihood of success effect whether the assasin is promoted or not?

Actually, I'm not sure of that myself. It seems to me that it doesn't matter a jot whether your victim was a king of kings or the captain of a lowly peasant unit, only your number of kills.

8. In terms of more overt conspiracies, rebels are a nuisance.While I dont mind beating them up (I prefer small 6-12 unit battles to the massive 20 unit ones), is there a way to automatically warn the player when they appear? Since I usually use the arrows to go from one city screen to another, I dont always look at the map and so somethimes miss them, losing money in the process.

Same here. I find 20-unit battles a bit of a handful, actually.

9. The Brutii have a unit "first legionary cohort" which is bigger 61 men and has a little eagle insiginia. How can I make train them? I can train urban cohorts in Patavium and Carthage and I dont think I can improve the barracks any further :unsure: Apologies if I am asking something really dumb that is clearly shown on the tech tree.

I think you have to train them in Italy Proper.... but don't quote me on that.

10. The Marian reforms, do they happen as soon as one faction finishes an imperial palace (24,000 population level)? Also all the Romans are upgrading their armies, except the Senate. They still only hae the startung hastati-principes-velite combo. Do they ever improve thier army?

I think a player finishing an imperial palace simply means that every turn, they will start rolling the probability for the occurence of the Marian Reforms. Can't quite answer the second part of your question, even though I've never noticed the Senate using legionary cohorts.

11. Anyway, the spearbands are definitely far more effective then the Gaulish or British warbands. How come the Germans are unable to beat Gaul or Britain? Or is it just that I havent played enough (two games only so far)?

That's because, I think, the auto-resolve function, which is used for all AI vs AI battles, doesn't factor in the phalanx. That's also why the Seleucids always lose to Pontus in Asia Minor, though they're relatively easy to fight if you play as the Seleucids yourself.

[The Wandering Scholar]

The extra elephant with a captain is interesting. Also while playing as Macedon I repeatedly sent my spy into Sparta resulting in riots every other turn. Although it did not revolt the reduced Spartans were easier to handle.

[Quirinus]

A nice touch is that, if Sparta revolted, the rebels would be called "Helot Rebels".

[Omanes Alexandrapolites]

To add to what Quirinus has said:

Even 0% loyalty doesnt seem to trigger revolts, I have had three assasin-spy team murdering and commiting arson everywhere south of Rome, one assasin destroys the Temple, another the sewers and the third the Ampitheatre. Two spies infiltrate and voila loyalty is down to zero. Scipii/ Brutii garrisons are tiny (6 units max), but no revolt.

It sounds like you are playing on a harder difficulty level. In this case making the AI settlements fall into dissent is painfully difficult, nigh impossible on Very Hard.

Sadly, the only solution is to change the difficulty level. Do bear in mind that this will also change other factors in the game which provide the AI benefits. You can "modify" the difficulty of the game using the RomeSage saved game editing tool.

5. In training my assasins, I have slaughterd may 15-20 Scipii and Brutii captains and a bunch of family members. So far none have been caught but doesnt the AI become suspicious and take countermeasures and hire its own spies? I have come across Gallic, British, Carthaginian and German spies but no Romans.

Nope, the Romans don't usually involve themselves in agent actions with their fellow Romans until the civil war has begun. Until then they oddly ignore the fact that their family is gradually getting obliterated by your hired murderers.

9. The Brutii have a unit "first legionary cohort" which is bigger 61 men and has a little eagle insiginia. How can I make train them? I can train urban cohorts in Patavium and Carthage and I dont think I can improve the barracks any further :unsure: Apologies if I am asking something really dumb that is clearly shown on the tech tree.

They are only trainable in Rome after the Marian reforms, although they can also be granted as a gift from the senate for the completing of senatorial missions.

10. The Marian reforms, do they happen as soon as one faction finishes an imperial palace (24,000 population level)?

The reforms are automatically triggered whenever an Imperial Palace is built anywhere in Italy/Scilly excluding Rome. The definition of Italy extends to the Northern Italian provinces which start out under Gallic control.

Also all the Romans are upgrading their armies, except the Senate. They still only hae the startung hastati-principes-velite combo. Do they ever improve thier army?

Sadly they usually don't - the senate rapidly train a large number of forces prior to the civil war and usually stop training just after the reforms - by then they're reached the maximum number of troops they are willing to support. The AI doesn't know how to disband its troops, and not using these built up forces in any wars prevents them from having to replace any lost men with the marian style of troop.

[o_loompah_the_delayer]

Your popularity with the Senate is impressive, considering that you mentioned that you have 44 territories now. Senate standing generally increases as you gain territories up till 35, after which gaining additional territories, even at the Senate's order, will make you lose popularity.

When I got the first "power" message I had around 30+ provinces and popularity was 4 senate, 8 people. Then there were a bunch of missions, take Damme, take Iuvanum, Vicus Macromanii etc. I conquered the Germans in about 10 turns, ffullfilling a senate mission every other turn. The coincidence between my plans and the senate missions was unbelievable, not that I am complaining as the mission in the early stages were nigh on impossible to complete, eg get maps from Germany. Either way the Senate was definitely suffering from Teuton-mania!

Yes, and curiously, this continues even after civil war is initiated.

Can we actually see their spies and can they see mine? I know I can see other factions spies if I have a spy very close to them.
If I cant see their spies, but I have access to what the spies report, could a clever player figure out the spies locations by seeing whihc areas are visible even though there are no faction agents present on the map?

Yes, this is very annoying. Captains seem to appear out of nowhere. Which isn't usually a problem on large unit scale, but if the captain happens to be in an elephant unit, he gets an extra elephant (IIRC). How unfair! Also, in those cases where the assassin wants to whittle down the size of, say, a lone unit of gladiators, this is not possible. Bleh.

Isnt the default captain someone in the cavalry?

That's because, I think, the auto-resolve function, which is used for all AI vs AI battles, doesn't factor in the phalanx. That's also why the Seleucids always lose to Pontus in Asia Minor, though they're relatively easy to fight if you play as the Seleucids yourself.

Auto resolve suck.

Thanks for all the many replies everyone and putting up with my incredibly long posts.

I am now Romes dictator!

[Quirinus]

Can we actually see their spies and can they see mine? I know I can see other factions spies if I have a spy very close to them.
If I cant see their spies, but I have access to what the spies report, could a clever player figure out the spies locations by seeing whihc areas are visible even though there are no faction agents present on the map?

Actually, good point. I think you can only see their diplomats and what they see. Though I don't think the other Romans use spies and diplomats a lot anyway.

Auto resolve suck.

Only when you're a phalanx faction. It's good when you're a Roman faction or a faction that has chariots.

[Punicus]

Quirinus, I'd just like to point out that when a captain is a member of an elephant unit, they don't get an extra elephant, he just rides the elephant with another rider. That's what happens in v1.5 at least, I'm unaware of what happens in other versions.

Isnt the default captain someone in the cavalry?

No, not necessarily.

[Quirinus]

I see...... my bad. I just saw a captain on an elephant and made that conclusion.