Guide to Roman Offices in 2.2b

[myarta]

EDIT: Now updated for 2.2b

Alright, that torrent finally finished, plus you got the 2.1b patch. You figured out that the torrent's installer wants your M2TW folder while the patch installer wants your EBII folder. You might even have checked out my submod to make some hidden stuff more visible (shameless plug). You've got a number of eligible gentlemen that you are ready to guide along the Cursus Honorum while playing as Rome. All you need is a handy guide for how to do that. Well, here it is, sorted by age requirements:

1. Tribunus Militum - Military Tribune. A leader in the armed forces.

Effects: Improved bodyguard valor
Term: 1 year
Transitions to: Ex Tribunus Militum
Effects of Ex Tribunus Militum (permanent): Increased troop confidence [Chivalry internal mechanic], Increased authority [this is hidden when not the faction leader, but more authority influences faction heir selection]
Minimum age: None
Requirements: Must have seen at least 2.5 years of military service. More service increases the chances of election to this office.


2. Legatus - Legate. A delegated junior governor for a province

Effects: Reduced unrest in governed settlement (helps with public order). Counters loss of morale in battle that occurs due to lacking Imperium. Counters most of the penalty to land battle attack due to lacking Imperium. Does not counter the penalty to sieging.
Term: Until elected to something better
Transitions to: None. Lost when you qualify for another office, does not leave an 'Ex' trait.
Minimum age: None
Requirements: End turn in a settlement with a Province building. Must not have ever been elected Praetor and must not be currently serving as Quaestor or Military Tribune.


3. Quaestor - Quaestor. Formerly murder investigators, now minor financial officials

Effects: 10% bonus to tax collection of the province you govern
Term: 1 year
Transitions to: Your rank goes up from Eques to Quaestor and after your term, goes up again to Senator. No explicit "Ex Quaestor" rank.
Minimum age: 26
Requirements: End your winter turn in a settlement with Ius Latinorum (Latin Constitution) government building (initially just Roma, eventually the other six settlements in Italy) once you've received the eligibility notice. Pay attention to its full text warning: if you have inadequate military service, consider going and getting more before standing for election [military experience is gained simply by ending your turn not in a city and 7.5 years are required for the highest tier].


4a. Aedilis Plebis - Plebeian Aedile. Official from the lower class responsible for maintenance of city buildings

Effects: Bonus to law, reduction of unrest (help with public order and corruption financial loss)
Term: 1 year
Transitions to: Ex Plebeian Aedile
Effects of Ex Plebeian Aedile: Reduced unrest. Law bonus of active duty lost
Minimum age: 32
Requirements: Plebeian status. Must have served as Quaestor previously. End winter in Roma for possible election once you've received the eligibility notice. Must not have served as Praetor+ yet.


4b. Aedilis Curulis - Curule Aedile. Official from the upper class responsible for regulation of markets and games. Similar in duties ultimately to Plebian Aedile, but allowed to wear the Toga praetexta etc.

Effects: Bonus to law, reduction of construction costs, increased personal security (defense against assassination)
Term: 1 year
Transitions to: Ex Curule Aedile
Effects of Ex Curule Aedile: +1 influence
Minimum age: 32
Requirements: Patrician status. Must have served as Quaestor previously. End winter in Roma for possible election once you've received the eligibility notice. Must not have served as Praetor+ yet.


5a. Tribunus Plebis - Plebeian Tribune. Representative of the lower classes with veto power over the action of the consuls and magistrates.

Effects: +1 influence, +1 personal security. CANNOT LEAVE ROMA (movement points trashed)
Term: 1 year
Transitions to: Ex Plebeian Tribune
Effects of Ex Plebeian Tribune: Reduced unrest. Also may gain traits regarding how he performed during his year
Minimum age: 33
Requirements: Plebeian status. Note that there is no eligibility warning like the other offices. You just have to know to leave him in Roma at the end of winter when he's 33 or older. Must have served as a Quaestor but not yet as a Praetor or Consul. Aedile status irrelevant.


6. Praetor - Praetor. Generals, judges, governors. First tier with Imperium

Effects: Bonus to law, +2 influence, +2 personal security. Imperium (legal command of armies).
Term: 1 year as Praetor, 5 years as Propraetor
Transitions to: Propraetor
Effects of Propraetor: Same as Praetor
Transitions to: No explicit Ex-Praetor status. Your 'Senator' trait is raised to reflect the former position.
Minimum age: 36
Requirements: Must have served as Quaestor previously. Aedile is optional. End winter in Roma for possible election once you've received the eligibility notice. Must not have served as Consul yet.
Note: May be re-elected. A man who has not yet served as consul may be elected to this office again after he has completed his Praetor year and his five Pro-praetor years. He can stand for a second Praetorship and for Consul at once, and having lost Consul that year, win another Praetor term instead. Once he has won the Consulship once, however, he can only stand for additional rounds of Consulship, not move "backwards" to Praetor.


7. Consul - Consul. One of two leaders of the Roman Republic [though there is no mechanic feasible with the engine that makes it possible to make exactly two winners per year: you may have none or you may have six!]

Effects: Bonus to law, +3 to influence, bonus to command, +2 personal security. Imperium
Term: 1 year as Praetor, 5 years as Proconsul
Transitions to: Proconsul
Effects of Proconsul: Same as Consul
Transitions to: No explicit Ex-Consul status. Your 'Senator' trait is raised to reflect the former position.
Minimum age: 40
Requirements: Must have served as Quaestor and Praetor previously. Aedile is optional.
Note: May be re-elected to the Consulate after completing his consular year and his proconsular years. As stated in Praetor, he can now only stand re-election for another Consulate, not another Praetorianship.


8. Censor - Censor. A magistrate who supervises the census and classifies citizens into their five tiers of wealth, also can chastise for breaking sumptuary laws. This is not strictly speaking 'higher' than Consul on the Cursus Honoroum.

Effects: +2 influence
Term: 1 year
Transitions to: Ex Censor
Effects of Ex Censor: +1 influence
Minimum age: 47
Requirements: This is a tough one. Must have served as Consul before. Must not be presently in office (includes proconsul status). Must be a Roman Census year coming up in the next year (every 5 years). In practice, your generals will be consuls or proconsuls a lot, and will just end up getting re-elected to that position instead of picking up Censor (as it disqualifies them for Censor). End winter in Roma for possible election once you've received the eligibility notice.


9. Pontifex Maximus - Pontifex Maximus: "chief bridgebuilder", lead priest. Not 'higher' on the Cursus Honorum.

Effects: +1 influence
Term: Life
Transitions to: Does not transition
Minimum age: 40 (no requirement itself, but must have served as Consul)
Requirements: Patrician status. Must not be Sacrilegious or Publicly Atheistic. Small chance every turn after you have completed your first term as Consul and Proconsul, regardless of season or location. Faction leader only. Thus, Plebeian faction leaders will never qualify.

[Shadowwalker]

No reply and no "thank you" yet?
Seriously?


Well, then it's my privilege to be the first thanking you for the effort of compiling this list, myarta.

This will greatly help any SPQR player (and as we know, about two or three people may play SPQR in EB 2.1 ).

Thank you!

[xyron]

There are fails ... Pro-praetro/consul should be for next 3 years ...

Re-election for praetor is wrong, noone never was more than ones praetor in Roman history....

[xyron]

But yeah, nice overview ... I try to play asap... great job men

[excubitor]

very nice guide myarta!

but i must ask,if you want to lead your armies with consuls/proconsuls wouldnt that limit your options?i mean they will hold their office for 4 turns and then you will need to get them to rome to get relelected right?

[myarta]

I can't speak to the historical accuracy of these mechanics. I'm just reading from the script files. Thanks, Shadowwalker.

But you're right, I'm reading these wrong. There's a hidden variable called InOffice that tracks how long you've had the position. Your propraetor/proconsul periods are longer than a year. I've been scratching my head reading the code here. It LOOKS like they are FIVE years long, but that doesn't seem like it could be right (so that's a total of 6 years, because you get one year in the position and 5 years as pro-whatever). I think in my campaigns it feels more like 2 or 3 years of pro-status but I'm not seeing the code that makes it happen. All I see is that the InOffice variable starts at 1 for each office and goes up by 1 point at the start of each Winter. There are three tiers of this trait, the first is at 1 point, the second at 2 points (to catch annual positions), and the third is at 7 points. During your first year of office, InOffice = 1. Then when winter comes around, InOffice raises by one point to 2 points. The threshold for Level 2 is 2 points, so now InOffice = 2. Thus at the end of your turn that same winter, you can have code that checks if you are, e.g. the PlebeianTribune and InOffice=2, and it follows by stripping the office, since it's only for one year. Praetor and Consul would shift to their Pro status, but would not be stripped, since the requirement there is InOffice=3. After a year as pro, at the start of Winter, InOffice would raise to 3 points. The threshold for level 3 is 7 points, so you're still considered level 2. After two years of pro, your score would raise to 4 points. So in general, a score of N means N -2 years as pro. N = 7, so that's 5 years as pro and 1 year as the main office. Yeah, that seems to check out. I'll adjust my post for 5 years. It really didn't feel that long between them, but maybe I was mashing end-turn a lot. 24 turns isn't all that long. I'm over turn 100, so that's at least 4 full cycles of people having to shuffle back.

Xyron, I think the reason that it is 5 years of pro instead of 3 is because our movement rates are too low. It shouldn't take six months to walk from Messina to Roma, but it does. One to two months tops is more like it. But we can't make actual army move points that long, since then the turn-based system gets absurd and you have to just watch deathstacks descend on your territory while you can't make any counter maneuvers. Also I think it causes crashes and/or massively long turn times when the AI has lots of move points. So I find it a decent fit.

As far as leading armies goes, Excubitor, as my post was originally written you'd actually have 8 turns since you retain propraetor/proconsul status for a year. But I'm about to edit it to say 5 years as pro* based on my above paragraph, so you'd have a total of 24 turns before having to return to Rome for re-election.

[xyron]

Myarta ... good job !! I agree 5 years is good because the problems with moving points you mentioned... I was surprised by 1+1 year only... but 1+5 its good ...

For example, I could image changing commanders in armies in Minor Asia will be really great issue with 1+5 years.. but 1+1 would be impossible

[myarta]

As I mentioned in another thread, there is one more position, namely that of Governor (Rector Provinciae) that you can get, one for each cluster of provinces (e.g. Sicilia, Gallia Cisalpina, couple in Hispania etc). To be eligible, you must have completed a term as a Praetor or Consul at some point, and you will have imperium within the province. So you might be able to use that for local defense forces and/or minor wars of conquest for territories in the historic province that don't belong to you yet. I think it is a good 6-8 turns to get from Roma to Antioch.

[myarta]

Personally what I do is stage mine, instead of spending the round trip time.
At the start of a given Spring, I get notified of generals who are 'Eligible for Praetorship/Eligible for Consulship'. If one of them is leading an army or something, then I write them down in my notepad as needing to get back to Roma before winter. Similarly, I write down who was elected Praetor and Consul this year. Then I send out the replacements, who move quickly since they are just cavalry. Usually their bodyguard is enough if they are moving within the provinces over good Roman roads (they do, after all, have road garrison buildings, generally). If the army is currently garrisoned, e.g. after taking a settlement and now occupying it, I may simultaneously recall the former leader. Otherwise I will leave them in place until their replacement arrives. Generally the newly elected official will make it to the front in time to start a campaign the following Spring, the first of their five pro years (so they might finish their arrival in winter, but I'm not going to march out in winter with a general already half-exhausted from the trip). The former leader will usually make it to Roma in time, and often will get re-elected the upcoming Spring, where the circle of life is complete, with him replacing other generals whose time was up that year. Worst case scenario, he will get elected another year after that if he has to wait in place for his replacement before he can leave, or is just a bit too far to make it in by the first winter's end.

[xyron]

Yeah .... I´m playing now EB1 and to manage all magistrates from Hispania and Africa to Asia Minor etc brings great problems... but everything is possible to solve.. so yeah, some internatl rules and will be good...

Enjoy your game !!

I´m looking forward to EB 2.1b testing...

[romanius24]

The elections are really problematic if you have a larger empire/republic.

Eventually you will have consuls that never fight a war because the 4 turns per year are not enough for them to go from Rome to the frontier.

Its already starting to happen for me and i am still fighting wars just around Italy. I cant imagine having a Consul to fight in Spain or Gaul or further.


I think because of the game's problems, elections should be allowed in any city that is large enough or has a specific building(a temple for a ceremony maybe or a unique building?) but make it so that in Rome there is a higher chance of election still.
This way you dont have to extend the senate offices and you keep them historically correct.

[myarta]

Around Italy? They're perfectly capable of legally commanding the army during their pro-Consul term, which is 20 turns long. If you're shooting for just the 4 turns of primary Consulate, then, yeah, that's not going to work. But it's less ahistorical to have a long proconsulate in which they command armies than it is to make the Roman elections not happen in Rome.

[Metaluis90]

Myarta you're a lifesaver! Without the military service points explanation I would be lost in my romani campaign, mainly because the new cursus honorum system, which is a enormous upgrade of EB I system, by the way!

As romanius and xyrius stated, I'm concerned in how the cursus honorum will affect late game, when you expand overseas and one or two Seasons won't be enough to reach an army from Roma, and while your work-around is perfectly sensible gameplay wise (I also have my own worl-around which involves using character_reset cheat, altough it is not reliable due the limit of Romani characters name pool) I do roleplay (or have an internal rule) where proconsuls can have imperium but only in their designated province, fulfulling a defensive role, while consuls lead the attacking /conquering armies.

This, of course, could work against me, since the proconsulate span (5 years) means any character that have serve as Consul won't be eligible until his proconsulate ends, which means I would be sending my characters into a political "freezer", in case there are too many pronconsuls.

That's why I believe a what Romanius have proposed, could work if implemented right in game. I remember in EB 1 there were the Olympic Games every four years, and of course you didn't need to move your character to mainland Greece (as it would be impossible gameplay-wise) to participate, you only needed to have your character rest in a given turn and he would earn a trait stating he was "away for the Olympics", losing every movement point to represent he wasn't actually there. Maybe this mechanism could be implemented, where you need to rest (in Autumn) your candidate in any city (or in a city which have an specific building, such as Provincia Romana) and then he would earn a trait stating he was away in Roma for the elections?

Of course this would need a change of proconsul trait, meaning it would become a different trait (instead of being another level of the consul trait as stated in one of your posts above). Maybe we should look into EB 1 again, where they had the "Consular" trait, so in order to earn the proconsul status you must meet the following:

1.-Have the "Consular" trait
2.-Rest in a city with provincia romana building and,
3.-Not holding any current magistrature.

These option could help expanding the Roman office system since this could help add specific (named) Proconsulship, such as the Proconsul of Hispania or Proconsul of Sicilia, which could further expand the roleplaying part of EB!


In an unrelated note, I know your guide is for 2.1b and, while I'm using the newest one (2.2c I believe) I can see that Ex-Tribunis Plebis doesn't give any influence points, contrary to what you posted, is this true for 2.2c?

[myarta]

Hey there. Glad this old thread helped. It's mostly still accurate because this system has been complete for a while and doesn't have any major bugs. Personally what I do is I just treat the Proconsul years like the Consul years as far as roleplaying them having authority to command the armies. The game mechanic supports this due to the imperium it gives them. It does get to be a little bit of a tedious minigame of keeping a chart updated every 4 turns and moving the units around when you've been doing it for 300+ turns straight, but at least it's something to do during peacetime besides just the usual building and recruitment planning.

The current version is actually 2.2b but they released the 2.2c campaign and battle AI. That doesn't affect the traits like this though.

I'll take a look and revise the original for the latest version.

[myarta]

Updated. Did I have it saying that Ex-Tribunis Plebis gives influence points? I don't think that changed in this update and it doesn't say so now. It's there under the effects for your 4-year term but goes away when you transition to ex status.

[Metaluis90]

Great to know Myarta!, it's kind of a bummer to know my struggling-for-influence plebeians are not getting their much needed influence points from their plebeian related former offices!

Also, thank for clarifying current game version

[myarta]

Great to know Myarta!, it's kind of a bummer to know my struggling-for-influence plebeians are not getting their much needed influence points from their plebeian related former offices!

That's true, but as Rome I often had to struggle to keep public order over 70 in newly conquered territory, e.g. Cisalpina, etc, until we slowly inculturated them and that penalty went down. Plebeians get two unrest reduction bonuses that Patricians don't have access to: Ex Plebeian Aedile and Ex Plebeian Tribune which isn't a bad trade for governors valued more for their ability to understand and placate the common man. So there's uses for both Patrician and Plebeian bonuses depending on how you use them. Also to get Plebeians more influence, try to educate the Sharp ones in a town with at least the first level of school from birth til 28 until they get the trait Erudite (pull them out of the town if it has a Ius Latinorum for the one turn after age 26 and after age 27 so they don't accidentally become Quaestors with minimal military experience: their weak early service will plague their career the rest of their life and can never be earned after Quaestor status). Then all throughout their life Erudite generals will benefit from staying in a town with a level 2 school or better. They will eventually pick up some traits that boost influence, provided their other personality characteristics are amenable. Also, use your plebe generals with low influence to fight outnumbered battles against rebels. The fewer the Romans who still bring victory, the more the glory! You can get a Corona from this that helps with influence. Also, you can use them as leaders against other factions and eventually get a Vanquisher of the X trait and qualify for a Triumph. If you celebrate it, they'll gain +3 influence for life as a celebrated Triumphator. So yeah, be born into a family with a rich heritage and the finest tutors and political influence, or win glory by arms. Sounds legit.

[Metaluis90]

Have you ever thought in doing a full Romani guide? Your advices are very helpful and insightful!

I'd give you Rep but apparently you were the last user I repped!

[2-D Ron]

I'm trying to figure out how to get the "Reformator" trait.
I have met all the requirements 7/6 Core Italia States have Latifundua's it's 550 turns in, i've also got a Family Member Elected as a "Consul" as I think Marian was a "Consul" when he put the Reforms in place?

[myarta]

I replaced 2.2b with 2.2d2 so I can't speak to the script for that version (unless you've gotten to 550 turns on 2.2d2??!!!), but it should probably not have changed much in 2.2d2 on the specific issue of Reformator. The requirements are:

- Sharp / Charismatic / Vigorous
- Influence 3+ wreaths
- Command 3+ stars

That will give you the "Potential reformator" Have you seen that yet? One of the earlier versions (I forget now if it was 2.2b or something earlier like in 2.1) had a bug with the wrong province IDs where instead of the six in Italy besides Rome it was actually checking some of those and some of Greece instead. To check, search for 'ecMarianPossible' in your data\world\maps\campaign\imperial_campaign\campaign.script.txt.

if you see before that

IsRegionOneOf 98 91.... etc

then you probably have the bug IIRC. Compare those seven numbers to the region ID #s you see when you hold your mouse over a province in-game and type 'show_cursorstat'. This was fixed in later versions to use a different syntax, one that says "region_098" instead of just plain 98, etc, which makes it less prone to getting broken by map changes renumbering provinces.

If you have the bug and don't want to start a new game, find which provinces have those ID #s and build the high level farms in them. You can still do it if they have a 'Province' building. IIRC the weird ones were in Greece but you can double check either in my post history somewhere (probably needle in a haystack to get the right keywords to find it, but 'Marian Reform' might do it) or by manually moving your cursor around and repeating the show_cursorstat command (hint: press the up arrow to get it to retype itself) and searching for that province ID. Final hint: they tend to be arranged left to right as far as counting goes, so if you've found 90 and need to find 100 something, try looking due east, but it's not an exact science that I'm aware of.

As for Consul, first you need Potential Reformator, then you can become full Reformator when they're elected to Consul.