Roman Civil War and Faction Wide Unrest

[Calvin]

Ok, due to how my brain works I needed to start a new thread about this to organise my thoughts

Dictator for Life

First off, let's talk about the trigger for the Roman 'Civil War' or at least as close as we can get to one - the Dictator for Life. Currently these are the criteria:

• Rome controls 60 settlements
• Character is a Legatus Legionis
• Character is a Legatus Propraetor
• Character is a Skilled Infantry Commander
• Character is a Good Commander
• Character is a Conqueror
• Character is next to Rome
• Character is in an army with 10 or more infantry units

I want your thoughts on whether this is too challenging or not challenging enough for the players.

Roman Civil War

Leading on from the above, a character becoming a Dictator for Life will then cause a scripted appearance of slave Legions. We need to decide:

• How many legions will appear - 7-10 full stacks
• Where the legions will appear

Also, since every players game is different, some might get a Dictator for Life (DfL) while not owning a single Asian province for example. Therefore, I think it is prudent to add to the criteria for DfL a number of provinces that need to be owned by the Romans. What we need to decide here is:

• Which provinces should the player need to conquer in order to allow a Dictator for Life

Faction Wide Unrest

The Sloths idea. Unless Squid has a better idea on how to implement this (which he may well do) I will code this by creating an ancillary that faction leaders can attain. Traits will be waiting for that ancillary and using the FactionwideAncillaryExists will then appear on every named character in the faction. Things we need to consider:

• Will this pose too much of a challenge to the player
• What criteria should be used to obtain this ancillary
• Which factions should use this

I think that's all for now. Lets brainstorm!

[tone]

Rome controls 60 settlements
Character is a Legatus Legionis
Character is a Legatus Propraetor
Character is a Skilled Infantry Commander
Character is a Good Commander
Character is a Conqueror
Character is next to Rome
Character is in an army with 10 or more infantry units (to simulate a march on Rome)

I'd say that these are too stringent. All the player needs to do then is keep the character away from Rome and doens't need to worry about civil war. My suggestion would be just for the Roman faction holding a certain number of settlements - maybe more like 40 or something - plus maybe one or two other attributes. You want to be pretty sure that the player will come up against this at just the point they think they're about to be coping pretty comfortably.

[Father Jack]

I agree with tone. At the moment it will be far too hard to face a civil war, and civil wars were pretty common affairs for Rome.

[rory o'kane]

I agree with tone. At the moment it will be far too hard to face a civil war, and civil wars were pretty common affairs for Rome.

mneh... between the assassination of the Gracchi brothers and the ascension of Octavian (Augustus) to the throne (122 BC - 27 BC), they were endemic, between the Servile Wars, Social Wars, the conflict between Marius and Sulla, and then later Pompey and Caesar followed by Marc Anthony and Octavian (who was sent by the Senate to hunt down Marc Anthony) joiningforces after a brief fight, then both of them fighting against the main Conspirators (Cassius and Brutus), followed by the hunting down of the remaining conspirators, and then the war between Octavian and Anthony and Cleopatra. That's a lot of fighting. And you've got to remember that in that period Rome still had to deal with many foreign powers - the Cimbri and Tuetones, Mithridates I of Pontus, and the endemic pirating in the Mediterranean. Plus there were huge direct territorial gains - Syria, Gaul, Asia Minor, Cyrenaica, Cilicia, and finally Egypt (when Cleopatra commited suicide, Aegyptus became a Roman province). After that, with the exception of the year of the Four Emperors, civil war was not particularly common until the beginning of the 3rd Century AD (which is conveniently JUST outside of our timeframe).
Occaisionally troops on the frontier would revolt (such as the Illyrian/Dalmatian revolt in 6-9 AD, or the Batavian revolt led by Civilis in 69 AD), the internal provinces were largely untroubled by unrest... so, after the big 'un, the player might have to put out small fires here and there now and again, but they shouldn't have to deal constantly with epic rebellions - though some areas, such as Judea, will need careful governing if they are to be kept stable.

[Father Jack]

Yeh I was thinking of the 1st century BC and the 3rd Century AD only

[dvk901]

We need also to remember that the 'Dictator for Life' idea is essentially ushering in that period when Rome was very troubled with revolt and civil war....whether it's 40 turns into the game or a 150. That's one reason the year convention in RS2 is so 'convenient', because it doesn't mean anything in terms of a historical timeline. I also agree that the 'main' civil war should be 'unavoidable'...if the conditions to make it happen are too stringent, then players may find ways to get around them. It should be very 'subtle' in terms of what is required for it, and so written that you'd have to gut the trait system to get around it.

But I do like the idea of 'small rebellions' as well....not just for Rome, but for all factions. Large Empires in this era were inherently unstable and under constant internal and external pressure. I don't care if you're playing the Arverni, and historically they never suffered any civil wars. I'm fairly certain that if they HAD forged a large empire in this era, they WOULD have had them.

[Calvin]

Ok, so now we need some details people! Rebel legion numbers and placement, precisely what criteria for Dictator for Life, which key settlements govern when a character becomes Dictator for Life etc etc. Sooner we sort out the details, sooner this can be coded

[tone]

In terms of legions we could look at the ones involved in the year of the 4 emperors prior to Vespasian taking over:

Galba's legions: VI Victrix, I Adiutrix, III Augusta, VII Gemina
Otho's legions: XIII Gemina, I Adiutrix
Vitellius: I Germanica, V Alaudae, I Italica, XV Primigenia, III Augusta, XXI Rapax
Vespasian: III Augusta

So seeing that these legions were ones involved in Legion vs Legion war, it would seem to make these the ones we choose. I know we need more specifics but this is a start. Presumably some auxiliaries involved too?

I guess the next question is: how many full stacks do we want?

[swhunter]

How about 2 or three ?
three legions. What ya think?
Also Tone did you receive my PM?

[Ketchup]

I think more than 3 legions. A skillful player could probably defeat 3 legions with 2 armies that would be (hopefully) posted in Italy at the time anyway. I think we want to create a situation where the player is forced to recall legions in from the extremities of the empire to deal with the rebels. I think it would be sufficient to have 4 full legions spawn - each with a commander. Then there could be perhaps an equal number of auxillia stacks to spawn. This would create a total of 7-8 good quality stacks, posing a major threat Rome's Italian holdings. The rebels may well take 3 or 4 Italian settlements before the player can physically recall legions from Africa or Germany or wherever, but this all adds to the excitement.

[swhunter]

Ok, I.m for 7 or even 9

[tone]

I'd say legions should be spawned not only in Italy but in some other Roman occupied territories if there is a way to determine this.

Yeah, I'd go with the BIG challenge here. These were bloody and desperate contests for supreme power. Over 6 legions sounds more like it

[apple]

I'd say legions should be spawned not only in Italy but in some other Roman occupied territories if there is a way to determine this.

Yeah, I'd go with the BIG challenge here. These were bloody and desperate contests for supreme power. Over 6 legions sounds more like it

There would if we decide to have some special territories as a criteria for the civil war to happend.

[rory o'kane]

indeed.

[dvk901]

Historically, I suppose the most troublesome areas would be upper Gaul, Spain, Sicily (which was Rome's bread basket for a long time), and of course the one instance of Ptolemaic influence.

[Calvin]

Ok, we're getting somewhere. I've updated the first post - what I still need to know to begin with is which specific provinces should Rome control for Dictator for Life to appear - Pergamon? Athens? Alexandria? etc etc We probably only need four or five to represent a decent growth of the Roman Republic into Iberia/Gaul, Greece and the East. Maybe Africa as well.

Personally, I think 9 or 10 full stacks of rebels would be ideal - the player should have to worry a little rather than have the civil war as just a bit annoying. So now we need to decide where they pop up. I like the idea of having one or two pop up in Sicily since most players (myself included) very rarely have decent sized forces there. Maybe 1 in Sicily, 3 in Italy, 2 in Greece, 2 in Iberia or Gaul and 2 in the east or africa. That or we can just slap em all down outside Rome

Once we've got these decided I'll get together with HoH about it and then start work on the faction wide unrest.

[tone]

Let's go with that idea. The best thing is to put it in and get people to start playing with it, and then tweak depending on feedback. BTW, is there a way of limiting this to only the player's faction so it doesn't bother the AI?

[Calvin]

I'm not sure, I'll ask HoH.

[tone]

It would help load the campaign against the human player and improve the likelihood of an AI Rome surviving if we can.

[Father Jack]

Britannia was also a hotbed for revolt. I believe it was one of the few Roman provinces to have a full time garrison of 3 legions and auxiliaries.