Playing Rome in RSII – A Basic Survival Guide

[Marcus Publius]

There is no secrets about this game.It's modified vanilla game.It stilll uses the same engine have same restrictions ect.

[Marcus_Vipsanius]

Ah, there he is: the Julius Caesar of the 21st century asking us, no-tactical-brain-ants, why we have so much trouble with this game
No, your honour, we don't have trouble. We only like to see what other people did in their game, what tactics they used and compare it to our own game or implement it. For other, less experienced player, it is interesting to see how they could do it to be succesfull, and/or apply it to their own tactic plan.

Of course, this shouldn't be something you have to do with your tactical masterplans in mind. So, with all due respect, if you have no interesting thoughts on the matter, then shut up.

[NerZhulen]

Actually I was considering if my post would be propriate..., and I concluded yes, because there is AAR forum where it can have nice place, here it will be lost within few days on page 2.

So I was asking if its a guide for beginners or normal aar.

[Ybbon]

Actually I was considering if my post would be propriate..., and I concluded yes, because there is AAR forum where it can have nice place, here it will be lost within few days on page 2.

So I was asking if its a guide for beginners or normal aar.

Good point, though not put very well to start with...

However, you are right, in a few days/weeks it will get lost, the same is true of an AAR so it probably should be stickied instead - maybe when AF has finished it can be stickied by a moderator?

[Grouchio]

Auto_win attacker! Auto_win attacker!

[HunterKYA]

Seems like this concept is kind of like what I'm doing over in my thread, except this is far more detailed and gives step-by-step explanations that make it easier for the player to follow, whereas mine just gives them basic ideas.

Great work, Aristotle's Folly.

[Aristotle's Folly]

Taking Cities: Tearing Down Buildings, Controlling Unrest, and the Cultural Penalty

Question: When you take a city, should you destroy any or all buildings built by another culture, in order to overcome the “cultural penalty”?

Answer:

I've seen this suggested on a couple of threads now and decided the information would be useful to include here.

In the old RTW system, cities incurred a cultural penalty when there were buildings in that settlement or city which were built by another culture (barbarian, Greek, whatever). This penalty was (and is) reflected on the Settlement Details screen like this:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

The number of “masks” indicates the amount of cultural penalty within that settlement.

In the past, one way to reduce to the cultural penalty was to simply destroy all buildings built by another faction or culture within a city. Some players established a general rule that, whenever they took a city, they would tear everything down that could be torn down and build new buildings. In the alternative, some people would build over everything they could and tear down the rest.

Last summer, during playtesting, I raised this this issue, since tearing down all the buildings meant rebuilding using RSII's now significantly developed building trees. In response to my question, DVK posted the following statement about the cultural penalty:

The 'culture penalty' you see in the scrolls in post #426 is RTW's built in business......over which we would have no control with any coding. In fact, I have no idea what it's even based on. Obviously it's a bit 'skewed', since it was 45% before AND after you destroyed the buildings, but some of the little faces disappeared. There may be some hard coded penalties built into the EXE that are specific to each culture, and related to certain buildings. But, by and large, the action appears to have gained 5% happiness, and plunge the city a 1000 denari further into the red.

(Emphasis mine.) This statement suggests that the cultural penalty that appears on the screen is not entirely accurate. He continued in another post:

AFAIK, unless there is a specific cultural penalty built into a building by the code (mine) there are no buildings you can destroy that would accomplish anything here. The 'cultural building' is indestructible, and there are penalties in it, but they are meant to be overcome with time. Other than that, there are no penalties, for example, for having a 'tavern' in a conquered barbarian town by the Romans or anyone else. Nor are there any penalties for temples, even if the faction that owned it previously didn't share that temple tree with you. I guess that's why I was puzzled when people said they destroyed buildings, because other than someone else's barracks, there are none that would gain anything but some money.

(Again, emphasis mine.) For clarity, note that the "cultural building" DVK is referring to is the indestructible one added by RSII and which is in every city.

From that point on, I've not torn down any buildings except ones that I could not possibly use: another faction's military buildings and temples. I frankly expected these buildings – those from another culture – to somehow create problems, but several campaigns have clearly demonstrated that any “cultural penalty” could be easily overcome by taking one or more of the following steps:

1. Upon taking a city or region, depopulate the area or enslave the population.
2. Build the Jupiter shrine on your first turn, followed by Government Determination.
3. Following that build other government buildings, a few more temples, and wells. Wells bring a huge benefit.

Always check to see if there is any unrest in the area when taking a settlement. That could indicate the presence of any enemy spy or assassin. If I see three or more indicators of unrest for more than turn or two, I drop a couple of spies or an assassin into the city for a few turns. Usually that's all that's necessary to flush out the enemy spy/assassin.

~ Dani ~

[Ybbon]

...

Always check to see if there is any unrest in the area when taking a settlement. That could indicate the presence of any enemy spy or assassin. If I see three or more indicators of unrest for more than turn or two, I drop a couple of spies or an assassin into the city for a few turns. Usually that's all that's necessary to flush out the enemy spy/assassin.

~ Dani ~

Definitely! You may of course end up with a nasty spy who you know is there because he pops out of your settlement during the "end-turn" phase and jumps back in when it's over - and then you can't do anything about that. Not had this with RS2 yet but I think it is an RTW thing so probably still exists. You then need to get top level spies, assassins and top mgt/influence governor in and you may flush them out, and you may just have to wait until the foreign spy dies of old age or something.


Also, if any army (including your own) sieged the settlement for any length of time, you'll end up with devastation outside it and as far as I know there is nothing you can do about that, it improves over time unless farming upgrades help.

[SonOfCrusader76]

That was a fun read, OP.

I decided to drop battles to Medium, and to try to avoid fighting Hannibal, so I left him alone a few turns, whereupon he got bored and wandered over to one of the North Western settlements. I followed him, and then when he attacked, retreated. As luck would have it, I retreated up to the top of a nice steep hill - where he followed me and thanks to the hill, got his arse well and truly whooped. He lost the battle, got himself killed in the process and then the Carthaginians sued for peace.

[Aristotle's Folly]

@ Aristotle's Folly

Hi! I love this guide (+rep) but I think it make need to be reworked as I followed it to the letter and after Turn 1 I ended up with only 30,000 denarii, rather than the promised 62,000. I suspect that this is because of patch 2.1a which I beleive reduced trade income.

Very true - you are correct. The economy has changed in the latest patch and the guide was written for the original release. It is probably quite out of date.

Thanks for your comment.

... and yes, there are elephants in RSII ... Carthage will sometimes bring a load to attack your islands.

That was a fun read, OP.

I'm glad you enjoyed it.

~ Dani ~

[yuri007killa]

can someone tell how can i change the weapon from the bear warrior from the cimbri faction . because he use a piece of wood and i would like a axe .

[Grouchio]

So is it possible to make a Seleucid strategy guide?

[Lupus]

RoberttheBlack, you are messing up a good thing. If you do not like it, please post somewhere else.

I vote for the continuance of this thread. As long as people are finding it valuable and AF is willing then all is good.

Aristotle's Folly, +rep for the commitment and time spend. I'll keep following your guide until I work up the courage and the time
to take on the multi-stacks and then some more. I'll have to kill the exams before the Barbarians...

Thank you and well done.

[SgtPepper]

I for one are eagerly waiting for part II. Keep up the good work AF! And for the people who don't like this thread: I take it you don't have a gun to your head, if not don't follow this thread if you don't like it.

[intel]

Nice tutorial, Aristotle's Folly. I'm just curious, why do you advice in your SURVIVAL guide disbanding some of the most important units in the game? Greek slingers that is?

[Aristotle's Folly]

I'm at work right now but have been following this thread throughout the day.

First, thanks for all the encouragement.

Second, the last thing this forum needs is a flame war. If you look at this thread, from about post 18 onward, many of the posts have nothing to do with original intent of the thread. Some of them have no other intent than to bait me into an argument.

I offer this compromise: My "tutorial" on the first ten years has four parts. I will post these four parts over the next couple of days. At that time, the members of this forum can decide if this thread has value. If not, then I'll stop and willingly. If there is interest in my continuing, then I'll do that.

If people are upset because of the level of detail, I'm sorry but I think the first ten years are critical and I did go into detail.

@ RoberttheBlack: At the risk of sounding paranoid, I can't help but feel Toluas is right. You seem to have come to this forum to attack me personally. Regardless of whether that is true or not, I'll only respond to constructive comments about my posts. Everything else will be ignored.

@ intel: Yes, those units are very important. I think they're over-powered and I don't need them is my first answer. But mostly, from the beginning, I like to limit myself to four Roman legions, and add other units local units later. It's a personal preference.

~ Dani ~

[Thanatos]

Enough. If you don't like something about a mod, then offer helpful criticism to make it better, but one thing that will never stand are insults. Not now, not ever. I will be watching this thread.

[apple]

Dani please continue. I'm sure many newcomers find this really helpful.

To the ones that are acting rude and just bluntly stupid, well I only got one thing to tell them and that is leave our forum.
You are free to express yourself in our forum, but not in a way that it can hurt other people. I don't care if you are an ex military or god himself (Steve Jobs ), you have no right to be disrespectful to any other member.
I will personally make sure that anyone that is doing that from now one get's banned from the site or at least our forums. Be nice or leave.

[Apio Claudio]

Dude just one thing why don't you take another six hundred soldiers from your cities neasr hannibal and make them join the battle? When you do that start the battle let the computer control them and let the attack hannibasl first then you engage against his army with your full stak, i always do this and i win the battle loosing somethinf like 400 hundred men and killing all of hannibal troops and yet e next turn profit 57 thousand denarii, i think it's a besta tactic. Besides this i always remove my army from emporiae and engage Massila where I conquer the city, it's a far better start

[Chicken]

Dude just one thing why don't you take another six hundred soldiers from your cities neasr hannibal and make them join the battle? When you do that start the battle let the computer control them and let the attack hannibasl first then you engage against his army with your full stak, i always do this and i win the battle loosing somethinf like 400 hundred men and killing all of hannibal troops and yet e next turn profit 57 thousand denarii, i think it's a besta tactic. Besides this i always remove my army from emporiae and engage Massila where I conquer the city, it's a far better start

The OP is female