Roman Leadership

[darth_dov]

This is just to see if someone can make it a little bit clearer for me.

From the flow chart included with the Docs, and the notes etc. am I right with the following assumption on how it runs -

Age 16-20 - Study at Rome (or nearest city with acadamy buildings)
Age 20-30 - Tribune (prove bravery by fighting with the army)
Age 30 - 40 - Legate (in charge of a smallish army)
Age 40-45 - Praetor (in charge of bigger army)
Age 45+ - Consul (in charge of largest army)

or for governers -

16 - 20 - as above
20 -30 - as above
30 - 36 - Legate
36+ - Provincial Governor

OR

16 - 20 - as above
20 - 30 - as above
30 - 40 - as above
40 - 45 - as above
45+ - Governor of Latium.

Note : ages assuming the character takes up the posts immediately thus serving the minimum terms (ie ten years as a tribune etc.)

I'm trying to play historically, and with the system in place I want to get my characters in the right posts at the right time, but the flow chart was a bit difficult to decipher so wanted to make sure I had it right.

[Quinn Inuit]

I think you have it right. I haven't personally run anyone through that in awhile, but I'm pretty sure that's how it works.

[Caesar Augustus]

I'll normaly do the military side of the career, I don't tend to play the civil career so much. Sounds right to me though

Welcome by the way

[HLandin]

That's about the way it works. Just as a note, the legate and praetor positions kinda overlap. The office of praetor predates the legate, originating about the mid-republic. The praetorship was an elected office: a praetor had imperium meaning that he had his own authority to command troops, but was junior to the consuls. He would have commanded a legion or maybe two - this would have been considered a praetorian army (which is referred to in the guide). A praetorian army would have been smaller than the armies commanded by the consuls (hence the title consular army). A consular army would have consisted of two or maybe three to four legions. However, it is important to note that unless it was a campaign that required large amounts of forces operating together, a praetorian army could and would operate independent of the consuls, maybe even in a different theater (example: consul A operating in North Africa, consul B operating in Greece, praetor operating in Spain, etc.)

The legate position seems to have emerged during the late republic. A legate was like a deputy of the consul or proconsul meaning that his authority to command was granted on him by the consul and he was not an elected position. This position was needed because of the growing size of the armies commanded by the consuls or proconsuls (sometimes eight or more legions). Thus, the legate's army would be viewed more as a detachment of the consular army as opposed to the praetor's army, which would have been an independently operating army.

Unfortunately, the limitations of the game do not allow all this to play out properly but make the best of it. Remember, while a praetor may operate far from the consuls, the legates should operate in the same theater as the consuls acting as support or detachments.

Hope this helps.

[darth_dov]

Thanks, thats great. I had no idea about the difference between legate's and Praetor's. Roman history is something I'm interested in, but never studied it, so I just read about what I can when I get free time. So to play as realistically as allowed, I should only really have a legate operating in the same region as a consul? (eg both being in N. Africa?) (I don't have a lot of free time at the moment, so I'm only about 4 turns into my game, everyone's still in Italy at the moment). Of course, the issue with playing the game, is always the balance between accuracy and playability, if a threat arrives, and my only option is to send a legate seperate from a consul then I will of course respond to the threat!

[HLandin]

Cooperation is acceptable. While the republic did NOT always smoothly handle different commanders operating together and sometimes this even lead to disaster (Cannae, Trebia, Arausio, etc.); however, there are also examples of generals cooperating to achieve a victory against the enemy (Metaurus being the best example). In fact, according to some accounts (i.e. Polybius), Hannibal understood this and would coordinate his battles to exploit this division, attacking when the Romans were divided and avoiding battle/retiring when the Romans were operating united. Just keep in mind that USUALLY each of the consuls would operate in different theaters to prevent this friction; in you situation, one might operate in northern Italy and the other in southern Italy or even Sicily.