Advice for Romani campaign, building varied provincial governments?

[QuintusSertorius]

Quintus, does the high number of turns for the elephants spawing relates to the siege bug with elephants?

They're not connected. It's a script that gives certain factions in possession of certain settlements a free elephant unit every 80 turns.

The bug is a vestige of RTW code, whereby elephants are treated as "rams" even though they removed that ability from them on the battlemap.

Huh. Looking at things...I should not build Ius Latinorum in Italy until right before Marian reforms, right? Because it looks like it'll remove some important local units in favour of factional ones, leaving me with no support troops. Or is it required for latifundia?

You need a municip (ie top government) to build a Latifunda as Rome, so yes, it will delay the reform if you hold off.

[Lusitanio]

They're not connected. It's a script that gives certain factions in possession of certain settlements a free elephant unit every 80 turns.

The bug is a vestige of RTW code, whereby elephants are treated as "rams" even though they removed that ability from them on the battlemap.

Yes, I know about the bug, I was just curious if it was 80 turns to avoid the chances of Factions having many elephants and later attacking cities...
The bug can be solved if the army has siege engines that can destroy walls/gates.

[QuintusSertorius]

Yes, I know about the bug, I was just curious if it was 80 turns to avoid the chances of Factions having many elephants and later attacking cities...
The bug can be solved if the army has siege engines that can destroy walls/gates.

They're never going to have many elephants, the AI rarely has the free cash to recruit them. I don't want to increase the priority to make them choose elephants over other units they'll use more usefully, either, so the script that periodically adds them is an adequate compromise.

[Sar1n]

Damn. I already noticed the native pools in Italy shrinking due to cultural conversion. Guess I'll have to make haste for the Africa to secure a source of Igallidan ASAP. I've already lost the possibility of recruiting Tarantine cavalry...

[Rad]

They're never going to have many elephants, the AI rarely has the free cash to recruit them. I don't want to increase the priority to make them choose elephants over other units they'll use more usefully, either, so the script that periodically adds them is an adequate compromise.

Seleucids... they have elephants

[Roma_Victrix]

Damn. I already noticed the native pools in Italy shrinking due to cultural conversion. Guess I'll have to make haste for the Africa to secure a source of Igallidan ASAP. I've already lost the possibility of recruiting Tarantine cavalry...

Good to know!

Seleucids... they have elephants

Antiochus III the Great of the House of Seleucus is really alarmed and disappointed by this scripting compromise.

https://i.imgur.com/XFV2eRM.jpg

[QuintusSertorius]

Damn. I already noticed the native pools in Italy shrinking due to cultural conversion. Guess I'll have to make haste for the Africa to secure a source of Igallidan ASAP. I've already lost the possibility of recruiting Tarantine cavalry...

Note that Roman governments are pretty much the only source of recruitment impacted by culture levels now. Most other places are phased by event_counters instead, so an Allied Government is always an option to preserve native units.

[Roma_Victrix]

Do the triggers for the election of censor actually work in the traits script? Or is the highly prestigious office of censor there just to sort of aggravate me and make me become despondent that I've wasted several years of life for some of my prime generals at the peak of their careers as they sit around in Rome waiting for that election? As far as I can tell nobody ever gets elected to the office of censor, although questor, curule aedile, praetor, and consul elections work. The pontifex maximus trait is given to my faction leaders even when they are nowhere near Rome. The triumphs also work just fine.

[Sar1n]

I dunno if anyone else noticed this...but "dislikes races" trait line seem to be very common among Romans, at least in my game, with no positive counterpart....

Edit: I also recieved "Uncomfortable supervisor" trait a few times...on a character that's a governor, and has been for a long time. Based on trait description, it looks like it was supposed to be a trait for long time governors that go out to the field...

[QuintusSertorius]

Edit: I also recieved "Uncomfortable supervisor" trait a few times...on a character that's a governor, and has been for a long time. Based on trait description, it looks like it was supposed to be a trait for long time governors that go out to the field...

No, that's also triggered by smart governors being in small settlements, and dumb governors being in large ones.

[nvm]

Do the triggers for the election of censor actually work in the traits script? Or is the highly prestigious office of censor there just to sort of aggravate me and make me become despondent that I've wasted several years of life for some of my prime generals at the peak of their careers as they sit around in Rome waiting for that election? As far as I can tell nobody ever gets elected to the office of censor, although questor, curule aedile, praetor, and consul elections work. The pontifex maximus trait is given to my faction leaders even when they are nowhere near Rome. The triumphs also work just fine.

It does seem possible in theory, but very rare. Elections for Censor only happen every 5 years (20) and requirements are really strict - it has to be someone who has served full term as consul and proconsul, and they have to be in Rome. But even if such terms are satisfied, there's nothing stopping them from getting just re-elected as Consul, which will block election to Censor.

[nvm]

My Roman campaign has now advanced to a point where I should be able to give my cities full citizenship, upgrading Italian government to the highest level, but I don't appear to be able to upgrade Ius Latinorum in Capua, which is by now a huge city with over 75% Roman culture. Is there any other requirements? Do I need that government to construct Latifundia for Marian reforms?

[QuintusSertorius]

My Roman campaign has now advanced to a point where I should be able to give my cities full citizenship, upgrading Italian government to the highest level, but I don't appear to be able to upgrade Ius Latinorum in Capua, which is by now a huge city with over 75% Roman culture. Is there any other requirements? Do I need that government to construct Latifundia for Marian reforms?

You can only upgrade with the Marian reform.

[Roma_Victrix]

You can only upgrade with the Marian reform.

Fascinating! Thanks for letting us know.

It does seem possible in theory, but very rare. Elections for Censor only happen every 5 years (20) and requirements are really strict - it has to be someone who has served full term as consul and proconsul, and they have to be in Rome. But even if such terms are satisfied, there's nothing stopping them from getting just re-elected as Consul, which will block election to Censor.

That's a good point! It would certainly explain things.

[Roma_Victrix]

Well, I finally got a family member to win the office of censor, only after having achieved the dignitas trait, but I'm befuddled by a new development: the fact that three family members can win the office of consul within the same year. This has happened twice now. Historically, the Romans only had two newly-elected consuls every year. Did you guys try to limit this in the campaign script at all? Was this a mistake you forgot to address? Or is this by design? I'm confused, but satisfied that I have an extra general being granted imperium so he can set out on the road from Rome to kick some barbarian ass.

[QuintusSertorius]

Well, I finally got a family member to win the office of censor, only after having achieved the dignitas trait, but I'm befuddled by a new development: the fact that three family members can win the office of consul within the same year. This has happened twice now. Historically, the Romans only had two newly-elected consuls every year. Did you guys try to limit this in the campaign script at all? Was this a mistake you forgot to address? Or is this by design? I'm confused, but satisfied that I have an extra general being granted imperium so he can set out on the road from Rome to kick some barbarian ass.

It's not possible to limit the assignment of traits to a specific number of characters, all trait triggers happen simultaneously for every eligible character.

[Roma_Victrix]

It's not possible to limit the assignment of traits to a specific number of characters, all trait triggers happen simultaneously for every eligible character.

Fair enough, but why do 90% of my generals/family members have the "faithless" trait? Isn't that extraordinarily high? Especially since atheists/agnostics were so incredibly rare in the ancient and for that matter medieval worlds. It was a literal death sentence in certain cultures and civilizations. Even Socrates was forced to commit suicide for questioning the gods and corrupting the youth of Athens. The Romans were an austere, simple bunch. They cared about their gods, not the arcane beliefs of a tiny handful of Greek philosophers who cast doubt on the established pantheon of deities. If anything the faithless trait shouldn't even exist, or at least be relegated to like 1% of all family members.

Also, isn't it a little extreme that a family member with six solid command stars literally loses ALL of them the split second his imperium expires? I can understand losing one or two command stars as a penalty for losing status as proconsul or propraetor (once those five-year terms are done), but losing that many stars is just obnoxious. Especially since it takes an enormous amount of time to have generals travel back to Rome from Iberia, Gaul, or North Africa.

[QuintusSertorius]

Fair enough, but why do 90% of my generals/family members have the "faithless" trait? Isn't that extraordinarily high? Especially since atheists/agnostics were so incredibly rare in the ancient and for that matter medieval worlds. It was a literal death sentence in certain cultures and civilizations. Even Socrates was forced to commit suicide for questioning the gods and corrupting the youth of Athens. The Romans were an austere, simple bunch. They cared about their gods, not the arcane beliefs of a tiny handful of Greek philosophers who cast doubt on the established pantheon of deities. If anything the faithless trait shouldn't even exist, or at least be relegated to like 1% of all family members.

The triggers are the same for all characters. The main one is intelligent characters in settlements with advanced schooling are most likely to get it. If you leave characters lying around in such places for long periods of time, it will tend to trigger.

Also, isn't it a little extreme that a family member with six solid command stars literally loses ALL of them the split second his imperium expires? I can understand losing one or two command stars as a penalty for losing status as proconsul or propraetor (once those five-year terms are done), but losing that many stars is just obnoxious. Especially since it takes an enormous amount of time to have generals travel back to Rome from Iberia, Gaul, or North Africa.

That's the Imperium mechanic, a feature of playing the Romans. Welcome to the real problem they had as their empire expanded of having to go back to Rome for another legitimate command.

[Roma_Victrix]

That's the Imperium mechanic, a feature of playing the Romans. Welcome to the real problem they had as their empire expanded of having to go back to Rome for another legitimate command.

I guess you're right, but it just seems so extreme. Is it supposed to simulate the distrust that the men would have for someone whose elected office had expired? If so, that's like arguing Mark Antony's men no longer had confidence in him when his office as consul and triumvir expired, but still controlled half the Roman world when facing against Octavian as a technical private citizen. I think a small penalty of one or two stars makes sense, not this loss of four to five command stars.

The triggers are the same for all characters. The main one is intelligent characters in settlements with advanced schooling are most likely to get it. If you leave characters lying around in such places for long periods of time, it will tend to trigger.

Fair enough, but that would hardly explain some other crippling problems. Now about two thirds of all my generals have that horrific "embezzler" trait, making public order a nightmare, and to make things even worse, all my generals are dying off and are NOT being replaced. It's a demographic crisis in my growing empire that already has 50 provinces but only 60 generals and that includes recruited client rulers who are going to die off without heirs.

Looking at my dwindling family tree, I only have three young sons to replace all of these guys! There are only 8 young girls to marry off when they come of age. That's insane. Not blaming you guys for this, since I've seen this happen once before in a M2TW campaign (perhaps it was also EBII, can't remember), but is there something I can do to stop this nonsense? I noticed about half my generals have that stupid "flaccid" trait. I think the game is pissed off at me for being so successful, since I recently surpassed the Seleucids as the most powerful faction on the map.

It's getting so bad that I'm very tempted to just cheat and use the "Fertile" trait in the tilde "~" command shell to get around this. Yet even that has limited uses considering the limited amount of Roman given names (Pvblivs, Nvmerivs, Tiberivs, Titvs, Cnaevs, Caivs, Avlvs, Servivs, and Sextvs) and no surnames, so cheating would only affect a small handful of characters. Even then it's a gamble and not a certainty that they will have kids, even with the 3-tier "prolific" trait and a doctor ancillary that gives a supposed fertility bonus or at least a small chance of it.

And by the way, I used to have 70 generals! Soon enough I'll only have 58 or 55 of them, since several of them are in their late 60s right now. I'm not stupid, I can see what's going on here, and I swear the AI is being super glib about this, basically a Nelson from the Simpsons style "haha" while pointing and laughing at my predicament.

[QuintusSertorius]

Ultimately, unless you're autoresolving most of your battles, Command stars are largely irrelevant for the human player. You can ignore the imperium mechanic if you wish, but it isn't changing. Most of the boosts for Romans come with playing along with the cursus honoroum.

We've just been discussing Embezzler in the main thread; keeping large surpluses will trigger it if your FMs are mostly sitting around in settlements.