March to the Eternal City!

Exile · June 8, 2003, 00:35

As I've mentioned previously, my own Roman Centuries scenario is still in the conceptual stage. I've done the research, have a good map, know what I'm going to do with most of it, BUT . . .

The one major conceptual snag that is holding me up is the difficulty of dealing with Rebellious Legions/armies. As much as I'd like to simply ignore it and go about the business of slapping the thing together, the unfortunate fact of the matter is that two very important periods in Roman history are characterized chiefly by the repeating pattern of barbarian incursion-->Roman forces rush to the frontier and are victorious-->the now-successful army commander now declares himself the new Emperor and marches on the capital. This occurred during the final years of the republic. Marius, Sulla, Pompey, Ceasar, Octavian, Antony; all led armies against other "Roman" forces. Then again during the length of the 4th century, frontier generals seized the purple over and over again.

I just can't leave this out.

I need ideas.

How does one simulate this? The only idea that I could come up with was this; a successful attack against a specific type of barbarian unit generates, via an event, a "Rebel Legion" unit in one of the squares next to Rome. It proceeds to empty Rome of units, but cannot take the city--it's an air unit. It's range is 1, and it promptly runs out of fuel on the next turn. A generic "Rebel Legion" text message appears when this happens (the "runs out of fuel" message redone), and another event subtracts a specified amount of gold from the treasury.

This is the best I can come up with so far.

Does anyone else have anything further to add?

Boco · June 8, 2003, 01:03

Glad you're tackling this aspect of the history. Your scheme sounds good to me, if you can control the trigger.

How and where would you create the barb unit(s) that start the cascade?

Any ideas about whether AEGIS units or the SAM improvement should ever be used? If the SAM were to represent some sort of measure that increased resistance to these coup's, then it should have a painfully high maintenance rate to encourage its sell off.

Safe to assume that airbases or Barb-controlled cities won't be in range of Rome?

ToT or MGE?

fairline · June 8, 2003, 04:04

Don't forget that the same thing was happening in the 3rd Century as well, Exile.

Stefan Härtel · June 8, 2003, 05:42

Placing strong barbarian units is, of course, simple and effective.
But they're more effective if your means of dealing with them are restricted.
In the 3d century AD, the Roman economy was crippled by inflation and corruption; this was nearly as bad as the revolts.
A government type which is effective on smaller cities but gets out of hand once the cities increase in size, plus changemoney events might do the trick. Maybe even changeterrain events will do something for you; economic downfall of entire regions (this happened) etc.

Another idea might be to increase cost and decrease strenght of the armies at certain tines. This may simulate the lack of effectiveness of the Roman army when their comrades revolt (and, with a bit of imagination, may also simulate corruption within the army).

curtsibling · June 8, 2003, 05:48

It's a tricky one.

You could have allied civs (like in Nemo's 2nd front) with the same flag, slightly different colour, who turn against you (via events) when they conquer a certain city....

Civfan · June 8, 2003, 10:00

a simple idea to have this included, is to have a seperate civ as a rebel civ. Make the settler unit with no movement so the civ will not expand and can't disappear in the game. Once a rebellion takes place, use that civ to generate a rebellion. Though this concept is very limited, it seems the only course of action to take to stimlate the rebellions without the use of barbarians.

Another concept is to use cspl program when its developed for civ2 gold. But this is in its begining period as I speak.

hardjoy · June 8, 2003, 11:44

Maybe you can tailor-sew a government form to fit this scheme, with frequent unhappiness problems, and perhaps combined with an givetechnology event which obsoletes certain happiness wonders. Worked with adjusting appropriate game.txt messages, this might do the trick. Barb units can appear at the same time, pillaging improvements and weakening the economy.

Then when the government falls (i.e. "roman general marches on rome"), a new govenment is established ("a new Emperor takes charge")

An idea how to force the government fall : if another civ (in this case the northern barbarians) demands a democracy the withdrawal of forces and the player doesn't comply (if he does he will leave his borders open and vulnerable to the aggressive barb civ).

Civfan · June 8, 2003, 14:42

question, how many governments allow can fall from unhappienest?

Republic, Democracy???

Civfan · June 23, 2003, 12:19

any news about this?

Palaiologos · June 23, 2003, 14:44

What exactly is the timeline of your scenario exile?

Palaiologos · June 23, 2003, 14:45

Democracy is the only goverment that can fall, i think.

EZRhino · June 23, 2003, 16:22

Republics can too, I think

Civfan · June 23, 2003, 19:50

Quote:

Originally posted by Exile

How does one simulate this? The only idea that I could come up with was this; a successful attack against a specific type of barbarian unit generates, via an event, a "Rebel Legion" unit in one of the squares next to Rome. It proceeds to empty Rome of units, but cannot take the city--it's an air unit. It's range is 1, and it promptly runs out of fuel on the next turn. A generic "Rebel Legion" text message appears when this happens (the "runs out of fuel" message redone), and another event subtracts a specified amount of gold from the treasury.

This is the best I can come up with so far.

Does anyone else have anything further to add?

Some questions on your idea. It sounds good, but heres some questions:

Are your attacks from Barbarians via-events?

An example, Vandals are on the march through Dacia and Greece, plundering their way to the city Athens.
--will you create the Vandal units inside Dacia province

Will you create specific Vandal units with a leader?

The creation of a Rebel Legion beside Rome as a Air unit is perfect, you could also create the Rebel Air units near the region which the invasion happend, example Dacia and Greece to attack any legions there as well as cities. The destruction caused by these Rebel legions is wide-spread causing for the player to rebuild his legions, area of devestation.

Michael Daumen · June 24, 2003, 21:12

Remember too that if you have air units, some of the player's units need the attack air flag, which could mess up any plans for impassable terrain.

If you wanted the Rebel legions to dissapear you could give them the missile flag. That would also prevent them from taking cities.

If you were adventurous, you could start the scenario with the Raging Horde level of barbarian activity and use Roman units in the unit slots for the eventual barbarians.

Why do you not want rebels to take over cities?

Exile · June 25, 2003, 01:49

Gone for a few days and so many excellent responses. I'll try to address some of them. There are some very good ideas here and that's precisely what I was after.

Fairline; 3rd century--correct.

Stefan Hartel; the economic downfall of entire regions. My plan is create barbarian units of varying strengths, a very few of which will be very difficult to beat. Using a batch file type approach, I should be able to vary the frequency of appearance of these (and other barbarian) units. Not many "horde" units would appear during the initial centuries, and then later in the scenario, their frequency of appearance would increase dramatically, then fall off after the 5th century again. Hopefully, the incursions of these units would successfully simulate the ruin of entire provinces as happened after the 3rd century.

Civfan & Curt; The "other civs" is another very good idea, one I hadn't considered, and might well be worth merit. I'm trying to comprehend all the tricks with that idea now. Making rebellious Roman troops another civ would be good, but it would limit flexibility in total number of potential player positions.

Hardjoy; I like your idea too, but I'm thinking that wily and experienced players will somehow find a way to keep their governments from falling. Republic and Democracy are both susceptible to falling governments, btw.

Paliolagos; It will run from 150 B.C. (post Punic wars) until perhaps 700.

Mike Daumen; Thanks for pointing that out about the air units and impassable terrain. Your question about not wanting rebels to take over cities is a good one. It seems that the various histories indicate that rebellious units/armies weren't interested in seizing territory and creating the tax/population base for empire-building. They were interested in taking the imperial throne by force and the empire came with it, but possession of the capital was necessary. Even so, your question seems to point toward the temporary sub-empires of Palmyra and Gaul in the 3rd century, so perhaps the creation of independent states within the normal boundaries of the empire is a good idea, but should be balanced with the more typical march on Rome.

Thanks everyone for the tips.