As those following the old thread already know, I had an idea to set up a series of historical challenges with the goal of finding out if real historical feats are feasible.
The first challenge I proposed was to see if a player can set up a Roman Empire resembling the historical one. In civ3 this was a lost cause since a Roman Empire would never die, but now with dynamic rise and fall, Rome is actually likelier to go down a-la fall of rome if it expands historically.
1: Territory - borders must believably encompass at least 90% of the Roman Empire as of Trajan's rule (map (http://www.socialstudiesforkids.com/graphics/romanempiremaplarge.jpg)), not entirely excluding any province or area (noteworthy extremities: England, Iberia, Dacia, Armenia, Mesopotamia, Mauretania)
2a: Infrastructure I - All cities under Roman control must be connected to the Roman trade network
2b: Infrastructure II - All cities above size 5 must have Aqueduct
3a: Culture and Establishment I - Roma and at least four other cities must be above size 4, have Barracks, and have 100 culture or more
3b: Culture and Establishment II - Roma and at least two other cities must have Collosseum
4: TIMING - At a chosen point between AD 50 and AD 200, all above requirements must have already been accomplished
(Gif version of the goals with the map, to print and view while playing: link (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads12/paxromana-challengepage.gif))
It may seem extremely hard and may literally be impossible, but the goal is to create suggestions for mod balancement that will allow the above goals to be completed. Keep in mind that it should be hard to achieve, require some luck, and that it should be impossible to get a little more than what the Roman Empire historically got by Trajan's time (if it's possible, it's too easy for Rome in the mod).
Everybody is invited to try, we'll decide in this thread when it's time to move on to the next challenges. I've got the following feats down, in no particular order, for future challenges:
Alexander's Conquest (most of the known world in a few years)
The Mongolian Empire (all of Asia in under 100 years)
English Colonial Imperialism (the sun never sets on the British Empire)

My first attempt didn't go so good. I immediately went to war with Greece and conquered Athenai. The problem was I lost my momentun and stalemated.

I'll start off with expanding first and leaving Greece and Egypt until I control more area.

Edit: I like the idea of the English challenge for the next one.

Here's a copy of one of my posts from the earlier thread about the Alexander challenge.

I was inspired by all of the talk about Rome and its conquests to attempt to recreate the conquests of Alexander. The game was set to the middle difficulty level to make it a bit easier (I usually play the highest). I made a valiant effort, but alas, it took me until 150 BC to destroy the Persians and conquer Egypt. I have confidence that I would be able to accomplish the goal if I were to try it again. Rather than me go through and describe everything I thought it would be better if I just showed you all some pictures

This is at 310 BC, the turn after which Alexander would have died historically.
http://img247.imageshack.us/img247/6506/310bc9by.th.jpg (http://img247.imageshack.us/my.php?image=310bc9by.jpg)

This is 150 BC when I completed my conquests. I decided to not invade India.
http://img289.imageshack.us/img289/5871/150bc0dy.th.jpg (http://img289.imageshack.us/my.php?image=150bc0dy.jpg)

I've gone on to completely dominate that game, I control most of Europe and am way ahead in points and techs.

A balanced thing to achieve would be that empires should be easy to create and hard to mantein...

A balanced thing to achieve would be that empires should be easy to create and hard to mantein...
Thats really one of the core issues with civ. Everything is set up so that its the opposite of that.

Thats really one of the core issues with civ. Everything is set up so that its the opposite of that.

Yeah, but the apparition of new civs in this mod makes this scenario possible. With the possibility of adding new civs, it would be nice that every civ has a "counter civ", that acts as a challenge for it´s evergrowing empire.

Okay, just did my first attempt, and when I discovered Calendar in 550AD I was shocked to discover how miserably I've failed. We should start to formulate conclusions for this challenge. I would say Rome should start with an extra worker, an extra galley and an extra Praetorian. That may go a long way in letting Rome set up a historical empire lightning-quick. It would let you get North Africa within about three turns of starting.

I believe there is one solution for all those empire challenges - more turns ;)
Slower tech discovery but more time left for war.

No, I think it's logistically feasible to create a historical Roman Empire in time, but it's just impossible to do so with the current start.
And I do think it's fair to conclude it's impossible to complete the challenge with the current conditions. Rhye, are you prepared to start tweaking the balance for this challenge?

I have never tried Rome but maybe I should :)

When defining start we should have in mind not only building Pax Romana but whole game. If we make Rome so strong in the very begining they could be invincible once empire is created. Then we have to strenghten new coming European civs and so on... All balancing is started from the scratch :crazyeye:

The point of the historical challenge is to focus on how possible it is to do one specific historical thing. If making an historical feat possible breaks the balance, obviously the balance has to be fixed, but that is not part of the historical challenge project, just a general mod development issue.

Yes I can agree with this. But I still think that adding more turns is better solution.
Even if you manage Roman Empire you surely cannot achieve that of Alexander or Genghis Khan - whatever starting power you give to them.

We'll have to try those next, but I do believe it's possible.
I think adding turns is out of the question because it makes the game slower and this goes against one of the mod's primary goals.

I just remembered some ideas I had before for UP and UU tweaks that can help make this challenge possible.
One idea is to just give praetorians the March promotion. It makes a lot of sense and could be just enough to keep the legions marching quickly to reach Rome's historical peak.
The other idea is a general direction for something to add to the UP or replace it with somehow. The basic idea is to have conquests of cities by praetorians give you a little something to keep the empire growing. The way I thought to do it was that every time a praetorian conquers a city, that city receives walls automatically. Whenever a praetorian conquers a city size 5 or more, a 0 XP praetorian spawns in that city automatically. That alone can be enough to make the challenge possible, and it makes sense historically, since occupied populations were enslaved into the service of Rome, and legionaries were skilled in all the building crafts and would build their own walls (and roads).

You know, this kind of Historical Challenge stuff could make for a neat feature. If you achieve the Historical Challenge, you get some kind of bonus that really improves your shot at victory.

The design challenge would be coming up with a goal for EVERY civilization, and one that's not too complicated to implement.

Just a thought.

No, I think it's logistically feasible to create a historical Roman Empire in time, but it's just impossible to do so with the current start.

I think it is just impossible to do with your conditions.

I got pretty darn close:

http://www.oneandfour.org/images/Civ/rome.jpg

But then you said in addition to conquering/settling the historic extent of Rome you need aquaducts and colleseums and Rome has to be the top city in the world and...

You just need to remember this is a game.

You just need to remember this is a game.

Usually it's easier in games to achieve greater things than in history. :D

There are things hardcoded in games - none in real life :D

Ozzy, I'm impressed with what you managed to do but I really don't like your attitude. The goals aren't just some kooky set of rules I cooked up to give you a hard time. They're a very scaled-down representation of some of the Roman Empire's real achievements. This challenge is a concentrated testing effort! The goals are intended to let us know if what we're testing for is possible or not. I have already agreed it's impossible right now and I want us to explore how it can be made possible, because this mod simulates a reality in which it really was possible.

Lots of aqueducts, even more barracks, three colosseums... plus a fully connected trade network.

Sounds to me like something that needs to be tied to Rome's UP.

I think the UP might be a great way to encourage this. Rome is famous for its aqueducts!

Rhye, are you prepared to start tweaking the balance for this challenge?


I'm not tweaking the balance for the challenge, but for the mod, if needed.
If I make Romans more powerful, I'll raise barbarian hordes too.

The challenge is for the mod, so for the challenge means for the mod. The Romans don't need to be made more powerful per se, it just has to be made possible for Rome to create a historical Roman Empire in an historical timeframe. Right now that is not possible because Rome starts with too few units and takes too long to get the masses required to create such a large empire. The barbarian hordes are already a major problem for a Roman Empire. It's not necessary to make them stronger every time Rome is given some kind of advantage, especially because Rome is bound to collapse with the Barbarian Invasion (German spawn and other European spawns) eventually. That's exactly what we need to tweak for. But first it has to be possible to acheive the historical empire in the first place.

I think the barbarian hordes could really be a bit stronger. In my last game barbarians were no real problem for my Roman Empire.

In both of my challenge test games today Barbarians were an almost constant nuisance on my empire in Europe, often doing real damage to infrastructure and to some legions, and sometimes coming close to doing lasting harm to my cities. In the first test game, where I had North Africa, I lost Leptis Magna to the barbarians and very very nearly lost Carthago too (it was a fluke that it lasted, it shouldn't have.) Barbarians should become a serious problem only after the time this challenge focuses on.

Ozzy, I'm impressed with what you managed to do but I really don't like your attitude. The goals aren't just some kooky set of rules I cooked up to give you a hard time. They're a very scaled-down representation of some of the Roman Empire's real achievements. This challenge is a concentrated testing effort! The goals are intended to let us know if what we're testing for is possible or not. I have already agreed it's impossible right now and I want us to explore how it can be made possible, because this mod simulates a reality in which it really was possible.

My point is it is currently impossible to do, and I don't think it is a good idea to change the mod to make it possible. I think having the challenge is a fun exercise, but the mod shouldn't be built around it or adjusted to fit the challenge, because I think it would necessarily unbalance the mod.

In both of my challenge test games today Barbarians were an almost constant nuisance on my empire in Europe, often doing real damage to infrastructure and to some legions, and sometimes coming close to doing lasting harm to my cities. In the first test game, where I had North Africa, I lost Leptis Magna to the barbarians and very very nearly lost Carthago too (it was a fluke that it lasted, it shouldn't have.) Barbarians should become a serious problem only after the time this challenge focuses on.

Uh, the "barbarians" represent Carthage, Gaul, the Alemanni, Illyria, Numidia, and so on and so on. I daresay they ought to be a serious problem for the Romans.

One thing to keep in mind here while we're trying to achieve historical situations - some things in history might have been less likely (though they happened) than things that did happen. Let's say the rise of Romeis was extremely unlikely - a 1% chance? In that case, it should be very unlikely that the mod allows it BUT it should feel like it's possible.

"If that barbarian hadn't broken through and killed my worker...if the Egyptians had been weaker...if I'd built the Oracle earlier", things like that.

I agree that getting some semblence of history is important, but the mod can't be built around 100% historical accuracy. Otherwise, you've either hamstringed certain players, or given other players a silly advantage.

Yeah. Ozzy, the point is that for this mod to be historical this challenge should be remotely possible. Right now, it really isn't. It doesn't need to be easy, just acheivable on Monarch with concentrated effort.

I did play one game as the Romans (monarch level), and did fairly ok in Europe, but I lost my African cities to the barbs (poor planning from my side no doubt), still couldnt achieve quite the historical result, gonna try a new game again perhaps :)

The other idea is a general direction for something to add to the UP or replace it with somehow. The basic idea is to have conquests of cities by praetorians give you a little something to keep the empire growing.

That's the definitely right idea if we a looking for a historical accuracy. Roman economy based on slavery but CIV4 reflects it completely inaccurately. Famous american antropologist and author of series of original works Joseph Tainter wrote:


The Romans' early success came from a means of expansion that was fiscally self-perpetuating. Defeated peoples provided the economic basis, and some of the manpower, for further expansion. It was a strategy with high economic returns. By 167 B.C., for example, the Romans were able to stop levying domestic taxes while still expanding the empire. At the same time, the economics of an empire such as the Romans assembled are seductive but illusory. The returns on any campaign of conquest are highest initially, when the accumulated surpluses of the conquered peoples are appropriated. Thereafter, the conqueror assumes the cost of administering and defending the province. These responsibilities may last for centuries and are paid for from yearly agricultural surpluses. The fiscal basis of such an empire shifts from accumulated surpluses, which are generally embodied in precious metals, works of art, and population, to current solar energy.
The late Roman Republic is a paradigmatic example of a high-gain phase in which the seizure of accumulated surpluses produced the wealth to finance further campaigns. Nevertheless, this steep gradient so disrupted the political system that republican government was soon terminated with the establishment of a new level at the top of the hierarchy, i.e., that of a permanent emperor and his court. This development signaled both the dissipation of the high-gain gradient and the start of the low-gain but more prolonged imperial phase.
Once the phase of conquest was complete and the accumulated surpluses spent, the Roman government was financed by agricultural taxes that barely sufficed for ordinary administration. The early empire was administered more by available income than by a planned budget. When extraordinary expenses arose, typically during wars, the precious metals on hand frequently were insufficient to produce the required coinage. Facing the costs of war with Parthia and rebuilding Rome after the Great Fire, Nero began in 64 A.D. a policy that later emperors found irresistible. He debased the primary silver coin, the denarius, reducing the amount of silver in the alloy from 98 to 93%. It was the first step down a slope that resulted two centuries later in a currency that was worthless (1.9% silver) and a government that was insolvent.
In the half-century from 235 to 284, the empire nearly came to an end. There were foreign and civil wars almost without interruption. This period witnessed 26 legitimate emperors and perhaps 50 usurpers. Cities were sacked, and frontier provinces were devastated. The empire shrank in the 260s to Italy, the Balkans, and North Africa. By prodigious effort, the empire survived the crisis, but it emerged at the turn of the fourth century A.D. as a very different organization.
In the late third and early fourth centuries, Diocletian and Constantine designed a government that was larger, more complex, more highly organized, and much more costly. They doubled the size of the army, always the major part of imperial costs. To pay for this, the government taxed its citizens more heavily, conscripted their labor, and dictated their occupations.
Diocletian established Rome's first budget, and each year a tax rate was calculated to provide the revenue. The tax was established from a master list of the empire's people and lands, tabulated down to individual households and fields. In an era when travel and communication were slow, expensive, and unreliable, it took substantial organization and personnel just to establish and administer a tax system so minutely detailed. Taxes continued to rise, apparently doubling between 324 and 364. Villages were liable for the taxes on their members, and one village could even be held liable for another. Tax obligations were extended to widows, orphans, and dowries. In spite of this colossal effort, the government still had to conscript men for the army and requisition services from guilds to meet its needs. Occupations were made hereditary and obligatory. Positions that had once been eagerly sought, such as in city senates, became burdensome because leading citizens were held responsible for tax deficiencies.
The tax system supporting the more complex government and larger army had unforeseen consequences. After plagues decimated the population in the second and third centuries, conditions were never favorable for recovery. There were shortages of labor in agriculture, industry, the military, and the civil service. The tax system of the late empire seems to have been to blame, because the rates were so high that peasants could not accumulate reserves or support large families. Whatever crops were brought in had to be sold for taxes, even if it meant starvation for the farmer and his family. Farmers who couldn't pay their taxes were jailed, sold their children into slavery, or abandoned their homes and fields. Under such circumstances it became unprofitable to cultivate marginal land because too often it would not yield enough for taxes and a surplus, so, despite government edicts, marginal lands were left fallow. In some provinces, up to one-third to one-half of arable land had been deserted by the time of the late empire. Faced with taxes, peasants would abandon their lands and flee to the protection of a wealthy landowner, who was glad to have the extra labor. Feudal relations emerged, and, in lieu of peasants, landowners offered vagabonds or even slaves for military service. By 400 A.D., most of Gaul and Italy was owned by fewer than a dozen senatorial families who had the power to defy the government's tax demands.
From the late fourth century the peoples of central Europe could no longer be kept out of Roman territory. The government came to rely almost exclusively on mercenaries from federated peoples. When finally they could not be paid, they overthrew the last emperor in Italy in 476 A.D.

http://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol7/iss3/art4/main.html

Very interesting read...

The only porblem with just giving them a bonus when a Praetorian takes a city is that it would do almost nothing when they try to expand into France and Spain, where there aren't really any cities to take. It would definately help give them a juggernaut momentum towards Greece and Persia, as well as Egypt and the Carthaginian Barbarians, but the cityless Europe would give them nothing. Perhaps whenever a city is founded a praetorian is created in it, this would be in addition to the conscription of conquered cities.

Either that or we could try and convince Rhye to script more Barbarian cities in Europe, which as probably none of you know I have always pressed for.

I only read the first paragraph (too tired to read more atm) but it gave me a very simple idea: roman cities would get a raw bonus to taxes per % non-Roman nationality in the city. Say, a city receives +1:commerce: per 10%non-Roman. A newly conquered city would yield a whooping 10gpt, which would slowly dwindle down into zilch. This bonus can also disappear with Guilds or a slightly later medieval tech, helping to speed the Roman Empire to collapse.

The only porblem with just giving them a bonus when a Praetorian takes a city is that it would do almost nothing when they try to expand into France and Spain, where there aren't really any cities to take. It would definately help give them a juggernaut momentum towards Greece and Persia, as well as Egypt and the Carthaginian Barbarians, but the cityless Europe would give them nothing.

Yeah, and that will be generally historically correct. Romans conquered Spain mainly because of precious ore deposits located there and military reasons, only secondary for slaves supply. About France... well, let me post another little quote from Tainter ;) :

Empires eventually reach or even exceed a sustainable size. In the preindustrial era this occurred when the distance from the capital would grow
so great that communication with the frontiers became slow and uncertain;
or when insurmountable geographical barriers were reached; or when peoples
were found whose conquest was uneconomical or impossible. For Rome, the most efficient empire would have consisted of the Mediterranean fringe, which could be administered easily by sea. Once the Romans had the Mediterranean, though, the lands they held were always threatened by new enemies further inland. To alleviate these threats the Romans expanded into the interior of Asia, to the Danube and beyond, and into northwestern Europe. In these places the empire found, or even exceeded, its limits of both territory and economy, for administration by land travel was always less efficient than by sea. Attempts at further conquest—in Scotland, central Europe, and Mesopotamia—showed that continued expansion would be too costly. Only a salient known as Dacia was held across the Danube, from the early second century until the early 270s. The Romans were correct in the threats that they perceived, for it was from precisely these areas that raids and invasions were repeatedly launched in later centuries.
J. A. Tainter, "Problem Solving: Complexity, History, Sustainability".

So conquest of France or Spania actually bring to Rome far less surplus than Greece or Carthago.

Perhaps whenever a city is founded a praetorian is created in it, this would be in addition to the conscription of conquered cities

I suggest creation of archer or smk of cavalry, ingame analog of Roman auxilarii.

I only read the first paragraph (too tired to read more atm) but it gave me a very simple idea: roman cities would get a raw bonus to taxes per % non-Roman nationality in the city. Say, a city receives +1 per 10%non-Roman. A newly conquered city would yield a whooping 10gpt, which would slowly dwindle down into zilch.

Heh, Tainter also refers to romanisation as cause of diminishing returns. Probably we need also sharply raise maintenance from distance.

Another consideration for a unique power is that Romans do not experience Civil Disorder upon conquering a city. Or, perhaps, each city they conquer immediately gets 10 free culture (expanding a ring, probably aborting the civil unrest, and making further conquest a bit easier).

I like both the no-disorder option, and especially Blasphemous' idea of extra gold for non-Romans. That's historically accurate in a way which pushes the gamer to be historically accurate, and almost desparately aggressive.

The more I think about it, the more elegant and correct the 1:commerce: per 10% non-roman nationality idea seems. The UP can be named Subjugation.
Rhye, what do you think of this idea?

It is not a bad idea, but not having the 2X road movement, it will make the empire harder to achieve...

A wonder can do the trick. Some appropriate Roman wonder can be give the effect of the builder's units moving +2 tiles/turn on roads in their lands. Hopefully the Subjugation power can give Rome the space it needs to afford building a wonder, as right now even with production concentrated only on units and the required buildings for the challenge it's impossible.

There wasn't really an official Roman wonder ... but there *was* the Flavian Ampitheatre (seated 70,000!), and the Aqueduct was also quite famous (even if it's a regular building). The Pantheon is another good one.

In Call to Power 2 one of the wonders was "The Appian Way" which gave a courthouse in every city in that game. Perhaps the increased road movement would be applicable for that.
More exotic however, would be if it added to every tile without a road that is being worked by a Roman city, a 25% chance per turn to generate a road. That, would be sufficiently awesome in my opinion to warrant a lot of time to produce it. It would mean Roman workers would not need to spend time making roads, Praetorians wouldn't need to be modified to make roads, and would just be really really cool.

How about give them several workers (i.e. slaves) from each conquered (or maybe founded) city? At the same time add script, which will check each turn every worker and disband it with some little chance (slaves die). Once expansion stopped, workers die in some number of turns.

P.S. Interesting article by Jeff Vail on subject
http://www.jeffvail.net/2004/10/all-roads-lead-to-rome.html

How about give them several workers (i.e. slaves) from each conquered (or maybe founded) city? At the same time add script, which will check each turn every worker and disband it with some little chance (slaves die). Once expansion stopped, workers die in some number of turns.

P.S. Interesting article by Jeff Vail on subject
http://www.jeffvail.net/2004/10/all-roads-lead-to-rome.html

I like this idea.

In order to make a strategy guide for the Roman Empire, I´m posting what I usually do when I start:

First I found Rome on the spot, send the 2 workers to the iron northeast, setting one to chop and the other one to build a road. I also build the fishing nets and set Roma to build a galley. I set my research to mathematics, to get catapults, and trade techs with egypt, which is always more backwards than greece.

The only Barbarian city able to be captured from the start is Gades, because if you capture the ones on Africa they are destroyed because of the 1 population. Perhaps Rhye should increase their population as it is somewhat annoying to wait for them to grow in order to capture them instead of razing.

A nice strategy is to build some galleys and catapults along with praetorians, and go directly to Athens, capturing it. After that, capturing the rest of Greece is very easy. The same can be made with Egypt, but it is a little more difficult as it capital is set 3 tiles from the sea.

Any more suggestions? Recommendations? Thanks!

I've created what I call a "challenge page", a printable page with all the information for the challenge. It was originally supposed to be a pdf, but I couldn't get it under 10 megs in that format. So I used .gif to get it to just under 1 meg. I don't know how you'd go about printing it correctly as .gif, but it should be possible (the proportions shlould fit an A4 page perfectly. I printed the thing in Photoshop before I got to actually making a version to upload.)
Here's a link to the .gif: link (http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads12/paxromana-challengepage.gif)
I'm going to go take another shot at the challenge now.

Okay, another failed attempt, but definately a good one. I didn't get as far east as before, but I did get a sizeable part of the empire. I witnessed the beauty of trying desperately to keep the Roman Empire up to size after about AD 200, when barbarians encroach on your lands from every direction. The dynamic in this period (the gradual fall of the empire) was very good and very realistic. That said, it's still probably impossible to achieve the challenge in time, if at all.
I'll list the problems I saw in this latest run:
-It doesn't make any financial sense for Rome to expand this fast. In real history it did, and Rome prospered. In the game the more you conquer the more you pay, and you gain very little from your conquests, besides the (very historically realistic) buffer against invasions. The "subjugation" model of conquest that has been discussed would of course solve this problem, but the extra civic column is a ways off. I'm not sure much can be done meanwhile.
-It's literally impossible to get troops to all the right places in time to conquer yourself an empire. Starting rome with an extra Galley, an extra Worker, and an extra Praetorian would go a very long way towards making Pax Romana a real possibility. It would also make sense to somehow make the Praetorian a better unit. March, Combat I or City Garrison I, or simply an extra point of strength, would both make sense and help boost Rome for just long enough to make Pax Romana possible without creating eternal Roman dominance.
I have to run now but I think that was it. I'll post a screenie of my empire and possibly keep writing later on.

I uploaded the screenshot earlier on the mod's download page, but all that I see there is "by Blasphemous...", without a pic to go with it. I expect it should show up a bit later. Maybe you can see it there already, before I can.
I remembered another significant problem was that Panormus is practically useless, at least until you get a Lighthouse there. Perhaps it would make sense to give Ziz a lighthouse. I also see on Wikipedia that Sicilian grain was very important for Roman food supplies - should Wheat be placed in Sicily, in the same tile where Ziz is placed?

-It doesn't make any financial sense for Rome to expand this fast. In real history it did, and Rome prospered. In the game the more you conquer the more you pay, and you gain very little from your conquests, besides the (very historically realistic) buffer against invasions. The "subjugation" model of conquest that has been discussed would of course solve this problem, but the extra civic column is a ways off. I'm not sure much can be done meanwhile.

Perhaps increasing both the gold you recieve for a city capture and also the city mainteneance costs might be a valid solution.

Having march would REALLY help Praetorians.

First of all, I think any discussion of Rome should be prefaced by the fact that Praetorians should absolutely and completely changed to Legionaries (I always change it for myself.) Calling them Praetorians is just plain stupid.

I don't think that Legionaries should be made any more powerful than they already are, they are already probably the strongest UU (you could make a case for the Redcoat.)

Sicily should get wheat on it, it was the breadbasket of the Roman Empire. I also agree that giving more money on conquering a city would be good, but that might be included somehow in the new civic row Rhye is working on.

I played another failed test (which I am continuing to play) and had a very simple thought: can't Praetorians just be cheaper? If they're made cheap enough, Rome can have them swarming all over the place until Rome collapses. It is literally impossible to retain a full, Trajan-era-sized, Roman Empire past about AD 400 (although it may be possible to regain that area by the end of the game, very slowly). Barbarian uprisings and then new civ spawns will make Rome simply have to give up on a large part of its territory in the AD 200-800 period. We really needn't worry about overpowering Rome as long as we're dealing in small-to-medium tweaks.
Rome should by every right be a gargantuan force in the ancient world. It should explode like a supernova, utterly dominate for a few centuries, and then start to collapse under its own weight and its own appeal as a target for invasions. We have a long way to go before Rome can fulfill its real historical role. Right now Rome is just a major regional power for a while. In real history Rome was pretty much the world for a while.
Rome was so influential in its time, that no historical realism balancement of the mod can be considered correct until we see a very large Roman Empire rising in a good proportion of games, even when Rome is under AI control. Please Rhye, give this issue high priority.

First of all, I think any discussion of Rome should be prefaced by the fact that Praetorians should absolutely and completely changed to Legionaries (I always change it for myself.) Calling them Praetorians is just plain stupid.

I agree with that.

I don't think that Legionaries should be made any more powerful than they already are, they are already probably the strongest UU (you could make a case for the Redcoat.)

Personally I don´t see a problem with that, as there is not much to conquer (in term of civs) when the new powers come they would be irrelevant. I think that the newborn civs should have more starting power though.

Rome should by every right be a gargantuan force in the ancient world. It should explode like a supernova, utterly dominate for a few centuries, and then start to collapse under its own weight and its own appeal as a target for invasions.

That´s my dream also... I think increasing both the gold you recieve for a city capture and also the city mainteneance costs can make that possible... Along with a military update...

Rome was so influential in its time, that no historical realism balancement of the mod can be considered correct until we see a very large Roman Empire rising in a good proportion of games, even when Rome is under AI control. Please Rhye, give this issue high priority.

I completely agree. The cities founded or governed by them were of a crucial value to the later European civs. In v1.01 I often had the problem as Germany that a weak Rome means a weak Germany, because the French and Spanish still get at least some of the barbarian cities located in their homeland. In the last game I started though a full 4(!!!) Roman cities flipped. Right when I was loosing faith after so many starts I would get one lousy city at best.:D
I think I should turn back to Rome, too. Actually I was always playing Rome before I started playing Germany to see wether their UP was overpowered or not.:mischief:

"In real history Rome was pretty much the world for a while."

Don't forget Han China, the empires were so big they came extremely close to meeting, and may have actually done so! (though with little significant impact)

Axum (Ethiopia) and India were also considered the other two major powers of the world in the Roman/Han era.

i think that with the new rules (3x3 flip when conquer a capital) it's possible to build a roman empire (with few exceptions... see england)

there are some in-game diffculties that should avoid us build a large empire (city maintenance)

i think that a little-big problem is the continue arrival on roman coasts of barbs galleys... they are so... problematic! they don't permit me to build a consistant fleet and i can't use fishing boat..
(for example a fast conquer of greece could be done by building 3 gallyes and put 6 pretorians.. now i'm afraid to do that with barbs)
other examples are the conquest of england and egypt. without barbs galleys you could conquer greece with 3 galleys + 6 pretorians then strike egypt by sea. (consider that you have some city attack promotion..) when the egypt capital falls you would have on your hand italy, cartagho, 2 greek cities and about 4 egyptian cities... this in a few number of turns.

We should also consider that in Warlords you will have Vassal states and don't have to conquer everything. But it would be nice if we could add some more turns to the ancient times. They are just too short.

The barb galley situation is realistic. Rome simply needs to be better-equipped to deal with this threat. In my last few games my first priority was to build a fleet capable of defending Rome's fish resource. As long as I keep two galleys there, the tile is safe. In my last two games I normally got by conquering the Mediterranean with just four galleys at my disposal. Sometimes they had to be rebuilt. But I've never yet tried to conquer England.

"In real history Rome was pretty much the world for a while."

Don't forget Han China, the empires were so big they came extremely close to meeting, and may have actually done so! (though with little significant impact)

Some say that was the beginning of the silk road.
What makes Rome so important is that influenced later European civs so much. As the Han dynasty passed away another Chinese dynasty took over. As Rome passed away completely new nations emerged. As Blas said Rome is important for historical balancement.:rolleyes:

Also in the Warlords version you could build triremes, which have a bonus against galleys. That would be a great solution, unless Rhye changes the barb galleys to triremes...

The barb galley situation is realistic. Rome simply needs to be better-equipped to deal with this threat. In my last few games my first priority was to build a fleet capable of defending Rome's fish resource. As long as I keep two galleys there, the tile is safe. In my last two games I normally got by conquering the Mediterranean with just four galleys at my disposal. Sometimes they had to be rebuilt. But I've never yet tried to conquer England.

I agree, there were a lot of pirates in the Mediterrainian. I think Warlords introduces the trireme or some other ancient warship. Maybe that could help. Pirates shooldn't wipe out military fleets, should they?:mischief:

Like I said. The triremes have a 50% bonus against galleys.

Sorry, Elhoim, we had the same idea at the same time and posted it at almost the same time.
Another thing: didn't prets (and other malee units) have the march promotion as Rome's unique unit ability some versions ago?

Sorry, Elhoim, we had the same idea at the same time and posted it at almost the same time.

Nothing to be sorry about! ;) It is I who should be sorry for not noticing... And like the saying goes, great minds think alike! :)

Yes, they had the march promotion as the UP, and in a glorious version :p we had both UP by mistake.

I don't think Rome needs to be any more powerful than it already is. The motivation for historical accuracy can only go so far.

Why not? We can always beat it up later with the apparition of Spanish, French, Germans, and with Warlords the Turks. Also we can kill it with high mainteniance costs per city. Let it grow as big as it can, so we can make it fall later.

It'll make life a pain for Greece to make Rome any stronger.

They can always come back with a revenge!

Rome doesn't need to be made way stronger, just a little bit to start them off. Besides that, the game needs to be set up in such a way that historic dynamics exist. It should make sense for Rome to want to expand explosively, and it already does make sense for them to suffer rapid collapse after a while. We have a very beautiful system of rise and fall and rise again (and fall again, etc.). The problem is there isn't enough incentive for Rome to truly rise. Rome doesn't need much more actual military power to be able to achieve the TERRITORY requirement of the challenge in time (I won't even be shocked if in v108 with the extra 1 starting unit it is already remotely possible), but to be able to actually prosper at the same time something needs to change in the economy of conquest. The perfect answer to this, I believe, is the Subjugation civic that I have proposed for the Expansion column(s). Another issue is that this is all still only possible if Rome's entire industry joins the war effort, which means Rome can't both rise to historical dimensions and do it with the comfort that it had historically (the CULTURE AND ESTABLISHMENT requirements of the challenge). For that Praetorians can be made slightly cheaper. If Rome gets Asia Minor early enough, it will probably have the production it needs to keep going, Hattusas is a crazy powerhouse of production. So the production aspect is also close to sufficiently feasible.
We basically have a very nice "almost" on almost every aspect of feasibility here.
Besides all that dh, the point of this mod is basically to model real historical dynamics, especially in the area of the Rise and Fall of Practically Everybody, so as long as we don't break gameplay along the way (and we won't in this case), it's perfectly legitimate to go very far with our will to make the mod historically realistic.

Besides, the AI seems somewhat stagnate. Except for the colonization AI, the historical empires never seem to prosper: Rome rarely leaves the zone around Italy, the mongols are not a threat at all, Alexander sometimes makes a sizeble empire because mesopotamia is full of barbs... I think that not only Rome, but many other should be beffed up...

Which is exactly why we need to resolve the Rome balance to make the challenge possible so we can move on to the next challenges, which include Alexander, the British Empire, and the Mongolian Empire. The general dynamic of the mod is good, one of the few things its missing is seasonal ginormous empires like real history had.

The AI Brits usually come close to achieving the British Empire, they always grab Australia, and if they're techonlogically far enough then they build cities in North America before America spawns, (although not usually to the extent that they had before the rebellion, but meh. what can you do about that) and usually some of the other places such as the Faulkland Islands. However, I have yet to see a British India or Egypt. The English generally do a fair job of colonization and almost always end up being a major power in modern times.

Yea I noticed the Faulkland Islands in my game, nice touch. :)

While it's true that the mongol empire is rarely that powerful, in my last game (Americans, 1.08), they managed to conquer China, India, Persia, Arabia, and Egypt. :eek:

Had another failed attempt, my expansion is starting to grind to a halt now at AD 410 because I'm on 0% science and still losing 23 gold per turn. I am actually conquering now when I can to get loot so I have some money, but it can't last...
That said, this version is better than the previous ones. Rome still isn't quite as capable as the real historical Rome, but it's getting there.
http://img133.imageshack.us/img133/3939/paxromanaad410fk0.th.jpg (http://img133.imageshack.us/my.php?image=paxromanaad410fk0.jpg)

I think Rome really needs an UP that helps them economically (lower maintenance costs for cities e.g.).

my attempt:

year 250 AD (monarch):

max expansion reached: i got gallia ( 3 cities), cartagho, athens, costantinopoli, hattusas, tyros (but destroyed 1 turn later by egypt), niniveh, babylon and ur... Started a campaign for invade spain.. After this turn some camel archers razed all my midwest cities excluding hattusas. Some axeman and horse archer destroyed constantinopoli and conquered athens...
I also built 1 aqueduct, some barracks but 0 colosseums... I liked the way that the east part of my empire collapsed while i'm taking iberia

problems: 0% tech but a +1 cash income :P, i lost many units in costantinopoli (90% battle statistics :( ).. i failed taking mauretania and found a city in jugoslavia

next attempt: a fast war with egypt ( hope to conquer their cities by flip, then rush here pretorians for the mideast, while rome and mediolanum rushes for greece and gallia)

PS: triremes would help a lot in resource defence.. (let's grow rome, athens and costantinopoli as powerhouses for aqueduct, barracks and colosseums)

I think Rome really needs an UP that helps them economically (lower maintenance costs for cities e.g.).
Which reminds me: Rome's UP is actually underpowered right now as far as empire-building, because so much of Rome's conquest has to be (and historically was) through the Mediterranean.
And another issue comes to mind, about aqueducts: Roman cities hardly ever get large enough to actually require an aqueduct, whereas in real life Rome was amazingly effective at building impressive aqueduct systems to hydrate its cities.
Perhaps an addition to the Roman UP could be that any Roman-controlled city on the Roman traderoute with 4 pop or more receives an automatic aqueduct. This wouldn't be such a huge help to Rome because Roman cities don't really need aqueducts in the era when Rome can have an empire. But it would be a realistic touch. And maybe aqueducts can be adjusted across the board to produce one :food: to make them more useful in the ancient world.

I like that idea. Nice job as the Romans there, by the way. You've got about 75%-80% of the empire there, just missing Egypt, England and Dacia, really. But the problem isn't so much the inability to reach the size, it's the fact that there is very little motivation to do so. I agree that the UP needs to be adjusted, since it does very little to help the Romans expand. I'm thinking something similar to what the former Persian UP was (but not quite as good) would be good. The Empire will collapse on its own anyways with the spawn of Arabia, Spain, France, England and Germany, causing Rome to lose most of it's land, excluding Greece, Turkey, Algeria, Egypt and of course, Italy.

We need an UP that makes them first have a bigger empire, and then it helps it fall.

About the aqueduct and infrastructure issue, perhaps they should be given a free aqueduct with each city.

I don't think we can make every single 'historical challenge' into a priority. I think those kinds of explosions of power REALLY mess with the game balance, and the dynamics of victory.

I think you can build a pretty good Roman Empire so far. It's not so bad that it takes a little longer and turns out a little smaller than you would hope.

Perhaps an addition to the Roman UP would simply be +1 internal trade routes under Decentralization.
This is good in a few ways.
-First of all, it's extremely realistic, as part of what made Rome so great was Pax Romana - the internal peace that allowed extremely efficient trade from lands as far apart as Gaul and Mesopotamia. One of the main problems that led to the Fall and then eventually to the way Europe looked and functioned for hundreds of years was the Crisis of the Third Century, when tension from without and within obliterated Pax Romana temporarily, forcing people in the Empire to huddle up in walled cities with self-sustaining communities, a situation that eventually evolved into feudalism in medieval Europe.
-Second of all, and perhaps more relevant to our discussion, it would give a big economical boost to Rome, especially as it grows larger. It would actually be somewhat profitable to have an empire spanning from England to Egypt.
-Lastly, it would be practically invisible to the player, since all it will do is add trade routes. You'll feel the difference, but you won't have to deal with it.
The UP could and should be renamed Pax Romana under this implementation.
Another alternative is just to start Rome with Free Market or Mercantilism enabled and active, which would be a cruder representation of the same thing but better-integrated in the game.

I don't think we can make every single 'historical challenge' into a priority. I think those kinds of explosions of power REALLY mess with the game balance, and the dynamics of victory.

I think you can build a pretty good Roman Empire so far. It's not so bad that it takes a little longer and turns out a little smaller than you would hope.
The issue isn't to be able to build a good Roman Empire. The issue is the game allowing and silently encouraging Rome to do what historically made sense for it to do and eventually happened. Right now the game doesn't have the realistic dynamics that caused such an empire to be created, and doesn't allow Rome the strength required to create such an empire anyways. The game balance should stay alltogether unchanged because the empire's influence won't last outside of its specific sphere of influence in time and space - the Empire will necessarily fall at least nearly as bad as the historical Empire did, at some point between AD 200 and AD 800. Its influence later on will only exist in the groundwork it lays for the civilizations that take its place. China and India, for instance, should go mostly unaffected by the power shift made for Rome. The balance will only change for a short time (BC 700 - AD 600~, that's under 100 turns I think) and in a small place (no more than a quarter of the map for sure) so we don't have to worry about the greater balance of the game.

Making Rome stronger militarily seems like a bad idea to me. As it is, Greece seems to get destroyed by the Romans, or at least lose Athens and another city or 2 at least half of the time. I mean, yes, it's one thing to want it to be able to happen, but another for it to happen EVERY time. I don't want for in every game to see Greece occupied by Rome, it would make it feel too...linear. I do like the idea for the UP though. As it is, it is ALMOST possible to assemble the entire Roman Empire within the time period (or close to it). The only problem is that your research grinds to a halt, your money drops to 0, and all this does is put you further behind when the Euro civs start spawning. The Romans need a way to make more money, not become stronger.

I don´t think that as a problem, because that is what makes its fall a necessity, not an obligation. I´m most games I end praying that Spain and France come so they take the load of some cities of me. But if we give them more money as you suggest, we would be able to mantain the empire, which is NOT the idea. That´s why I say that we should give Rome much more military power in order to achieve it´s empire, and let the weight of it crush it later.

I'd hate to play a game where Greece and Persia had the odds stacked severely against them.

Why is that, dh?

@Elhoim, I actually agree on that, I just think a Pax Romana UP will only alleviate, not remove, Rome's financial trouble. But at the end of the day, until we have something like the Subjugation Civic, we aren't going to have the real historical dynamic of conquest for financial gain.

I found a new way to build a big empire... maybe this way is not completely viable (fast loss of money...)

The screenshot at turn 96 (only 14th turn from the born of rome)

conquer italy, then send your 2 galleys and 4 pretorians to cartagho...
then conquer cartagho and lyqi.. (getting most promotions on city attack as possible)
then crush egypt capital by sea. I put my hand on 5 egyptian cities, i can built as many pretorians as i want but this empire costs so much...

i'll do another try, researching fast code of laws (building many courthouses in egypt) and razing lyqi (unuseful, maybe refound it later)

(image is big... sorry :P i forgot to convert it)
http://img225.imageshack.us/img225/3423/empireun2.th.png (http://img225.imageshack.us/my.php?image=empireun2.png)

PS: 2 bugs, flip panormus: 2 archers in anctartica, flip egypt: idem :)

Brilliant, cece84. I think I'll try it some time.
I don't think building courthouses will do much good, it's too small a reduction of maintenance and you need your production there for Praetorians.

mm.. i tried the courthouses system. it partially works, the research don't freezes anymore but you still have a -15 gold/turn circa and its too slow.. (i was able to substain economically my empire only in 400 AD)

i love take egypt soon but its cities are too expensive (it would be nice if i can choose what city keep and what raze.. it would help a lot)

ideas?

A good strategy is to build the oracle if you have it, and research mathematics (for cats) and monarchy (for happiness). I don´t think we are too far away from making it, but I think that with a little notch up in the military area we can actually pull it off. When I´m having financial troubles, I just do some pilage while going into anarchy. That really helps and it reflects the troubled period at the last eras of the Roman Empire.

Stacking the odds against Greece or Persia means it's really not much fun to play as Greece or Persia. Even if the Roman AI is stupid.

Indirect solutions might be better. For example, continuing to mess with the calendar system. Or allowing every Civilization to burst on the scene with a Golden Age.

Indirect solutions might be better. For example, continuing to mess with the calendar system. Or allowing every Civilization to burst on the scene with a Golden Age.

Those are nice solutions. Also adding some turns to the ancient eras might help.

Getting the Great Lighthouse helps Rome TONS, I find, so long as you have lots of coastal cities (which many of the Roman cities are...Rome, Panormus, Carthago, Athens, etc.). It's not a big enough bonus to help sustain a huge empire or anything, but it helps a lot.

I just recently found that the problem is not power, but time (yeah, I know it was somewhat obvious...).

By 610AD I finally reached a somewhat sizeable Roman Empire. (For the challenge, by 190AD I had all that, except Constantinople and the Middle East Cities. Of course no infrastructure except the Oracle and Barracks).

135724

And here is the power graph:

135725

As you can see, the problem is not power, but time.

What made me lost time?

- The pop 1 barbarian cities. Having to wait for the to grow to size 2 or to build a barracks is a time sink.

What may help me gain more time?

- A city in Madrid´s position, so to cover the entire iberian peninsula.
- A city in London´s position, so to have an stronhold in Britannia.
- An earlier start, like 4 turns before.
- More turns alloted to that timeframe.

All this won´t make the game easier for Rome, but set a better base for an stronger Europe.

I like the way you're thinking Elhoim. A slightly earlier Rome and a couple cities wouldn't disrupt game balance too much, but still make a Roman Empire more feasible with a quickness.

I can't change the year of the foundation of Rome, and neither the timeline.
Most of the barbarian cities are already size 2 though

Then can you add London and Madrid as barb cities early on?
I also noticed to get all of Gaul you have to wait until the three cities in that area (Lutetia, Lugodunon, Burdigala) spawn, and then conquer Lutetia. Otherwise it takes too long and costs too much. Historically Gaul was a pretty early conquest. Perhaps those cities can spawn slightly earlier so Gaul can be taken earlier on? There really were Gauls there pretty early on, so those cities should be there by the point Caeser historically took Gaul.

Yeah, I know most of them are size 2, but conquering Nova Cartagho and Leptis Magna can take A LOT, since sometimes the city is size 2 and the next turn is 1 again (I think they rush someting). So it takes many turns to capture them instead of razing them...

On another note, I noticed that the French and Spanis chose Bordeaux and Cádiz as Capitals, because they were the biggest cities.

As far as I know, you can conquer Lypq (Leptis Magna) at size 1 and it won't be auto razed. In every Rome game I've ever played it hasn't happened. Also, I had an idea for a new Roman UP: Courthouses are built in cities that you conquer automatically. I don't know if its such a good idea, but it would help combat the corruption without having to sacrifice valuable time. It might be a bit too powerful...Maybe limit to a certain time period? (as in between when they spawn and when say...Arabia spawns). I don't know if it would be an accurate representation of Roman power though.

I don't know if its such a good idea, but it would help combat the corruption without having to sacrifice valuable time.

The problem is that you would sacrifice time if you take away the 4X road movement. That is very helpful for conquests.

I know the fall of Rome is generally considered the end of the classical era, and the beginning of the Middle Ages (a relative term if I ever heard one). Other people argue that the Middle Ages start with Rome embracing Christianity.

... maybe the whole yearless-calendar thing should extend for the entire game? I bet that would create a much better sense of realism for Rome's achievements.

... maybe the whole yearless-calendar thing should extend for the entire game? I bet that would create a much better sense of realism for Rome's achievements.

That´s what I´ve been yearning for all this time. I´m tired of having the years as a Damocles Sword over my head, telling me how far or behind of history I am, or when are the civs to be born.

... maybe the whole yearless-calendar thing should extend for the entire game? I bet that would create a much better sense of realism for Rome's achievements.
That would definately be good. It's funny - you, Elhoim and I the most active posters in this thread right now, are all arguing about achieving timeline accuracy and are all among those who have supported yearless play since the idea was first brought up.
Pretty please, Rhye? With sugar on top?

Perhaps we should make a petition thread?

:D I totally didn't realize we're on the same page. I think this would be a real plus for the game. It's ultimately Rhye's call, but I'd definitely say this would be a big boost to realism.

Rhye, are you open to this idea at all?

I opened a poll on it. Let's cross our fingers.

i'm thinking this new strategy:

1) take egypt as soon as possible (get promotions on your 4 prets (carthago) and smash them, tested)
3) bring the other 1-2-3(if you are lucky) to italy to contrast barbs
4)let's rome build the great lightouse since the early years (for example build lighthouse, pret, and great lighthouse) while mediolanum builds a settler (you need bronze, found spalatum)
5)chop down every single tile near rome (and enslave some citizens if necessary) and build the mine in spalatum

(i think that 2-3 prets are strictly necessary for defend)

after that i think you can rush prets for greece and gallia (research col ( it's always my first tech!) and currency fast!)


i let you know :D

ok i tried it.
what to say? great lighothouse is great :D
i've built it fast (saving 15 money per turn) (egypt bring you to -40..)

i lost much time in build a settler in mediolanum and found spalatum (razed -_-)...BUT G. LIGHTHOUSE DON'T NEED BRONZE WTF (grr)!!! next time i'll build some prets in milan!

then started build some courthouses in egypt (also built oracle in egypt) and mediolanum.after some time i have a -7 at 40%, then researched currency and go +4! (gallia has also spreaded christ church over the europe! and its mine (great prophet where are you? :( )

in 250AD i controlled italy cartagho egypt jerusalim and gallia :( but i manage to take research at 40% for almost all the game)

CONCLUSIONS: the game was good also with few lands taken. next time i save time building soon 2 prets in milan instead of settlers. this bring: 1)better defend,
2) this is very important -> bring 2-3 prets near the tile where lutetia spawn.. let it spawn and gallia is yours in 2 turns!

i think that we will achieve our goal (90% of romans lands, maybe 100% if trireme will be implemented) but without achieve the buildings requirements probably...

Try one game with the Oracle if it is available, and race for to techs: Mathematics (for catapults) and Monarchy (for happines).

mm i don't use so much catapult in the pax romana and happiness is not a big problem (for example last time i rushed civil service that gives bureocracy for money and some prets boost in Rome)

You should use some cats for collateral damage. Those things are killers! They increase the winning odds dramatically!

Personally, I have never seen the AI acheive anything close to the Pax Romana. It almost never build roads in italy because its workers are afraid of far away barbs. The barb gaulish cities more often than not take Mediolanum and Rome, followed by a collapse of the civ. Carthago and Leptis Magna are conquered early but razed afterwards by barb camel archers. It is capable of taking Athen and Byzantion but I have rarely seen them keep it after the european civs pop out. And when the european civs arrives, it usually becomes a race for the scraps of roman territory left. I think the Romans as they are cannot acheive even near what happened in history.
Only good point, in my last game as Arabia, I saw (in the editor) that althought Rome was down to Panormus, Rome and Mediolanum, it had completely colonized Britain and left the lone northern barb city alone. That was funny to see.

There's an idea that I think was raised before but may require resurrection.
I happened to read about the Roman road system on Wikipedia recently. Road-building was a matter of ideology and law in Roman society. It wasn't just something that was done - people were duty-bound to serve the road system, and the roads were extremely well-designed, well-maintained, and purpose-driven. Just like the saying says, "all roads lead to Rome". This was no coincidence - roads were built between Rome and everywhere else, so as to connect Rome to everywhere in the empire, but not to allow rebellions of provinces to come together (the road system would go through Rome and back to the other cities in your province if they don't happen to be right in between your city and Rome).
So in-game, how about a Roman road system that builds itself? Every turn, regardless of what was or wasn't there before, a road system would spawn connecting Roma to every Roman city by the shortest route available. Tiles with enemy units on them would have no road created on them, but if a tile is pillaged the next turn the road will return there if no enemy remains on the spot. We could even keep the extra speed on the roads, since this road system was extremely well-designed and efficient.
This would free up Rome's workers to connect resources to the network, and it would mean Roman troops always have a quick way to keep on going past newly conquered cities, since the very turn after conquest a road would reach the new city.
The auto-building part of the UP could switch itself off once Rome falls or is exiled (so it doesn't continue later if Rome returns.)
There's something elegantly right about this idea, but I'm not necessarily saying it's better than the economical Pax Romana UP I suggested earlier.

It´s a good one. Like I said before, what we need is time, and time will buy a lot of it!

An interesting idea. There are many roads we could follow (pun definitely intended) as to the Roman UP, since there are so many things about the empire we could choose to show as the UP. I think this is a good idea, but I am of the opinion that something to increase Rome's money would be a better idea. Like I've said, the Empire will fall on its own from a combination of Barbarian Pressure and the spawning of new Civs, which will eliminate at least half of Rome's land (assuming they achieve the full size or something close to it), not to mention rebellions in Greece and Egypt later on in the game. The courthouse idea I had earlier may not be the best portrayal of Roman power, but it would work. I'm not saying this is the best idea anyone's had or will have on the subject, in fact I think your idea about the roads is better, Blas. The only thing I'm sure of is that the current power just doesn't do enough. The movement helps, sure, but I find I never have a city to build a worker with decent production that has nothing else to build. I think your idea would fix the problem. God, I've written a lot more than I had intended without really saying much, so I'll finish off here.

I've written a lot more than I had intended without really saying much

Maybe you can become a politician ;)

I think changing the Roman UP to some kind of road bonus would be both realistic and strategic. Auto-roads is a neat idea.

One vote more for auto-road!

Just did a monarch game with Rome on version 1.08 I think. It was fast at the beginning, taking North Africa, Spain, Greece, Turkey. Due to all the city conquering, the UP was almost useless as all roads were in Italia. After Finishing off the Greeks in the Middle East, all that was left to conquer in order to acheive the territorial part of the challenge was to conquer Egypt. Alas, the Persians and Egypt declared war on me at about the same tyme, so most of my army was bugged down trying to defend the middle east, which was anyways worthless. That is when my research fell from 50-70% to 10%. Before, all the city conquering had amassed a huge treasury which supported the momentum for more conquests. But as soon as I stopped for a few turns, the -50 or 60 gpt wasn't substenable anymore. I'm now in 610AD I think, a few turns away from the birth of arabia. The middle east is a wreck, the invasion of Egypt is under way, my economy is deep in the red and I will never settle Britain.
Comments :
1) Too much barb activity in North africa. I can't stand up to multiple stack of 3 camel archers or horseman while building an infrastructure.
2) the UP is useless as boat is much faster since most of the time no roasd exist
3) an elegant new UP would be to double the amount of money Rome gets from plunder/conquests of cities, which could simulate a fast early expansion and then the collapse as the treasury gets emptied, althought I suppose Elhoim idea could work
4) building aqueducts is useless and time consuming. The cities are too small and there are too many health food bonus in Europe. This part of the challenge cannot be acheived I fear.

yes, the roman UP is quite useless (i use it for defend north italy from barbs..)

it is also useless due to many rivers that stops the movement rate.... (no bridge building..)

we need a new UP, something that reduce maintenance (expecially in cities connected to rome..) or something that permit you gain more money (forum?)

another thing: i love build oracle for civil service (enable bureocracy -> i founded it realistic! rome -> supercity, it reflects its power in the past as the only centre of power)

PS:(CIV4 original has a -50% maintenance..)

I have a couple of ideas relevant to Pax Romana but not only.
First of all, like I've said before (and captain beaver graciously reminded us), aqueducts are useless when and where they were historically used. Rome should be huge on building aqueducts, but in-game Rome has no reason to build aqueducts until well after the Imperial era. For this I suggest to make Aqueducts a little cheaper and make them give +1 or even +2 :food: in addition to what they already do. This will make them a worthwhile investment for Rome in cities in the Middle East which have little sources of food (and this will also make these cities less useless).
Another thing which I just thought of, is the way trade routes are calculated. I'm pretty sure the farther away a city is, the more money you get from its trade route. But since the scale in RFC is smaller than vanilla cIV (cities are closer together), this calculation is no longer fair. Having cities in Britain as well as Asia Minor should make Rome rich. The calculation of trade route yield should be adjusted so far-away cities net more than they do now.

I was thinking about the new road UP and I was thinking it would be far too complicated to implement codewise. I think that giving praetorians the ability to build roads and lowering the cost of road building by both prats and workers would do the job right.

Another problem is the lack of culture. Perhaps the addition of a Mediterranean religion would help in the culture development...

It actually wouldn't be all that hard to code the road thing. All you have to do is put in possible routes from Rome to each of the possible city locations, which aren't that numerous since the potential area is severeley limited. It's something any of us here could write up in just an hour or two, I'm pretty sure. Then the game would just have to check each turn which cities exist, and for each existing city the appropriate route to Rome would be placed.

Another problem is the lack of culture. Perhaps the addition of a Mediterranean religion would help in the culture development...
Personally, in the game I just played at monarch level, I was able to build all of the wonders, except stonehenge which I anyways captured in Hatusas. Of course, it made me lose time since I could have been building praetorians instead, but the other AIs seemed to have forgotten to build wonders. Is it just my particular game or is it widespread that in 753BC, almost no wonders have been built? At any rate, the Great Lighthouse helped tremendously along with currency. Only thing I forgot to research was code of law to build courthouse.
Plus, a mediterranean religion would just complicate things when Christianity arrives.

Also, I support Blasphemous idea on trade routes. I most my coastal cities with currency and the G Lighthouse made 4 gold from 4 commerce link. However, they were from locations such as Jerusalem trading with Gadis. It should be more.

The only problem I see with the auto-route thingy is that it will slow down the game by having to check and recheck everything each turn. I'd like my new UP idea better :mischief: .

I agree that the auto-route thing has some potential to lead to huge processing times and so on.

Maybe the UP could be that roads take zero turns to build? so a worker could build masses of road networks in a short amount of time, inhibited only by some terrain movement costs.

I agree that the auto-route thing has some potential to lead to huge processing times and so on.

Maybe the UP could be that roads take zero turns to build? so a worker could build masses of road networks in a short amount of time, inhibited only by some terrain movement costs.

Yeah, I agree too. I repeat, I think that Praetorians shold be given the ability to build roads, as we usually have more of them and they are in the place of the capture. And with a 1 or 2 turns per road you could build a network that keeps your troops going.

But the important question is: Will AI understand how to build roads with Praetorians?
I don't like features used by human players only. Feels like an exploit.
And AI definately needs help as Rome. I've never seen them building an empire.

Whatever the UP is changed to, it should be something that helps the player AND the AI in achieving the Pax Romana. Otherwise we're right back where we started unless you play as Rome every game.

I forget what Rome's current UP is?

4x road movement.

Has someone tried to replay the expansion of the arabs, from spain to peria?

That's an easier goal to accomplish. Although the Spain part is pretty tough. For now, the focus is on the Roman Empire. Once it's possible (or near enough), some other great empires will be looked into, like the British Empire, The Caliphates (or whatever it was called), The Mongols, and so on.

Recreating Alexander's conquests is really fun too. Set your goal to conquer as much as he did by 323 BC. I had a pretty good attempt at it in one of the (much) earlier builds.

Of course now I just realized that this goal would no longer be possible to measure since dates have been removed from the early game :sad:

That's the way it should be, though. Stop thinking of time as linear, and start thinking of it more like Max Payne -- with a war being like "slow motion". This will let you have the sense that you've created a classical empire in 20 years, whereas in the old version it would have counted it as 800 years.

I don't think Alexander's is even possible! I've had a go at it before, and I use the spawn of the Romans/Persians as the end mark, since there's no year system anymore for early game. I usually get Jerusalem, Nineveh, Hattusas, Byzantion and Athens and then they spawn. I don't really see how you could accomplish Alexander's empire. Not within a somewhat similar time period, anyways.

I completely understand your reasoning for prefering the era-based timekeeping. I've just always loved being able to compare my progress in a game to that of the real world. You can still do that to a limited extent with the eras, but for me at least, its not the same.

I don't think Alexander's is even possible! I've had a go at it before, and I use the spawn of the Romans/Persians as the end mark, since there's no year system anymore for early game. I usually get Jerusalem, Nineveh, Hattusas, Byzantion and Athens and then they spawn. I don't really see how you could accomplish Alexander's empire. Not within a somewhat similar time period, anyways.
Well it doesn't make sense to use the spawning of the Persians or Romans as your end mark. The empire that Alexander fought was the Persian empire, and the Romans spawn around 750 BC. Thats a good 300 years of conquering left for you.

In every game I try to get calendar as fast as possible to see what date it actually is. :rolleyes:
The pop up solution would be much better.

Well, I know that, but since it's the only way to know the current year without getting calendar, its what I use. The point I was trying to make was that even in that extended time period, I don't think it would be possible.

I think in order to check yourself you could just use the WB to temporarily give yourself calendar, check the date, and take it away.

Never really thought of that. But again, the point I was making was just that once the Romans spawn, I know that my expansion period is well over, and that even with the 20 or so extra turns, it's still ranging from extremely hard to impossible to do.

A possible way to streamline the auto road Up is what I suggested earlier, that every turn any tile being worked by a Roman city gets a road free of charge. That would get a huge road network up pretty quickly in my opinion.

Another possibility is giving roads to tiles with Praetorians on them free of charge, that would get a far more linear road netwrok of routes to enemy cities.

Hmm, the paretorian idea sounds good, and it would die off once praetorians lose their usefulness. Not sure if that would be good or bad, though.

It would be good because that would mark the beginning of the fall of the Roman Empire anyway

Here's a fun little challenge I've come up with and tried out on one of the older versions. You play as the Aztecs (or Mexica) trying to create what is the Aztec Legacy, Mexico.

Legacy of the Mexica
1. Expansion
The Aztecs need to have all the land from the Yucatan to California
including Texas.
2. Weapons of the White Man
a. The Aztecs need to have both the techs Gunpowder and Military Tradition.
b. The Aztecs must be only at most one tech behind the western European civs and the Americans.
3. Survival
The Aztecs must never lose a single city to another civ or to barbarians.
4. Western Influences
Every Aztec city of size 3 or more must have a theatre, a courthouse, and a market.
5. Independent Latin America
There should be no European cities in the Caribbean, Central America, or
Western United States.
6. Time
The goal should be completed by 1836

Aztecs start in 1200 or turn 251.
1835 is turn 376.

So the challenge is 125 turns long.

Head Serf, if you are serious about this challenge please open a separate thread for it. I think we had some excellent discussion here about the matter at hand thanks to the fact that this thread is very focussed on this specific challenge.

And this is also not really a Historical Challenge.

Legion or Legionary please. Legionaire (the Butcher of Words strikes again!) is the French style. Even better, Legio.

As for a Roman bonus, how about giving the Legions 2 move points instead of one? For a heavy infantry formation, they moved ridiculously fast (managing in an average day what the Greeks did after the battle of Marathon). It is also something that the ai can handle.

Well I think Praetorians (or Legionaries) don't have to be any stronger. The AI problem is just that they don't build enough.

Well I think Praetorians (or Legionaries) don't have to be any stronger. The AI problem is just that they don't build enough.

Yep, and for the player the problem is that there isn´t enough time...

The Roman AI has definitely improved though. They used to never expand much beyone Italy, but now They'll often times control France, Greece, Algeria and Italy, not to mention building a few cities around Austria/Hungary. They're a long way off the empire, but it's a big step up.

I tried this Historical Challenge again with the new version. It is definately easier as the last time I tried but still very difficult. I ignored goal 2-3 and only tried to achieve the military part (and get some culture). I conquered Egypt very early and after I took their capital all their cities flipped to me :goodjob:. This definately helped a lot. I went on to Greece, razed Sparta and sieged Athens which was a tough nut to crack. The screenshot shows my empire 200 AD. Still I didn't conquer Persia and Brittania but came close to it.

My mistakes though: Didn't research Code of Laws and didn't build Great Lighthouse. Because of this my economy totally collapsed. Didn't build enough workers so I really couldn't take advantage of the UP. Galleys were the engine for my conquest.

What could be done:

- One additional worker when Rome spawns would be nice and very helpful.

- Barbarian galleys are a real pain. I can't control the Mediterranean Sea because of them. Of course Triremes will help in Warlords but maybe until then less galleys could be spawn?

- Maybe a different UP? Auto-building roads or some economy boost would be nice.

Code of Laws is a particularly Roman tech you know... They were very serious about their code of laws. They should start with that tech. We know today of written law dating back at least far as 449 BCE. Formal Roman civil law related to religion dates back to - gasp - 754 BCE.
Perfect timing for the Roman spawn, I'd say. So, how about it?

I got pretty close last time I tried, and I might have gotten everything except for Britain and maybe some of Spain if a few things hadn't decided to happen in 70 AD. 1. Persia declared war, and I had stripped my praetorians from the border for a few turns to invade Egypt. If not for that, this wouldn't have been a problem and 2. There are 3 horse archers looming 2 turns away from Constantiinopolis and the 2 archers garrisonned there/that i can get there in time will definitely not be enough to take on them.

Straight away, I loaded up my 4 praets and set sail for Carthage/Leptis Magna and took both cities the next turn using 2 of the praets, so that they could get 2 exp they needed for the City Raider 1 promotion. Next I headed for Athens, and took it. Then on to Hatussas with 2 praets. I took it, but lost 1 praet. It had Stonehenge in it though, so it was worth it. I took Tyrus the next turn with my other 2 praets, and the Greeks were destroyed. Next I took Jerusalem from barbs, and then Egypt declared war. Nothing came of this aside from a few raids agasint Leptis Magna which repeatedly failed. I got the Great Lighthouse in Rome, and the Oracle in Greece, which I used to found Christianity. After that, I spent the next few turns preparing to invade Egypt and building some settlers. Right around the change from BC to AD I moved in on Egypt, and wait straight for Niwt-Rst. They had a good 7 archers in it, but I got lucky and didn't lose a single oF my 4 praets. I conquered all of Egypt except for 2 cities through this, (Imu and the one next to Per-Wadjet, which was sandwiched in by culture anyways). This was where Persia declared war and I saw some Horse Archers headed for Constantinopolis.

Anyways, i had about 15 turns left and in that I could have taken Gaul and maybe Nova Carthago. That's most of the empire. With a bit (a lot) of luck, it IS possible to assemble the empire in time, or near enough to it. The only things now is the other requirements, I never had a city with decent production tnat could spare to build a useless and time consuming collusseum or aqueduct. It was a pretty good attempt though, and probably the best I've ever done.

I did pretty well in this respect. I had Gaul, Italy, Greece, Asia Minor and North Africa. I never fell apart from the barbarians thought the matinence is stilll killing me. One question I had was that when England, Germany And Spain spawned (all in areas I did not control) france never did, It is now the 1800's and not even of a whiff of france ever exsisting

the only way to build a good empire by 250 AD, with quite good research is:

Military part:

1) conquer cartagho, raze lyqui, conquer egypt with 4 prets. at least 2 of them promoted (city attack). You must be fast!
2)build some prets in rome and milan. use them for defense untill gauls spawns (4-5 is a good number).
Then you can easy control gallia conquering lutetia (it need few prets)
3)build some prets in egypt and bring them near jerusalem
4) greece is becoming strong? pick your 5-6 prets with few catapults if you have them near athens from italy(with 1-2 galleys). At the same time attack tyros, niniveh and hattusas (the toughest). You can conquer easily greece and constatinopoli.
5)this is the final part. you are under barbs pressure. (build many spearman in egypt and cartagho!)
if you can, conquer iberia (not really easy at this point), found spalatum and declare war on persia (babylon and ur are easy to take if oyu have at least 2-3 promoted prets..). My games always stops here... (camel archer spawns and raze my eastern part of empire..)

Civil/Technology part (i dont remember well all the tree..maybe some techs are wrong and in a wrong order)

Objective techS:
Sailing (lightouse in rome..)
Priesthood (oracle!)
Masonry (great lightouse in rome is a priority)
Code of laws (egypt needs many courthouses)
Late game drama is quite good for culture

When you have these techs plus some other basics tech (like archery ecc..) you are ok.
Now you can focus your research on what you really need.

Choose one of these 3 techs. These are really important (get them via Oracle. not always directly but via monarchy or metal casting)

1)Feudalism (good archers + serfdom) (vassalage too expensive)
2)Machinery (good crossbowman + watermill for egypt)
3)(late game) Civil Service (bureocracy,rome saves more money and build like mad, maceman are good)

Ok, the civil part. Built soon a lightouse in rome. Now You have built some prets in milan and rome (waiting for masonry/priesthood/code) ok.
Milan continues bulding prets while rome is building Great Lighouse.. then you can build the oracle (fast wonder researching a good tech (look the tech part). After this, no more wonder are really needed (colossus and parthenon helps a bit, not too much). Now you can spawn courthouses everywhere hoping that your cash resists :)

PS: national/military epic are too slow... i would not research for them
Conclusion on money:

Great lighouse in Rome is the basic wonder
Bureocracy saves some money
A great priest in rome helps
Courthouses in egypt(obv.)
Found a holy city. (late game: chiristianity is often founded in a barb city in iberia or gaul(lucky!). When you control that city switch to cristhianity, it spawns in many cities, and hope that rome build another great priest) This could bring your cash in good health (and with good research too)

bye :D

I prefer to take Greece before Egypt. The maintenance is less, the cities are better and it's generally easier to do.