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Deity
AT A GLANCE
Rome is pretty straighforward and very focused in warfare. It's unique ability calls for conquering cities, its unique unit allows doing it since the Classical era, and its unique building grants massive Great Generals and more gold to keep up your army.
UNIQUES
The Glory of Rome
When you conquer a City, the City retains all valid Buildings and you immediately acquire additional territory around the City. +15% production towards Buildings present in the Capital.
Every building that is present in the Capital is easier to build in all other owned/puppeted cities, so to get the most of it, just build everything in the Capital. Specially since you cannot control what the puppets build, even buildings you may not desire, but that your puppets may decide to build them nonetheless, and the faster they are built, the better. This has a side issue, if the Capital builds every available building, it might not have time enough for wonders.
Keeping all buildings after a conquest means Rome is less likely to suffer unhappiness when conquering, the population of a conquered city is reduced but the infrastructure is kept, so they'll be quite happy after the resistance period, except for the foreseeable religious divisions.
Legion, replaces Swordsman.
+2 Combat. Can build roads and forts. Starts with the Cover I Promotion.
Find iron as soon as possible, and fight for it if necessary, for Rome would be nothing without its Legions. This strong swordsman unit is able to take on cities by itself, while defending well in rough terrain and laughing at archers. It can build roads and forts, so while you wait for some more units before launching an attack or in
A Legion assault force is best promoted in Drill, beelining Siege, and maybe Cover II, and going later into Blitz. Legion stands fairly well against anything, but dromons can be annoying, so bring a couple of ranged units or some trirremes if possible when fighting near the coast. The best capitals may need a siege unit or two to soften their walls.
For combat, if you have spare iron, you can bring some Legion promoted in Shock, or else horsemen with some support for rough terrain.
Legion performs better in inland rough terrain, where it can get advantage for terrain bonuses, move faster thanks to the roads, and avoid dromons.
Colosseum, replaces Arena.
+3 Culture, +3 Production, 2 Tourism. Gain +5 Great General or Great Admiral points and +5 Golden Age points when you destroy an enemy unit. City connections produce +2% more Gold. +2 Production for Barracks, Forge and Armory. Nearby Perfume provide +2 Culture, and Olives +1 Food and +1 Gold. Reduces Boredom Slightly.
Colosseum is a very nice building. It gives extra culture, production and culture since the very start, in addition to what an Arena is capable of, giving bonuses to military buildings you were going to build anyway. The extra money enhances what you already gain by city connections, which favors big cities.
But the real thing is in the GG and GA points. You'll get Colosseum in every city anyway, it's a building too good to not build it. Then, at every kill, every owned city is making extra GG and GA points. Perhaps it doesn't sound like a big deal, but being Rome you are going to fight a lot, so prepare to see a constant flow of Great Generals, Admirals and some unexpected Golden Ages.
HOW TO WIN
Rome is a heavy and early warmonger. It needs to focus on military units and aggressive policies, expanding, and conquering since the Classical Era. By Middle Age, Rome has to be big. The Capital needs high production to build every building. Statue of Zeus is a nice wonder to build, maybe Terracota Army, and the rest is better to take from the neighbours. Get beliefs that match a big and aggresive civ: Earth Mother (you want to settle near iron and mine luxuries), God of Commerce (you'll have many cities connected thanks to Legions), God of the Expanse (because many cities turns into many expanded borders) and God of War (if you can fight your way early on). If able to Found a Religion, pick religious beliefs that benefits from fights or from number of owned cities mostly, because you'll be busy just spreading your religion to your newly conquered cities. If you cannot found, go conquer a Holy City ASAP. Piety branch is very good to keep your empire happy: reduces religious divisions and the happiness bonus is for the temple, easy to get built in every city. Rome will probably be big enough to Reform its religion without St Basil's help.
When Legion becomes obsolete, Rome should be big enough to keep conquering just by its production power, so Imperialism->Autocracy is the obvious choice. But it could happen that some neighbours prove too difficult to bite. By then, you probably have stolen some wonders, great works, and surrounded some City States. In that case, Industrialism->Order would do better, maybe picking a couple of policies in Statecraft or Aesthetics. Try to keep fighting even if not able to take new cities, as Rome gets good bonuses per killing.
Colloseum is an excellent building if Rome can keep fighting through all the game. It gives extra Great Admirals even if you fight only inland, you can keep one or two to support a small fleet and send the rest for luxuries (more happiness). You can build many Citadels with the extra Great Generals too, and after getting Autcracy's Lebensraum you will crush enemy cities fighting defensively. And even if your happiness is low after so many conquests, you can still enjoy some golden ages to help during the resistance phase. So don't be shy! Fight and conquer!
MISTAKES
Legion abilities. It's easy to forget they can build roads, and leave them idle waiting for the next fight, or send them to build roads to the opposite direction where the fight is. Legions should connect recently conquered cities and set new roads towards the next objective while in peace. They can build forts too, so if a fight is specially hard, build one or two near the borders.
Going peaceful. Rome has nothing to help winning if it stays small. Even if domination isn't feasible, Rome should at least conquer half world to have a chance, and keep fighting as much as possible.
Neglecting City States. Rome will have some votes thanks to Religious authority, but that won't last. It will need some embassies and some allied CS just to prevent Global Peace resolution, which can completely stop your progress.
Leaving experienced units as garrisons. After taking a city, you may leave this unit inside healing, and forget about it. Honor policy will give a basic melee unit every 8 citizens in a city, so send them to recently conquered cities to serve as garrisons where you may have forgotten a veteran.
