IR- Roman Civil War - Description feature

Introduction
This mod is a standalone version of DBM. It features 14 scenarios ranging from 88 BC to 275 AD:

01: Marius vs. Sulla

02: Pompey the Great
03: The First Triumvirate
04: Caesar vs. Pompey
05: Veni Vidi Vici
06: The Triumvirs vs. the Liberators
07: The Second Triumvirate
08: Octavian vs. Antony
09: The Year of the Four Emperors
10: The Year of the Five Emperors
11: The Year of the Six Emperors
12: Philippus vs. Decius
13: The Year of the Three Emperors
14: The Crisis of the Third Century

Time Frame, Periods and Factions
Each scenario covers only a short period in history, sometimes just a year. The time-scale is 12 turns per year, so time is limited. The time frame is broken up into 3 ‘Periods’. Period 1 covers the scenarios 1 and 2, Period 2 the scenarios 2 to 8, and Period 3 the following scenarios. The Periods define things like city development, Romanization, and most importantly recruitment. The major change is from Period 2 to Period 3 (‘Post-Augustan’). In the early Periods your Auxilia are local units, which gives you a broader range of units but also causes logistical problems (you cannot retrain “German Auxilia” in Egypt for example). In Period 3 your Auxilia is uniform, what allows you to recruit and to retrain them in every corner of the Empire, but also limit your choices in light infantry and cavalry.

In a scenario there are Major Factions and Minor Factions. Only Major Factions are playable. These are usually the Roman civil war factions plus occasional foreign factions that play a key role, for example Parthia in Scenario 03. But in general, is this a Roman-centered mod, so don’t expect too much foreign factions to be playable. Minor Factions are not playable factions. These represent lesser states that did play some role in the Roman conflict, for example as Roman allies, as victims to Roman expansions, or as a nuisance you have to deal with.

Factional Moral and Dissolution
Each faction has a certain “Factional Moral Index”. The starting moral is defined by the script of the respective scenario and is usually ranging around 100. A faction can gain or lose moral when winning or losing battles, upon the destruction of armies, when provinces are conquered or lost. The Factional Moral Index is given as a trait that every general has. This trait gives him a bonus/malus in Troop Moral and Unrest, independently of his personal qualities as a general or governor. It also affects the loyalty of your generals. The levels are:

Poor Moral (Factional Moral below 25)
Weak Moral (Factional Moral between 25 and 74)
Good Moral (Factional Moral between 75 and 124)
Perfect Moral (Factional Moral above 125)

Once a faction’s moral drops below 0 it will dissolve. This means it will surrender all its possessions to another faction (Roman faction usually surrender to other Roman factions whereas foreign factions usually surrender to the slaves). As a result, you don’t have to conquer each village and kill every family member of an opposing faction. Inflicting some crushing defeats and taking a handful of provinces can do to break their necks. On the other hand, that faction doesn’t have to surrender to you. You might as well have strengthened another opponent that way.

Civil War Leaders
Civil War factions usually have one or more Civil War Leaders. These are not to be confused with the M2TW faction leader (even though it usually is one and the same person on game start). A Civil War leader is defined by a special ancillary (‘Dux’). This ancillary can neither be transferred nor be acquired by other characters. A Civil War Faction that has lost all its leaders can no longer prevail and will undergo Factional Dissolution (see above).

Rome, Grain and Roman Offices
Holding Rome can offer you a couple of advantages:
The faction that is holding Rome gets 2 extra moral points each turn. Conquering Rome gives you another 18 moral points – losing Rome will cost you 18 points in return.
Even in civil war times, Rome is considered the seat of the lawful Roman government, last but not least because of the Senate. So Roman factions, and sometimes also client kingdoms, usually surrender to the faction that is holding Rome (if possible). Senatorial offices can also only be acquired by a faction that also holding Rome. Senatorial offices are:

Period 1 & 2
Consul (I)
Consul (II)
Proconsul Africae
Proconsul Asiae
Proconsul Gallia Cisalpina
Propraetor Gallia Narbonensis
Propraetor Hispania citerior
Propraetor Hispania ulterior
Propraetor Macedonia
Propraetor Sardinia & Corsica
Propraetor Sicilia
Propraetor Bithyniae
Propraetor Ciliciae & Cypri
Propraetor Illyriae
Propraetor Syriae

Period 3
Proconsul Africae
Proconsul Asiae
Propraetor Gallia Narbonensis
Propraetor Sardinia & Corsica
Propraetor Sicilia
Propraetor Macedonia
Propraetor Bithyniae
Propraetor Achaeae
Propraetor Cretae & Cyrene
Propraetor Cypri
Propraetor Baeticae

In order to acquire a provincial office your character has to be inside the respective province and your faction has to hold Rome. Once your faction has acquired a certain office it can be transferred to any other character. Only when one holder dies a new acquisition is required via Rome.
Additionally there are seven Imperial Offices in Period 3:

Praefectus Urbi
Praefectus Praetorio
Praefectus Aegypti
and 4x Legatus Augusti

The legates can be appointed by any Roman faction. The Urban (i.e. Roman) and the Egyptian Prefect can be appointed in the respective provinces. Praetorian Prefect cannot be appointed. The office is granted on game start.

Holding Rome is also holding a great responsibility. That is, you are responsible for feeding the citizens of Rome. In peace times, this is not much of a problem because with Sicily, Sardinia and Africa Province there are three ‘granaries’ right across the sea. Things become more complicated in civil wars because Roman governors do not hold back from starving Rome herself in order to bring a rival into trouble. In order to secure Rome’s supply you have to control five corn exporting cities. The corn exporting cities are:

Syracusae
Lilybaeum
Caralis
Utica/Carthago
Leptis
Chersonesos
Crimean Neapolis
Pantikápaion
Hermonassa
Alexandria (The Alex counts for four corn exporting cities)

When you do not hold five of them you still have the option to buy corn from them. Each ‘load’ of corn costs you 1,000; again Alexandria counts for four cities, means you can buy up to four ‘loads’ from there. Buying corn only is possible when you have sufficient funds and as long as the respective city not is held by a hostile faction.
Supply is checked for every January. When he holder of Rome ensured sufficient supply everything is fine and his faction gets 5 moral points. In case the holder failed to provide full supply the City might see a ‘Corn Rebellion’. The chance of such rebellion is happening is depending on the amount of grain missing (from 16% to 84%). When a Corn Rebellion happened the faction that is holding Rome loses 18 points moral and unrest in Rome will seriously rise.

The Snapshot World
Each scenario only covers a small span of time. The 12-turns-per-year mean that everything that happens within two years, for example, and take four or eight turns in other mods, take 24 turns in this mod. The built-times and –costs have been raised respectively. This also means that some advanced structures take longer to build than the scenario is going. In general, on game start your cities are what they should have been in the period and improving usually doesn’t pay off during the scenario.

You will also notice that your characters don’t acquire additional personal traits. They are who they are and wouldn’t seriously change in their personality during the two or three years of that civil war; even though the war experience might cause a change in their later lives.

Designer Notes
This game plays much different to other mods or M2TW Vanilla. You will not achieve much when you sit around, improve your towns and armies, mob up a rebel settlement from time to time and wait for the next AI faction being stupid enough to attack you. When the game starts you usually have plenty of armies and well developed provinces at your disposal, and you are at war with most other factions who are the same strong. So, this is pretty much a war game and you will encounter massive battles right from the start.

The Factional Moral should not be a problem for you because you usually win the battles against the AI (do you?), unless of course you prefer auto-calc. Keeping your Dux alive can be a bit more challenging (as long as you don’t hide him somewhere). I managed to lose “Octavian vs. Antony” within three turns, for example, because I had my Octavian being killed in a completely unimportant encounter with Antonian cavalry right after landing in Greece.

Keeping Rome in supply shouldn’t be much of a deal as long as you have sufficient funds because in most scenarios either Egypt or the Bosporan Kingdom are non-hostile factions, and each of them is able to provide you with four out of five ‘loads’ of corn. On the other hand, occupying Alexandria or the Bosporan Kingdom can cause serious trouble to the faction holding Rome.

Note that this mod is still pretty much Beta: I didn’t test each scenario with every faction. I didn’t encounter any crashes and the scripts seem to be working as intended. So, that’s what would be called ‘playable’. A first version had rather small armies with one real legion roughly corresponding one unit, larger militia garrisons and recruit times of three turns. This resulted in the AI making their family members and legions the garrisons, and marshaling armies of the militia; absolutely not what was intended. I then raised armies’ size to one historical legion corresponding with 8 units (4x legionary cohort, 4x auxilia, including cavalry and arches). I also reduced recruit times and militias. This finally resulted in the huge armies and massive battles I was looking for.

I hope you'll enjoy it!