I think this guy is a few decades too late to the party.
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Looks like Rome has managed to secure more of the Mediterranean. One step closer to Mare Nostrum.
Vasconia certainly looks impressive over in the west. I can see why you're trying to court then, since they should be of great help against Carthage's Iberian territories.
Vasconia certainly looks impressive over in the west. I can see why you're trying to court then, since they should be of great help against Carthage's Iberian territories.
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Those cities along the coast had very high warscore values, so it strongly limits how much you can cut off in one war. Just the way the game is designed, any campaign against a large nation will take many smaller wars to win.
The Vasconians in Iberia and the rival tribes in England have both been fun to watch, and the Vasconians could be valuable future allies if Rome doesn’t want to rule all of Iberia itself.
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But some were their own countries, right? At least when they are independent allies you can separate peace them.
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I didn’t think I:R had the option for a separate peace. If I’ve missed that then I’ve really made my life harder..
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It has. Peace out leader, peace out all. Peace out others, peace out them. But not sure you csn peace out vassals independently.
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Can't peace out vassals/client states separately if I recall correctly. Its very similar to EU4 peace treaties
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@RedTemplar: How do you have such big levies? I tried following your path and giving Citizenship to the biggest minority groups. Etruscan, Sabellian, and Lepontic. I went after Cisalpine Gaul before Greece and haven't taken Sardinia and Sicily from Carthage.
I only have 28k from Italia and 10k from Magna Graecia and nothing from Cisalpine Gaul even after giving all those filthy Gauls Citizenship!
I only have 28k from Italia and 10k from Magna Graecia and nothing from Cisalpine Gaul even after giving all those filthy Gauls Citizenship!
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So I fired up my save from the start of the Second Punic War... my integrated groups are the Romans (1,341), Etruscans (594), Lepontics (502), Macedonians (476), and Punics (408). With a total levy size multiplier of 15% (7.5% default + 7.5% for the Republican Levy law) that gives me roughly 60k (120 cohorts) in Italia, 25k (54 cohorts) in Cisalpine Gaul, 23k (47 cohorts) in Macedonia, 17k (34 cohorts) in Magna Graecia, and 13k (27 cohorts) in Africa, as the major regions. All told, I had about 136,000 men in the field total for the Second Punic War, not counting any mercenaries I hired midway.
Your numbers might vary for any number of reasons... Time, population size/growth, levy laws. Especially if you've taken the law to enable legions, it slashes your levy size dramatically.
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@RedTemplar : I have much smaller number of Pops about 300 of each integrated culture and about 500 Romans. That explains a lot.
I am about 260 BC (Time of First Punic War IRL)
I am about 260 BC (Time of First Punic War IRL)
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Aw man i can't belive i didn't notice this thread starting till now, I love I:R AARs!
Read it all and looking forward to more!
Read it all and looking forward to more!
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Never too late to hop on board! Got another post brewing for this weekend.
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I've been doing my own campaign as Rome and never got going conquering as fast as you did. Mostly because I couldn't afford a big enough military until later. I think my taking on the Gauls before the Greeks was a mistake.....but the Greek World was guaranteed by the Ptolemies, who became an Empire, for Ages until they started going into Civil wars.
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Why didn't I catch this one sooner? Great to see you're still around, RedTemplar! I'm excited to see where this new megacampaign goes, especially since this is starting with Imperator. Never seen an Imperator AAR before, much less a megacampaign starting there.
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Just finished reading through this. Great work! Looking forward to more!
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Ch. IV.iv: The Aftermath of the Second Punic War
For years, the Carthaginians saw themselves as a leading great power in the southern Mediterranean, masters of a vast maritime trade empire and worthy rivals to the growing Roman republic. But the first two Punic Wars violently humbled Carthage, and after two defeats at the hands of the Romans, the Carthaginians were desperate to stave off further defeat and humiliation.
Rome had now conquered the crown capital city of Carthago and expanded its control eastward to occupy multiple wealthy Punic trade cities along the north African coast. Though Carthage expanded its holdings in west Africa and southern Iberia, it was not enough to make up for the loss of its wealthiest and most influential cities; parity with Rome was quickly slipping out of reach. A change in course was needed, or else Rome would soon overrun all the remained of Carthage. A new election brought a new Shopet, and with him came hopes of a plan to deter the Romans from launching a third Punic War.
Shortly after his election in the aftermath of the Second Punic War, Milkiram Bodoni reached out to King Ptolemaios III Lagides of Egypt, seeking an agreement of mutual protection against Roman aggression. By forging an alliance between their two nations, Bodoni insisted, they could hold the Romans at bay by threatening to force them into a two-front war fought along almost the entire southern Mediterranean coastline. Ptolemaios quickly accepted the offer, and the two north African powers formed a united front against Roman ambition. Both nations also began to expand their naval forces at an aggressive pace, until soon the combined navies of Carthage and Egypt outnumbered the dreaded Roman fleet.
Bodoni's plan worked. Having lost its naval superiority, Rome was reluctant to fight both Carthage and Egypt simultaneously. For the next several years the hostility between the Mediterranean rivals cooled, if only temporarily, allowing Carthage and Egypt to try and further shore up their defenses as allies.
Meanwhile, as an uneasy peace spread across the Mediterranean, blood was being shed in the east as the Persian Empire continued its long war against the invading Parthians. Persia, ruled by the Xenokratid dynasty which overthrew the Seleukids by civil war in the 260's BC, had suffered greatly at the hands of the Parthians at at one time had seen their realm cut in two by the steppe invaders. But by the end of the Second Punic War, Thoas I had rallied his soldiers and begun to drive the Parthians back northward, reconnecting the separated limbs of his empire and fighting back hard. The Parthians were reeling, and momentum was quickly shifting toward the Persian Empire's cause.
Ptolemaic Egypt, too, was seeing favorable results in war. After concluding his alliance with Carthage, Ptolemaios III led a successful campaign into the Arabian peninsula, expanding his kingdom's influence outside of Africa and pressing ever further east. With the wealth of the Nile Delta at his disposal and surrounded by weaker neighbors, Ptolemaios had no difficulty in maintaining Egypt's place as the most dominant power in the southeastern Mediterranean region.
Meanwhile, while Rome had been prevented from striking further into Africa by the alliance of Carthage and Egypt, the senate was not content to simply remain in idle peace. With Africa off limits, at least temporarily, the Romans turned their attention to the tribes of Breucia to the northeast, against whom they waged a short but bloody campaign. By capturing land from the Breucians, Rome widened the corridor of land connecting Italy and Greece, though the tribes there proved unruly and difficult to control, raising frequent rebellions in the coming years.
The conquest in Breucia, however, only mildly placated the expansionist senators in Rome, who lamented the cessation of war in Africa. But while the alliance between Carthage and Egypt seemed to make the two states strong enough to resist Roman ambition, civil unrest was beginning to make cracks in their collective armor. Both nations were suffering from significant inner turmoil, and in 219 BC, a large rebellion broke out in Carthage that saw the great republic split in two by warring factions. This civil war, which would stretch on for countless long years, gave Rome the opening it needed, and the senate was quick to move in.
The Romans used the chaos and violence of the Carthaginian civil war as their justification for military action. The movement of legionaries into neighboring rebel-controlled territories was not an invasion, in Roman logic, but an attempt to protect the local populations from the abuses of the rebel soldiers. Thus, as Roman troops marched westward, it was to "restore order" rather than to wage an offensive war. Further, they insisted, Egypt had made an alliance with the Shopet of Carthage himself, and not with any rebel faction fighting against the lawful government, and so it would be neither lawful nor honorable for them to intervene in the Roman occupation.
As a result, the Egyptians stood down as Rome advanced into Carthaginian territory, "liberating" cities from the rebels wherever possible before troops loyal to the government of Carthage could reclaim them. In this way, the Roman incursion continued westward along the coast and inland, driving the Carthaginians back as the civil war raged on. A peace treaty was swiftly concluded with the rebels, and soon after, the time would come to wage war against Carthage proper. Seeing their continued weakness in the midst of civil war, the senate believed it prudent to declare war against the lawful Carthaginian regime, seeing their vulnerability as Egypt was in a state of full collapse.
Carthage was suffering from a long-running civil war, but Egypt was soon to face an even worse conflict. Dissatisfied with the ruling dynasty, a massive rebellion led by the upstart Tabnit Alashayyi shattered Egypt and plunged it into a lengthy civil war that would last for over 40 years before the kingdom would again be unified. Rebels and loyalists waged a violent and deadly war all across the desert kingdom, and the bitter infighting left Egypt completely isolated from foreign affairs for decades, giving Rome the freedom to ravage their allies in Carthage without consequence.
With both of their archrivals mired in civil wars, the Romans were free to carve out even more land from the Carthaginian loyalists, who were ill-equipped to fight back and without any meaningful foreign aid. Within the span of a few years, even more of Carthage's north African territories had come under the Roman banner, and the Carthaginian dream of reclaiming land lost to the Romans was fading quickly.
From this point on, there is disagreement among scholars of the era as to the naming and classification of Rome's remaining conflicts with Carthage. Some delineate these future conflicts as third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and even seventh Punic Wars; still others regard the Second Punic War as the final decisive conflict, with the remaining years merely representing a gradual dismantling of the shell that remained of Carthage's once-great realm. Regardless, the rivalry between Rome and Carthage had come to an end, and over the next few decades, the last vestiges of Carthaginian land would be swallowed up by Roman expansion.
Ch. IV.v: The Question of Legions
By the beginning of the second century BC, the Roman legionary was among the most feared soldiers in the world. Rome's citizen levies had marched across Italy to unify the peninsula; crushed great Greek kingdoms like Macedonia and Epirus; and conquered large swathes of Africa from the mighty Carthaginians. The organized, heavy infantry-focused legions had proven themselves a match against any foe, carrying Rome to military dominance on their strong shoulders. But one visionary man believed that he could take the world-renowned Roman legions and forge them into something even greater.
Vopiscus Claudius Pulcher, a young and promising member of one of Rome's greatest aristocratic families, brought a proposal to the senate to modernize the army by opening its ranks to all Roman citizens, regardless of economic class, and standardizing their training and equipment to form a more unified, cohesive fighting force. This, he argued in his presentation to the senate, would improve the efficiency of the Roman army in several ways.
Vopiscus envisioned a permanent standing army, always ready to answer the call to war. The levy system, he argued, had become increasingly ineffective and logistically cumbersome as the Roman republic had grown larger. Attempting to raise, mobilize, and concentrate forces from disparate regions like Africa, Italy, Gaul, and Greece could sometimes take many long months, delaying campaigns and preventing Rome from responding quickly to emergencies or uprisings. A standing army could be mobilized for war or national defense much more quickly, and its legionaries would be much deadlier than conscripted levies due to their extensive training.
But the Optimates, headed by Tiberius Centenius, the Consul at thattime, were not keen on the idea of establishing a class of permanent soldiers. Ever interested in maintaining the power of Rome's existing elite, they viewed this potential new "military class" as a threat to the existing political order. The ideal Roman soldier, in Tiberius' vision, was the landed, wealthy citizen who took up arms to fulfill a civic duty to protect the country in which he owned land and property, fighting for his nation and then returning to his estate in the model of Cincinnatus. Full-time soldiers, he insisted, would lack the noble motivation of levies fighting for their home and livelihood, and that they would instead become violent and brutish, seeking out violence at any opportunity, rather than using it as a necessary tool for the preservation and prosperity of Rome.
But in spite of the vehement protests of the Optimates, support in the senate for the creation of a standing army was strong enough to overcome their objections, at least in part. In the end, the two sides reached a compromise in which the model of the professional standing legion would be tested on an experimental basis. Four men were chosen to become the leaders of the first professional legions. First among them was Vopiscus himself, who was designated the first of the Roman legates, appointed as a commander over his three closest subordinates. Flavius Centenius and Secundus Cornelius Violens represented two more of Rome's great families, while Itius Aboliis was chosen to allow the lesser nobility a place among the commanding ranks of the new army.
Each of these men was given the command of a 10,000-strong legion of full-time warriors, equipped at the state's expense and paid a consistent wage. These four founding legions were christened the Lupi, Leones, Accipitres, and Corvi -- the Wolves, Lions, Hawks, and Ravens. Each was centered around a core of 5,000 heavy infantry warriors, supported by lighter spearmen, heavy cavalry, and a small corps of supply staff and other non-combatants. These professional soldiers were to be the tip of Rome's spear against her enemies, and the pioneers who would test whether or not a permanent standing army was to Rome's benefit. In later years, these legions could be expanded, maintained, or eliminated entirely at the pleasure of the senate.
Soon, then, war would call these new legions to the front lines for their first test.
For years, the Carthaginians saw themselves as a leading great power in the southern Mediterranean, masters of a vast maritime trade empire and worthy rivals to the growing Roman republic. But the first two Punic Wars violently humbled Carthage, and after two defeats at the hands of the Romans, the Carthaginians were desperate to stave off further defeat and humiliation.
Rome had now conquered the crown capital city of Carthago and expanded its control eastward to occupy multiple wealthy Punic trade cities along the north African coast. Though Carthage expanded its holdings in west Africa and southern Iberia, it was not enough to make up for the loss of its wealthiest and most influential cities; parity with Rome was quickly slipping out of reach. A change in course was needed, or else Rome would soon overrun all the remained of Carthage. A new election brought a new Shopet, and with him came hopes of a plan to deter the Romans from launching a third Punic War.
Shortly after his election in the aftermath of the Second Punic War, Milkiram Bodoni reached out to King Ptolemaios III Lagides of Egypt, seeking an agreement of mutual protection against Roman aggression. By forging an alliance between their two nations, Bodoni insisted, they could hold the Romans at bay by threatening to force them into a two-front war fought along almost the entire southern Mediterranean coastline. Ptolemaios quickly accepted the offer, and the two north African powers formed a united front against Roman ambition. Both nations also began to expand their naval forces at an aggressive pace, until soon the combined navies of Carthage and Egypt outnumbered the dreaded Roman fleet.
Bodoni's plan worked. Having lost its naval superiority, Rome was reluctant to fight both Carthage and Egypt simultaneously. For the next several years the hostility between the Mediterranean rivals cooled, if only temporarily, allowing Carthage and Egypt to try and further shore up their defenses as allies.
Meanwhile, as an uneasy peace spread across the Mediterranean, blood was being shed in the east as the Persian Empire continued its long war against the invading Parthians. Persia, ruled by the Xenokratid dynasty which overthrew the Seleukids by civil war in the 260's BC, had suffered greatly at the hands of the Parthians at at one time had seen their realm cut in two by the steppe invaders. But by the end of the Second Punic War, Thoas I had rallied his soldiers and begun to drive the Parthians back northward, reconnecting the separated limbs of his empire and fighting back hard. The Parthians were reeling, and momentum was quickly shifting toward the Persian Empire's cause.
Ptolemaic Egypt, too, was seeing favorable results in war. After concluding his alliance with Carthage, Ptolemaios III led a successful campaign into the Arabian peninsula, expanding his kingdom's influence outside of Africa and pressing ever further east. With the wealth of the Nile Delta at his disposal and surrounded by weaker neighbors, Ptolemaios had no difficulty in maintaining Egypt's place as the most dominant power in the southeastern Mediterranean region.
Meanwhile, while Rome had been prevented from striking further into Africa by the alliance of Carthage and Egypt, the senate was not content to simply remain in idle peace. With Africa off limits, at least temporarily, the Romans turned their attention to the tribes of Breucia to the northeast, against whom they waged a short but bloody campaign. By capturing land from the Breucians, Rome widened the corridor of land connecting Italy and Greece, though the tribes there proved unruly and difficult to control, raising frequent rebellions in the coming years.
The conquest in Breucia, however, only mildly placated the expansionist senators in Rome, who lamented the cessation of war in Africa. But while the alliance between Carthage and Egypt seemed to make the two states strong enough to resist Roman ambition, civil unrest was beginning to make cracks in their collective armor. Both nations were suffering from significant inner turmoil, and in 219 BC, a large rebellion broke out in Carthage that saw the great republic split in two by warring factions. This civil war, which would stretch on for countless long years, gave Rome the opening it needed, and the senate was quick to move in.
The Romans used the chaos and violence of the Carthaginian civil war as their justification for military action. The movement of legionaries into neighboring rebel-controlled territories was not an invasion, in Roman logic, but an attempt to protect the local populations from the abuses of the rebel soldiers. Thus, as Roman troops marched westward, it was to "restore order" rather than to wage an offensive war. Further, they insisted, Egypt had made an alliance with the Shopet of Carthage himself, and not with any rebel faction fighting against the lawful government, and so it would be neither lawful nor honorable for them to intervene in the Roman occupation.
As a result, the Egyptians stood down as Rome advanced into Carthaginian territory, "liberating" cities from the rebels wherever possible before troops loyal to the government of Carthage could reclaim them. In this way, the Roman incursion continued westward along the coast and inland, driving the Carthaginians back as the civil war raged on. A peace treaty was swiftly concluded with the rebels, and soon after, the time would come to wage war against Carthage proper. Seeing their continued weakness in the midst of civil war, the senate believed it prudent to declare war against the lawful Carthaginian regime, seeing their vulnerability as Egypt was in a state of full collapse.
Carthage was suffering from a long-running civil war, but Egypt was soon to face an even worse conflict. Dissatisfied with the ruling dynasty, a massive rebellion led by the upstart Tabnit Alashayyi shattered Egypt and plunged it into a lengthy civil war that would last for over 40 years before the kingdom would again be unified. Rebels and loyalists waged a violent and deadly war all across the desert kingdom, and the bitter infighting left Egypt completely isolated from foreign affairs for decades, giving Rome the freedom to ravage their allies in Carthage without consequence.
With both of their archrivals mired in civil wars, the Romans were free to carve out even more land from the Carthaginian loyalists, who were ill-equipped to fight back and without any meaningful foreign aid. Within the span of a few years, even more of Carthage's north African territories had come under the Roman banner, and the Carthaginian dream of reclaiming land lost to the Romans was fading quickly.
From this point on, there is disagreement among scholars of the era as to the naming and classification of Rome's remaining conflicts with Carthage. Some delineate these future conflicts as third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and even seventh Punic Wars; still others regard the Second Punic War as the final decisive conflict, with the remaining years merely representing a gradual dismantling of the shell that remained of Carthage's once-great realm. Regardless, the rivalry between Rome and Carthage had come to an end, and over the next few decades, the last vestiges of Carthaginian land would be swallowed up by Roman expansion.
Ch. IV.v: The Question of Legions
By the beginning of the second century BC, the Roman legionary was among the most feared soldiers in the world. Rome's citizen levies had marched across Italy to unify the peninsula; crushed great Greek kingdoms like Macedonia and Epirus; and conquered large swathes of Africa from the mighty Carthaginians. The organized, heavy infantry-focused legions had proven themselves a match against any foe, carrying Rome to military dominance on their strong shoulders. But one visionary man believed that he could take the world-renowned Roman legions and forge them into something even greater.
Vopiscus Claudius Pulcher, a young and promising member of one of Rome's greatest aristocratic families, brought a proposal to the senate to modernize the army by opening its ranks to all Roman citizens, regardless of economic class, and standardizing their training and equipment to form a more unified, cohesive fighting force. This, he argued in his presentation to the senate, would improve the efficiency of the Roman army in several ways.
Vopiscus envisioned a permanent standing army, always ready to answer the call to war. The levy system, he argued, had become increasingly ineffective and logistically cumbersome as the Roman republic had grown larger. Attempting to raise, mobilize, and concentrate forces from disparate regions like Africa, Italy, Gaul, and Greece could sometimes take many long months, delaying campaigns and preventing Rome from responding quickly to emergencies or uprisings. A standing army could be mobilized for war or national defense much more quickly, and its legionaries would be much deadlier than conscripted levies due to their extensive training.
But the Optimates, headed by Tiberius Centenius, the Consul at thattime, were not keen on the idea of establishing a class of permanent soldiers. Ever interested in maintaining the power of Rome's existing elite, they viewed this potential new "military class" as a threat to the existing political order. The ideal Roman soldier, in Tiberius' vision, was the landed, wealthy citizen who took up arms to fulfill a civic duty to protect the country in which he owned land and property, fighting for his nation and then returning to his estate in the model of Cincinnatus. Full-time soldiers, he insisted, would lack the noble motivation of levies fighting for their home and livelihood, and that they would instead become violent and brutish, seeking out violence at any opportunity, rather than using it as a necessary tool for the preservation and prosperity of Rome.
But in spite of the vehement protests of the Optimates, support in the senate for the creation of a standing army was strong enough to overcome their objections, at least in part. In the end, the two sides reached a compromise in which the model of the professional standing legion would be tested on an experimental basis. Four men were chosen to become the leaders of the first professional legions. First among them was Vopiscus himself, who was designated the first of the Roman legates, appointed as a commander over his three closest subordinates. Flavius Centenius and Secundus Cornelius Violens represented two more of Rome's great families, while Itius Aboliis was chosen to allow the lesser nobility a place among the commanding ranks of the new army.
Each of these men was given the command of a 10,000-strong legion of full-time warriors, equipped at the state's expense and paid a consistent wage. These four founding legions were christened the Lupi, Leones, Accipitres, and Corvi -- the Wolves, Lions, Hawks, and Ravens. Each was centered around a core of 5,000 heavy infantry warriors, supported by lighter spearmen, heavy cavalry, and a small corps of supply staff and other non-combatants. These professional soldiers were to be the tip of Rome's spear against her enemies, and the pioneers who would test whether or not a permanent standing army was to Rome's benefit. In later years, these legions could be expanded, maintained, or eliminated entirely at the pleasure of the senate.
Soon, then, war would call these new legions to the front lines for their first test.
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Phew! Life and family made that take a bit longer than planned, but another update arrives! Carthage is severely weakened at this point, and the transition to legions offers some fun roleplaying opportunities, as well. I've played a good bit so far, so another update is in the works as we press on!
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Carthage isn’t quite destroyed, but it effectively is now. Rome can go anywhere from here, though that Egypt looks scary.
By the way, what are your end goals for Imperator? Any ideas in mind for the conversion?
By the way, what are your end goals for Imperator? Any ideas in mind for the conversion?
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Carthage allying Egypt would have put a serious damper in your expansion into Africa if they both hadn't immediately collapsed into civil war. Part of me was looking forward to seeing a bit of challenge there, but I also enjoy seeing Rome just walk all over its enemies.
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