New Player looking for tips

[Barron of Gondor]

So, I bought IR when it came out; but as with a lot of people I didn't like it too much. So I stopped playing until Marius. I got back in and I thought it was good. But I was overwhelmed with it and put it down until now. I've started up a Rome game; and I've took all of Italy minus Cisalpine Gaul. I had a war with Carthage; and it went the way the first Punic war went. I took Sicily and they kicked my ass in the med. I have my first Legion and decided to use that for most of my fighting from now on. For the longest time I've been struggling with money, and I think I know why; I was building tax offices and market places to increase both my trade and tax income(plus I wanted to Romanize Italy). But I found out that they are crap investments. I'm sitting at around +25 ducats a month and around 1500 pops.

So what I'm looking for is tips that will help me Romanize faster so I can push into Iberia and Cisalpine Gaul, Improve my economy, determine whether I should make more ships; or bigger ships to beat Carthage, what is the best amount of integrated cultures, should I build farming settlements, mines or slave estates. And any random tips that will help out someone who understands some of the game but not all.
Thx

 

[manager2525]

Seems you are doing a very good job already from what you have described since it is your first serious run after so much time.
Anyway regarding gold / economy for the settlements from most important to less important mines->farming settlement->slave estates. Try focusing first to the most important goods. So prioritise a mine on precious metal to one on base metals. Also if you haven't done this already try to build everything first in Latium. The reason is to try and get as many capital bonuses for your trade goods as possible. It is a bit of micro but it is worth manually bringing slaves to Latium in order to get the capital surpluses. For cities concensus is that building foundries is the way to go. Tax offices and market places are indeed a bad investment. On the other hand aqueducts and academies will bring you a bigger benefit on the long run. For Romanization Great Theatres are a no brainer. Great Temples are also useful in the placed that are not predominantly Hellenic. They will help to convert pops. Converted pops will in turn be more easily to assimilate. Cultural decision can also help with assimilating. Set up colonies for the extra assimilation rate and get right of intermarriage.
Imho as Rome it's better not to give additional rights (accepted cultures) to any other culture except for some rather large one like Macedonian or Punic. Maybe if you would like to reach some other kind of tradition tree this is a reason to make more cultures accepted.

 

[Barron of Gondor]

Seems you are doing a very good job already from what you have described since it is your first serious run after so much time.
Anyway regarding gold / economy for the settlements from most important to less important mines->farming settlement->slave estates. Try focusing first to the most important goods. So prioritise a mine on precious metal to one on base metals. Also if you haven't done this already try to build everything first in Latium. The reason is to try and get as many capital bonuses for your trade goods as possible. It is a bit of micro but it is worth manually bringing slaves to Latium in order to get the capital surpluses. For cities concensus is that building foundries is the way to go. Tax offices and market places are indeed a bad investment. On the other hand aqueducts and academies will bring you a bigger benefit on the long run. For Romanization Great Theatres are a no brainer. Great Temples are also useful in the placed that are not predominantly Hellenic. They will help to convert pops. Converted pops will in turn be more easily to assimilate. Cultural decision can also help with assimilating. Set up colonies for the extra assimilation rate and get right of intermarriage.
Imho as Rome it's better not to give additional rights (accepted cultures) to any other culture except for some rather large one like Macedonian or Punic. Maybe if you would like to reach some other kind of tradition tree this is a reason to make more cultures accepted.

Oh, I have Etruscan and, another Italian culture integrated(I forget what its called. The Samnite one). Together they make up 500 ish pops. So I should drop them down to freemen and eat the opinion hit? Also, what is the best party to have in government? Other than loyalty, What is the point of handing out holdings? Should I prioritize building up cities or settlements first? Rome is at around 75 pops, should I upgrade it to a metropolis?

Sorry if I'm spamming questions.

 

[Atey]

What is the point of handing out holdings?

I usually avoid handing out holdings to prevent character's power base from spiraling out of control, but in specific cases, increasing power base can be beneficial. For example when you seek to empower a particular party, handing out holdings to its memebers could help. Additionally, characters can use their funds to construct buildings (limited to farms and mines) in the territory where their holding is located.

 

[manager2525]

Oh, I have Etruscan and, another Italian culture integrated(I forget what its called. The Samnite one). Together they make up 500 ish pops. So I should drop them down to freemen and eat the opinion hit? Also, what is the best party to have in government? Other than loyalty, What is the point of handing out holdings? Should I prioritize building up cities or settlements first? Rome is at around 75 pops, should I upgrade it to a metropolis?

Sorry if I'm spamming questions.

You have Etruscan and Sabellian. I would highly recommend to drop them both to freeman status as you mentioned since 1) They are in the same culture group so you have less of a minus 2) They are all hellenic religion so again less of an issue with happiness 3) A lot of those pops are in your capital province so again less unhappiness. If you set them to freemen you will see them assimilated to roman in time. It would be more worth it to get as an accepted culture a culture that is not of your culture group that its pops do not follow your religion. As mentioned it is worth it if there are a lot of pops in question and/or you want to get to the relevant traditions.

You need to get Rome to metropolis status ASAP. Especially in your capital territory you want to have as many pops and also as many of them to be nobles. The reason is that the nobles provide for more trading routes. You will gradually see that the trade routes to your capital are increased. You will get the amphorae orange notification for unused capital trade routes when this happens. Again with all the extra trade routes you can get more capital bonuses that are really important. For the end game you probably will have bonuses from all the goods. Also get roads from Rome to all adjacent territories since this also somewhat increases trade routes (although if I am not mistaken all roads lead to Rome already from game start - They are already build).

Building up between cities and settlement depends imho. While I have not done a full on number crunching there are cases where you will need to build in the cities and other where you will need to build on settlement first. For example foundries should be a priority. For the cities in Cisapline Gaul the great theaters and temple should be a priority. If you are lacking a specific good and you can procure it by building a mine or a farm at another province you own you should prioritize it. As a very general rule I think that most players build up settlements first but again there are exceptions like building up your capital city.

Don't hesitate to ask if you have any other questions!

 

[Barron of Gondor]

You have Etruscan and Sabellian. I would highly recommend to drop them both to freeman status as you mentioned since 1) They are in the same culture group so you have less of a minus 2) They are all hellenic religion so again less of an issue with happiness 3) A lot of those pops are in your capital province so again less unhappiness. If you set them to freemen you will see them assimilated to roman in time. It would be more worth it to get as an accepted culture a culture that is not of your culture group that its pops do not follow your religion. As mentioned it is worth it if there are a lot of pops in question and/or you want to get to the relevant traditions.

You need to get Rome to metropolis status ASAP. Especially in your capital territory you want to have as many pops and also as many of them to be nobles. The reason is that the nobles provide for more trading routes. You will gradually see that the trade routes to your capital are increased. You will get the amphorae orange notification for unused capital trade routes when this happens. Again with all the extra trade routes you can get more capital bonuses that are really important. For the end game you probably will have bonuses from all the goods. Also get roads from Rome to all adjacent territories since this also somewhat increases trade routes (although if I am not mistaken all roads lead to Rome already from game start - They are already build).

Building up between cities and settlement depends imho. While I have not done a full on number crunching there are cases where you will need to build in the cities and other where you will need to build on settlement first. For example foundries should be a priority. For the cities in Cisapline Gaul the great theaters and temple should be a priority. If you are lacking a specific good and you can procure it by building a mine or a farm at another province you own you should prioritize it. As a very general rule I think that most players build up settlements first but again there are exceptions like building up your capital city.

Don't hesitate to ask if you have any other questions!

How about Characters, I somewhat get them; meaning I know what all the skills mean. And how to pick out a good general/governor/official/researcher etc. But to be blunt, I don't get what the point is with all the women. (geese that sounds so wrong lol)...

Anyways, I also don't pay much attention to who wins the elections. Because to me I feel like I can do very little to influence them, and I feel Ican just ignore them and I won't have much in the way of consequences. Is that a false assumption?

What can I do with people who is not any sort of office holder/gov./gen.?

When IR first came out, I saw the dev clash and saw people seize funds, ransom, etc. characters from other nations. But for the life of me I have no idea how they did that...

What should I do with the families of my subjects and conquered enemies when I annex them?

 

[IsaacCAT]

How about Characters, I somewhat get them; meaning I know what all the skills mean. And how to pick out a good general/governor/official/researcher etc. But to be blunt, I don't get what the point is with all the women. (geese that sounds so wrong lol)...

Anyways, I also don't pay much attention to who wins the elections. Because to me I feel like I can do very little to influence them, and I feel Ican just ignore them and I won't have much in the way of consequences. Is that a false assumption?

What can I do with people who is not any sort of office holder/gov./gen.?

When IR first came out, I saw the dev clash and saw people seize funds, ransom, etc. characters from other nations. But for the life of me I have no idea how they did that...

What should I do with the families of my subjects and conquered enemies when I annex them?

Roman Republic is a lite form of a Republic.

You can ignore Characters and elections and you may be fine, or you can play the political game and enjoy a lot knowing your nations chacters.

In Monarchies, people like to look for blood lines so their dynasty get better with every bloodline.

For Republics if you do not go the Dicatorship path to the Empire, you can balance power base to decide the party that dominates the Senate and this way be able to choice your next Consul.

The idea is to follow your Heads of Family, because they are the characters that have more Power Base and see which faction they have more conviction. You want to send them as governors of small regions to negate their senate influence if they are from a faction you do not want in power.

For the election, look at the characters menu and sort by the election succession score. You will see that popularity, family prestige and statesmanship are the factors that influence the vote for that character. Every faction will support their best characters.

To elect a character you want to have their faction with a senate majority and him being more popular, having more family prestige and statesmaship than his competitors.

To do so, you have to teach/give experience to your chosen characters when they are young, so they can get statesmanship and popularity (as governors, legates, researchers or officials) and adopt them in one of the most prestigious families.

Some players choose to always please all families giving them enougb jobs so they are not scorned. But you can chose one family and give as many jobs to them. The heads of family power base is function of family prestige that they get mostly by holding offices by family members. So you can permanently scorn a family and not let them gain prestige while at the same time promote another family to power. Is up to you.

Finally, what faction do you want in power? That will depend in your playstyle, read on the wiki what the boni, populari and the optimates want, you want a faction that will approve what you do as a player https://imperator.paradoxwikis.com/Government#Roman_factions

Also, remember that characters can change their faction conviction with time, look at how is changing to understand why and when they will change.

The political game is time consuming but helps a lot to know the characters of your nation.

Do not forget that you have to play the other aspects of the game, too! As this grooming of characters and political bickering can absorb all of your attention.

 

[manager2525]

How about Characters, I somewhat get them; meaning I know what all the skills mean. And how to pick out a good general/governor/official/researcher etc. But to be blunt, I don't get what the point is with all the women. (geese that sounds so wrong lol)...

Anyways, I also don't pay much attention to who wins the elections. Because to me I feel like I can do very little to influence them, and I feel Ican just ignore them and I won't have much in the way of consequences. Is that a false assumption?

What can I do with people who is not any sort of office holder/gov./gen.?

When IR first came out, I saw the dev clash and saw people seize funds, ransom, etc. characters from other nations. But for the life of me I have no idea how they did that...

What should I do with the families of my subjects and conquered enemies when I annex them?

Again this is a matter of personal preference but I really do feal that characters have more to give when you are playing as a monarchy. Don't expect that even then there is going to be so complex as ck but still it is going to be more interesting than the Republic.
For example marriage to right woman is a lot more important. The spouse stats are taken into consideration when ruling. For example you have a 9Martial, 7Finesse, 8Oratory, 2Zeal ruler. You should marry him with someone that has high zeal. In such a way they will use her Zeal as a basis. Also there can be royal marriages with characters from other countries that will boost your relations. In addition you can marry your daughter to some important character like a governor or a legate that will boost their loyalty. Also you can try to bring some bloodlines to your ruling family via marriages.

There are still some things you can do even as a republic. For example after conquering a tag you can opt to imprison all important characters that will later let you sell them off to slavery for some gold (and tyranny). It is not a huge amount of gold but when you are starting as a dirt poor tribal in Hibernia it can be one of the very few sources of income early on.
In general use the option that is more beneficial at the time. You can decide between gold, ruler popularity (might be not that useful for a republic) and aggressive expansion decrease if you have recently conquered to much and you are facing stability issues.

As for party agents and elections I think you are good as long as you manage to have high approval ratings from the parties. I use to support / give more power to the oligarchs as the democrats tend to want shorter terms while the former longer. I have found it more easy to go for longer terms.

 

[Atey]

Anyways, I also don't pay much attention to who wins the elections. Because to me I feel like I can do very little to influence them, and I feel Ican just ignore them and I won't have much in the way of consequences. Is that a false assumption?

You can influence the elections in a limited way, mostly by smearing the leading candidate's reputation. Characters get elected based on their popularity, statesmanship and family prestige, so you could also try employing only characters of a certain desired conviction, so they gain statesmanship and have a better chance of getting elected. It has to be noted though that there is a hefty bonus to candidates from the same faction so mostly the strongest faction decides.

What faction your ruler belongs to matters. In this game, the ruling faction is the ruler's faction, not the strongest faction in the senate. The strongest faction usually gets their way but sometimes there is an extremely popular, experienced or otherwise desirable candidate that gets elected despite being from a weak faction. The ruling party gives you a unique set of modifiers and also sets the senate agenda. This means that they can attempt to push through their faction agenda at some point and if you stop them, they will not be pleased.

Faction strength is the sum of senatorial influence of its members. Senatorial influence comes from characters' power base and is further adjusted by modifiers from traits and such. This means that factions which include heads of families, characters with loyal cohorts or characters with large numbers of holdings are the ones which get to decide. Note that characters with high senatorial influence can be neutralized by giving them a governor position or command of an army.

 

[Barron of Gondor]

Thank all of yall for the advice. As to an update on the game. I finally beat Carthage on the seas, and have taken Sardinia, and the Balearic islands from them. The last time I checked it was around 220 BC (I'm using a mod that shows BC rather than vanilla date system) and have taken the eastern part of Cisalpine Gaul, around the Venice area. I would love to push into Greece next because its mostly one culture and religion, but there is a massive Macedon and I don't think I can take them yet. they are about the size of the Byzantine's in CK. (it was the Antigonid's but they formed Macedon after they killed them). So I'm now doing one of the missions that makes you build up Italy. And then I'll finish off Carthage when my truce is up.

 

[Barron of Gondor]

Also, I wanted to make a second Legion. But sadly I don't have the Marian reforms yet. BUT I found that you can split your Legions into "Cohorts"...

OK, this annoys me. Why is it that the Sub Legion is called a Cohort. Isn't a cohort the base unit off 500 men in this game? Similar to a regiment in EU? Because my army is now called Cohort I Legio Italia, and Cohort II Legio Italia. What? lol. Wouldn't it of been called Legio I Italia and Legio II (insert name of Consul at creation)? Then If you raise a "Legion" for Magna Grecia it would be Legio III Magna Grecia?

I mean, Caesar had 4 Legions under his command.

I like what they did with the army system; but they got the naming all wrong. lol Shouldn't it be; Army (Lead by a General) Legion(Lead by a Legate) Cohort(Base unit) and not Legion(lead by Legate) Cohort(lead by a Tribune) Cohort(Base unit)?

Is there a mod that dose this?

 

[Aotrs Commander]

DO NOT attempt to split your one allowed legion in an event to mitigate attrition (which it lets you do, unlike with mercenary units), lest you end up with the game-killing CTD bug I got 30 hours in, which CTDs the game when it tries to award a promotion to a legion that doesn't exist and basically nukes the game.

 

[olivenkranz]

DO NOT attempt to split your one allowed legion in an event to mitigate attrition (which it lets you do, unlike with mercenary units), lest you end up with the game-killing CTD bug I got 30 hours in, which CTDs the game when it tries to award a promotion to a legion that doesn't exist and basically nukes the game.

I never had that issue ... I split my legions and all of them got the same promotions. Or I never noticed

 

[Aotrs Commander]

I never had that issue ... I split my legions and all of them got the same promotions. Or I never noticed

I was only allowed one legion at the time and it threw a bit of a wobbly when I tried to recombine them, so I disbanded the legion entirely and made a new one... And only many hours later, it flagged up a promotion to a legion that didn't exist (or only partly existed confused with the existing one) which caused a consistent CTD. As it was one fired by a pulsed event, no way around it, either. I made a full report (even did a little digging into the save file), but technical support's response was, ultimately (if not phrased as bluntly), "no-one around to support it now, you're boned, mate."

I suspect it is possible to save-edit rescue it, but funnily enough, I completely lost any enthusiam to throw more time at the game (or money at PDX in general) after that.

(Kinda bitter about it, you may have noticed by me periodically bringing it up on the forum... But after giving PDX the benefit of the doubt, buying the game on release and being prepared to wait a good couple of years for them to get it up to standard, I fully intend to keep needling about it until they actually, y'know, do something. I mean, it worked for that chap in the Stellaris bit who repeatedly brought up one bug repeatedly for years until they did, finally, fix it and good for him.)

 

[SAS]

You can't combine Legions. Are you talking about Cohorts?

 

[Aotrs Commander]

You can't combine Legions. Are you talking about Cohorts?

During a war in the south of Egypt, I split my one allowed Legion in half to attempt to mitigate attrition. Afterwards, I attempted to merge the units back into one stack.

It let me split them, but really didn't like recombining them apparently, hense the catastrophic problems later, even having disbanded an re-raised the legion.

Now, whether the fact it LET me split them is a bug would be a matter of question. But seeing as the tech support team isn't around to take a look at the saves...

 

[SAS]

Odd. I have split the cohorts of legions up and recombined with no effect. We you over your unit allowed size when you recombined your cohorts?

 

[Terixis]

I also had a game that got nuked by CTDs on the monthly pulse. I was able to force it forward a couple of months but it would just start crashing on the pulse from a later month so I gave up. I don't know what caused it, but I always only use a capital legion that I split constantly to save money and for building roads, avoiding attrition, etc. If it's caused by distinctions being awarded then there really doesn't seem to be a workaround beyond not splitting your legion, which is unfortunate. Aside from that one save game though I've only had a couple CTDs that both resolved when I reloaded *knocks on wood*.

Thrace is an ugly green color anyway, I didn't even like that save file in the first place!

 

[Aotrs Commander]

Odd. I have split the cohorts of legions up and recombined with no effect. We you over your unit allowed size when you recombined your cohorts?

I never reached the point I could have more than one legion. I didn't add any more cohorts to said legion while it was split (I think I was at maximum anyway).

This is the bug report thread I filed.

I also had a game that got nuked by CTDs on the monthly pulse. I was able to force it forward a couple of months but it would just start crashing on the pulse from a later month so I gave up. I don't know what caused it, but I always only use a capital legion that I split constantly to save money and for building roads, avoiding attrition, etc. If it's caused by distinctions being awarded then there really doesn't seem to be a workaround beyond not splitting your legion, which is unfortunate. Aside from that one save game though I've only had a couple CTDs that both resolved when I reloaded *knocks on wood*.

Thrace is an ugly green color anyway, I didn't even like that save file in the first place!

Sounds very like what happened to me; it was a monthly pulse promotion, and it was trying to award it to what appeared to be a broken semi-existing legion.

It's sort of good (but not really) to see that it may well not just have been me to have the problem, so if they can ever be fragged to start up again, there's a snowball's chance they might fix it.