Middle Provincial Era GROGPUBLIC game thread

Started by JasonPratt, September 17, 2018, 05:04:17 PM

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Tripoli

1st order of business. The raising of all available legions.
2nd order of business. The raising of all available fleets. Depending on how the votes go, I may have other. Proposals. I don't think we need a voting order for these first two proposals. Militarists vote for both proposals
"Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?" -Abraham Lincoln

JasonPratt

For convenience, here's the State of the Republic information from earlier. Player mats have changed, of course, so aren't reposted, but the other stats are the same up to now since the start of the Senate.

Quote from: JasonPratt on December 26, 2018, 10:34:18 PM
STATE OF THE REPUBLIC:
----------------------------

The Republic currently has 196 Talents, with an income of 60, and more Allied Enthusiasm about to add another 50 next Turn. Current expected expenses are -10 and -20 for Active Wars, and -10 for an Immanent War which will activate before the Revenue Phase next Turn. Expected expenses also include -2 x 13 Active Legions. (Vets cost nothing extra for upkeep, though really they should.)

There's a Spolia Opima historical Event in the Forum, and strictly speaking it doesn't distinguish between Land and Naval Victories against an Enemy Leader! However, neither does the prologue fan expansion feature naval battles at all. And, to be fair, while the rules mentioned a Spolia Opima event, they forgot to include any details for it, so its details are totally my invention anyway. ;) So I'm going to rule that claiming it must require a Land Victory over an Enemy Leader, which is certainly the spirit of the event anyway. (I'll try to remember to clarify this rule on the card text soon.)

Unrest is currently 1.


Here's the Immanent War again for convenience:



And the two Active Wars plus Enemy Leader:


ICEBREAKER THESIS CHRONOLOGY! -- Victor Suvorov's Stalin Grand Strategy theory, in lots and lots of chronological order...
Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
Survive Harder! -- Two season narrative AAR, an Amazon Blood Bowl career.
PanzOrc Corpz Generals -- Fantasy Wars narrative AAR, half a combined campaign.
Khazâd du-bekâr! -- narrative dwarf AAR for LotR BfME2 RotWK campaign.
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IncompetentIdiot

The Aristocrats will naturally vote in favour of the defence of the Republic.

malize

Catching up on events and I feel like I've taken a drink of a Pan-galactic Gargle Blaster...

JasonPratt

#964
Now, on Reforming Veterans (loosely based on the reforms of Marius and that other guy whose name everyone forgets because Marius was more famous... ;) )

I was a little surprised and disappointed that Veterans are so brittle in this game. Maybe that's for play balance, I dunno, but in my estimation the best power of the Legions wasn't in their ability to hit doubly or triply hard (thanks to training and command/logistic structure). I mean, that's definitely important and something the game simulates, but I regard their best power as defense, the ability to professionally outlast their opponents.

It was during this period that Rome's Legions started upgrading into the professional military machine that could only be seriously matched, other things being equal, by fellow Roman Legions. Which of course is why the game starts leveling up Legions into vets. And sure, the first thing they arguably did was learn to fight more damagingly. But the Marian Reforms (and successors) also introduced tons of defensive doctrinal changes to keep those harder-hitting fighters alive and hitting back (harder).

That's what I decided to add for simulation in the game, so that over time Rome's Legions have opportunities (provided by the Senate, where possible and agreed upon), to develop up not only into the peak efficiency of the coming Imperial period, but even to create the nucleus of what will become the Praetorian Legions. Maybe. ;)


So! The Sabrerule flowchart has a (now outdated) paragraph on this already, but I've been refining it over time, and I'll update it after chewing on it some more (with feedback hopefully!) But here are the details.

For topical context, when the game rolls for casualties, I have a process where, starting with the 'youngest' Legion in the fight and working upward (highest to lowest legion number), I roll a 1d6 for each Legion to see if it will be one of the necessary casualties lost. The older Legions are presumed to be more experienced even if not Veteran yet, so the younger Legions roll their chances first. If we get to the end of the list and not enough casualties have rolled yet then I start over with the youngest surviving Legion and test each again, until I run out of casualties so to speak. That means sometimes randomly 'older' Legions will die off faster than younger ones, but the nominally more experienced ones have a little better chance of survival, even if they aren't Veterans yet.

By the same token, the Legion which levels up to Veteran after a non-Defeat fight, will be the oldest (lowest-number) non-Vet Legion. That's why the 1st Legion is currently a Vet! And consequently, it counts twice now when figuring out the dice-roll modifier for the battle roll, unlike once for other Legions.

From this Turn forward, now that a Veteran Legion exists, the Senate can vote to spend Talents instituting training for superior Veteran strength in defense. Attack will always stay x2 (or x3 now, in effect, where a Commander's Mil Skill is high enough to count them yet again for the fight!)

For New Veterans (Level 0), i.e. until the first paid Reform, Vets only get double attack bonus. That's our 1st Legion right now, for example: only extra attack, no extra defense.

The first paid Reform creates Seasoned Veteran training with the first defensive bonuses. All Reforms cost 10 Talents times the number of Veteran Legions + 10 Talents per level of Reform. Only one level of Reform is allowed per Turn. Training Reforms are permanent and affect all current and future Veterans going forward.

For Seasoned Veterans (Level 1), all non-Vets must roll for survival first in a cycle, then Vets (youngest to oldest Legions in each case).

For Mature Veterans (Level 2), the testing order goes back to normal, but the Vets get 1 extra survivor roll for each death roll; passing the roll cycles on to next oldest Legions, as usual.

For Hastati Veterans (Level 3), combine both Level 1 and 2 rules: all non-Vets must roll for survival first in a cycle, then Vets (youngest to oldest in each case), but the Vets get two rolls to survive. Any casualties remaining, start over again on all surviving non-Vets first. Continue until the casualties fill out.

So far, there has been no change in how many Legions perish. If the roll says three Legions lost, three will be lost. If that's all the Legions, no need to even roll, that's everyone, Veterans included.

For Elite Principes (Level 4), along with Level 3 combined benefits, any Veteran survival roll reduces the remaining casualty number by 1! That means survival of a Veteran decreases the chance of even non-Vets perishing! -- now they know how to put their training to work to save other Legions, too, not only themselves.

So far, each upgrade affects all Legions, current and future, once researched and funded. The Elite are the normal ideal Veterans that new Legions become when becoming Veterans: able to hit hard, less likely to be destroyed, and able to save lesser Legions, too.

Once Level 4 training has been reached, however, a whole other category of Veterancy training can be bought for specific Legions, at 50 Talents per Legion. These Gold Veteran Legions will be denoted by a permanent gold coin on their chit (actually representing 100 Talents but that seemed too much to pay under the circumstances), and are in effect entire Legions of Triarii: the ultimate experienced troops too valuable to even be put in danger usually, so who usually only hit hard as the reserve to finish out a fight! Aside from being allowed two survival rolls, and any survival success reducing the remaining casualties by one, Gold Vets do not even roll casualties until a Gold-only Force remains! For then, as the saying goes, "It has come to the triarii!" The saying originally referred to groups less than a whole Legion of course, but it came to be proverbally applied to last-chance defenses.

The Gold or Triarii Veterans are really no better at fighting than the Principes, they just get to die last -- if it comes that! By the same token, they only get that privilege if there are other Legions (Vet or otherwise) to die first! -- otherwise you might as well send in a Force of only Level 4 "Elite Principes" Vets. I thought there should be a Prestige level of Veterancy, beyond the normal maximum, where now it's efficiently worse than useless to even have them, because you're spending lots of the Republic's cash to bling them out but they haven't gotten functionally better. Naturally these would be the precursors to the Praetorian Guard.

Being a class of veterans no more useful except as bling, I intend for them to confer an Influence bonus at least, maybe also Pop and/or a Mil Skill increase, for a senator who sponsors their promotion to 'Gold'. I haven't worked out the details on this yet, but I've got a minimum of 5 Turns to do so. ;)
ICEBREAKER THESIS CHRONOLOGY! -- Victor Suvorov's Stalin Grand Strategy theory, in lots and lots of chronological order...
Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
Survive Harder! -- Two season narrative AAR, an Amazon Blood Bowl career.
PanzOrc Corpz Generals -- Fantasy Wars narrative AAR, half a combined campaign.
Khazâd du-bekâr! -- narrative dwarf AAR for LotR BfME2 RotWK campaign.
RobO Q Campaign Generator -- archived classic CMBB/CMAK tool!

malize

Quote from: Tripoli on January 05, 2019, 09:26:08 PM
1st order of business. The raising of all available legions.
2nd order of business. The raising of all available fleets. Depending on how the votes go, I may have other. Proposals. I don't think we need a voting order for these first two proposals. Militarists vote for both proposals

Yes on both

Erax

Yes on both, and I suggest we take advantage of JP's new veterancy rules and go up to level 1 while the cost is only 10 talents. Err... 20 talents.

JasonPratt

Quote from: Erax on January 07, 2019, 02:34:09 PM
Yes on both, and I suggest we take advantage of JP's new veterancy rules and go up to level 1 while the cost is only 10 talents. Err... 20 talents.

Correct: 10 Talents for the first level + (10 times one Veteran).
ICEBREAKER THESIS CHRONOLOGY! -- Victor Suvorov's Stalin Grand Strategy theory, in lots and lots of chronological order...
Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
Survive Harder! -- Two season narrative AAR, an Amazon Blood Bowl career.
PanzOrc Corpz Generals -- Fantasy Wars narrative AAR, half a combined campaign.
Khazâd du-bekâr! -- narrative dwarf AAR for LotR BfME2 RotWK campaign.
RobO Q Campaign Generator -- archived classic CMBB/CMAK tool!

Tripoli

Concur.  Also, I propose
3) That 10 talents be spent on the 1st  legion to increase its veteran status.  Militarists vote yes on this proposal
"Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?" -Abraham Lincoln

malize

Quote from: Tripoli on January 07, 2019, 07:11:18 PM
Concur.  Also, I propose
3) That 10 talents be spent on the 1st  legion to increase its veteran status.  Militarists vote yes on this proposal

Yes


JasonPratt

#971
Ahem, it will actually be 20 Talents (as correctly noted by Erax). But it's almost as cheap as possible to do get the first level done now, while there's only one Veteran Legion; and all Vets going forward will benefit from being Seasoned Vets.

With the Aristocrats joining the vote, the first Proposal crosses the majority, and passes. Context indicates the next two proposals will also pass with their votes being indicated. 14th and 15th Legions go Active. Republic Treasury down 20 Talents (10 x 2 Legions) from 196 to 176.

Tripoli Proposes to Raise all 15 available Fleets in the Force Pool; passed by the same votes. 1st through 15th Fleets go Active. Republic Treasury down 150 Talents (10 x 15 Legions) from 176 to 26 Talents.

Tripoli Proposes to Reform the Veteran Legions to Level 1 Seasoned Vet Training; passed by the same votes. Cost is (10 Talents x 1st Level Training) + (10 Talents x 1 Legion) = 20 Talents. Republic Treasury down 20 Talents from 26 to 6!

As a reminder, next Turn's normal Income is expected to be 60 Talents, plus 50 Talents in Allied Enthusiasm, for 110 + 6 current Talents. From this will be nominally subtracted 10 Talents from the 2nd Samnite War, 10 from the 3rd Samnite War (which will go Active during the first Phase), and 20 from the 1st Punic. (All active Wars from Early Provincial onward cost 20 instead of 10 Talents.) From that will be subtracted the nominal Fleet and Legion upkeep costs of 2 times the sum of the Fleets and Legions, or 2*(15+15) = 60 Talents.

6+60+50-10-10-20-60 = expected 16 Talents in the Treasury going into the Forum Phase. Of course, this could be modified by a permanent income increase of 20 Talents if the 2nd Samnite War gets knocked out; and/or by any Fleet and Legion losses (reducing upkeep costs); and/or by Contributions from senators during the Revenue Phase's first segment.

Even so, you'll have left the Republic rather dangerously exposed to fatal runs of expensive bad luck during the Forum Phase! And you won't have a Plutocrat HRAO to fall back on, because even if you send out the two Consuls, the Censor will remain as HRAO in Rome -- and ideally the Consuls will be back anyway with solid Victories to build for progress on next Turn! The PontMax will not be able to act as a financial Last Ditch next Turn... (unless a bunch of assassinations get successfully thrown...)
ICEBREAKER THESIS CHRONOLOGY! -- Victor Suvorov's Stalin Grand Strategy theory, in lots and lots of chronological order...
Dawn of Armageddon -- narrative AAR for Dawn of War: Soulstorm: Ultimate Apocalypse
Survive Harder! -- Two season narrative AAR, an Amazon Blood Bowl career.
PanzOrc Corpz Generals -- Fantasy Wars narrative AAR, half a combined campaign.
Khazâd du-bekâr! -- narrative dwarf AAR for LotR BfME2 RotWK campaign.
RobO Q Campaign Generator -- archived classic CMBB/CMAK tool!

Tripoli

All-I'm consulting some allies regarding my next proposals.  Will make some additional proposals or end the phase later tonight
"Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?" -Abraham Lincoln

Tripoli

I am proposing 1) Cornelius and  all Legions prosecute  the Samnite war and

2) I will take the fleets and teach the Carthaginian dogs a lesson.....  :)
"Do I not destroy my enemies when I make them my friends?" -Abraham Lincoln