Middle Provincial Era GROGPUBLIC game thread

[Tripoli]

Sorry for the delay in responding.  Julius will co-sponser the bill.

[JasonPratt]

Let it be noted! {scribbling}

The Frog must now call the vote on the Bill, and designate the Faction order of voting. Appius (who Proposed it), and Fabius and Julius, will have their votes necessarily counted as 'for'.

So the count stands thus at (clockwise from the proposer) Appius Claudius 7 (5 Ora + 2 knights), + Fabius 2, + Julius 4 (3 Ora + 1 knight) = 13 votes for.

All senators must vote, no exceptions, for this Proposal. A vote against will reduce your senator's Popularity by 1. No knight activist abilities will trigger to affect this vote.

[JasonPratt]

While we're waiting for results: this vote, pass or fail, will end the Mandatory business.

The only non-Mandatory business available will be the question of raising more Legions from potential (in the Force Pool) to Active; and then creating a Force or two with the Conul(s) to send the Legions to War.

These are separate proposal types, so must be proposed separately; although if the Frog wanted to create two Forces from the Active Legions, and assign one Force to each Consul, he could batch that as one Proposal. (Normally that would be two Proposals, sending two Forces to War under two distinct generals.)

It will be up to the Frog to make the official proposals in any case. If he decides to send only the two currently Active Legions to War, and proposes that, and someone thinks that's too weak, then he risks Players voting against it! -- but if he wants to blow the budget completely out and raise the remaining 5 Legions (through the 7th Legion) to work with first, and someone doesn't like the Republic's budget being handicapped to keep the Plutocrats in power, then he risks Players voting against that!

Or he can try a more moderate set of proposals. Or talk to people publicly and/or privately before making the proposal.

Mmmm.... politics.  ^-^

Anyway, something to be thinking ahead on while we wait to hear the voting order for the Land Bill and then the actual votes.

[Ethel the Frog]

Ok.  So, I would like to call the vote. 

I think we already completed the vote for consuls?  And the vote passed?
Cincinatus told me he wanted to go to war, and would vote for me for Roman Consul if I would send him off to war.  That's why I did it the way I did. 


I have voted for. 
Next the plutocrats.
Then militarists
then aristocrats then
the conservatives. 

If there are any assassination attempts while I am roman consul, there will be consequences.
Assassination is not civilized. 

David

[Ethel the Frog]

I would also like to hear opinions as to how to conduct this war. 

Currently, inclined to send Cincinatus with the two active legions off to fight. 
And, as you know, I have a promise to Cinciantus that I intend to keep. 
That said, if we want to muster soldiers and/or send more than one leader, I would consider. 

David

[JasonPratt]

Okay, to update the vote tally, I forgot Claudius' 2 knights, so it was actually 13 starting votes 'for'.

Fulvius of the Plutocrats adds another 2 Ora = 15 for the Type 1 Land Bill.

Tripoli with the Militarists are next to vote.

[JasonPratt]

I think we already completed the vote for consuls?  And the vote passed?

Yes, between you and the Aristocrats, you had a majority block, and (unlike this vote) pro-or-con made no difference to the senators' stats, so there was no need to spend time polling the Militarists and the Conservatives. Appius is currently Roman Consul (and HRAO, thus also Presiding Magistrate), and Cincinnatus is currently Field Consul. Each senator gained 3 Influence.

[JasonPratt]

Let me do a quick tally check, because we may already be past the point where there's no benefit for anyone opposing the Bill to even try voting against it. Primary numbers are Oratory, Secondary numbers refer to knights.

Definitely for already: Appius 5+2; Fulvius +2; Fabius +2; Julius +3+1 = 15.

Potentially against: Aristocrats +7; Manlius +2; Furius +3 = 12.

Okay, we can call a stop to the voting for the Bill at this point. Everyone else might as well vote in favor of it, because that comes with no downside while voting against it will only earn you -1 Popularity per senator with no way to win.

The Land Bill passes.

[JasonPratt]

Unrest immediately reduces 1 point (down from 2 to 1). A Land Bill chit goes on its reminder square for next Revenue phase (-20 Talents). Fabius' Popularity goes up to 2 to 2; Julius Pop goes up to 1 to 1.

Updated board overview:

[JasonPratt]

And the current sideboard zoomins:











Plus a reminder of the war to plan for now:

[JasonPratt]

Now, some things to consider when proposing and voting on how to deal with this war:

1.) Wars don't ever attack Rome directly, including this one (well, not in this game anyway). But they'll cost money each turn they stay active, and if you let them sit around too long they may 'team up' with other Wars of the same 'family' and become that much harder to stop.

2.) This war has a strength equal to 2 Legions (that's the 2 in the lower right corner), plus one more Legion's strength thanks to Tarqy (that's the +1 on his card).

3.) When the time comes to fight the War -- all fighting happens automatically as I roll and do calcs -- you'll be totaling a 3d6 roll, to which you'll subtract the enemy strength and add your Force's strength. You want the total to be 14 or better. If it's 18 or more, then you win with no losses, which is the ideal result.

4.) Every war has a basic strength which it will always have for as long as it's active. Later in the game, some Wars can pick up auxiliary strength which can be whittled away. And sometimes you can manage to randomly kill the Enemy Leader which will permanently remove the bonus strength to his War(s), even if his War continues on.

What this means is that almost always any losses suffered will be the Republic's.

5.) There are five possible results to the combat roll:

5.1.) Defeat, on a total of <=7. In this case any of your surviving Legions will return to the Active Pool, and any surviving senators at the War will return to Rome (specifically to the mats for each Player). However the senator commanding the attack will die. Unrest immediately jumps +2. Depending on the level of Defeat, you may lose x number of units in your Force.

5.2.) Disaster, on a total of the specific black square number for the card, replaced by the black square number on the leader's card. Tarqy scores a disaster if you total a 7. You lose 50% of your Force rounded up, and Unrest jumps +1. But your army (if anything is left) stays in the field.

5.3.) Standoff, on a total of the specific gray square number on the card, replaced by the grey square of the leader. Tarqy scores a Standoff on a total of 14 (which would normally be a victory for you!) You lose 25% of your Force rounded up, but no Unrest, and your army (if anything is left) stays in the field.

5.4.) Stalemate on a total from 8 to 13. Your army stays in the field, and loses x number of units depending on the exact result.

5.5.) Victory on a total of 14 or higher (unless the War or its Leader supersedes that with a Standoff result!) The War discards, and the Leader goes to the Curia, while your surviving Legions and their commanders go home (though they won't arrive home until the Forum Phase next turn). There are some other possible results depending on circumstances (getting to loot spoils, and maybe the Leader permanently discards), and you could still lose x-number of units depending on the exact roll.

In any case, if you or your enemy leader isn't killed outright, you both check randomly to see if you die or, in your case, if you're captured.

[JasonPratt]

Now, what's important to take from all that:

1.) Having a commander who negates Disasters and Standoffs for a particular war, can be important.

2.) You can attack a particular War more than once a Turn, if you have enough separately commanded Forces at the War. On any Turn, a War can only generate one Standoff and one Disaster result, so one strategy is to send two Forces with orders that the D/S voiding general attack first, possibly burning out a D or S result.

3.) This War has a power of 3, so unless you bring a Force of more than 3 power, it'll be a purely random dice roll, mostly weighed against you, since even some victory and stalemate results will be negated (by Tarqy's D/S scores), and only Rome will take damage (even in most victory situations).

4.) Your general will double the power of x-number of Legions under his command, where x = his Military skill. So sending 2 Legions under Cincinnatus will be like sending 4 Legions; and sending 5 Legions will be like sending 10 Legions. But sending 6 Legions will be like sending 11 Legions, not 12.

5.) Sending 2 Legions, even under Cincinnatus, will only make your Force's power 4. Meaning you'll only add 1 to your 3d6 dice roll (4 - 3 War power = +1 to roll.) That isn't much to offset the table stacked against you.

[JasonPratt]

Oh, and 6.) If you want to raise more Legions to active duty, they cost 10 Talents each, and the Republic has 36 Talents. You can afford 3 more Legions before you go in the hole. Each new Legion will add another 2 Talents every year to Rome's ongoing expenses, remember.

[IncompetentIdiot]

I'd suggest that we raise at least two extra legions. A +5 or +7 should give us a decent shot at victory.

[JasonPratt]

Even a +5 (from raising two more Legions for a total of four Legions, under Cincinnatus = power 8 - War power 3) would at least avoid an outright defeat. And Tarqy's Disaster target, too! (Minimum roll 3 + 5 = 8.)