Middle Provincial Era GROGPUBLIC game thread

[JasonPratt]

Next up, AzTank's Conservatives. He rolls a 7, which is a random Event, not a Scenario card draw.

Here's a zoom of the random event table:



You may notice that the table is overlaying a different table on the board. That's because the random event chances/list for pre-Early eras is different from the E/M/L ears. (Civil War uses the Late Era list.) Also, up until the end of the Italian Era, if you roll a 15 for your random Event, Carthage donates 4 Fleets to your navy (even if you don't even need a fleet yet ;) ), as part of a treaty with them! (This sort of happened historically, too.) They take those fleets back, of course, once the 1st Punic War goes active, but that won't happen until sometime in the Early Era.

Anyway, this post will also test if I can generate a random dice roll after I've already "previewed" the post, since the forum engine prevents tampering with the dice roll by editing the post afterward.

Random Events are a 3d6 total:

[blockquote]Rolled 3d6 : 4, 6, 5, total 15[/blockquote]

[JasonPratt]

 :DD :DD

I swear, I not only didn't manipulate that, I couldn't do so! Though come to think of it, I didn't test previewing the post with the dice roll code either.

This roll won't count, but I'll do it now for my own testing purposes.

[blockquote]Rolled 1d6 : 6, total 6[/blockquote]

When I previewed this post with the code, it showed rolling a 3 on a 1d6.

[JasonPratt]

Edited to edit! -- never mind, I didn't read the rule closely enough. Carthage only donates you 4 fleets if you roll a 15 during the Italian Era.

But Allied Enthusiasm is a great random event, arguably much better than 4 Fleets you'd have to pay to upkeep but can't use for a while anyway! It means that next Turn, your allies will donate another 25 Talents to the Republic.

[JasonPratt]

So, it's AzTank's round now to manage his senators. Here's a recap of your sidebar.



Each of your senators has 2 cash. No one has a knight as their minion yet. Any senator has a maximum 50/50 chance to do so if he pays all 2 Talents. (Players are limited to one knight persuasion chance per Turn.)

No family senators remain in the Forum to try to persuade. Any other Players' senator will instantly subtract 7 points along with subtracting his loyalty score AND subtracting point for his personal cash (if any); all of which you'd have to overcome to even have a chance of persuading him to join you instead.

Currently the most vulnerable target then is Fulvius of the Plutocrats, with a Loyalty of 8 and no personal cash. -8 -7 = -15. None of your senators has enough combined Ora, Inf, and cash, to even possibly persuade him.


So, your only choices this Turn, for your Forum Round, are:

1.) Do you want one of your senators to try for a knight, and if so sacrifice how much cash to try?

2.) Do you want to change your Faction Leader?

[ArizonaTank]

Fabius will spend 2 to try for a knight.

no other action

[JasonPratt]

Y'okay, let's do it!

Needs a 4 or better to win (cash will be sacrificed either way).

[blockquote]Rolled 1d6 : 3, total 3[/blockquote]

[JasonPratt]

Close but no minion!

Time for newcomer Malize and the Populist Faction.

Roll to see if it's a random event or a card draw:

[blockquote]Rolled 2d6 : 5, 5, total 10[/blockquote]

[JasonPratt]

Not 7, so it's a card draw.

It's actually one of the few good historical Events! -- the Spolia Opima! (While the Birth of Republic rules mention this card, there's no description for it so I had to make something up based on its historical application.)

The Spolia Opima, or best spoils, was awarded to a general early in the Republic's history (I forget offhand who, but I think during the victory over Rome's neighbor Veii, one of the Etruscan major cities). It was only ever awarded twice again, so far as we know, and never near to one another -- the last time was the 1st or 2nd century CE, if I recall correctly. (I don't have my reference book handy.) So it's basically a legendary epic conquest reward, that you wouldn't normally see for several lifetimes. Consequently, there's only one in this game.

The Event hangs around in the Forum until the next Victory against any War with an Enemy Leader. (A Victory with no Enemy doesn't trigger it.) The senator who gains the Victory adds an extra 5 Influence, 5 Popularity, and 5 Talentons, beyond any other stat/chip adjustments!

This is an awesome early Victory reward! -- though of course it also represents the game trying to tempt players to compete with each other at the possible expense of the Republic's survival.  >:D


Neither of the new Populist senators has enough Oratory + Influence + cash to even possibly persuade out any of the three most vulnerable senators from other players (Fulvius of the Plutocrats, and two of the Conservatives' senators): you'd have to beat a negative adjustment of -15, and only Brutus has an Ora 3 + Inf 7 + 5 cash to even equal 15. So you'd have to roll a 0 or less on a 2d6. ;)

(Note that once Conservative senators start winning knights, each of their knights adds 1 more resistance to being persuaded away by other players.)

Your senators each have enough cash (5 Talents) to guarantee persuading one knight, though. So your choices are:

1.) Which senator do you want to go for the knight? (And do you want to spend all 5 Talents trying?)

and

2.) Do you want to change your Faction Leader from Lucius Junius Brutus to Aurelius?

[malize]

No leader change

Let Brutus burn 5 and get himself a knight

[JasonPratt]

Done!

Erax's Progressives next.

Rolls the 2d6 for Scenario or Random Event:

[blockquote]Rolled 2d6 : 3, 1, total 4[/blockquote]

[JasonPratt]

Not 7, so it's a Scenario card.

The famous, or infamous, Roman traitor general Gaius Marcius Coriolanus, of the Shakespeare tragedy, is drawn! -- he'll lead the Volscian War, unless he dies a natural death first. He goes to the Curia to wait upon history.

He earned his cognomen, or nickname, for successfully besieging the Volscian city of Corioli. But a grain shortage led to a debate within the Senate about how to assign resources, and Marc argued that the Senate should only distribute grain if the concessions to the first Plebian Secession were reversed. This led, understandably, to a popular revolt, and the Senate generally agreed that he should be convicted of something to calm the populace, but otherwise dealt with mercifully. Rather than accept this dishonor, he quietly left the territory before conviction, and defected to the Volsci, who had been impressed with his siegecraft (obviously) and also with his relative mercy in his victory. He eventually led the Volsci to besiege Rome, intending to become king, but his wife and mother came out to plead for the city, and in his mercy he pulled back the Volscian troops, after which he disappears from history, his fate unknown. (Modern scholars are generally more than a little sceptical of these events, for various reasons, aside from hostility with the Volsci.)

It's nicely coincidental that we drew him right after the Agrarian Unrest led Rome to pass its first Land Bill, voiding the first Plebian Secession drawn on this Turn!

Here's a quick, slightly not-updated recap of the Progressives:



Actually, there's no cash in the Faction purse, and each senator has 5 Talents.

It's impossible for either senator to even try persuading another Player's senator to defect, so the only choices are:

1.) Which senator do you want to try for a knight, and how many Talents do you want him to sacrifice for his chances?

2.) Do you want to change your Faction Leadership?

[Erax]

Flaminius burns 5 for a guaranteed knight.

No change in leadership.

[JasonPratt]

Done! Normal vote tally up 1 to 4. (Your senators suck at Oratory so far.)

I.I.'s Aristocrats next, rolling:

[blockquote]Rolled 2d6 : 6, 3, total 9[/blockquote]

[JasonPratt]

Not a 7, so it's a Scenario card.

Well, anyone who knows the Republic's early history could guess this was coming...!



Somewhat sooner than later, for our game purposes, but the northern barbarians sack Rome (historically in 390 BCE).

First, the Republic's Treasury loses 30 Talents, down to 39 -- so this was about the best possible time to be sacked, really, especially with another random Allied Enthusiasm on the way next Turn to make up most of that loss (+25).

Then Unrest increases by 3 points to 3. Not possible to automatically lose yet, but you could possibly get down to the next worst thing. (though that's super-unlikely). What you can be sure of, is that Unrest won't decrease when Appius Claudius gives his State of the Republic speech -- he just doesn't have the popularity for it. (His Pop is still 0, neutral.)

Last but not least, 3 Mortality Chits are drawn.

In this case, families 9, 12, and 14.

14's family isn't politically active yet, but Acilius the new senator for the Plutocrats, and Aurelius of the Populists, are both taken Captive. They must be ransomed, at either 2*Inf or at least 10 Talents each, by the end of the next Forum Phase on Turn 3, or they die. Meanwhile they count as away from Rome, meaning they can't affect Influence or the vote tally; nor can they take any action in the Senate; nor can their personal cash be used for anything other than ransoming.

Which means, since they each had some cash, that Acilius needs 8 to live; and Aurelius needs 5. (That personal cash will definitely be spent for ransom.)

They can be ransomed at any time, but the ransom must be paid by the Faction from the Faction Treasury. Other Players can donate of course (from their Factions Treasuries, not from Personal Treasuries), but the cash will be put in the delayed boxes until next Revenue Phase.

Until ransomed, those senators are regarded as away from Rome, so their votes and influence are deducted. They can take no action during the Senate Phase (and no action at all until ransomed); cannot be given anything; their cash cannot be used for anything but the ransom; if they had minions, they wouldn't act without direction (so wouldn't vote whether normally or with activist powers); and they cannot earn income in any way (including by Aurelius' Concession). Neither of them have an office, but they wouldn't automatically lose any major or minor office (aside from normal Senate procedure).

This procedure is the same when a general is taken captive in a war, too, except the repay must be made before the War is defeated.

For topicality's sake, I'll move to I.I.'s choices in the next post.

[JasonPratt]

Cornelius (the Faction Leader) has the best chance of persuading anyone, but even his score altogether would be only +13 vs the current minimum -15 of the most vulnerable player senators, so that choice is impossible this time.

No senator has a knight yet. Cincinnatus and Valerius each have 2 Talents, and Cornelius has 5. I.I. didn't specifically say earlier during distribution that he would do an automatic minion for Cornelius, so I'll have to see a public decision about that.

Also, you can change Faction Leader now (for free, automatic success, as always).