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Saturday, 29 March 2025

God Emperor! Concluding the first stab at it..

 Continuing on from last weeks post, I have played the rest of the reign of Gaius Maudlinus (see below), but first a word about the game itself.

Surplus Dairiprodus by Uderzo


Game mechanics

For the first go at the game (well technically the second, but my Caesar was assassinated in year 2 of the first attempt) I only used the Random Events to run the game - Gaius was not a very proactive kind of leader. The following table is changed slightly from Mark's original - I used a d12 and added an extra line.



Rome started off with 3 Legions - as Provinces are captured, an extra Legion could possibly be raised in Years of Peace & Prosperity to a max. of 1 per Province gained.

I added Glory Points (GPs) from the following table - I think I was over generous in this first go as GPs were also given in the Random Events...


At the end of the incumbents' reign the total GPs are used to determine how the leader will be viewed by History. Again, I made a few changes to Mark's original (possibly based on a misreading of the rules):

The next go at this will certainly involve more decisions being made by the would-be Emperor, plus Random Events, so more aggressive play.

Game

At the end of the first session, Rome controlled most of the Italian peninsula - how would Gaius fair going forward?



Well there it is. Gaius didn't do too badly given he wasn't allowed to make any decisions!

I enjoyed the randomness of my first go and can see the system as being a nice way to run a campaign where the Random Events add to strategic play, so thanks to Mark for the great ideas! 

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8 comments:

  1. Mark Cordone29 March 2025 at 13:13

    Thanks! I like your additions! The d12 will even out the events. My original idea behind making it totally random was actually to give context to some randomly generated battles. Playing it actively is a great idea, I think all you would have to do is come up with a nice list of allowed actions, and have some of the random actions preclude any action that turn, like invasions lets say. I like your titles for how the emperor will be remembered by history as well.

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    1. Maudlin Jack Tar30 March 2025 at 08:27

      Thanks Mark. I'll write up my thoughts more formally and put them in the next post. I'm not sure if the Player should declare any Legion movements and THEN roll for Random Events, or the other way round. I can imagine sending out the Legions only to find Barbarians at the gates! Perhaps a d6 for initiative!?

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    2. Mark Cordone30 March 2025 at 12:48

      That should work very well.

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    3. Maudlin Jack Tar31 March 2025 at 07:22

      đź‘Ť

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  2. Martin S.29 March 2025 at 17:52

    Lovely report….pity about the back pains…! Were the battles fought out with DotS again?

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    1. Maudlin Jack Tar30 March 2025 at 08:07

      Cheers Martin. Yes DotS games resolved the battles.

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  3. Elliesdad29 March 2025 at 19:32

    Very nice. I like the way the summary charts the tale of Gaius Maudlinus’ reign - the victories, the challenges faced and overcome, as well as the quiet years of peace (and, hopefully, prosperity).
    Cheers,
    Geoff

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    1. Maudlin Jack Tar30 March 2025 at 08:05

      Thanks Geoff. The summary seemed the most sensible way to explain what happened. I might try something different in future games.

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