First off, sorry I've been out of touch for the last month. I somehow managed to sneak past the admissions committee at the University of Texas Law School, so I've been getting all my ducks in a row for that.

On to the rules. I think most of these changes are really good. I haven't had a chance to completely digest them yet, but I'll toss in my initial impressions:


Section 3: Tribunes

In principle, I think this is great. There should be a cost or benefit to Tribunes changing the course of politics.

However, I'm worried that these point loss actions tend to limit/penalize on the PC tribunes. This leaves the potential for rich players to still bribe an unlimited number of tribunes to do their bidding. I wonder if there shouldn't be some limit here, or at least something like an increasing possibility of exposure the more one bribes tribunes over the course of the year.

Also, I note the Pontifex loses on 200 Religious Action points to shut down ALL lexes, while a tribune can lose up to 100-150 points per lex. I wonder about the balance here.

And how are repeat lexes affected? For instance, if I offer the same lex 3 months in a row, would a PC Tribune have to pay the penalty to maintain his veto for three months? How about an NPC? Would he have to be bribed 3 times, or would his veto automatically hold? Again, we are drifting toward a situation in which NPC tribunes are effectively more powerful than PC tribunes.


Section 4: Military

The limitations on seizing land/factories are good and necessary. The indexing of the Military Action Points to the battle results is a good idea too, but I wonder of the limits aren't too low. For instance, MAS just fought the most important battle since Zama. He was (as I remember) slightly outnumbered and won a tactical victory. So his victory would have netted him about 25 Action Points. This seems low.

I can think of 2 possible solutions off the top of my head.
1. Raise the points gained/lost by 2.5 times, up to 25xForceRatio for a Draw, 50 for a Tactical Victory, 100 for Significant, and 300 for Overwhelming. Or,
2. Create a size multiplier by multiplying the number of legions involved times the result you already have. The thinking here is that a large battle reflects more work, more importance, and thus more reward. So if I won an Overwhelming Victory in a cohort-on-cohort skirmish, I would only get 1/10 of the available action points (for the .1 legions involved). MAS, on the other hand, had, what, 6 legions or so? He would have gotten 150 action points in this scheme.
2.5 A slight twist on #2 would be to break down battles into 3 classes (Skirmish, Minor Battle, Major Battle) and create a multiplier for each class.



Section 5. Religion

Great work reforming the list of gods/temples, I think it's wonderfully detailed and helps create room to expand the involvement of religion in Imperium. However, I do have a complaint about a previous rules revision. A line was recently added (actually in Rule 2.2.7):
Office [of priest/augur] is held for life of PC & is considered "Currently Held" in addition to any other Religious office, unless revoked by order of the Pontifex Maximus following a majority vote to strip the PC of this office. If revoked the player retains the 'Previously Held' points.

Does this stripping of priesthood have any reference in historical Rome? I didn't think Priests could be summarily stripped of office. The priesthood is not so directly political, but is a much more tradition-based office (as Imperium tacitly acknowledges by giving Patricians an extra 500 votes in religious elections).

More fair, more fun, and possibly more historical would be a religious trial. The trial could be called either by a majority vote or by order of the Pontifex. It would be presumably presided over by the Pontifex, and have as a jury probably the Flamens (i.e. the umpire). This would be far more interesting and allow people to play off their knowledge of Roman religion.


7 Personal Finances

7.4.10 - Limitations are fine, but these limitations are roughly half of what a commander is allowed to seize after conquering a city. Ergo, they should be doubled. (Remember, even a size 1 city will be regional hub, providing goods for the local back-country) Also, should there not be some limit on land ownership? Not all land near a city is useable, and one person would certainly be blocked from owning all of it. Finally, if one person owns too much, there is the possibility that they could actually make a profit by paying to expand a city (thus doubling the value of their land from size 1 to size 2, see section 8). While I don't want to stop such cleverness, the practical effect is that we would have no more size 1 cities within 6 months, which doesn't seem accurate.

All the loan changes: The details may be a bit confusing until someone actually does it, but I think these are great.

Factory value changes: great, actually brings luxury/military factories back into the game. As a longer-term concept, I wonder if there is a way to set up some regions as more geared toward basic production, some more geared to luxury or military production. These regions could possibly produce more profit for their type of factories, but pay better for importing the stuff they don't produce as well. It could all be indexed by adding a couple more Regional Modifiers on the Gazetteer. It's just an idea that obviously needs a lot of fleshing out.


8 State Administration

8.3.1.6 - While I am a huge fan of setting up a system for the expansion of cities, it confuses me how that would cause the chance of rebellion in the entire province to drop to 1% for the entire year. The larger provinces easily have enough money to do this (25-30,000), so they can effectively guarantee themselves freedom from rebellion in one move, even if they raise 10 legions. Seems too easy.

Also, should expanding a city reduce Rome's available manpower by 5,000 men (as I assume people don't just appear, but are drawn to the city with new roads/aqueducts/facilities/jobs)?

And as I said above, the fact that a person can make a profit doing this means that cities will be expanded very fast, I suspect. I wonder if there shouldn't be a balancing factor. Say, large cities demand both more provincial resources spent on them continually and also demand great rights in relationship to Rome (possibly diluting the existing tribes/power blocks in Rome)?