What I did this weekend (apart from socialising)

Firstly, might I just say that my weekend was awesome, thanks for asking. Unfortunately the product of which has left me with an epic game of Rome Total War which I still have not finished.

I have 32 provinces, mainly on the Aegean Coast, 220 years to go and I'm in the fortuitous position of being liked by both the people and the senate thanks to some of my illustrious family members. I'm also slowly taking huge Egyptian cities, which is a double edged sword because on one hand I am getting cities which I can crank out urban cohorts but on the other I can never move said urban cohorts out of the city for fear of rebellion or siege. Furthermore, I don't want to knock down all the Egyptian buildings to reduce the culture penalty because some of them are quite advanced and giving me nice little benefits.

It's interesting because Jerusalem and the neighbouring cities all have urban barracks while my capital and nearby cities are still producing Praetorians. But that's fine by me. Thank God for Gaius Marius, without his reforms I would still be fending off Egyptian war chariots with principes and velites.

Just before the reforms I was in a bit of trouble, my armies were being whittled down and I was losing some cities, which is no surprise since I garrison all my cities (except for the middle east) with peasants (cheapest unit in the game, excellent at keeping cities from rebelling for some strange, weird reason). So I shifted from an economic focus of adding ports and dockyards to all my cities to building barracks and building every military unit I could get and it has been working thus far.

I would of thought I would be broke by now though... I distinctly recall on previous games going broke and having to face rebellion after rebellion, but maybe that only happens after you get 45 provinces or something.

So yeah apart from sushi with my sisters and chatting with old friends, that's my weekend.Some old school gaming. I haven't played RTW in a couple of years and now I remember why I liked it so much. The infantry are just so tank and hearing the words "THIS LAND IS ROMAAAAN" is just so satisfying.

As always, I am left thinking of why didn't the Romans be sensible and do what I have been doing? Perhaps the empire would still be alive today if they just burnt every barbarian city to the ground and garrisoned them with peasants...