This masterpiece by Alex Mor created a story line using many quests throughout its 7 event files. The player must accomplish each quest within required turn limit; otherwise he may fail to trigger further events.

Contrary to many people’s impressions, this scenario is very easy to win. This is because that, for the first 150 turns or so, the AI controlled Roman empire almost never builds any units. Furthermore, most Roman cities (that is, except for some quest cities and the cities on the Sicily island) only have two types of units in them: the catapult (bomber unit, a/d/m(r)/h/f=6/1/1(2)/2/2) and the garrison (a/d/m/h/f=0/2/0/2/1). Once the player masters the technique of defeating such a combination, he can basically take any Roman city except for the Sicily ones. With cities so easy to be occupied, 150 turns is more than what a good player needs to build up a bases for winning the scenario.

Use your units with ‘see 2’ flag (Spartacus, Artorix, etc.) to check out Roman cities, move around to see if there are catapults outside them.

Some cities have all catapults in/out of the city at the same time. You can move your forces (at least 12 vet archers or vet gladiators) next to the city when those catapults are out, and strike the next turn before the Romans can do anything. Archers are the best attacking unit and become even better after the start of part IV (gains ‘ignore city wall’ flag).

Some cities have some catapults always inside the city. There are several ways to deal with it, but no matter what you do, always pick the turn when lesser catapults are inside the city to move your archers next to it.

One method is to use fortress squares next to the city (if available) to avoid stack-kill. Another is to use a high defense unit to absorb the catapult attack and protect your attacking units. In part I you can use the siege tower (appears after you occupy Neapolis); after part I you can bribe a Roman legionary (has x2 vs air flag, alpine ability) using about 2000 gold. Legionary units appear via events. You can also find them in Sicily. Get Artorix killed once so he will reborn a vet spy, for cheaper bribing prices.

Using the above technique, I was able to take Rome in part III (and I think make it to part II is possible)!

Bribing Roman blockade units on ocean squares next to cities in parts II and III can also help your attack (Roman ballistas and catapults will suicide on attacking the blockades). Penteras can do coastal bombardment. Also, you can use pirates to do amphibious assault. Be aware of the Roman ballista missiles (after part I the range of the ballistas drops from 3 to 2), you should always retreat your ships out of the missile range. Sometimes sacrifice a trade ship to a ballista is a good choice.

Do not leave unique units such as Spartacus in cities. Due to their high defense factor they will be picked up as defenders against turtles and get killed. Instead, let them stay next to cities (preferably on key road squares). They can get a chance to kill the Roman units trying to siege the city, and prevent those Roman units from pillaging roads.

You may get attacked under three occasions until the last parts when Roman cities start to build attacking units.

First, almost all of your quest cities, after you have occupies them for several turns, will be attacked by turtles, rams, legionaries, and centurions (those units appear next to the cities via events). Have unique units parked next to the cities and fortify the city with a lot of cheap units plus several archers. You cannot help to lose several cheap units to the turtles and rams, but you can finish the attacking Romans with your archers and unique units when you counter-attack.

Second, Romans may pop up when you kill a camp, skull, cross, and the sort. Before you kill those strange units, move your archers to good positions around it, and you’ll be able to kill the Romans before they can strike you.

Third, starting from part II, whenever you kill a Roman garrison or catapult, a militia may appear somewhere and move towards you. In each part the militias will appear in a particular city so it is easy to prepare the defense.

Starting from part VI, random turn events will give Roman tough units (in part VII Romans are giving turtles!).

In the last part (part VII), the Roman Pompean units start moving and they are very tough. Build fortresses on hills along the border using your settler units (Artaban and Tigran, but Tigran will lose the settling ability in part IIV), and build roads to connect the fortresses with the closest cities so you can rotate defense units and get them repaired in the cities.

Also in part VII, Roman Triremes will start moving from the Southeast and the Southwest corner of the map towards you. You can build a fleet of biremas to intercept them. Although triremes are tough, their move point is only 1 so you don’t need to worry about counter attack. This will give you an edge in the battle. However, your biremas are very vulnerable to Roman warships, so it’s better for you to occupy most of Sicily and all Southern Italy in early parts to reduce your danger.

Get free units by killing ‘slaves’ and ‘peasant’. Do not kill ‘peasants’ (with an ‘s’) until the peasant leader joins you since this will give the Romans a cavalry unit. Build walls, barracks and start building archers. Save your money early on since you need to bribe at least one legionary.

Turn 1, do not take Pompei. Move Spartacus to the forest square northwest of Pompei and have other units wait Southwest of the city. The Roman reinforcement to Pompei will turn against Spartacus instead of getting into the city. When you take the city on turn 2, Spartacus is in position so you can kill the Roman tribune immediately. Rush build city walls in Pompei and fend off the Romans from both North and South. The units from North (Militia) will suicide against the city walls. However you should attack the units (pirates) from the South since those units have high attack factor but very low (0) defense factor. There is also a tough Roman unit from South, which had a hidden unit icon. Kill it with an archer after it has lost some blood attacking you.

After taking Neapolis, use your birema to attack Roman warships sitting around Spartacus Camp. Carefully position your ship at 2 squares away from the Roman ships, and do strike-duck-rest-strike-duck-rest until you kill off this Roman fleet. In part II, bribe the blockade(s) between Sicily and the peninsular. Almost all Roman ships are on the other side so you can freely move your units along the seashore, without worrying about coastal bombardment.

Use a large portion of the forces you can spare for Sicily. If you can get most of the island (except for Syracuse, which you should not try to occupy since there will be an event happening there in part IIV), then your ships can move freely in the sea.

Rome can be occupied from the Sea. Build a city South to Rome (using Artaban) to form a channel, and you can use coastal bombardment to attack the city.