Middle Provincial Era GROGPUBLIC game thread

[JasonPratt]

(Note catching up, the Frog's Tribune is publicly discarded, and all Suspicions are deleted until next Turn.)

The Aristocrat vote pushes the Proposal solidly over the majority line, so the Proposal passes.

Roman cash drops 90 Talents to 5 cash.

The 1st, 2nd, 4th, and 5th Fleets return to Active duty; and the 16th through 20th Legions are created.

[Tripoli]

I'm thinking very seriously about sending my own guy (Aelius) as the MoH.  I'm willing to hear arguments as to other candidates for the position.  According to my calculations, Aelius would give us a total +9 DRM on the combat table, (Julius takes 10 legions against the Gauls, giving us 10 Legions + MIL 9 (Julius)+ MIL 3 (Aelius as MoH)-13 war value=+9 modifier -1 (OMENS))= 8 which translates into a +62% chance of a victory with no losses.  See https://anydice.com/.  Any thoughts?

In accordance with my proposal from several pages back, I'm proposing Julius and Aelius take 10 legions against the Gauls. 

Flaminus takes 2 vet legion and 8 regular legions against the Saminites.  This gives us 12 strength + MIL 4 (Flaminius) - 1 (omens) = 15, - 8 war value = a +7 modifier.

Manlius takes the 11 fleets against the Carthaginians but does not prosecute the naval war

I believe this proposal reflects earlier discussions I had with various parties via PM.  If I'm wrong, please correct me.  Voting will be in any order, but I will vote last to allow for any corrections (ie, if I have somehow misrepresented earlier discussions in this proposal, I'll vote against it, and we'll put together a corrected proposal)

[Erax]

We vote in favor.

[IncompetentIdiot]

For.

[JasonPratt]

Technically not a majority yet, but one more Faction will get there.

[malize]

For.

[JasonPratt]

I should note that technically this is a Batch Proposal: a number of Proposals of similar kinds, which is legal to do in most cases. It is illegal to batch Proposals of different kinds, and it is illegal to batch a few Proposals (like Land Bills, iirc) and to batch Laws (which we haven't gotten to yet in the game).

But this is a Batch Deployment Proposal, so that's fine.

I will also note, more relevantly, that before I can process this Tripoli must clarify the Deployment order. Strictly speaking I must resolve the Deployments in the formally stated order, and then resolve Combats later in the order of Deployments (among other rules for which fight resolutions go first, but Deployment order is the main rule for resolution order.)

This can be very important for subtle political purposes. But at the moment the main issue is this: if I resolve the Proposal under the current order, the Dictator will leave Rome with his Force (and with his MoH), and THIS WILL IMMEDIATELY CLOSE THE SENATE! -- meaning that the other Deployments won't happen! The Presiding Magistrate is responsible for managing Force Deployment, which is why if he's deploying he must leave last.

Or, alternately, he must resign his post as PM, and give management of Deployment order to the next senator in line for PM (typically the Roman Consul). The new PM can of course immediately pass the post down to the next one and so forth until reaching a high ranking available officer in Rome who then must Propose the Deployment order and Force compositions along with Commanders. Nominally if the Dictator and all Consuls are meant to deploy, then the Censor (who cannot deploy unless he's also Master of Horse/Ships) would be Presiding Magistrate and would be responsible for Proposing the Force Compositions and Deployment order.


Now: in this case it doesn't strictly make any difference, so to speed things along I'm going to pretend that Tripoli has already had Julius revise the Deployment order so that he Deploys with his Force last, and the other Consuls arbitrarily Deploying in the nominal Field Consul / Roman Consul order.

(This particular order isn't necessary under these circumstances: the Dictator or whoever is PM can deploy them in any order -- the key rule is only that when the PM as the PM departs Rome that's the end of the Senate Phase and no further actions will be taken, for which the typical expression of the rule is that the Roman Consul Deploys the Field Consul first and then himself if necessary. But since Deployment order makes no strategic difference in this case, I would simply assume a default Deployment order of Field, Roman, Dictator.)

But I figured I should use this opportunity as an example to stress how the Deployment rules work, before there are opportunities or consequences depending on my procession of the actions.  O:-)

[JasonPratt]

Oh, crap, I do need Tripoli's clarification on one point though:

Regarding Proconsul Manlius, he's already Deployed of course with a Force, so the Deployment is simply sending him Reinforcements for his Command. (Not sending a second Commander to his War, much less Recalling Manlius.)

However, if I send enough Fleets to make 11 at the War, Manlius will meet Minimum Force requirements, or actually exceed them! Minimum Naval Force in this case is greater or equal to 10, the base Naval Force of this War.

If a Commander meets or exceeds Minimum Force requirements, he MUST attack the War. He can only opt out of attacking if he does not meet Minimum Force.

Consequently, if you want Manlius to avoid attacking the Punic Fleet, he must not have more than 9 Fleets under his command at the War. He currently has 7, so only 2 Fleets (or no fleets) should Deploy as Reinforcements.

In fact, strictly speaking if the Senate votes majority in favor of him not attacking, then there's no need to send him Reinforcements at all: the War isn't going to attack him (weird as that sounds), and there's no advantage to him having the extra Fleets at hand. (Other than political games perhaps in making sure someone else doesn't have sufficient Fleet support to win their fight! -- but that isn't even possibly an issue here.)

Edited to add: I could just process the Deployment and then force Manlius to fight with 11 Fleets anyway, against the intention of the voted Deployment, but I'm treating this as my fault for not noticing and calling out the discrepancy to alert the Players in the first place. And I want to be fair.  O:-)

To save time I'll go ahead and move along into the Combat Phase, ending the Senate Phase (with the departure of Julius last), and retroactively apply the correction to the Deployment vote: either to attack with x Fleets, or to not attack with 9 Fleets or less.

[JasonPratt]

 #:-)

Okay, hang on, I was checking the most recent Living Rules (April 2018) for any clarifications.

1.09.643 MINIMUM FORCE: The Senate may not propose to send a Commander to fight a War without his consent unless the combined Strength of his Force (including his Military rating) is greater than or equal to that of the War and any applicable Leader. If as a result of losses sustained in a previous turn, a Proconsul's Force falls beneath that of the opposing War, he has no such right of refusal and must attack again the following turn. [EXCEPTION: If the Proconsul has insufficient Fleet Support, no Legions when fighting a Land battle, or no Fleets when fighting a Naval battle, he is automatically recalled when the Senate Phase ends.] The Senate may not recall Legions from a Proconsul without his consent that will reduce the Strength of his Force to less than that of his War and any applicable Leaders.

I'll need to adjust my Sabrerule compilation flowchart. But the adjusted problem remains: Manlius MUST attack the Punic Fleet if he's there.

So the options are:

1.) Recall Manlius...
1a.) ...and Recall the Fleet Force with him. If the Force doesn't have a Commander, it will be automatically Recalled at the start of the Combat Phase anyway.
1b.) ...by Deploying a Replacement Commander (with or without extra Fleets). The new Commander will be in the same situation as Manlius. I don't think anyone is trying to do that, but technically Deploying a Replacement will automatically Recall Manlius.

Note that Recall is usually a separate Proposal and cannot be batched with Deployments unless Deploying a Replacement. For our purposes the important point is that if there's a Commander at the Front, there's going to be a fight! What the Commander can refuse, is to be Deployed with less than Minimum Force. Once he's there, he has to fight with whatever he's got. If you don't want to fight, Manlius must come home and no one be sent to Replace him. One way or another then, the Fleets will return home, too.


2.) Deploy Reinforcements for Manlius, so that he has more Fleets to fight with. This can be done as a Batch.

3.) Don't Reinforce Manlius, so that he has no extra Fleets to fight with. He has to fight with the seven that he's got.


In order to move things along, I won't require everything to be revoted. I just need clarification about whether the intention was to fight the Punic Fleet or not. If so, I'll fight it with what you send Manlius. If not, then I'll process a Recall of Manlius and his current Force. (Whereupon he'll be back in Rome with his votes during next Turn's Senate Phase. ;) )

[Erax]

I'll go along with whatever Tripoli decides.

[IncompetentIdiot]

I'll go along with whatever Tripoli decides.

As above.

[Tripoli]

Hmm.  I guess I should have specified:
1) Saminite war gets prosecuted first.  S
2) Since we can prevent the Punic war from being by prosecuted by holding off on the reinforements, we will build, but not deploy the four fleets.  The Punic war then does not get prosecuted, and Manlius remains deployed.
3)  If everyone is okay with those decisions,  then we will finish up the Senate phase by deploying Julius, the MoH and prosecuting the Gauls.

Does that sound okay?

[JasonPratt]

I'm sorry that I was unclear, since that was totally my fault for misunderstanding the rules and then having to correct myself on them.

But if you leave Manlius at the War, whether you send him Reinforcements or not, he'll have to attack it.

The only way he won't fight is if you Recall him, but if you do so will the Fleets. This won't cost you anything, they'll all just be available next Turn for Deployment.

[Tripoli]

Yes, I don't want to fight the 1st Punic war right now. Until we build up the fleets, it is too risky. If the only way we can avoid that is to recall the commander and fleets, I want to do that.

[JasonPratt]

I'll process that all tomorrow morning then.  O:-) (Spent tonight at Cyrano's Saturday Night Fights trying to run some Mahdi safely off the board. Came close to winning, but the Brits managed to ping off too many points.)