By Hannibal Barca
Official SCC Writer

Rome Total War was a drastic improvement from Medieval Total War and Shogun Total war. It went from small Pixel men all the way up to 3-D moveable men that you could zoom right in on to see. Creative assembly is going all out on this one, they started making it when they started making M:TW over 3 years ago.

Lets start with something simple for the preview, The campaign map. The Campaign map of M:TW was a risk style flat map of Europe. It included Rivers, mountains, cities, forests, and bodies of water. However they were all flat and in Rome Total War they are all rendered in Glorious 3-D. Mountains will soar into the sky, rivers and oceans will ripple in the waves, trees will sway, and cities will grow.

Units as well will appear differently on the campaign map. Spies will sneak, assasins will club opponents over the head, armies will march, and ships will sail. There are over 10 thousand small squares on the entire map and every one is a different battlefield. You can choose which one to fight on by simply moving him onto that specific square.

The game takes place during Roman times, from 264 bc up until 14 ad at the death of Augustus, the first emperor of Rome. It will see all 3 punic wars, The rise of the Roman Empire, and even the birth of Jesus Christ. The object of the game is to Take rome for yourself and control over 15 provinces yourself. In the beginning you will be restricted to merely the 3 Roman factions but as you defeat other factions you gain the ability to play them. The point of a Roman faction is to gain many men from the senate by undertaking missions and conquering other lands. Then you will be able to march on the city of Rome itself and start a civil war with Rome. You will have to fight the senate and the other 2 roman factions, and hold rome for 15 years, It will be bloody as your enemies will be numerous but it should be fun .

The playable factions are Carthage, Julii Romans, Brutii Romans, Scipii Romans, Gauls, Brittanians, Germanians, Seleucids, Egyptians, Greek city States, and Parthia. They will all have unique strategies and now I will give you a basic understanding of how that nation works.

Carthage: Placed on North west Africa and has a large empire, was partially responisible for the 3 Punic wars and was renowned for its mercenary army and war elephants. In the 2nd century bc Hannibal Barca led over an expedition into Rome by going over the Alps and Pyrenhees. He remained there for many years. Good use of elephants and your libyan Pikeman will win you the day.

Julii Romans: Best known for Julius Caesar who conqered Gaul and overtook Rome in its first major civil war. You win battles by your famous Legionnaires and cant go wrong with Praetorian Cavalry.

Brutii Romans: Best known for Brutus, the man who assasinated Julius Caesar with a few other men. You will also win your battles by using Legionnaires and skirmishers to break up the greek hoplites.

Scipii: Best known for Scipio, he defeated Hannibal Barca at zama and conquered north Africa over Carthage. You will win battles by using legionnaries and flaming pigs which scare elephants.

Egypt: One of the successor kingdoms of Alexander the Great, when his empire collapsed 3 generals took over and founded the successor kingdoms, Ptolemy took over Egypt, These men are good with bows and have an eastern style phalanx.

Seleucids: One of the Successor kingdoms, best known for Antiocus who attacked Egypt and Ptolemy at the battle Raphia to his loss. The seleucids offer a variety of units, from War elephants, to immatation legionnaires all the way to the silver shield pikeman.

Greek city States: The greek city states are very historical. They each fought for control of other cities for centuries down on the fields of Greece using men called Hoplites which formed the phalanx, a wall of spears. You will be nearly undefeatable with the Spartan hoplites and skirmishers.

Germania: A barbarian Faction of the north in modern day Germany. This faction wields awesome Berserkers who wear bear pelts over there bodies and are good ambushers. The barbarians are good individual fighters and will only lose if they are not properly organized by you.

Gaul: Gaul is a barbarian faction of modern day France, they were famous for their archers who could hide in most terrain, them combined with an ambush will help you win most battles.

Brittania: Famous for their war chariots and the woad warriors who put blue dye on them and their bodies in order to scare enemies. Proper use of Chariots and your woad warriors will bring you victory.

Parthia: Famous for the fast and maneuverable horse archers, these men can fire while on the move, and combined with heavy Cataphracts you cannot lose.

Those are the playable factions for the game. However there are a few non playable ones which may have a small impact on you. Such as rebels, Macedon, Scythia, Dacia, Thracia, Pontus, and Spain.

Another major change from M:TW is that now you can place men on the stone walls and actually see them fight on them. As of yet we have no confirmations on whether the men will be able to walk off the walls however. In order to defeat those men on the walls you will either need to sap the walls down, use ladders or siege towers to attack them or blow up the wall using Catapults. This will certainly add a new element to castle assaults. In order to win a castle assault or defence you must either take the town square or defend it from your enemies. Also other armies will be able to come to your aid 1/2 way through the battle if they are near. Rams, Siege Towers, Siege ladders, and Catapults will all be available for training during a siege.

The battles have been slightly revamped now too. You start the battle by either undertaking it yourself or autoresolving it which allows for an automated chance of win, loss, and casualties. When you pick to do the battle yourself, you will be transported down to the battle yourself.

If, on the map, there was mountains, rivers, or trees where your army was then you can expect them to be on the battlefield as well.

Once at the battlefield you will have the option of deploying, and after completely deploying your troops you will go into the battle. This is where the "Total War" Franchise makes its name, you can now move the men in any direction running or walking, to attack you simply left click on one of your units and right click an enemy unit but be careful! Some units can beat yours if you dont know how to play well. Your men will taunt occasionally and you generals will give moving speeches to the men at the beginning based on traits that he receives in the game. From anything of Coward to Insane these will each affect your generals command rating and his speech.

The tutorial will allow players to learn all the basics of the game, it will hold your hand and eventually let you decide what is the best option. Many players do not like games that take forever to understand but Total War games are large and always easy to understand once you have started playing it.

All you must really know to play the game in an average campaign mode is how to move your armies, how to use the diplomacy tool, and how battles work and your fine. Each of these takes less than one hour to fully understand and comply with, it takes even less if you undertake the tutorial.

You will also be able to replay Historical Battles from real history. From Cannae to the battle of Teutonburg forest the choice is yours, you will be given the men and units that each army had and will have to upkeep history or change it! You will even be able to play from both sides of the game so if you wanted to try the battle of Trebia from the Roman side you can.

The R:TW engine is new to total war fans in the fact that it now allows 3-D units to be seen from up close. You can play with over 10 thousand fully moving units on screen at once! It may seem quite confusing or hard but each man is placed in a unit which you control 20 of, with about 200 men in each on the "huge" setting for units you will have 4000 men under you control, however if you dont want to have complete control you can issue control of some men to an ai general of yours who will move and act according to how you are.

Multiplayer games are done basically the way they were before in M:TW. You pick a faction and your allies and enemies(up to 8) will as well and then you spend a certain amount of denarii(ancient money) on the units that you would like for your strategy. Then you will go down and fight the battle much like in single player battles of R:TW.

Rome: Total War is slated to ship "This fall" by CA however most major businesses estimate for September 21st. The demo will also be out soon. It will allow players to fight as Hannibal Barca against a Roman force in what appears to be Trebia due to the use of Elephants.

I for one am anxiously awaiting this games arrival and think that R:TW will make Creative Assembly the King of Future Real Time Strategy games.

FAQ

Hi every one we will be releasing the latest set of FAQ's here, every week, over the next few weeks.


Latest Questions (last updated 17th December).

Q. After I essentially beat the game by staying Imperator of Rome for 20 years do I have the option to continue to play and conquer the world???

A: Oh, all right then, seeing as you asked nicely. The game will be open ended if you wish to continue after "winning".

Q. How much will you be able to customize the campaign map? Just change the unit/city status of each faction? change the borders of the provinces as well? Will you even be able to change the landscape and maybe even create a completely new campaign?

A: Yes. If this game had a middle name, it would be "moddable".

Q. How about changing unit statistics and appearance with a special idiot-friendly tool? Maybe you could even create completely new units with this option. Those who have no expertise in 3d-graphics could simply create super-legionaries
(Legionaries with only one man per unit, but with awesome fighting capabilities) or any other unit, that looks identical to another. For those who ARE good with 3d, the sky's the limit.
You could create a completely new game!

A: We won't be shipping the game with idiot-friendly tools. We have to keep those safely within our own walls. :P Once again, though, it's worth pointing out that Rome: Total War is going to be very moddable. On the other hand, if you go around creating forces of super-legionaries don't moan when your game isn't fun any more. Our very own RTS [?] is spending his entire life between now and release carefully balancing and honing the game, and he won't be pleased if you come along and break it...


Q. Can a horse-archer fire his weapon while he is in motion

A: Yes. We've even included the famous "Parthian Shot" for, well, the Parthians. Bit of surprise to other factions, that one.



Q. How is the game going to handle leaders and heirs? If you're leading one of the Roman factions, what is your title, and how do you have an heir if you are a general or senator and can't expect your son to automatically succeed you like a monarch would?

A: With skill, style, aplomb and a witty smile. :) A faction leader's title depends on who he is leading, so a Roman leader will be the "pater familias" of his particular faction. Other characters in his faction will be related to him by blood, marriage or adoption. An heir is nominated for the faction - usually it's a son, but not always - and if he's still alive when the old man snuffs it, he gets to take over the 'family business'. The Romans were a pragmatic lot when it came to family matters and inheritance, and would make good strategic marriages to keep power and wealth in the family, not to mention gaining both through new connections. Just look at Julius Caesar and Octavian (Augustus): they were cousins, as well as "father" and "son". Alternatively, you could look up the Caecelii Meteli or the Scipios to see the kind of family shennanigans that went on.

Q. Will I only be able to train only one unit per city per turn again???

A: Yes. It's a nice simple system that works.


Q. How "historical" will the big campaign be over time? Will it follow a historical Ariadne thread or will it just be "everything goes"?

A: "Historical" is one of those cans of worms that means different things to different people. We're setting up the game to have accurate starting conditions, but after that your actions as the player will start to change the future. A game that only evolves along a predetermined - or fated - path will rapidly become very boring. If you know precisely when the Marian reforms are due, you'll start "bending the rules" to take full advantage - and that's playing the system, not enjoying the game! Historical "stuff" is in there - huge great heaps of it! - but it won't all appear in every game, and it won't always appear on precisely the right date. Political and military events cannot be tied solely to the date, simply because in that case the game would have no idea "what's really happening" in the world, and the events may not be that relevant.

Q. Will we be able to put stakes in the ground and make traps for the enemy to walk on? Also, now knowing it is TB mode, how will we be able to set ambushes...like the ones in MTW or say you know where the enemy is coming from so you put units on either side of the road they will going on lets say.....Will we be able to do this when not in Battle-mode?

A: No, stakes are not part of the gameplay.

Q. How important is Naval units in RTW. How do you get your men across the Mediterranean Sea, with out walking.

A: NAval combat is abstracted in Rome: Total War. We've chosen to concentrate on the land battles of the period and make those as insanely great as possible. However, naval units do exist and can be used to convoy troops across stretches of water.


Q. Have the devs done any testing on multi-processor systems, or on Intel's hyperthreaded processors? And what kind of performance improvement have they seen?

a. Multi-processor and hyper-threading systems have both been tested and work, as one would expect, but performance improvements are fairly minor, on the order of 5%, which is mostly due to peripheral code being sped up rather than the game core.



Q. Can I buy the Time Commanders game?

A. Time Commanders uses the Total War engine and Rome: Total War will ship with a number of historical battles - as is usual with the Total War series. There are, however, currently no plans to release an official Time Commanders game.



Q. Are strategic ambushes possible?
I hide an army in a forest, in... say Germania, and an enemy army comes along, say a Roman one, will they always see me or can they stumble upon me?

A: Yes. Full details of how the ambushes work will be revealed soon. Suffice to say they're very cool - and make for a completely different kind of battle within the campaign game.


Q. Can your allies start inside your city's walls and help defend it?

A: Allies can't start in a city, but a nearby allied army could march to your aid during a siege battle and fall upon a besieging army from the rear. This is quite fun *when* it happens.

Q. Now that sieges have been largely revamped will there will be more than one gate for the besieged army to undertake sorties against neuralgic spots as baggage trains (assuming they'll be included) or siege machines?

A: Cities have more than one gate. With forts, it depends on the realworld prototype. The besiegers do have the option to leave their walls and sally forth, usually in an attempt to destroy artillery and siege equipment. Sometimes this can be enough to make the besiegers lift the siege and go home. Sometimes it just hastens the end... But, surely, this is what cavalry locked inside a besieged city are there to do?

Q. How will river crossing be handled now?! At both tactic and strategic level.

A: Rivers on the campaign map are barriers to movement - armies have to find a river square that has a crossing point before they can get to the far bank. This creates a whole bunch of strategic chokes points that can be guarded and fought over. On the battlefield crossings will either have fords or bridges - and it'll be worthwhile sending out scouts to look for secondary fords even if you think you've found the only route across the river.


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Previous Questions

Q. When is Rome: Total War (RTW) out?

A. Rome wasn't built in a day so... when it's finished, polished and has met the expectations of the developers and publishers.

Q. What spec machine will it need?

A. We're still hard at work on Rome, and we've only just started optimizing. The min spec is not nailed down yet but it's is a really important issue for us, and rest assured we'll do our utmost to keep it reasonable.

Q. When is it set ?

A. The timeframe covers approximately 264BC (the start of the 1st Punic War) to around 14AD (the death of Emperor Augustus). The main campaign will be the rise and eventual death of the Republic, including Civil Wars and the various reforms of the Roman army. The most important of these reforms, under Marius, changed the whole Roman 'way of war', and the game reflects these changes. There's loads of juicy stuff in the period: the Punic Wars, Hannibal, Spartacus, Pompey, Caesar in Gaul, the conquest of Spain, the rise of Roman 'Imperial' pretensions in the leading families, and finally the seizure of power by the Imperators... That's a lot of gameplay and history! We will be including a couple of smaller campaigns and a selection of tasty and exciting historical battles for those who want a snack rather than a full-on Roman feast! :)

Q. So is this an RTS. Is there still a turn based campaign map? Has it really evolved much from Medieval: Total War?

A. Total War games are in genre of their own. If you love strategy games, you will love RTW, but this isn't an RTS, it's much, much more. You can tailor how you play the game to appeal more to your tastes. If you want a perfect balance of politics, micro management and real time epic sized battles you've got it. If you want to spend more time in the senate than on blood stained battle field you've got it. If you want to prove your might purely on how you master the art of war then you've got it.

The biggest change you'll notice is on the campaign map. The 'Risk-style' provinces have disappeared to be replaced by point-to-point movement for armies, and settlements with their own regions (hinterlands) that they draw on depending on the size of the settlement. A big, advanced city will have more influence on its surrounds than a small town. Armies and characters on this map are now fully animated and march (or sneak, in the case of spies!) to fulfil your orders.

Cities generate income and train new troops, drawing on local resources. Each city can be assigned a governor, who will do his best (well, probably) to manage the place and keep order.

What is cool and new is that when you fight a battle to control the city, every building that's in a city on the campaign map is there on the battlefield. Destroy a building in a siege, and it's gone on the campaign map. Storm a city and take it with siege towers, batterings rams or artillery and you'll find that you can use any buildings still standing to further your plans of conquest. Better still, the buildings in a town even show who made them, as each culture has its own style of architecture!

Q. Can you make your own treaties?

A. You will be able to negotiate specific treaties and other agreements with other powers. This lets factions agree military treaties, trade agreements, trade cities and territory, arrnage diplomatic marriages, demand tributes, pay blackmail money, swap information and so forth. Deals don't have to be symmetrical, so you can trade a city for military access, and some cash if you want!

Q. Are maps fully dynamic i.e. what happens on the battle map has a physical effect on the strategy map and vis versa?

A. Rome: Total War features a continuous 3D map covering the whole of Europe, North Africa and the Middle East, and any point on this map could be a battlefield. The Campaign map is comprised of thousands of 'battle maps'. This means that you could fight on approximately 10,000 battlefields, each of which can change according to your actions in the game.

Every mountain, hill, forest, farm, volcano, city and Wonder of the World that you see on the campaign map is right there on a battlefield. As the map changes with roads, forts and farms being built it is reflected on the relevant battlefields. As the seasons change you see snow on the north of the campaign map and on northern battlefields. This continuity between the two levels of the game opens up all sorts of strategic options. You can build forts to guard mountain passes, set ambushes in forests, make beach landings, launch fast raids into enemy territory, move your armies through allied territory to co-ordinate campaigns, capture Wonders of the World, ford rivers and generally try to out-manoeuvre your enemies. It all helps to make you feel like you are in one epic, continuous world.

Q. Can you give me some details on the main campaign modes that make up the game?

A. The main section of the game will be the Imperial Campaign. As one faction contending for ultimate power within Rome, you won't control the whole of the Roman world. Instead, you'll have to deal with external and internal enemies and listen to the demands of the Senate.

The Senate will ask you to carry out task for them from time to time; these will be missions like suppressing barbarians, fighting common enemies, developing the Empire, or crush rebels. Do well, and your influence in the Roman Senate will grow. Do badly - or attack your fellow Romans without permission - and you'll be in serious trouble! You might even trigger a damaging civil war and let Rome's enemies crush the Republic. The Senate, by the way, is one route to getting enough influence and political 'clout' to be declared Imperator (Emperor) of Rome and winning the game!

You will be able to play as a non-Roman faction. The good news is that if you're commanding the Carthaginians you don't have to worry about the Senate. The bad news is that you have the mighty Roman army on your case!

Each faction, by the way, has its own version of the tech tree, its own collection of exclusive units, and some even have their own Vices and Virtues for characters to collect.

The smaller campaigns are just that: small campaigns (doh). By concentrating on the important action we can highlight the exciting bits of ancient history: the Spartacus slave revolt is a good example. Spartacus never left Italy, so his war can be fought on a smaller, more detailed map. Likewise, Caesar conquering Gaul only really needs a map of Gaul! (Doh! Again). We're also including a special 'Prologue' campaign to ease players into the new game.

Q. Are the playable factions decided?

A. The list of factions is pretty much finalised. We have divided them into a set of broad 'cultures' who share architecture styles and units, but individual factions within each culture can still be added. At the moment we're arguing about exactly who and who isn't a 'Greek/Macedonian' at different times in history. :) This isn't quite a simple as it sounds, given Alexander's ability to conquer everywhere he fancied. At the moment, we're looking at around 20+ factions in total, but not all of these are worth making playable in the full campaign.

Q. Is there an option to save during battles?

A. The chance to save immediately before a battle will be included, but not during.

Q. Is there a chance to witness dynamic weather systems on the battlefield (imagine your elephants dealing with ice wind and blizzard...)?

A. Yes, there's weather on the battlefield and changes to the light as the day progresses. Start fighting in the afternoon, and you may end up pursuing your enemies from the field in the gloom of twilight.

Q. How do the naval battles work?

A. Abstractly. For the moment, we're concentrating on making land battles the most exciting and immersive things anyone has ever seen in a PC game.

Q. Will there be an editor so players can make their own battles, create personalized banners/shield devices, repair Greek hoplite shields?

A. Rome: Total War is going to be the most moddable game in the Total War range so far, and there will eventually be a range of editors and tools to make it easy for anyone to create new campaign worlds, units, factions, cities and much more besides. Rome: Total War won't just be a game, it'll be a tool kit for empire building! It's going to be fun!

Q. What about decimation?

A. We can't go out and kill 10% of our players! That would be bad, in fact very bad, on the whole good-bad scale of things.

A completely new Total War^TM engine uses innovative technology and groundbreaking design to bring the world of ancient Rome to life to deliver the biggest and most cinematic battles ever seen in a videogame. So the battles in Rome: Total War maintain the epic scale that fans of Total War^TM " are used to, but now use high-detailed 3D polygonal troops and allows huge cities to be displayed on the battlefields. The result is truly spectacular.

Sticking with the award-winning formula of Total War^TM games, the campaign game lets players build an Empire using the arts of war, diplomacy and trade. The new engine recreates Europe as a 3D game world ripe for conquest, where the whole physical terrain of Europe has been re-created.

Cities and settlements will grow and develop over time (providing they are managed properly) and as players develop the environment around their cities (e.g. by building roads and bridges or improving the agriculture) the battlefields will adapt to show these features. The result is a fully dynamic interactive world.

• Epic battles between collosal armies. Over 10,000 fully polygonal, motion captured men can be displayed simultaneously with virtually no sacrifice of performance compared to Medieval: Total War.
• Players can command entire Roman Legions, Greek phalanxes, barbarian hordes and the armies of Carthage, Egypt, and the Successor Kingdoms, each with a mix of exclusive units.
• The campaign game is accessible to all gamers from those who want to do everything through to beginners (who can use city governors and automatic systems to handle the detail of taxation, military training and building) and those who just want to fight enormous battles!

• Besiege huge cities and storm mighty fortresses with powerful artillery and siege engines. Bring your enemies defences crashing to the ground with catapults, smash through their gates with battering rams as burning oil rains death from above, fight your way onto the battlements with siege towers and assault ladders and undermine their walls by igniting sapping points.
• Rome: Total War also allows up to 8 players to fight epic battles over a LAN or the internet.

The Roman Legions and Marius’ New Roman Army

From the very start the advantage the Romans had over their enemies was organisation on the battlefield. Initially (6th century BC) this was achieved by arranging the army formations and its command according to strictly defined social classes and wealth. The Roman army at this time fought in centuries (a Centuriae meaning 100) but the style of combat was close to that of the Greek Phalanx with each century lining up along a long front. There were sixty centuries in a Legion (Legio). Little changed until early in the 4th century BC when the Consul Camillus, introduced the Maniple (Manipulus) to the Roman army. This was effectively a joining of two centuries in to a combined fighting unit, and changed the organisation of the battle line in to a checkerboard of Velites (young and poor skirmish troops), Hastati (The inexperienced or poor frontline), Princepes (the Second Line: wealthier or more experienced shock troops) and the Triarii (The Third line, who were wealthy and battle-hardened veterans used as a last resort).

A precise chain of command was imposed, with Centurions (captains of centuries) given different ranks and the introduction of Military Tribunes as superior officers. This system was used by Rome during the Punic Wars (264-146 BC).

As a result of many expensive victories, Rome found her eligible population stretched very thin. It was no longer possible to continue with the short service times of the Early Republic’s legions. Professional, long serving and standing forces were needed, and quickly.

The answer to this problem was to a great extent solved by the Consul Caius Marius, a roman citizen from the small town of Arpinum in the Volscian region. Marius was a client of the powerful Caecilii Metelli family and a “New Man” (Novus Homo, someone not of the nobility, but wealthy and politically powerful) and uncle of Gaius Julius Caesar.

Marius, an organisational and political genius, passed laws that allowed the conscription of the poor and landless (the Proletarii and Plebeian classes) into the army and set their term of service at twenty campaigns. Previously a Roman soldier had needed an estate worth 4000 Asses (each As = 12 ounces of bronze). Now, he only needed to complete basic training and collect his pay. By doing this Marius ended a crisis in recruiting from the higher social classes and gained enormous popularity with those who no longer had to face potential financial ruin caused by years of military service. This turned the army of Rome from a citizen militia into a mercenary citizen army.

This was not the only change. Marius downgraded the Maniple to an administrative division within the Legion and made Cohorts the standard tactical organisation. Each soldier was expected to carry his own mess gear and camp equipment to reduce the baggage train. The soldiers of the time jokingly (or maybe not so jokingly!) referred to themselves as “Marius’ Mules”.

The new Marian army was thus arranged in the following manner:

1 Century = 80 men*
6 Centuries = 1 Cohort = 480 men
10 cohorts = I legion = 4800 men

*Although a Century meant 100, in Roman military terms it now represented a fighting force of 80 men. There are a couple of reasons why this could have happened:

1. With the reorganisation of the Legion over hundreds of years the traditional names of each military unit and officer had stuck but the numbers serving had changed. It’s the same sort of thing as the British Army still having Fusileers as well as Riflemen, even though they are armed with the same gear.

2. Or that each Century still contained 100 men but only 80 were actually front line troops. The other 20 being camp and baggage train support to the 80, not counted in a unit’s actual fighting strength. These extra staff would be clerks, blacksmiths, surgeons, cooks, retainers and baggage handlers and not expected to fight except as a last resort.

Of course these numbers were ideals and not always lived up to in the real world. Combat losses, injury and illness would mean that a Legion rarely had a completely full table of organisation.

In battle this new Marian army formed 3 lines, with 4 cohorts in the first line and then 3 in the second and third lines, again arranged in a checkerboard pattern." The configuration was flexible and could be arranged as the commander in the field saw fit. It could also turn quickly to meet unexpected threats.

Now the Legions were kept together on a permanent basis, the Roman army was turned into a powerful fighting force that improved over time and would be loyal to a commander who trained them, looked after them and, most of all, won his battles.

When discharged these conscript soldiers were sometimes used as armed colonists in the new territories of the Roman Empire, but were more often left without land or money and thus relied heavily on the continued support of their generals. The long-term effect was to have a major impact on the structure and society of Rome and lead to a new figure in roman politics: The Political General.