Completed SIGNA FERTE or Let's Play A Legionary's Life

[Dayyālu]

You know, reading Kalin's LP or True Love made me think that I could publicize a little fun game that deserves more love. With that out of the way, welcome to

Great title guys, seriously.

So, what's exactly A Legionary's Life? Amusingly enough, it's essentially a Raising Sim. Yes, like Princess Maker 2 or countless jap games, but instead of killing pedophiles or trying to fuck Japanese schoolgirls you have to survive Gaul mercenaries trying to rip your head off. It's fun!

The game is set during the Second Punic War, and I seriously hope no one needs an intro on that. No problem, the game will nonetheless provide a in-character one. Our character starts off as a humble legionary in the Hastati, and the entirety of the game is pretty much the grunt viewpoint. Do not expect a character-driven narrative: the author did a fairly interesting job, taking historical sources and fitting an overall "life experience" over them.

But don't worry! It has STATS

AND MORE STATS

That said, thread partecipation can be a tad complex, because we'll get a shitton of choices, so I will ask for more of... what kind of Roman we're going to be. Also, this is going to be a single life, if we get killed by a spearman on the third battle, it happens. That may happen depending on how foolhardy we are, also the game dev rebalanced the game extensively since my playthroughs and I could fuck up. So, some initial choices for the first update:

1) Do you want a BASELINE character or a ENHANCED character? Like most roguelites, Legionary's Life gives you extra options if you did well in previous playthroughs. While it's entirely possible to finish the game either way, a "improved" legionary will see more stuff, be harder to kill, and reward more risky player choices. I'd almost suggest picking enhanced.

2) ROLL THE STATS

Pick PHYSICAL FOCUS, BALANCED, MENTAL FOCUS

Mental characteristics are harder to improve in the long run, but trust me, that spear doesn't care if you are a smooth talker and a dead man is dead.

3) MORALITY

This will focus on what will be our approach to, well, ethics. It's somewhat simple: VIRTUOUS or NOT VIRTUOUS. Pick one, and I'll pick the appropriate choices.

4) COURAGE

Not a stat, but a way to tell me how you want the character to act. Spoiler, Rome wins the war. That means you can survive by playing defensively and putting others in the front, OR you can take the risks and go for that Corona Muraria. This will also impact the combat style of our Legionary, as you will see in the updates. What we will be, AGGRESSIVE or DEFENSIVE?

5) NAME

I'll pick the one that amuses me most.



Go forth and triumph, children of Mars. If I get some pity posts, of course. Be the voices inside the head of a psychotic Roman!

 

[Darth Roxor]

Thanks for reminding me that I keep forgetting to check the demo.

I'd almost suggest picking enhanced.

In that case I vote baseline

As for the rest:

Balanced

Virtuous

Defensive

Name: Boreale

 

[Kalin]

Holy shit this gon b gud. I say go baseline grunt because I'm buying this baby and I don't want her totally deflowered. Voting physical combat ape, not virtuous, aggressive. Name, Broliath.

 

[Grimwulf]

1. Baseline char. The game kind of loses its charm once you get too many starting points. Gotta keep that tension.
2. Physical focus. Otherwise playing baseline gonna be impossible.
3. Not virtuous. Staying alive is all that matters.
4. Fuck courage for the same reason.
5. Gaius Codexius Kommunus.

 

[Kz3r0]

Baseline.
Physical.
Not virtuous.
Aggressive.
Pedicator Maximus.

 

[Dayyālu]

Goddamn, we're going baseline. I hate you specifically, Darth Roxor

1. Baseline char. The game kind of loses its charm once you get too many starting points. Gotta keep that tension.

It also gives you some great situations to get yourself killed if you get overconfident! My first successful char was a baseline dude tho, exported directly from the demo. It has charm tho, but the thing in the last chapters will be sorta boring to fight sadly.

I'll wait for some extra votes (if we get extra votes) and maybe put out an update tomorrow.

 

[Strange Fellow]

Enhanced.
Balanced.
Not virtuous.
Defensive.

You're here to survive, dammit.

Name: I don't speak Caesar, so whichever pun you decide to go with will no doubt go over my head. Someone else can have the honour.

 

[sqeecoo]

This look like a cool game, why don't I know it?

1. Baseline.
2. Balanced.
3. Virtuous
4. Aggressive
5. Quintus

 

[Binky]

1. BASELINE. It is the only way.
2. Balanced.
3. Virtuous.
4. AGGRESSIVE. It is the only way.
5. Gluteus Maximus.

 

[Endemic]

1. Baseline
2. Balanced
3. Virtuous
4. Defensive
5. Alexius

 

[baud]

1. Baseline.
2. Physical.
3. Virtuous.
4. Aggressive

Caius Céplus

 

[Darth Roxor]

Goddamn, we're going baseline. I hate you specifically, @Darth Roxor

 

[Dayyālu]

Time's up, let's see what we will pick from the flower of the youth of Rome.

BASELINE (thank you Strange Fellow , i love you)
PHYSICAL
VIRTUOUS (weak!)

And we have exactly half votes for Aggressive and half votes for Defensive. This means, that, well, I'll play it smart, risking if I feel that we can take it but not throwing our life away for GLORY.

Because I have a soft spot for Grimwulf's insane drunken LPs and because this is the Codex, we're going with GAIUS CODEXIUS KOMMUNUS

Spoiler

First of all, we roll for stats. Yes, you roll randomly how many times you want until you find a set of stats that's good enough. I am going to reroll a bit, because we're going baseline AND EVERY SINGLE POINT MATTERS. Physical focus as requested.

After just a few rolls, I get a .... fairly good result. This won't be inferior to a upgrade character with some points invested. Gaius is built like a Latin bull, but he's not completely devoid of mental prowess. Quickness and coordination are middling, but we can work on that.

I'll let the game explain the stats for me. Being coordinated and quick is sometimes more valuable than being simply strong, due, well, to armour and pose. But we'll get to that when we fight someone.

Mental skills are less useful on the battlefield, more difficult to upgrade but sometimes they give you extras.

Praenomen Gaius (not surprising, praenomina are kinda repetitive) from the Gens Codexia, cognomen Kommunus. Gods only know why he got Kommunus.

Here we could buy better equipment. Better stats. Improvements. We won't, because you all hate me.

YES GAME I WANT TO CONTINUE

First, music! All the soundtrack of the game is Mc'Leoned or classical. Mars, Bringer of War never gets old.



While in our sad, contemporary age young men waste their life pining for cruel women and studying to become cogs in a machine, we descend in a different time. When men were men, and gutting people for the supremacy of your people was the greatest endeavour.

EXORIARE ALIQUIS EX OSSIBUS ULTOR, as they say.

Choices are for pussies. Mandatory recruitment to save our city from destruction, that's where the fun is.

Welcome to the ENCAMPMENT screen. You'll see this a lot, and it's where you get the Raising part of the Raising Sim. Essentially, this simulates the peaceful periods between battles and diret warfare, and in game terms are the time you are given to train yourself, equip yourself better, or simply waste all your money in whores and games.

Here's we are, almost a true RPG. Our stats are good, but our skills with a sword are terrible, on the level of a militiaman. This screen also gives us our rank in the Legion, our pay, and our place in the order of battle. Unsurprisingly, we're in the Hastati, the youngest and least experienced. Still better than being Auxilia, at least we're proper ROMAN CITIZENS.

MOAR stats. This time mostly related to our equipment: it ain't terrible but it ain't good either. Our sword is an italian-made xiphos, akin to those used by the Hellenes, and we have merely a pectoral plate, a celtic-inspired helmet and our faithful scutum. Baseline but efficient. Let's hope we live enough to get better.

Bar training and buying/selling stuff we can also waste our time in Leisure

Kind of self-explanatory, even if the effects may vary (Dices require charisma for best results, board games Intellect) but they are essential for "winding down" and not getting our character collapse due to over-training. A man needs his rest.

Or we can choose to be a bootlicker and do extra guard duties. It's not risk free, tho, you have chances of RANDOM ENCOUNTERS!

To be honest, you get random encounters even while doing standard training. It's a way to spide up the monotonous life in the camp. You'll see what I am talking about when it happens.

Like this. Let's see what we got....

We're not dumb. It's a dog, I bet. Useless to check.

Ehrrrr.... wrong pick?

The standard routine for the Camp section is to train your weapon skills/physical attributes, fun time, and do it again, trying not to take a hit to your Morale. High Morale helps with all checks.

Gaius is quite smart, and being smart has its pros.

Not again.

We aren't a pussy, we aren't going to complain but we aren't going to be heroes either. Aurea mediocritas.

I FORESEE A GREAT FUTURE FOR GAIUS AND HIS SKILL CHECKS

FUCK YOU TOO

When the time's up, you have to move on to the next "action sequence", that usually depicts a pitched battle. I won't lie to you, this Camp session has been absolutely horrendous and we barely improved. Never had so much bad luck with a character.

Hopefully we won't die here. Hopefully.

I will use the backlog to cut down screenshots, the standard system the game uses to display text is nicer but I would need to make a billion screens. And we're going to fight our first battle, against a bunch of militiamen sent to soften us up.

As typical of the Roman way of war, you are given the chance to throw one of your pila against the incoming enemy. We can make an effort or play it safe, I'd say let's trust our limited skills for once.

Yes! It works as it should, the weight of the pilum making the shield useless.

Steady.... steady.....

Welcome to the combat screen. In a Legionary's Life, the combat system is fairly complex (but also fairly easy to pick up) and it simulates the experience of fighting in a battleline against an opponent directly in front of you. Of course, you'll get also duels and melees with more enemies, but the usual situation is one on one, shield against shield.

Legionary's Life simulates where you are fighting giving bonuses and maluses: for example, when you are fighting uphill you will get maluses, if you manage to break the guard of a spearman you get bonuses, in a tight formation spearmen and shieldless opponents will be less effective, et cetera....

The essential things in the interface are .... well, the game has an excellent tutorial, I will let it speak for me:

There are several ways to mop up opponents: a series of feints to unbalance them before going for the kill, or trusting your skill and trying to overpower them directly. The bar under our character is the Attitude: how strongly you are focusing on defense or offense, and you can change it on the fly. Of course, if you focus on the offense you are easier to hit... risk and rewards. Also no health potions here, so your health is what you get for battle.

It's deceptively simple, because there are a shitton of background stats (weapon quality, weapon range) but they all work rather well.

Good, time to send another pilum in the face of the oncoming Militiaman.

GAIUS BY JOVE'S BALLS

We miss, and the enemy manages to wound our arm. Lucky bastard. I'm going to wait until he fumbles an attack before unbalancing him and trying to attack his torso.

We almost kill him. We get some recognition from having almost killed him. Goddammit. Goddammit. He got lucky in the last desperate turns. Ah, yes, combat isn't to the death: there's an entire battlefield around you, and often the situation will change and you won't have the time to fight an opponent as much as you like. Do the best you can in the limited number of rounds you get.

An example of branching paths. We failed this check, maybe we're not buff enough, and we will take another role in the battle. It's a good thing for replayability, I guess.

The best job. I swear.

As we storm the walls, our Centurion gives us promises. It's an excellent way to get killed, spoilers. We need to play it safe.

And it works swimmingly! No wounds, steely defense.

Would you believe that psychology studies have proven that being in a battlefield is probably the most stressful experience that a man can experience? Surprising, isn't it? One wonders why we pay psychologists and sociologists.

Ah, we get to be bait while ChadLegionaries got the glory. Awesome, isn't it. SCIPIOOOOOOOOOOO

We break in the city, and it's time to overpower the last defenders.

Do as the Romans do.

Some people don't know when to quit, it's not like this is their city or something.

He's an "expert" militiaman. It probably means it's better than US, truth be told. And he is, when I check his stats. We need to wait for an opening and rush him, to use the length of his spear against him. We get some fellow Romans to help us, he has no chance but we have few chances too to be the one to land the killing blow.

Or not. We push harder, and the militiaman falls to the ground as our sword gets inside his guard and we slash his unarmoured body.

We are virtuous, aren't we.

Poor fuck.

But in the end, he's just another kill in a battle that claimed hundreds.

I SAID VIRTUOUS

Lemme guess, they want volunteers to kill 'em.

Hmm, they are experienced, and it's risky, but it's less risky than it seems. Let your dear OP tell you that this is a chance to reap rewards with far less risks than it seems.... we just need to survive while others fight, and we'll look better for it.

The city is ours in any case.

Reap the rewards.

It's over, Gaius, they have the high ground.

The mercenaries are sorta of the "first boss" of the first battle. They aren't impossible to kill, but it's somewhat risky and even riskier with a baseline character. We'll try to wound some and avoid getting killed. Balanced.

In what I can describe as an incredible stroke of good luck, with some quick feints we manage to completely unbalance our opponent (notice how his Stance, the blue disc, is empty) , and he's more skilled and on higher ground. Doubt we can kill him, but maybe.....

No luck. We barely manage to scratch his arms. Time to rest in the rear.

We can try again after a short while. The enemies are in numerical inferiority, our opponent should be tired (I forgot to point out that Legionary's Life also consider fatigue: it's the green circle under Health and Stance, and it gets depleted by, you guess, fighting. Being exhausted is bad).

THe second merc is simply too good. We hold our own, but the battle was already a foregone conclusion and their formation shatters.

Smart men.

Excellent.

Good.

Better.

And we get some needed skill boosts from fighting. Rejoice, men, we have survived the first battle of the game!

I'll be honest, it's a tad difficult to LP this properly. The interface is immersive and simple, but the majority of the text is cut into small sentences and it would require a billion screenshots.

Also, don't worry: New Carthage was the easy part. Unarguably the follow-up Iberian Adventures are the most lethal, or at least were the most lethal for my characters. Can't wait for our undignified end....

Plis tell me if something isn't clear or the screens aren't put up properly. Again, not the easiest game to LP in action, I swear.

 

[Grimwulf]

We almost kill him.

This cracked me up Speaking in game terms, Gaius is currently unstable to the point of falling prone. And pretty exhausted to add. His opponent, wounded as he may be, has full stance and still fresh in terms of stamina. He could have landed a killing blow and end this LP right there if it wasn't for combat shift.

Someone almost got killed indeed.

 

[sqeecoo]

This is great, and the presentation is easy to follow (although I can imagine it's a lot of work). Basically you've already made me buy this game at the first opportunity!

 

[Binky]

Doing Mars' work. Love this game.

 

[Dayyālu]

Someone almost got killed indeed.

VILE SARMATIAN PROPAGANDA

A True Son of Mars was that close to give the killing blow to an unlawful scoundrel and only the cruel Fates stopped his blows! I will accept no revisionist interpretation!

(I sorta pushed hard for a lucky hit knowing well that we had just a few rounds left, I mean, the fuck survived for 2-3 HPs. Blood frenzy, I guess)

 

[Darth Roxor]

Great shit.

 

[Kalin]

Good going! Practically an hero already! I say spend dem coins on rec time with the camp whores, gotta play it smart though so maybe sacrifice to some health goddess as well so we don't contract the crotch rot.

 

[baud]

Good job. No issue with following this either.

 

[Dayyālu]

Good! So, we got New Carthage.

Kinda far from Rome, truth be told. But let's proceed.

Spoiler

First of all, my premiere interest is to get some good equipment from the loot we gained. The best equipment is usually found after some duels or fights, but sometimes the marketplace is useful to get something, and we got some money to spare, particularly because the hellenic-style sword ain't the best option.

Searching the market consumes time and it's not THAT great, but this time we find a very well made gladius made in the iberian style. As you see, weapons have a fair bit of self-explaining stats to them, mostly derived from their type and quality. The developer even wondered to add extra weapons bar short swords, but in the end it didn't fit and the only remnants are the extra skills on the character sheet and a single check where you can use your pilum as a spear. A single one.

We buy the well-made gladius, it will be a fine new sword. New armour could be useful, but it's expensive and not needed. I hope.

Training will focus on the usual raising stats-keeping wearines down. Sadly for Kalin, wasting our money in whores is useful only when you are taking huge hits in morale (for example, healing from a nasty wound), and divine help ain't a thing. If there's one thing that I dislike about the game, funnily enough, is the minor fact that your character gets positive effects from sacrifices only if, well, dumb: smart characters don't get the same bonuses. This ain't good for a good representation of the Roman psyche, methinks, and the "ha-ha-ha only dumbasses believe in religion" is a tad cheap.

My opinion, though. Roman approach to religion and tradition is fairly complex and different from ours, and this is merely a game.

Awesome. What we get?

Minor event, but a proof that Gaius is indeed built like a sturdy vir.

Another event.

Following traditional Roman law, furtum manifestum (so if we get the thief in the act) is punished with flogging and enslavement, in theory. Roman law is a subject I'm not too skilled in tho, and it didn't stay static. The point stands: we're going to try to catch the thief. Ourselves!

Bad pick. I hoped that our improved Quickness from training would have been enough: the thief stole roughly an entire salary. The pain.

Long camp session, so we get a variety of random events.

Eh, way to go to show one of the problems of the Republican army. The difficulty of mantaining its model of census-based soldiers caused the Marian reforms and its....following political and military problems. But that's far beyond poor Gaius, and beyond his comrade Gaius. HEY GREAT JOB WITH NAMES

(Roman nomen aren't that varied, and it gets worse with women, that usually got only the family name and a numerical adjective. Clodia Major, Clodia Minor, Clodia Tertia....you get the point)

I'd guess we should be lenient, even if a breach of discipline is somewhat big.

Virtue, apparently.

A year of training passed. The results of our training are far better physical stats (we are stronger, faster and far more resilient) but sword training didn't manage to reach good levels. It's merely...acceptable. I don't like this too much, but it's time for another pitched fight.

Divide et impera, to misuse an overused saying.

Another branching path, we get assigned to the reserve and Scipio himself leads us against the enemy. There's also the option of supporting the velites.

No chance of getting light cavalry, and let's not waste javelins.

And we get struck by a numidian javelin in response after failing a defense check. Damage is minor, but for sure I pick the best choices, eh?

Wound aside, at least our body doesn't fail us. We climb the slopes well.

We got 'em in disarray. Let's see if we can give back the javelin with interests!

Pity, but at least we hit someone!

Fuck, it's one of the Celtic mercenaries employed by Carthage. Good fighters and their swords are deadly, but while fighting in a packed formation our weapon gives us advantage (and he gets a malus!)

A good pilum throw before we engage and we hit him on the torso. First blood!

This reminds me that I never explained how, well, fighting works. As you see, there's the small menu under our Gaius:

ATTACK are standard attacks that can focus on different part of the enemy (torso, head, groin, neck for example) feints are useful for depleting the enemy Stance and get better % for hitting him, Soft Spots are armour-penetrating attacks but somewhat more difficult to perform. Shield lets us bash or charge, powerful but risky if we fail. And of course, we can use turns to Respite (regaining stamina) or regaining Stance. It's fairly nuanced, but not impossibly complex.

The Gaul is a better fighter than us: we'll try to unbalance and tire him out before getting some hits in.

We manage to wound him severely before their entire formation routs. He manages to hit our neck, lucky us, a light wound.

Good, plunder!

Bad, no plunder! Let's split up and search some tents. Maybe we'll find something interesting.

Be the do-gooder, the the do-gooder... and we don'teven get a virtue bonus for the good action. Truly, no reward for the virtuous.

Scipio has a plan, but we don't get it, but at least we get some money from our victory.

Well, we're reaching at least "good enough" skills with our sword, and our Centurion probably saw our good fight with the Gaul. Promoted to Tesserarius! What's a Tesserarius you ask? Obvious, he's the lesser of the principales. What are the principales?

NCO, in contemporary terms. A Tesserarius is a night watch commander. We manage passwords and stuff. Little authority, but still some authority!

New Camp phase, and with our PROMOTION comes a new duty....

Foraging mini-game. I like this one a lot, being the most arr-peee-gee lite you get in the game.

You are that small roman soldier here, that represents you and a small number of your companions. Your job is simple, get enough food for the camp by fishing, hunting, or more realistically GOING STRAIGHT FOR VILLAGES AND LIBERATING THEIR FOOD SUPPLIES.

Yes, seriously the optimal way of doing this is to go straight for villages and avoid woods and broken terrain as much as you can. Have I told you that there's a time limit and serious penalties if you fail?

I like the minigame a lot though, it has quite a few nice random encounters and it's a good way to represent one of the biggest worries and activities of ancient soldiers beyond pitched battles: the grind to keep everyone fed.

We get to our first village, and a girl approaches us.

THERE'S NO RAPE OPTION DON'T EVEN ASK YOU SICK FUCKS

Interesting. We aren't scoundrels, but we can't fail our Legion and our comrades. We'll try to haggle, it's not like all my choices went horribly until now.

Apparently, Gaius is smooth with the ladies. Good to know.

Another village, another....random event? What the HELL? Of course I'm going to look harder!

Told ya, born officer material.

I SWEAR IT'S THE FIRST TIME THIS HAPPENS THREE VILLAGES AND THREE RANDOM EVENTS

WHAT'S THIS PLANESCAPE: TORMENT EVERYONE HAS A SOB STORY

I swear, if this is the first supply mission I fail in all my playthroughs....

VIRTUE. VIRTUE.

Our Born to Lead skills at hard work.

And apparently we are heroes or something.

The problem is, we're DUMB heroes. Thanks to getting just a few villages in our area and being merciful with the locals, we won't find enough supplies. It's a first, a goddamn first.

ITS THE FIRST TIME I FAIL A SUPPLY MISSION

AND WE GOT OFF LIGHT

GOD DAMMIT LAST TIME I LET GIRLS AND OLD MEN GET THE BETTER OF ME

THAT AINT THE ROMAN WAY I TELL YOU

IT AINT

I need a pause. Goddamn women and their feminine wiles! I failed you, ROME!

 

[Darth Roxor]

True Love: Rome Edition, exchange food for waifu time. And not even any hentai scene to compensate, smh. Maybe if Gaius was higher rank than some lowly thesaurus he'd commandeer some action.

I like the idea behind the combat encounters a lot - that you don't have to actually defeat your opponents, only survive long enough for the other boys in red to break their backs. This is how it should work in way more games.

 

[Binky]

"Biutiful laydee, I kissa yor hand!"
NOT ENOUGH SUPPLIES
"What a mistake-a to make-a!"

If you run out of time, forage/hunt till you have enough food. Your superiors will be more understanding if you're late but have enough grub.

 

[Darth Roxor]

Gave the demo a spin, got shanked to death by an inexperienced scutarius who luckerfagged on stabbing me in the dick multiple times (though to be fair I was first softened by a libyan dindu who almost killed me so there's that). Cool game, getting the full deal.

 

[sqeecoo]

If there's one thing that I dislike about the game, funnily enough, is the minor fact that your character gets positive effects from sacrifices only if, well, dumb: smart characters don't get the same bonuses. This ain't good for a good representation of the Roman psyche, methinks, and the "ha-ha-ha only dumbasses believe in religion" is a tad cheap.

My opinion, though. Roman approach to religion and tradition is fairly complex and different from ours, and this is merely a game.

I agree that this is pretty dumb, yeah. And I'm an atheistard myself. Can you tell us a bit about Roman approach to religion? I'd be very interested From what I can tell, it wasn't really about faith but more about trade - on the eve of battle you'd sacrifice to Mars, cause Mars is the god of martial prowess, although he's an asshole overall. But you basically try to buy favors from gods through worship. Something like that?

Great game otherwise tho, I've bought it And I think we're doing fairly well! I mean we are not dead at all after two battles!