Rome AARisen - a Byzantine AAR

Irenicus - Welcome to the AAR! Okay, in response to probably the most in depth reply so far (a good thing!) -

Alot of your criticisms about Manuel are dead on. I readily admit at times I struggled with how to write him - he's a deceitful, even murderous cad, but at the same time from the perspective of being an emperor, he's highly successful. That's a difficult line to tread as a writer - giving off that sense of evil while showing his success.

Basilieos will have his own delicate lines to tread as I write him, but hopefully things will work through alot better. I hope people like where he leads Romanion.

As for Zeno, he's not done yet, nor has he been reduced to simply a betrayer. Remember two things - he wants conflict, not war. Thats a key difference. Conflict breeds opportunities for advancement - and he's come relatively far, from being in constant exile to now staying in Konstantinopolis with a princely title. The threat of war with the Turks could lead to important things for a Komnenid prince - like an army to command, for example.

Finally, I'm thinking tonight I'll post a mini-update with some of the character images from in-game.




Okay, as for the Imperial guesses - foreign kings do not count, and neither do ancient Roman Emperors. I'll have the answers up tonight when the post gets put up!

EP, how many times have you changed your flag avatar since I started this AAR? I'm thinking I need to start an "EP flag archive" for posterity!

As promised, there’s a brief update tonight. I have no skill whatsoever in writing gameplay AARs, but nonetheless, the following is a salute to the CK gameplay AARs (you know who your are, Mr. Packer). EDIT - Some of the pictures don't have the provincial flag, and all have the names and dates removed. I don't want to ruin too much by revealing things like death dates!


Thus concludes Rodrigo’s short tour of the characters in this AAR… I hope you all enjoyed it, despite the fact that no characters were harmed and/or killed in unusual ways during the making of this update… :rofl:

I'm glad to see people enjoyed Rodrigo's thoughts on everyone else. :rofl: As another project, I've also started work on a table of contents for this monstrous thing - it should be up soon.

But now, its time for the real update.

Firstly, I was amiss when I posted the last update, because I never revealed who the inspirations for Basiieos were! Let’s just say, for the most part, people have been making some good suggestions (save Leo III, I get my Byzantine Leo’s confused… was he part of the Macedonian dynasty?).

Yes, his affinity for all things Latin bears a resemblance to the real life Manuel Comnenus.

His military skills also bear resemblance to Manuel’s, as well as Basil II and Heraclius.

His other traits (social awkwardness, spartanism, temperateness and romanticism) are a combination of the three above and the traits he received in game.


May 15th, 1161

The noise of the Emperor whistling unsettled Basil.

Alone, in the woods with his father and a small cavalcade of hunters, it wasn’t the only noise that greeted Basil’s ears. There were birds singing, the noises of the forest, the friendly jostlings of Bernard, Rodrigo and Alexandros behind him, the noise of three guardsmen and Strategos Psellos as well. Against this natural background, the pleasant whistling of someone that was normally as dark as Manuel Komnenos was unnerving.

“Why are you in such a happy mood?” Basilieos asked warily. The previous four days whenever Manuel had been around his son, he’d harangued him over one topic after another – his affiliations with the Latins, his lack of reading, his belief in ‘just rule,’ which Manuel equated with weakness.

“I’ve foiled a plot,” Manuel whispered and smiled. “Your cousin Zeno grew overconfident – the deer we caught this morning has been poisoned by him and that wretch Theodoros. I’ve sent several men back to the city to bring a boar for us to eat. We’ll claim the deer had gone rotten prematurely.”

Basil’s stomach dropped, yet his father seemed to be in an excellent mood.

“When are you going to look for a woman?” Manuel asked louder, changing the subject. “And why do you continue to refuse to see any of the nice young princesses I have lined up for you?” The Emperor looked at his son with a raised eyebrow.

Basil winced. His mind still wasn’t over how easily his father had dismissed the idea that relatives had tried to kill him.

“He’s asking if you’re like your uncle,” Alexandros offered, and Basil turned and growled at his friend’s ‘helpfulness.’

“I…” the prince stammered.

“He is in love, Your Majesty,” Bernard snickered from further back. “So much so his tongue gets tied in knots when you mention her name.”

“Oh?” the Emperor’s look of suspicion changed to a grin. “Really? Which young woman has smitten you so hard you can’t talk? Was it Princess Anna from Brunswick? The daughter of Alexios Chouminos?”

Basil winced even more. None of the women his father had sent him had been attractive. They had been beauties, to be sure – Rodrigo especially reminded Basilieos of this every time he sent one of them away – but they weren’t attractive. Zoe Chouminos might have had body that would tempt a celibate patriarch, but she was vain to no end, and given to unspeakable debauchery with even a little wine (as Rodrigo bragged several nights after Basil rejected her). Anna from Brunswick had witnessed Basil struggling to read a minor document and mocked him. Even the latest offering – the daughter of the Rurikid Korol’, had a penchant for drinking and roughhousing that made Basil blanche. His mind, and his heart and settled on one girl.

“She is none of those…” Basil said quietly. “I’ve asked her hand in betrothal.” He was sure he’d just breached the unsteady peace.

“ Ah…” Manuel said quietly, barely hiding his disappointment, “what is her name then? Perhaps we can salvage something from this?”

Basil felt his face flush. Part of this was from embarrassment – a true warrior and knight shouldn’t be tongue-tied to talk about love, but part of this was from pre-emptive anger. Basil knew what would happen if he told his father even her first name – the Emperor would arrange for her and her family to be shipped off far away, in an effort to force Basil to marry one of the Emperor’s choices. Instead of speaking, he decided to merely look at his father in defiance.


“Her name is Sophie!” Bernard shouted from the back, and Basil’s heart fell. He turned and snarled at his young friend. Alexandros did on better and punched Bernard hard in the shoulder for his trouble.

When Basil turned to look at his father, he’d expected a look of calm – that placid face the Emperor wore when he was seething and didn’t want anyone to know. Instead, he was greeted with a look of shock, that nearly bordered on disgust.

“No! Completely out of the question!” Manuel waved his hand dismissively.

“Father, you’ve married out of love three times!” Basil complained, without controlling his tongue. By the look of thunder rising on the Emperor’s face, the peace had definitely been breached. “Why can’t I?”

“Boy, you clearly don’t understand,” Manuel rumbled, his voice growing louder and louder. “There are considerations!”

“What considerations?” Basil pressed, and Manuel clearly began to lose his temper.

“An Emperor must marry out of politics, not love, you romantically starved fool! I married for politics!” the Emperor shouted, “something you don’t seem to want to even think about! I married Yeva because her marriage brought a large dowry! I married Erminside because she is a cousin of the Western Emperor!”

“And my mother!” Basil felt his own voice rising, as one of the sharpest points between father and son came to the front.

“She was nothing more than a good lay,” Manuel sneered.

“You take that back!” Basil spurred his horse in front of his father’s, then cut him off. “You take that back, you vile cur!”

“Fine, I will. She was good in bed and pretty to look at. As for being a mother,” the Emperor said, his voice dropping back to a conversational tone in mockery, “she was clearly a failure. You’re more Latin than Roman.”

Basilieos bristled. “And what do you mean by that, father?” he said icily.

“Romanion is a wild horse. The nobility need frequent doses of poison to keep them docile and tame,” Manuel said sharply. “If you don’t drop these utterly foolish ideas that you can rule by love, that you can control them through kind words, this empire that I and your grandfather built will come to utter ruin! Romanion needs a strong emperor, not a starry eyed boy!”

“I am not a boy!” Basilieos said darkly, iron in his voice.


“Lord, here we go again,” Rodrigo’s whisper rang hard in Basil’s ears.

“What was that, Spaniard!” Manuel stopped his horse next to a clearing, blocking the small group’s path. “See? A Latin cur raises his ugly head!”

Basil looked back Rodrigo, and to his relief, his friend had merely looked down instead of shooting off a smart reply. Considering the mood of the Emperor, talking back might literally be tantamount to suicide.

“Father, not all of the Latins are bad!” Basilieos snapped on his friend’s behalf. As heir to the throne, he was free from the restraints on Rodrigo. “Have you thought the dynatoi listed to the call of rebellion because you are a cold-hearted, mean, murderous…” the prince stumbled over the next word. He couldn’t bring himself to swear.

“And what will they think of you? A starry eyed, weak-willed, knock-kneed boy that would listen to Latin clerics more than his own generals!”

“Come now, Majesty!” Basilieos heard Psellos rise to his defense.

“Would you want to have rumors about you too?” Manuel dropped back into the mocking tone at Basil, ignoring the strategos. “Just like Nikolaios, save instead of a catamite for men you are a catamite for Rome!”

Basil tried to open his mouth, but no words came out. He felt his face flushing red, and rage building up. His hand flashed to the sword on his hip, but he did not draw – he could not draw.

“See?” the Emperor smiled darkly, “He’s angry, he’s furious, but he won’t draw his sword, just like he’s blind as a bat, and he can’t read! Some heir I’ve begotten!”

It was only later that Basil would remember hearing the noise. It was quiet, a slight whizzing sound, as if a gnat was flying close to one’s ear. He felt a slight wisp of air blow by him, before he heard a seris of dull thumps.

Two of them were behind him. He didn’t see the two of the three guardsmen with the group tumble off their horses, crossbow quarrels sticking from their chests. He didn’t see the third leapt from his horse as it crumped with a quarrel through its neck. Basil’s mind was too focused on his father suddenly slumping forward in the said, a cry of pain coming from his lips, the long, dark shaft of a quarrel sticking from his spine.

“Ambush!” Psellos cried out the obvious, as the woods, previously silent save for the argument, exploded into chaos.


Instantly, Basil’s sword was out. There were shouts, screams of panicked horses and dying men. Basil felt his horse lurch, and by instinct he leapt the opposite direction the horse was falling. He rolled when he landed, spinning back up in an instant.

Five men were around him and he wounded father.

They did not have the wide-eyed look of madmen, or the scared look of hired peasants. Their eyes were cold, calculating, men who had been places and seen more death than any assassin would in their lifetime. They slowly circled him. Basilieos was aware of shouts and cries from the other members of the party, the singing clash of swords in combat, but he paid no attention. For him, the world was only these five men.

Old Halfdan had preached all those years before that before a man decides to strike in combat, there is aways some kind of nervous tick that will give his plans away. Some men wrinkle their brows, some yell, some merely blink faster. Basil wasn’t sure what either of the first two swordsmen’s tick was he just knew it, and leapt backwards as they jointly attacked.

Their blades only met empty air, as the Prince spun his body low and swung upwards with his blade, catching one of them in the groin. As the man howled in pain, his comrades charged in. For all the skill he had a swordsman, Basil knew he was in trouble – a fox might be weaker than a lion, but if enough foxes gathered…

One of his assailants screamed in pain as a blade suddenly burst out of his chest. The man rudely fell forward as the lone surviving guardsman kicked him down with his boot. Basil gritted his teeth in a deadly grin – two versus three was odds he could live with. One went swinging wildly towards Basil, an axe looking for the prince’s head. Basil ducked low again, an leaned into the man’s charge, using his body to trip his assailant. The man tumbled over the prince into the ground. Only a second later, the prince’s sword found the prone man’s neck.

Basil spun around, to see another assassin trying to pull his father from the saddle. Manuel was desperately trying to draw his blade – but Basil would tell something was wrong. The Emperor’s hands twitched and moved almost uncontrollably. Basil charged the assailant, slashing at the hand that held a knife. The man screamed in pain, and Basil brought the flat of his blade across the man’s face. The man tumbled backwards, howling in pain.

“Keep him alive!” Basil heard his father shout – the call sounded more like a wet warble than the stentorian bellow the Prince was used to. Instead of slashing the man’s neck, Basil merely swung at his calves. With no achille’s tendon, he wouldn’t be going anywhere.

It was then, and only then, that Basil looked up at the rest of the party. Rodrigo was standing off to one side, his horse clearly dead, his face and tunic covered with blood. By his heavy breathing and strong stance, it was clearly the blood of others. Alexandros was almost unscathed, save his blade, up to the hilt, was stained crimson. Psellos dispatched the last of the attackers with a vicious headbutt, before opening the man’s belly. Bernard, for his part, was cowering behind a tree, yet even his sword was stained with combat.

“Crossbows!” Psellos shouted, kicking at one of the bodies.

“Father is wounded!” Basil shouted. No thoughts of the previous argument came to Basil’s head, only what needed to be done, here and now. “Strategos Psellos, take my father’s horse by the bridle and get back to the camp now!” Orders came naturally to him. “Rodrigo, mount up with my father! Alexandros, you’ll take the miscreant behind me!” Basil looked at the one lone guardsman. “You! What is your name?”

“Clemente Kosaca,” the guardsman breathed hard.

“Clemente, you will mount with me. We make for-!”

Basil stopped. Psellos suddenly had a look of horror on his face.

“Highness! Look out!”

Basil spun around and saw the glint of a knife in the unslashed hand of the last assassin. Before he could do anything, the man smiled cruelly, before stabbing the knife into his own heart. As Basil watched, stunned, the lone surviving assassin gurgled, and rolled to his side - dead.



“What are they doing with the deer?” Theodoros said uneasily pacing inside of his own tent. The periodic court hunts were always chaotic affairs – with tents for the “camp” sprawling over hundreds of yards - a miniature fair in the countryside while the Emperor and select retainers went out and hunted game.

To Theodoros’ frustration, his cousin Zeno merely smiled. “It’s inconsequential. The back up will work. Besides, you need to sit and rest from this morning.”

Theodoros nervously nodded, then went to lay down. “So it is agreed then?” Theodoros stretched back on the cot in his tent and rested his aching back, though his eyes did not betray the same sentiment.

“Manuel has agreed to it in principle,” Zeno too stretched his legs in relaxation after a long day trekking through the wilds of Thrake. “Kosmas would get command of the Army of Syria, with me as his second in command – that should pad my resume, and make the final arrangement look legitimate.”

“Good,” Theodoros said uneasily.

Zeno grunted. In his opinion, war with the Turks was almost an inevitability, and it seemed Romanion was always a step behind in her planning. Partly this was due to Zeno’s withheld information – he didn’t inform the Megos Domestikos of the activity on the border of his theme until a year ago, several months behind when it occurred, and partly this was due to Manuel.

The Emperor knew his realm was tired and worn. The Great Rebellion had stretched things to their limits, and Manuel was putting off calling up the levies until the last possible moment. Every single solidus in taxes the peasants could give before the war began was precious – and once the peasant men were called up, taxes dried up quickly.

“Bah,” Zeno finally said. The necessary front of bickering and squabbling over army commands would soon come to an end. Manuel had been reluctant to let Zeno even have a sniff of high command – he’d completely refused to commission Theodoros. It was only after Theodoros managed to get gentle Kosmas to point out there weren’t enough loyal dynatoi left to fill the necessary command posts that Manuel consented that one of them could have command. Zeno had jumped at the chance – knowing full well the opinion of his cousin would shortly not matter.

Zeno knew, more than any other Komnenos, that the reputation of the descendants of the Megos rested in the military, and the support of the army. The Megos, without question was a military leader. Manuel had taken up that mantle, and no matter what Zeno could say about his cousin’s methods, Manuel’s skill on the field could not be doubted – eleven field battles, numerous sieges, and not a single defeat. Even the scholarly Nikolaios had taken the field with success. The road to the Emperorship was covered with the shields of the Imperial army. And for all his skills in politics, Zeno had never held a senior army command.

True, he was known as the son of Christophoros, but his father’s memory had faded quickly over the last two decades – Christophoros had not been canonized like the Megos, had not conquered as much as the Megos, and wasn’t as charismatic as the Megos. Once people had referred to Zeno’s father as the ‘Little Megos’ – now many were using that title for Zeno’s cousin Manuel.

Army command was the key to gaining the army’s trust. All the previous rebellions and coups had crumpled because they did not have the army – Basiliea’s because most of her troops were mere thematakoi and easily crushed, Hajnal’s, Siddiqa’s. Only Zeno’s father had successfully defeated a sitting Emperor – because he had the army.

For now, Manuel had the army. Shortly, Manuel would have nothing, and shortly after that, Zeno would have the army, rising on Kosmas’ coattails after the latter inevitably broke the Turk. The Romanoi had always broken the Turk, and in Zeno’s estimation, they would always break the Turk.

The plan was simple – utterly simple. So Zeno couldn’t understand why Theodoros would fret so much- and cover up that fretting but discussing the inane army commands that would soon be confirmed by Zeno’s hand, not Manuel’s. The Prince of Mesopotamia sighed.

“Theodoros, I hired the best possible for our backup. Ex-military, all with the rank of kentarchos or higher. They would die, rather than talk.”

“Are you sure about this?” Theodoros asked uneasily. “I mean – if the Turks invade, and the succession is in doubt…”

“Which is why at first the crown will officially go to young Basil,” Zeno smiled. “He’s only fourteen, so a Regent would need to be appointed, remember? And with a few victories under my belt, it will be an easy step to the throne, over the objections of a beardless boy."

Theodoros nodded, and smiled uneasily.

“And if you’re telling me that you doubt Kosmas’ abilities against some Turkish dog, I’ll laugh in your face,” Zeno said with a grin. “This Sulieman seems to be a wily one, but I have no doubt he’ll go the way of Malik, and – what was that young man’s name that we broke at Nineveh?”


Theodoros shrugged.

“That young boy too. Kosmas is more highly regarded than the Megos Domestikos, I have no doubt he’ll have an easy time crushing whatever army the Turks send his way.”

Theodoros nodded in agreement, and sighed. “So, you hired…” Theodoros started to say, before flap to his tent rustled. Both Komnenid cousins fell silent, and waited until a petite head covered in a crown of long black locks poked inside.

“Father?” its owner asked, in a slightly frightened soprano.

“Yes? Come in my dear, there’s no need to tremble,” Theodoros said gently. His daughter had only arrived in the city a year before, and from all accounts she was having trouble adjusting. She’d stayed hidden in her room often, and lately she’d stopped going to any galas or other events. Theodoros was starting to become concerned – she might not be the most beautiful girl in the city, but as the daughter of a prince she must go about her social graces if she was to obtain a good match.

“Cousin Zeno,” she curtsied, before looking towards her father. “I…um… I’ve met someone…”

“Yes…” Theodoros managed to keep an even keel. He knew where this was going, and it meant either a quick marriage or a nunnery.

“He has asked my hand in betrothal…” she said slowly. Instantly she could read what was going through her father’s mind, and her voice rapidly went into panic mode. “It’s not what you think! He has been an utter gentleman! I’m still a virgin! He hasn’t gone past giving me a gentle kiss on the cheek!”

Theodoros breathed an audible sigh of relief, and ignored the smirk coming from the obviously amused Zeno. “Go ahead Sophie, tell me his name then.”

Sophie Komnenos started to open her mouth, before a horse shrieked in the distance. Within moments, the noises of horses at a gallop thundered into the camp, along with shouts that, despite his foreknowledge, made Theodoros’ blood run cold. A glance towards his cousin showed a brief, deadly smirk on Zeno’s face.

And so it all began.