having seen this game droolingly praised on here over and over, I broke down and bought it (well, I had this gift card for Walmart that I got for Christmas just sitting around). Played a couple of short try-out games as Rome... and I admit, I do see the appeal of it. So many paths you can take, and just which are the right ones is up in the air. So far, haven't really been in any large scale warfare, but that's about to change...