So what was your favorite family to play as? (Scipii, Brutii, or Julii?) (asking everyone)
In order:
Julii: the start is kind of a slow ramp-up because you are probably taking a lot of undeveloped provinces, which is kind of nice. Though I don't know, the last time the Senate threw me at Thermon and Sparta. But what this means is that when civil war comes around, you're looking at seizing big delicious moneymaking huge cities in Greece and also Carthage probably
* in re Germans, 1) the computer builds shrines of Freya everywhere because it is dumb so you face a lot of screeching women, that is, IF you get around to conquering their provinces before someone else (Britain) does, because... they use a lot of screeching women and tend to lose
Brutii: take Greece, get super rich - once you know how to handle phalanxes this is the easiest faction in the game. Problem is when the civil war happens... well, what do you want with the other factions' chump-ass provinces? Where's your motivation? "Ooh, Lugdunum"
Scipii: I like their temples and their ships but they have to deal with Carthage first (not too big a deal if you take out their starting elephants early), those far-flung desert cities, and *@$# Egypt later, HATE Egypt - not even sure this faction is easier than Egypt, or Macedon for that matter