Round 8 - The Colosseum

The little heir Agapetus is finally old enough to come with his family to the Colosseum and watch a game this round, and of course, he's very excited.

Today's gladiator challenger has been randomly chosen to be old Quintus Nixeira, head of the ancient Nixeira family.

He'll be facing his own long lost brother, the gladiator Tacitus.

Tactius is right on to the point, and after a brotherly hug, the slapping begins.

It doesn't seem like Quintus was quite ready for what's happening, as he pees himself in fear.

He doesn't fight back a single time, until Tacitus outright attacks him. Can he beat his little brother?

Unfortunately, he can't. The long life of Quintus Nixeira has come to an end in the Colosseum.








Round 8/20 statistics:
Births: 15
Weddings: 4
Deaths: 7
The rounds are starting to get really long with the current number of households. However, we did lose one this round; the Nixitus household is no longer with us. We finally got to see boys being born again, and the number of girls without a betrothed dramatically decreased from 14 to 6. At last! The neighborhood also reached 100 living residents, and our generation 5 girls became teenagers, which means the number of rounds left in the Roman Era can be counted with three fingers, hehe. Yay!

Round 7 - The Colosseum

The time has come once more for a traditional Colosseum fight. This event is Aphrodisia's first to attend.

Our gladiator is Septimius Zima, and his challenger has been randomly chosen to be old, crazy Martina Nixitus.

The opponents are siblings, and give each other one last family kiss before entering the stage.

Septimius only response to his sister's pleading before they start is a rude yawn.

Martina is always close to tears, and now is no exception.

It's not at all long before the fight breaks out. Septimius knows the drill by now.

She put on a good fight and lasted a lot longer than I expected, but in the end, Septimius score of zero lost fights continues.

Martina says goodbye with one last breakdown. I'll miss you, crazypants. At least she got to become an elder, that's a lot in this neighborhood.






Round 7/19 statistics:
Births: 11
Weddings: 2
Deaths: 4
A calm round with some good and bad moments. We're at 98 sims in the neighborhood now, still not in the three-digit numbers, but unless some enormous tragedy is in store for next round, we'll reach it then! Now we head for Round 8/20, the twentieth round since we started, which feels amazing.

Round 6 - The Colosseum

Another round done, or nearly at least. There's still one thing to do, and the presence of the Emperor's family in the Colosseum should remind everyone of what that is. This is Empress Sabina's first time on the Emperor's balcony.

Since there is room for a new gladiator after the death of Marianus, this won't be a gladiator fight, but between two randomly chosen slaves. The winner becomes the new gladiator, and the loser dies.

As the Empress takes this moment to announce a pregnancy, I'll introduce you to the poor chosen competitors. Probably because of the high amount of little girls in the neighborhood at the moment, the drawn names both belonged to little girls. They are Glaucia Zima and Joce Nixotho.

Glaucia tries to intimidate her opponent.

All the initiative seems to come from little Glaucia, who must have a strong survival instinct.

When the fight breaks out, it's also at her initiative. But will this instinct lead her to victory?

It seems so. Little Glaucia Zima wins, giving the place among the gladiators to her, while the opponent Joce Nixotho dies. I'm sure her close twin brother Job will be devastated by this. She's the first sim to be born and die in the same round.


With this tragic ending, I declare Round 6/18 (Roman rounds/Total rounds) done. A lot has happened: generation 4 has started to become adults, and generation 5 is born. This should mean we're halfway through the Roman Era.
Round 6 statistics:
Births: 21 (which is a new record by far)
Weddings: 1
Deaths: 5
An increase of 16 sims in the neighborhood this season, which is just insane. When all of these children grow up, I'll be having a massive amount of households to play.

Round 5 - The Colosseum

Once more the bachelor brothers of the Palace had gathered at the Colosseum for some entertainment in the form of fighting to the death. Today's challenger has been chosen randomly and the lucky one is going up against a gladiator. If she wins, she lives, if she loses, she dies. Simple rules!

The lucky one is already supposed to be dead some rounds ago, but was revived - Nona Zimeca! Mother of five and wife of Seneca Zima, she used to work at the Palace as a teenager, until she murdered one of her fellow slaves, Vibianus Zimayo, in the kitchen.

Her opponent is none other than her brother, Tacitus. They have been separated for many years now, working for different Patrician families since childhood, and do not know each other.

As the fight softly begins, Nona seems terrified at what's happening.

But she quickly goes into offensive stance, slapping and slapping her brother/opponent over and over again.

Finally, Tacitus gets enough and attacks.

As the dust settles, it's clear that our challenger isn't successful. Tacitus wins the fight by killing Nona, making the Zimeca children motherless once again.





That's it for Round 5! While it wasn't a brutally eventful round, a lot did happen. For example, generation 5 was conceived (Drusa and Antonia are the lucky mothers), and the youngest member of generation 2 became an elder (Andile Callani), while the youngest of generation 3 became a teenager (Petronius Seoli).
Round 5 statistics:
Births: 12
Weddings: 1
Deaths: 2
As you can see, a population change of +10. It's growing, and quickly.
I am very excited about Round 6/18, which begins next, because of three reasons: One, the marriage between Emperor Varius and Sabina Callandile; Two, the birth of the first generation 5 babies; Three, the firstborns in generation 4 will become adults (and I believe generation 3 starts to become elders as well). There's a lot of progress in the next round!

Round 4 - The Colosseum

The moment everyone has been waiting for has arrived - the Colosseum event. As you might already know, this round's event is different from the standard event.

Emperor Varius and his brother, which makes the Emperor's family as he's still unmarried, has gathered at their balcony. Today, they won't be witnessing a slave fight, but the fight of Caecilius Callarai's life, former Head of the Callarai family. He's convicted of murdering the Callandile wife Abeni with several witnesses, among them the Emperor himself. After the fight, which will determine if Caecilius will live or die, a trial is being held for Felix Jax, suspected of murdering the Callandile heir, Tarquinius. It has been a devastating round for the Callandile family.

The mood in the cell isn't the brightest. Caecilius took dirty measures to increase the chance of him winning this fight - no proofs have been discovered, but it's pretty certain that he paid off a criminal to steal the workout equipment from the gladiators house to keep them from gaining skill points for fighting.

Caecilius makes an attempt at appearing dangerous. The gladiator he's facing is Septimius Zima.

They begin with some light struggling, such as slaps.

Caecilius soon breaks down and cries. May it be that he's finally regretting all the douchy behavior that led him here?

A storm approaches to set the mood for the match, while the Emperor's family cheerfully discusses death.

Finally, the actual fight breaks out. Will Caecilius masterplan have saved him, or is his reign of terror in this neighborhood over?

It seems it is. Septimius is the champion, killing Caecilius as he wins. Caecilius was very close to his brothers, Hortensius and Manlius, and we'll see if any tension develops between them and the Emperor.

Felix Jax, waiting in his cell, doesn't seem too eager to get this started. He's an extremely nice but poor boy, who got attacked by Tarquinius, and accidentally killed him in self-defence. Unfortunately, another Patrician boy was witness to only the ending of the fight, and the reports he made to Tarquinius father wasn't in Felix favor.

When Felix arrives to face his judges, the Emperor's family, he's expecting a fair trial. However, he soon discovers that what he recieves is a mock-trial where he's barely allowed to utter a word before they sentence him to death and send the hungry lions up to eat him, claiming that he'll make a nice meal because of him being fat.
Felix dies.

I have to say this was a very eventful round. The neighborhood has more families than ever - a total of fifteen households. Five patrician (counting the Emperor's family), three plebeian and seven slave households. Not quite balanced yet, but there are a lot of plebeian boys waiting to grow up and I think it'll be more pyramid-like soon.
Round 4 statistics:
Births: 12 (new record!)
Weddings: 6 (new record!)
Deaths: 5 (not sure whether this is a new record too, but it might be - or else it's close)
As you can see, the neighborhood grew by a lot this round. With round 4/16 (Roman/total) completed, we now head for number 5/17.

Round 3 - The Colosseum

It's time for the last event of the third Roman round! The Emperor and his unmarried siblings has gathered on their balcony to watch the third Colosseum fight - and for the first time, it's a gladiator fight! The gladiators has a special rule, that says they have to lose a total of three fights before getting killed.

You might recognize gladiator Marianus, the teen one. And who is he fighting? None other than his older brother, Tacitus Nixeira. They aren't brothers in more than name, since Tacitus was taken from the family as a child to work in the service of the Callarai family, where he's had quite a nice life. The Head of the Callarai's mother, Chinwe, started a secret relationship with him and this round, he married a slave named Martina and had a daughter. The question is if he'll survive the night to see any of them again.

The boys each take a deep breath, getting ready for what has to be done.

And then, they fight. Never had a fight start this quickly before - no slaps, pushes or anything, just straight on.

Growing up in a rich household has proved advantageous to Tacitus, who's had access to workout equipment, and therefore has the same amount of body skill as his gladiator brother. So believe it or not, but he wins! It seems like our mighty gladiator debut is a bit of a flop, but I do believe that the slaves growing up in the apartments won't stand much of a chance against them.

Now, what happens to Tacitus? Does he go back to the Callarai household? No! Since there is room for three gladiators in their household, he takes the spot of the third one. I have a feeling the mood between him and his brother won't be great when we return there next round...

Round 3 statistics:
Births: 7
Weddings: 1
Deaths: 3
Funny enough, the same amount of births and deaths as last round. Now we head for the fourth Roman round (also known as Round 16 if we count total rounds).

Round 2 - The Colosseum

And then it's time again! Every Patrician and even the Emperor's family has gathered at the Colosseum to witness another fight to the death between two slaves. This time, the combatants has been randomly chosen.

Who are they, you wonder? The unlucky two happen to be Dalitso and Septimius Zima - who are father and son. Dalitso is the elderly man, who has become a minor criminal to help support his oldest sons family, while Septimius is just starting his own and hasn't even fathered any children yet. Who will live to see their family one more time?

As they enter the ring, they give each other one last family kiss before getting serious.

Dalitso is first to make a move, as he pokes his opponent in the chest, trying to provoke him. Of course, Dalitso isn't the type of man who would rather live a few more years to the cost of one of his son's life, but is trying to make his son accept what he has to do to survive. So he pokes him, again and again.

Septimius breaks into tears at realizing what he has to do, but the Emperor's family have no mercy for the slaves.

At his worst, he slaps his father in his face, but he doesn't poke him back even once.

When the fight breaks out, it's Dalitso who starts it, ready to get things over with. Fittingly, the rain starts to fall down upon them.

It is a very quick fight, as Dalitso already is ready and willing to lose. And he does. Septimius is the winner, meaning that Dalitso's long life in Winter Valley should come to an end. The Callarai's express wishes to take responsibility of Septimius training into a gladiator, and the Emperor accepts. Emperor Varius decides that a house will be built with room for three gladiators, where they will live and train in between the fights in the Colosseum.

Round 2 statistics:
Births: 7
Weddings: 4
Deaths: 3