Prestige (Factors)

The Gods at play. Are you Pius enough?

In Greek fire cities vie with each other, not necessarily to win on the battlefield, be the biggest or most powerful, or even the richest. They vie to be the best, the most well thought of. The overarching measure of a city's success is its prestige - and prestige is the primary victory condition. It is intrinsic to Greek Fire that different cities have different goals and outcomes - and you can get to high prestige in many different ways, some visisble to others players, others less so. Let's talk through the factors that contribute.

Piety: Honour, reputation for fair dealing, religious observance. Is the city seen as 'good', does it have the favour of the gods? How does your city handle the fates that are handed out to it? Stoic acceptance that this is the rightful will of divine powers? Or have you committed hubris, and visited destruction on yourself?

Prowess: Military power - but more than just numbers. Smaller states may be considered to have 'prowess' in a narrow field of military expertise. Even bigger states will have a characteristic that defines them (Athens being a Naval power, Sparta famed for her Hoplites). Beware - defeat can destroy your prowess, though it depends upon the manor of it. Flight in the face of the enemy, or a refusal to fight will destroy your reputation. Glorious defeat in a hopeless, but heroic, last stand? That will enhance it.

Polity: The size of a city, linked to its power, economic success, justness of it's laws, is captured by 'Polity'. But it also encapsulates a more nebulous concept around the political identity of a city. Athens starts as a Democracy, Sparta an oligarchy. Political identity is core to the Greek city or 'polis'. If events - defeat in battle or internal revolt, for example, forces a change of political identity, that will damage the self identity of city - it will damage 'polis'.

Fate: The Gods are fickle. The life and fortunes of the polis are inter-woven with the random events, and whims of divine powers. A sudden storm? An earthquake? Plague, or fire? These are not a factor that defines the polis like Piety, Prowess or Polity, but your reaction to them might effect the prestige of your city in other ways, particularly if they have just happened to someone else, and you choose to help (or not).