Republic of Rome is a great boardgame. Or at least I think it is -- I've never really been able to play a proper game. The rules are so complicated, and so badly written, that I've never really felt I understood them. So, I decided to write a cheat sheet. One that would be useful for someone who is trying to learn the rules while playing their first game.

I've experienced two distinct kinds of confusion while trying to play this game.

1. "What the hell is going on??" -- when we move into a new, confusing phase of the round, and I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing.
2. "What the hell is that?" -- when I look at my cards, or the rules, and I don't know what they mean.

So to tackle this problem, my cheat sheet is divided into two parts.

Firstly there is a phase-by-phase description of the game. For each phase, I've tried to exhaustively describe what options a player has, and why they might choose them.

Secondly there is a glossary. I've briefly described each game concept, and tried to say what it's good for, and how it is used in each game phase. For example, I've often been confused by "Influence", which is one of the main characteristics of a Senator. It always seems to be going up or down, but it rarely gets used for anything, so what am I missing? Well if you get a Senator to 35 Influence then you win the game... it's little things like that that people forget to tell you!

Anyway, I've posted the cheat sheet, as a PDF and an Open-Office format file. It's Creative Commons licensed, so feel free to use it and improve it. I'd appreciate it if you send me your suggestions for corrections and improvements.