If you do not want your characters to be in the army, be a priest, or work in the civil service, then you may have to consider other ways to make a living.
Farming
Farming is probably one of the most common ways to make a living, aside from the sale and production of goods at the shops or workshops. If you wish to farm, then you need to own land in one of the provinces. The price of land will continue to rise as more and more people own land at a particular location. In any case the minimum price is about 24 uncia per iugera, but this price will rapidly increase where people have bought a lot of land, eventually it might even reach a point when the purchase of new land at that location either becomes unaffordable or unprofitable.
Read chapter 4 for more information about agriculture.
Fishery
Ports can be found at places adjacent to seas. There is one wharf for every port and there are a total of 117 ports in the world. You have to own a fishing wharf, if you want to fish the sea, additionally you need a fishing boat and assign fishermen to a fishing boat. Some ports have a bonus and those ports that have a fish bonus yield more fish for each fishing trip.
A normal fishing trip yields about 4000 fish, but at a port with a bonus the yield is about 5000 fish.
Forestry
Your farm workers will also act as foresters and lumberjacks.
Fallow land or barren land yields 400 logs per iugera each summer. These logs can then be processed into timber at a sawmill.
Mining & Quarrying
There are a few places on the worldmap where you can mine ores such as: copper, tin, iron, silver or gold. These ores can be smelted into metals at a smelter and these metals in turn can be used for the production of all sorts of valuable goods. Some metals like copper, silver and gold can be used to mint new currency.
Aside from mines, you can also quarry for stones or marble, or dig for clay in some places. Stones, marble and timber are resources that are commonly used in the construction of buildings, while clay is used to produce pottery.
Mines and quarries are scarce, but the ownership of a mine or quarry can often be a very profitable enterprises.
The following amount of stone quarries, marble quarries and claypits exist in the world:
The following amount of mines exist in the world:
Mines and quarries are sold by the state to the highest bidder at an auction. The ownership of a mine or quarry is transferred to the highest bidder by a Censor or Quaestor. A Censor or Quaestor may not accept his or her own offer. The yield of mines and quarries is 2700 resources per worker (assuming fatigue is 0).
Industries
If you own a workshop, then you have the ability to produce goods.
Read the paragraph on production for more information.
Commerce
You can also try your luck with a shop instead of a workshop.
Taberna or taverns do not produce or sell anything, instead taverneers make their money of NPC traders. Players can purchase some goods at a fair. About 90 percent of the sales by NPC traders ends up in the hands of tavern owners. NPC traders will pick a place to stay at random. So the odds of making money depends on how many taverns there are in the city and how many players purchase goods at the market fair from the NPC tradesmen.
Owning a bank can be a very profitable business, but is also a risky business. The risk depends on the debtor's ability to repay the loan. Naturally all bankers require collateral for the issueing of loans. The collateral is always land, so you cannot ask for a loan, if you do not own any land. Just how much collateral is required depends on the size of the loan. A player or debtor may not have more than one outstanding loan, while a banker may not issue more loans than he has money in his treasury!
Loans may be a necessary evil sometimes if you happen to have run in the negative, because if you have no more money, then you are unable to buy things. The most common way to run into debt, is when you were unable to pay the taxes! Loans may also be a quick way to get a lot of required money, that you need, to buy something expensive, say for example a mine or a quarry, or something like jewelry.
A loan can be eliminated due to several reasons:
Reason 1 results in the bankruptcy of the debtor, if his funds are in the negative and he has no more land and no more resources for sale. The end result of bankruptcy is that the debtor has lost the game!
Reason 3 means the loan is deleted and the debtor does not have to give up the collateral, but has to return the borrowed money!
Reason 4 automatically results in the collateral being given to the moneylender!
Sea Trade
Marine trade can be a risky but also a very profitable business. With a ship you can export or import certain goods at barbarian or provincial harbours.
Voyage over sea can be a dangerous affair. Storms sometimes occur in the winter season and these storms have been known to sink ships.
There may also be pirates who capture ships. Only hostile pirates are known to capture ships. Hostile pirates are shown on the sea view map as a red colored ship, while ships of ordinary pirates are colored green. There are 6 various groups who take to piracy:
Of these groups, the Ligurians and the Redonians are always hostile as long as they exist. The Cilician pirates are connected to Mithridates and they will be hostile to Rome if Mithridates is hostile towards Rome or at war with Rome. In a similar manner the Rhodian pirates are connected to Cleopatra and the Illyrian pirates to Tueta and the Carthaginian pirates to Hannibal.
The Cilicians are potentially the most dangerous pirates, second are the Illyrians and third the Rhodians. What makes these pirates so dangerous is that they are known to sail in several seas and that they share seas with other pirates. For instance if the Cilicians and the Illyrians, who both sail the Mare Ionium, are both hostile to Rome, then as much as 10% of all ships passing through the Mare Ionium may be captured by pirates.
Pirates can be defeated. If Rome manages to take the pirate nests, then the pirate group, whose nests have all been conquered, will dissapear.
Entertainment
A last way to make a living is for your character to be an entertainer, whether that is a charioteer, a gladiator, an actor, a poet, or a bathkeeper.
The circus is the place where chariot races are held. Players who wish to race, have to join a syndicate. A race can be held when at least 2 syndicates have a member participating in a race. Each syndicate can have only one charioteer member participate in a chariot race. The winner of the chariot race wins the prize money offered by the Aediles.
The amphitheatre is where gladiatorial combat takes place. Owners of gladiators can have their gladiators participate in fights.
There are several types of gladiators:
And several kinds of fights:
For the munera only certain kinds of combinations of gladiators are possible. This list shows all possible combinations:
The theatre is where plays are performed. Actors can write stories, or post entertaining things.
The odeum is like the theatre, but the focus is more on reciting poetry and singing songs.
The thermae or baths are a place to relax and chat and have your characters take a bath to clean them. Family members have to take a bath each season to stay clean. A dirty character has a low sanitation value and prolonged uncleanliness decreases the health of the character.