This will largely apply to all the nations worth playing (i.e. mostly Mediterranean civilized states). Keep in mind that the techs that you will need to prioritize depends highly on your starting situation and what you want to accomplish in your campaign. This guide is thought for people that do not understand fully the concepts and modifiers in the game. There are other very powerful synergies that can be achieved with other tech paths.

The bottleneck resource most of the time will be Political Influence, so prioritizing techs that give you more is important.

In the mid game you should look towards transitioning from levies to legions, and should make your way down to the Cohorts innovation (alternatively you can wait for the Marius reforms event if you're a Republic). Keep in mind that you will need the Great Power status to be able to raise multiple Legions as a monarchy.

This guide focuses on setting up a GW with Expanding Culture (Dominance through Enlightenment, Civic), Government Tradition (Provincial Census, Oratory), and Honored Leader (Avatar of Glory, Oratory). Plus using Great Temples and Grand Theaters for turbo conversion and assimilation. In the grand scheme of things, GW are NOT that costly. They are very well worth it.

Other good effects are Conquering Traditions, Siege Traditions, Omen Observations and For The Masses.

As a last note, the only tech trees I would say largely to avoid is the Left Civic (Trade) tree, the Right Martial (Naval) tree and most of the middle Martial (Siege) tree, other than to unlock Foundries and Sapping for that +1 Siege Engineer.

With the starting innovations, it is good to spend 4 to get Professional Training in the Martial tree. This will give your troops an extra 10% discipline, which increases your army damage by 10%. This can often make or break fights in the the early game, which is particularly valuable on something like an Epirus or non-Roman Italian peninsula start, where you need to fight power enemies quickly and early. You'll eventually need to make your way down for Cohorts anyway.



Unlocking Foundries (Blacksmith Apprentices) is very important as Foundries are extremely strong.

The Expanding Culture Great Wonder effect (Dominance Through Enlightenment) will make it super quick to convert and assimilate pops after your conquests. I've also marked the National Commerce Income techs because Commerce income in Imperator is king, you should grab them if you want to field lots of armies.



(Cultural Administration) is also very helpful for quick and mass conquests.

As said previously, I would generally avoid teching into the left side of the Civic Tree. As it just does not feel too strong. There are ways to achieve good money without wasting inventions into that side of the tree.

In the Oratory Tree you should target Honored Leaders Great Wonder effect (Avatar of Glory) as well as the Government Traditions Great Wonder effect (Provincial Census).

If you get a GW with Expanding Culture, Honored Leaders and Government Traditions it will be very difficult for to encounter any province rebellions whatsoever. You will be converting and integrating everyone very quickly.





(Gradual Economic Integration) will allow you to build Grand Theaters. I have also marked (Book Binding) as you should always grab Max Research Eff technologies.

Left side of the Oratory Tree is a no brainer if you want (Winning Land by the Spear), aka Imperial Challenge cb. Very strong casus belli, enemy provinces will change hands once you occupy them and vice versa.

In the Religious Tree the most important thing to get is (Open Religion) to be able to build Great Temples, they will help you convert pops. After that if you are a monarchy you can target (Proscribed Cannon) which will allow you to choose between Conversion Law Policies, they are very strong laws to assimilate and convert. (Formulaic Worship) is also a very good addition for converting. (Auxiliary Recruitment) increases the Levy Size multiplier allowing you to field bigger Levies and thus Legions.

Thanks to u/cywang86 and u/TastyGherkin for the techonology insight.

I made this guide as I have noticed a lack of this type of techonology guides in the steam forums. I hope the newbies like it.