Sometime in the game the other Romans went from being "allied" to neutral, although the Senate is still giving me missions. They're all, however, threats rather than offers. So at one point they ask me to move my armies out of allied Roman territory, which I do.
At this point in the campaign the Senate is distrusting me, and my popularity is 2 with them and 7 with the plebs. So I build up some good post-marius troops and attack a Julii army that is sieging a Spanish settlement, and of course the Julii declare war on me.
But the SPQR didn't. Nor did the Scipii. I drove away the assaulting force, saving the Spanish city from being conquered (I plan to make an alliance with them soon and give them all of Spain) and driving the Julii out of the region.
So I end turn, and a Julii diplomat comes to me and asks for a ceasefire. I accept. And Rome still is neutral to me; I haven't been outlawed even though I've shed Roman blood.
Then two turns later, with no diplomatic change, the SPQR declares war on the Julii! And I am still neutral to them! This is strange; I've read here before that the player's faction is the only one that can be outlawed, and when war breaks out all the Romans band against you.
Finally, some turns later, the SPQR make a ceasefire with the Julii and Scipii and decalare war on me, and it seems that now the normal civil war has begun.
But the process is really strange; I've never played a game where it was like this before. Has anyone else had a civil war start off like this?
((I had a screenshot of the diplomatic information but evidently I took another since then... dammit.))
"Republicans who did not play the patronage game were ridiculed as the Mugwumps for sitting on the fence--their "mugs" on one side of the fence and "wumps" on the other. Historians generally consider this era a low point in American politics."--United States History by John J. Newman and John M. Schmalbach