Right era, but I disagree with the reference to which war. The Social War was absolutely not republican Rome's finest hour, but the "uh oh" seeds were planted 1

Right era, but I disagree with the reference to which war. The Social War was absolutely not republican Rome's finest hour, but the "uh oh" seeds were planted 15-20 years earlier with the Marian reforms to the army. The Marian reforms created a standing army rather than a conscript-civilian army, which did then fight in the Social War, but the fuse set by those reforms didn't really blow up until after the Social War when Marius and Sulla started fighting over just who got to have all of the consulships and just who was the bigger, manlier man who got to have all their enemies murdered by the public for gold. ...Ahem. (It is not a pleasant period of history to read about.)