Just like the title says, this thread is to talk about the problems, and ideas, of a realistic survival of a Roman Empire.
Here's what i've been thinking about.
Staying together. Of course this is the most obvious problem, Rome split into east and west, power base weakened even more later by barbarians which ruled parts of the empire and eventually split it up. Stopping this is the number one thing to do. The most attractive way to unite the empire is probably with a strong conqueror who unites the empire and sets to do some reform to save it from the fall.
Message system to create greater cohesion amonst the large empire, involving post riders, birds carrying messages, Heliographs, Semaphore.
Governmentalreform, Roman senate survives? Roman democracy? The emperors Weren't exactly the best form of government. Perhaps we could have a type of constitutional monarchy, after some roman emperor goes too far. And eventually, that develops into a democracy. Or maybe, a weaker form of dictator, elected by the senate, so stupid people don't get to become emperor and ruin the empire.
Economical reform, with the onset of barbarian invasions, Rome hunkers down and goes on the defense instead of on the conquests of the early republic. This leads to changes in the economy, instead of relying on plundering and slavery, Roman emperors begin to try to get as much out of their lands as possibl
e. Im not very good with economics, so i really don't know exactly how rome would fix its economy, I remember hearing that another problem was debasement of Roman currency and scarcity of foodstuffs, leading to city depopulation. I think this problem is seriously overlooked in most TLs dealing with Rome, there is no way Rome would have survived with its collapsing economy. The problem with the weak currency is that monetary taxation was replaced with direct requisitioning, basically creating a type of state socialism.
Stronger, powerful roman army, using roman citizens. Little or no use of barbarian mercenaries instead of roman citizen armed forces. This is key, the Roman use of barbarians as soldiers has been cited as one of the most important causes if not the number one cause of the fall of the empire.
Keep barbarians out of Rome, strong defenses along the Roman borders to the east, a Roman great wall even? The barbarians must be defeated, especially, but not limited to , the Franks, Goths, and Saxon peoples. Also dealing with the Huns is another big problem, preferably, the germans would already be either under roman control, or soundly defeated by the time the huns arrive. The sassanids are a greater threat to the east, but they can be checked and are not looking to migrate into Roman territory.
Romanization campaing to romanize the barbarians who do enter roman territory and turn everyone into roman, kulturkampf style. If everyone in the empire develops a roman cultural identity, maybe the empire will hold together better.
Im not sure how this would be accomplished exactly, but maybe through schools and propaganda.
In 165 A.D, Rome suffered the Antonine plague, later, more diseases like measels, smallpox killed many Romans and weakened Rome. Eventually the black plague (if Rome is to survive into the medieval times) will make things worse. Either find ways which Rome could deal with this and survive, or just say it doesn't happen.