Cinna, still consul in Rome as the year 84 BCE begins, is faced with minor disturbances among Illyrian tribes.
Perhaps in an attempt to gain experience for an army to act as a counter to Sulla's forces, or to show Sulla that the Senate also has some strength of its own, Cinna raises an army to deal with this Illyrian problem.
Conveniently, the source of the disturbance is located directly between Sulla and another march on Rome.
Cinna had been working to transport his troops across the Adriatic in order to meet Sulla on foreign soil.
The troops are not relishing the upcoming fight, which promises no booty.
Their dissatisfaction is increased when they hear that the second convoy of troops who had been in transport had been shipwrecked in a storm.
Those that survived had returned to their homes.
Cinna orders an assembly in order to terrorize the troops back into obedience and is stoned to death by his own soldiers in a mutiny, his murder not due to his politics, but as more of a brief flare up of the mob spirit within his troops.
Sulla, hearing of Cinna's death, and the ensuing power gap in Rome, gathers his forces in Asia and and prepares for a second march on the capital.
