maybe in sandbox we should be allowed to something similar to colonization from singleplayer campaign? Maybe after you own a city for "x" number of years it becomes your faction's? My game as aetolian league quickly became near impossible financially because all your troops have to be mercenaries since they only have 2 starting cities and manpower became a huge problem.

My ideas were either to implement the fact that cities have population (usually between 5 to 10 I believe) maybe sending 3 citizens from a city to colonize one?

Or just every x ammount, say 5 cities you can colonize 1

My other idea would be, say if you completely take over a region, not nation, that region now allows you to hire "allied" troops there instead of mercenaries. This would be seen as a sort of "liberation" if you take a region from an empire (athens or persia) or forced vassilization if you take over a free independent region. The reason I say region instead of nation is for taking over ionian greek city states on the coasts of the persian empire, it would also make islands of the agean better for recruiting because of recruiting allies instead of mercenaries. This would keep the troop diversity and in my oppinion add realism because you wouldn't have a strange scenario like building spartan hoplites in byzantium.

Raistlain gave the following idea in a previous forum

"This is the same kind of thing ancient Greeks did anyways - After major expansion they would sometimes colonize strong cities in order to strengthen their hold on an area. The thing could be linear - every 10 cities for example you get one - or it could be exponential allowing early expansion to build up a decent home faction area first, maybe going 1 capture, then 3 capture, then 5 capture then 6 capture then 10 capture, etc."

anyone else have other ideas for colonization in sandbox?

Could you just have gradually decreasing resistance to occupation? Perhaps, every season the number of garrison troops needed decreases by 1, so 4 per year? When it reaches 0 you have yourself an allied city. Its unlikely to be game changing and is unlikely for walled cities to ever change over unless in your heartlands during a very long campaign but unwalled cities taken early can be won over to your side gradually. Furthermore very low hostility factions should be very simple to win over whereas the big haters could take much longer.

You could even limit it so that only a maximum of 30 points (for example) can be reduced this way so that ONLY the low hostility cities can become allied while the really hostile ones just become a little more relaxed.

hey guys im a wee bet new here but ill geve you something to try 1 buy out your x nabring fachin buy createing a trus or 2 try to thake the emny x fachin off goard buy cuting thre suply lins or bring farms

hey guys im a wee bet new here but ill geve you something to try 1 buy out your x nabring fachin buy createing a trus or 2 try to thake the emny x fachin off goard buy cuting thre suply lins or bring farms

What the -fu- hell does that mean? Are you dyslexic? Or maybe foreign?

I have no idea what he meant. I just want some system so that you aren't just infinitely stretched thinner and thinner until you can't advance anymore from no manpower

Just as you mentioned, I completely agree. The idea of decreasing requirements for garrisons is a good idea too though. I think either or both of these would make gameplay much more interesting without breaking any game components.

Yea my basic argument is either somehow make things cheaper to recruit or make us need less garrisons for conquered lands over time.

I think that historically big powers in Greece relied upon several strategies to maintain their own hegemony:

Become very rich, acquire prestige (for example for contributions to the wars against Persia) and make alliances with people, ensuring their continued friendship with either bribery or the looming threat of a "league action" against recalcitrant allies.

Greek politics was odd and probably isn't well-represented in the game, which uses more modern assumptions about conquest. I can't think of too many examples where Greek states actually invaded and conquered their enemies' towns. The usual practice in war was to raze the walls, execute part of the population and install a "friendly" tyrant or ruling council. Places were unlikely to be occupied (at least not for long), even less become, for example, "culturally Athenian" (in game terms, being able to recruit home troops from). Factions with a small "cultural" base do seem to be at a disadvantage because of this, and I do think the cultural system is quite flawed. Such a vast area of the Aegean did not feel such close ties with Athens, but because of the way the game works, it has to be represented that way.

I do think that there was a distinction between language groups in Greece though. I'm struggling to remember but there were at least three major language families: Doric, Ionic and North-Western Greek. The Athenians, who spoke Attic Greek, were a part of the Ionic language group. Perhaps not coincidentally, most of Athens' allies were also Ionic-speaking. A way this could be represented in-game, and make things easier for smaller factions, is as follows:

1. All factions and cities are assigned a broad cultural group: Doric, Ionic, NW-Greek etc.
2. If you conquer a city with the same cultural group as your faction, you can recruit allied troops from it.
3. If you conquer a city with a different cultural group then you're stuck with mercenary units.

This would encourage a more historical play-style, with Athens finding it easier to conquer the islands of the Aegean and the coast of Asia Minor, and Sparta finding it easier to dominate the Peloponnese (though strictly speaking there were various language groups in that area).

hey guys im a wee bet new here but ill geve you something to try 1 buy out your x nabring fachin buy createing a trus or 2 try to thake the emny x fachin off goard buy cuting thre suply lins or bring farms


I worked it out, hes saying to take an enemy faction A, truce with neigbour B, C, etc. and then cut the supply lines of Enemy faction A. He really can't spell.