Europa Universalis: Rome - Beginner's Guide To Colonisation and Barbarians
Thank you to Achab and Little Darkling for providing additional material for this guide!
Part One: Political Map Overlay
If you wish to expand your nation's borders in a relatively peaceful manner, you will have to learn how to colonise the dark wilderness and deal with it's savage inhabitants... the Barbarians! So, let's fire up a new game, playing as Pontus. Pontus is a fun country to play and has a handy Barbarian province ready for colonisation. As usual, when the game begins, your game will look something like this:
You will also notice a handy little tab hanging from your top taskbar. If you hover your mouse pointer over this tab, it will inform you of any provinces, ready for colonising. Here's what to look for:
For this guide, we'll change to a different map overlay, so that we can see Barbarian provinces as lot more clearly. Take a look at the bottom right corner of the screen and you will see the mini-map. To the left of this are six buttons. Each one represents a map overlay (Terrain, Political, Regional, Religion, Trade and Diplomatic). Click the Political map overlay icon. I've highlighted the appropriate icon for you below:
Now your map should look like this:
The brightly coloured provinces show different AI nations. The purple nation is us, Pontus (obviously!). You will notice the dark gray province adjecent to Pontus and many, many more dark gray provinces if you look around the map. These are all untamed Barbarian provinces, untouched by civilisation.
Some Barbarian provinces are more civilised than others, so take a look around your sorroundings on the map to help your decision of where to colonise. The Black Sea coast is rich with "Barbarian" Greek civilisations, so this is a great advantage to any local Greek nations (Pontus, Bosporan Kingdom and Macedonia). Here's a list of the Top Barbarian provinces, their native culture and civilisation value:
- Olbia / Greek / 70.0%
- Tyras / Greek / 70.0%
- Tomis / Greek / 65.0%
- Trapezus / Greek / 65.0%
- Saguntum / Iberian / 60.0%
- Brecci / Pannonian / 50.0%
- Taurica / Scythian / 45.0%
If you're unsure where to colonise towards in a game, maybe try to aim for these provinces if you're a nearby country.
Part Two: Preparing For Colonisation
Our aim here is to send colonists to Trapezus (the Barbarian province next to Pontus). Unfortunately, it's not as simple as it seems. There are a few requirements which must be fulfilled before colonisation can proceed.
You can only construct a colony if you fulfill the following requirments:
- You have a province adjecent to the Barbarian province which has a Civilisation value of 50% or more and a population of 10.0 or more.
- The Barbarian province must have a Barbarian power of 2 or less.
- Surrounding AI nations must not have a province of greater civilisation value than your own, adjecent to the Barbarian province.
The Governor in control of a neighbouring province adds his / her own Finesse skill to the civilisation value (in regard to colony priority only). For example, if your province have a civilisation value of 50 and your Governor has a Finesse skill of 8, the overall value will be 58 (50+8).
Click on your target colony province to take a closer look. This window should appear in the bottom-left corner of the screen:
By taking a closer look, we can see if the province is worth our time and effort. In this case the above average civilisation value, Greek culture and Greek religion show that the inhabitants aren't the toothless, savages you would expect, but rather civilised Greeks living a peaceful farming life "off the radar". They may be civilised, but they're just as dangerous as the stereotypical Barbarians. This province is well worth grabbing, though, as these people will provide research and manpower.
You will notice a skull symbol with a number next to it. This is the strengh of the barbarians. In other words, they have the ability to mobilise 8,000 men to defend their lands. This number will increase over time and can lead to the Barbarians outgrowing their surrounding and forming a horde to violently seek out new pastures. So if you neighbour Barbarian land, try to be prepared at all times.
Ok, let's colonise this province! Wait... you can't. The "Colonise" button is grayed out. This means that we don't meet the requirements just yet. In this case, the Barbarian power is way too high. Colonists wouldn't dare to enter these lands! Time to bring our army to the frontier...
Part Three: Provoking Barbarians
Now, we could send our main army into the Barbarian province but the province Supply Limit is only 4. This means that the province can only support 4000 men. Any more men and this inhospitable land will begin claiming the lives of your troops with attrition. Move your main army to your most civilised province which is adjecent to the Barbarian province. In this case, Pontus. Now, recruit a single unit of mercenary Militia at Pontus. I've highlighted the correct unit here:
These mercenaries cost more gold, but don't drain your manpower pool. There's no point wasting our fine Greek soldiers for this task. Don't appoint a General to this new militia unit and move them to the Barbarian province.
Now we play the waiting game. These unsuspecting mercenaries are actually bait for the Barbarians. The people of Trapezus will see our incursion into their lands as an act of war and rise up to defend their homes. This can take anything from days to years to happen, so just be patient. It sometimes requires the Barbarian Power to increase. In my example game, the Barbarians took roughly six months to snap and attack my mercenaries.
The poor mercenaries will be slaughtered, but their deaths weren't in vain. The newly formed Barbarian horde will begin marching towards the nearest civilised province (i.e. Pontus), but our army will be waiting. The Barbarians will be led by a random memeber of their community. In this case they're being led by Forrest Gump
.
Beware, though, for every Conan the Librarian there is an Atilla the Hun or Genghis Kahn. I got lucky this time.
The Barbarians will soon be throwing themselves onto the blades of your main army. If you don't defeat them in one blow, they will retreat to their home province and immediately return to Pontus for more action. This is know as a "ping-pong" battle. Simply wait for the Barbarians to be wiped out and you will be greeted with this message:
Once you have totally eliminated a Barbarian horde. You will automatically enslave a fraction of the Barbarians (0.1 Slaves per Cohort) and sieze the gold they have plundered on their travels. The amount of Gold will increase with every province they occupy and loot.
NOTE: The above technique may be considered an exploit or "cheating" by more seasoned players. If you wish to roleplay the situation or your concience gets the better of you, consider provoking Barbarians in a way in which you see fit. To avoid "ping-pong" battles, consider chasing the Barbarians back to their homeland and defeating them on their own turf. This will speed things up, but be careful of attrition.
Now you're safe from threats, let's take another look at Trapezus.
Part Four: Building A Colony
Click on Trapezus (or whatever your target colony is).
You will notice that the Barbarian Power has been dropped to 1. This means that there is still a Barbarian presence, but they don't pose any threat to colonists. The "Colonise" button has also been activiated, meaning that we can now proceed! Click "Colonise" to begin.
Once Colonisation has begun, you will notice a new icon (representing a carpenter / builder) has appeared on the map.
Hover your mouse cursor over the new icon to find out when construction of the new colony will be finished. Now, the colonists will have to come from somewhere. A fraction of your capital city's population will migrate to the new colony to populate it.
Congratulations! You have built and populated a new colony! The province is now yours to use how you see fit. Bear in mind that a new colony is extremely weak and will need to "bulked up" as soon as possible using trade, growth omens and good governors.
Also be aware that there is still a Barbarian presence in your new province. They will live among your people for a while until they get assimilated into your culture via event. The Barbarian power will increase twice as fast as normal when they live amongst a colony. Presumably, this is to represent the growing resentment of their homelands being tainted by outsiders. They still have the ability rise up against their new government and attmept to reclaim their homeland. If a Barbarian horde manages to occupy a newly built colony, they will murder it's populace and burn it to the ground. This will cause the province to return to it's Barbarian roots. A Barbarian horde cannot destroy a colony with a population of 7 or more.
Remember not to over-stretch yourself when it comes to colonsation. Continuous colonisation will drain the population of your capital and weaken it substantially, over time!
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Ok, well that's all for now on this topic. I'm well aware that plenty of information has been left out regarding Governors, Barbarian diplomacy, etc. and I will update and tidy up the guide over time. I can't do it just yet as these guide are utterly exhausting to write, as pathetic as it sounds!
I hope it's helpful in this state anyway.
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