Colonies are cool!

[Hitti-Litti]

I thank thee, Lord Shadow!

 

[Lord Shadow]

I thank thee, Lord Shadow!

No problem!

 

[vodlaian]

I had tested this feature out last night, here are my observations:

- The colony can be the same civ? My vassal turned out to be America.. But I'm America..
- +10 permanent relationship "you have granted us our independence"
- You have the option to liberate select cities or you can select groups of cities which are on another island/continent.

That +10 makes it worth it to me. Because there's an almost guaranteed trade partner for the rest of the game.

 

[thecommonnate]

This feature is the one I have been omst eager to ask about.

I guess the first question would be is it really good or just some over-eggagerated mess? It seems like a hard concept to think about, and I wasn't excpecting a lot.

Also:

1.) What are the kinds of civs that spwn when you grant them independence. I know that civs have other civs they like to spawn, but how often does this acctually happen? If it doesn't is it still accurate?

2.) How is the vassal feature different for colonies? Does the vassal have unhappieness because of its vassal status? And does the rule still apply that if the vassal's empire grows large enough it can no longer be a vassal to you?

3.) Any news on bad vassal/parent relationships and wars for independence? This would kind of suck...but I would really love to see it in the game.

 

[jkp1187]

Yes. There is a "colonial expenses" header in the maintenance tool-tip in each of your cities.

Your colonies are quite cool with giving you their resources, as you get a huge diplo bonus with them (+10 for granting us our independence or something).

Wait a sec -- I was under the impression that "colony maintenance" was, actually, an extra maintenance fee for cities ruled directly by your own Civ that were located on an overseas island/continent, and that the maintenance fee for Colonies that you've spun off from your own civ were handled just like Vassals (since "Colonies" are really just vassals that you create....)

See, e.g., this thread: http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?postid=4991167#post4991167

 

[Nikis-Knight]

Incorrect. I waged war against Jewish Stalin () in a continent different than my home one, took five of his cities and when the revolts were over, I realized I could grant independence (not giving them to Stalin) to those five even though they were really close to the still-Russian cities, and the vast majority (over 80&#37 of the population was Russian.

hmm, okay, I stand corrected.

 

[Watiggi]

Wow! I just started a game with a hug map, small islands and 2 civs

I'm Victoria (Imperialistic!) and wow! I have just settler spamed all the islands I can find.

Just build the Great Wall (to get the Barbs off your back), screw the military and just build settlers and galleys. I have 4 vassals and am currently looking for more islands! You can also add more cities to an existing vassal as well, effectively swamping your opponents. I've built 19 cities and I own 3 of them All you need is 2 cities on one island and it can become a colony. Conveniently, the Galley can carry 2 settlers

It's going to get interesting when all my vassals start picking on each other

It's like you start with only 2 civs and end with there being 15 civs or something!

Watiggi, what was the advantage to you of having the colony?

Expansion without the headache, essentially. You 'own' the cities, but you don't have anything to do with them. Basically it's like a normal vassal (extra happiness, extra territory/pop and extra team power rating), but they want to be apart of you and have no real interest in leaving.

 

[jkp1187]

Wow! I just started a game with a hug map, small islands and 2 civs

I'm Victoria (Imperialistic!) and wow! I have just settler spamed all the islands I can find.

Just build the Great Wall (to get the Barbs off your back), screw the military and just build settlers and galleys. I have 4 vassals and am currently looking for more islands! You can also add more cities to an existing vassal as well, effectively swamping your opponents. I've built 19 cities and I own 3 of them All you need is 2 cities on one island and it can become a colony. Conveniently, the Galley can carry 2 settlers

It's going to get interesting when all my vassals start picking on each other

It's like you start with only 2 civs and end with there being 15 civs or something!

Expansion without the headache, essentially. You 'own' the cities, but you don't have anything to do with them. Basically it's like a normal vassal (extra happiness, extra territory/pop and extra team power rating), but they want to be apart of you and have no real interest in leaving.

Watiggi, that sounds fantastic!

Two more days. I hate you!

By the way -- can you still build Great Wall without having to build a few city walls first?

 

[DrewBledsoe]

Watiggi, that sounds fantastic!

Two more days. I hate you!

By the way -- can you still build Great Wall without having to build a few city walls first?

Yeah, the Gw can still be your very first build, which sorta disappointed me. For any marathon players, barbs seemed slightly toned down from before, but then settlers are 300 now, so they need to be.Imp's settler bonus is actually very valuable now. The barbs are interesting. I had several barb events, which randomly generated a whole stack of barbs just by my territory.Something about "the Phillistines gathering together a massive attack", then there are 6 barb axemen in one tile, 4 away from my very lightly defended capital.Ouch!

Just a little more new teaser info

 

[PimpyMicPimp]

Wow! I just started a game with a hug map, small islands and 2 civs

I'm Victoria (Imperialistic!) and wow! I have just settler spamed all the islands I can find.

Just build the Great Wall (to get the Barbs off your back), screw the military and just build settlers and galleys. I have 4 vassals and am currently looking for more islands! You can also add more cities to an existing vassal as well, effectively swamping your opponents. I've built 19 cities and I own 3 of them All you need is 2 cities on one island and it can become a colony. Conveniently, the Galley can carry 2 settlers

Seems almost broken...

Oh well, should make for some fun strategies.

 

[Lord Shadow]

Seems almost broken...

Oh well, should make for some fun strategies.

Broken? It sounds like Britain: a tiny island with lots of colonies all over the world.

 

[futurehermit]

(**)

Question:

Do colonies count 50% toward your domination totals like vassals do? Or do they count 100%? Or 0%?

Thanks!

 

[PimpyMicPimp]

Broken? It sounds like Britain: a tiny island with lots of colonies all over the world.

Game-wise; if he isn't needing to build anything but settlers and galleys

Oh well, FUN!

 

[Snoopaloop]

I must have missed something very obvious, but how can you release colonies?

It's weird that in my game there are 2 leaders with the same name thanks to the colony system.

Hitti-Litti, maybe you should report that in the bug forum. It doesn't seem right to have a civ that is already in the game appear as a colony as well.

 

[Jaybe]

Hitti-Litti, maybe you should report that in the bug forum. It doesn't seem right to have a civ that is already in the game appear as a colony as well.

Roman Empire -> Western Rome & Eastern Rome (Byzantium by another name)

They probably didn't always have the "same name" option available, but if you didn't allow it, WHAT would you call them? Not every civ has "sister" civ names available, and if THEY were already in play you could be disallowed colonies just because there was no civ name available. Is THAT what you would want?

 

[Impaler[WrG]]

A little Beta tester trick for you to try. Stealing techs with Colonies, they immediately receive techs to bring them up to par with the rest of the world and this can sometimes include techs you don't have (especially if your behind or have been heavily bee lining). And their of course very willing to trade on favorable terms so you spin off a vassal to 'steal' techs from empires that wont trade them.

 

[PieceOfMind]

A little Beta tester trick for you to try. Stealing techs with Colonies, they immediately receive techs to bring them up to par with the rest of the world and this can sometimes include techs you don't have (especially if your behind or have been heavily bee lining). And their of course very willing to trade on favorable terms so you spin off a vassal to 'steal' techs from empires that wont trade them.

lol thanks for sharing that Impaler. I'll keep that in mind.

 

[mice]

Tech trading is good with them. One point, they need to know other civs, just as usual, or they cant trade , so giving them Optics helps.

Also noted, the AI will accept gold for techs much more than before , colonies and other civs both.

If you want to trade a tech instead they may accept, but generally speaking, gold seems to have much greater value to the AI now.

Related note, random events are all payed for with gold, so this gives things that make gold a boost as some of the random events are very beneficial (some)

 

[brianshapiro]

Wow! I just started a game with a hug map, small islands and 2 civs

I'm Victoria (Imperialistic!) and wow! I have just settler spamed all the islands I can find.

Just build the Great Wall (to get the Barbs off your back), screw the military and just build settlers and galleys. I have 4 vassals and am currently looking for more islands! You can also add more cities to an existing vassal as well, effectively swamping your opponents. I've built 19 cities and I own 3 of them All you need is 2 cities on one island and it can become a colony. Conveniently, the Galley can carry 2 settlers

It's going to get interesting when all my vassals start picking on each other

It's like you start with only 2 civs and end with there being 15 civs or something!

Expansion without the headache, essentially. You 'own' the cities, but you don't have anything to do with them. Basically it's like a normal vassal (extra happiness, extra territory/pop and extra team power rating), but they want to be apart of you and have no real interest in leaving.

if you build the great wall when all of your borders extend to the sea, does the great wall even show up on the map? has anyone tried this?

 

[I_pity_the_fool]

And is it just me, or is the Great Wall cheaper now? I swear I never used to be able to build it in 6 turns before.