Senate missions - negotiating a protectorate

[hatcat]

Hello. I decided to post this message because my bug list contains an issue with the "negotiate a protectorate" Senate mission, remarking that this is a forum/community request. I developed the Senate (amongst other things) so I thought I should share with you a couple of important subtleties that aren't made obvious by the manual or general gameplay.

Negotiating a protectorate is not easy. This mission is only issued if the target faction has < 4 settlements and < 5 family members and the Senate is at war with them. To tempt the faction into submission you need to be at war with them, threaten them quite severely, particularly by massing extensive troops on their borders, blockading their ports and putting the entire faction under pressure. Once that's in place, the faction should be more amenable to subjugation. You may have to be prepared to hand over large swathes of their territory back to them, so consider this if you choose to accept the mission. If the Senate is no longer at war with them, they will expire the mission with no cost to your faction.

Don't forget, the Senate will assign you more unpleasant missions with more dire consequences for failure rather than rewards for success as your popularity with them tumbles. At some point, you may have to just bite the bullet and accept the punishment - you can avoid some of these if you get elected to the office of Quaestor/Censor. Bear in mind that the office of Censor requires the official to have served in lower offices, so if lower officials are killed somehow, say in a freak gardening accident, before they complete their tenure, the pool of candidates to choose from will be reduced.

I hope this helps.

Cheers,
J Guy Davidson.

[Slaists]

I believe, the forum request was actually for fixing the current bug that having a faction as your protectorate (as opposed to luring into being a protectorate) drains your treasury...

[The_Emperor]

Cheers for that.

So when you say we need to "threaten them quite severely" just how severe do you mean? When I fought the Gauls they kept on giving me the "freedom speech" despite me having two full stacks running around their last (lightly garissoned) territory and their only port blockaded!

I lost patience with them and eliminated them, its easy enough and cancels the mission.


I believe, the forum request was actually for fixing the current bug that having a faction as your protectorate (as opposed to luring into being a protectorate) drains your treasury...

yes that would be an idea. According to everything I have seen a protectorate gets a vast amount of cash from the "protector" faction. Shouldn't it be the other way around? They should be paying for protection, not the other way around!

[warlordmb]

Hello. I decided to post this message because my bug list contains an issue with the "negotiate a protectorate" Senate mission, remarking that this is a forum/community request. I developed the Senate (amongst other things) so I thought I should share with you a couple of important subtleties that aren't made obvious by the manual or general gameplay.

Negotiating a protectorate is not easy. This mission is only issued if the target faction has < 4 settlements and < 5 family members and the Senate is at war with them. To tempt the faction into submission you need to be at war with them, threaten them quite severely, particularly by massing extensive troops on their borders, blockading their ports and putting the entire faction under pressure. Once that's in place, the faction should be more amenable to subjugation. You may have to be prepared to hand over large swathes of their territory back to them, so consider this if you choose to accept the mission. If the Senate is no longer at war with them, they will expire the mission with no cost to your faction.

Don't forget, the Senate will assign you more unpleasant missions with more dire consequences for failure rather than rewards for success as your popularity with them tumbles. At some point, you may have to just bite the bullet and accept the punishment - you can avoid some of these if you get elected to the office of Quaestor/Censor. Bear in mind that the office of Censor requires the official to have served in lower offices, so if lower officials are killed somehow, say in a freak gardening accident, before they complete their tenure, the pool of candidates to choose from will be reduced.

I hope this helps.

Cheers,
J Guy Davidson.

Thanks for the info, Hatcat.

You might want to consider writing this explanation into the readme of the next patch you release because there is nothing in the game or manual that tells how protectorate status works ??????

Lots of people have complained about not being able to get this part of the game to work.

[Tamur]

Thanks very, very much Guy! This is going straight into the diplomacy doc.

*runs off skipping -- "A quote! A quote!"*

[hatcat]

"I believe, the forum request was actually for fixing the current bug that having a faction as your protectorate (as opposed to luring into being a protectorate) drains your treasury..."

Spotted, fixed.

"So when you say we need to "threaten them quite severely" just how severe do you mean? When I fought the Gauls they kept on giving me the "freedom speech" despite me having two full stacks running around their last (lightly garissoned) territory and their only port blockaded!"

Mmmm. That seems wrong: they should roll over and let you tickle their tummy. I'll alert the authorities.

[Akka]

Thanks for sharing it with us, Hatcat :)

But well, as it was pointed, the main problem with protectorate is that it's bugged for now.
The second problem, is that we simply don't know at all WHAT a protectorate is. There is some guesses, based on the word and some hints inside the game, but that's all. No definite explanation.

Additionnally, I think that the amount of pressure required to make a faction bend is hugely exagerrated. Even reduced to one province, with a puny army, after ten years of constant crushing defeat, they still ASK for something in exchange of peace/protectorate.

Well, if it's more costly to make peace, or to make them a protectorate, than to eradicate them, you can guess what's the option most commonly used...
As you don't have any penaly if you destroy a faction when you are ordered to make it a protectorate, it's what I do. No sense in giving back five regions and half my treasury while all the forces they have to counter my legions is 240 peasants...

[Quillan]

I've had the same result. As the Bruti, the senate wanted me to make the Dacians a protectorate. They were down to their final city (Lovovisce, I think, in any event it was landlocked), it had one general and two units of falxmen as garrison, I had a full 20 unit army (general, 1st cohort, 9 legionary cohorts, 2 roman cav, 2 legionary cav, 1 wardog, 4 archer auxiliae) outside the walls, and another pretty much identical army within the borders. I got the "Our freedom is precious to us" speech, no matter what I demanded or offered, so I just killed them.

[Red Harvest]

Great info, thanks for posting! One of the better aspects of RTW has been the Senate missions in my opinion. I really did enjoy them.

[chunkynut]

I understand the need to destroy a faction if you get a protectorate mission but the consequences if the senate has deemed in the diplomacy screen that the nation should be made into a protectorate and they are destroyed doesn't your senate rating plummet? It has every time i've destroyed a faction when i should have been a bit more softer with the military touch.

I had both a high senate popularity and people popularity in one game before i destroyed the egyptions. After the mission to make them a protectorate disappeared i had a senate approval rating of about 3. I understand the senate would have been afraid of my power with the people but such a dramatic shift?

[The_Emperor]

Mmmm. That seems wrong: they should roll over and let you tickle their tummy. I'll alert the authorities.

Many thanks for that!

After all the campaigns I have done, so far I have yet to make anyone a protectorate. But it was really strange in my opinion that even though they were so pathetically weak they were still defiant, and still rebuffed all attempts at reaching a peaceful settlement... (even a ceasefire at one point)

[Slaists]

in my experience, the senate just sends you a note saying that the mission (to makes someone a protectorate) is no more relevant... they seem to miss the point that it was YOU who rendered it irrelevant by destroying the faction in question :) i guess, it's more difficult to use this solution to the protectorate issue when they request that you make a faction your protectorate when you do not share any borders with it and have not way to ferry armies there in the time aloted.

[Sizzlorr]

In my last campaign (Brutii, m/m), I convinced both the Scythians and Parthians to become protectorates. With the Scythians, they had 4 provinces left, I had 4 armies in their lands, full stacks. I offered them large sums of money (30000), but they refused. I offered them the province of theirs I had just ravaged. They refused. I offered them map information, they totally caved. Same thing happened with the Parthians. They are suckers for map information. Now, I don't know why I would want 2 protectorates, what with the financial drain (which I did notice), but it certainly freed up a few armies from piddling little border wars for the much larger civil war.

[SpencerH]

I've seen both of these too. You're about to eliminate them and they drain your money or refuse to give in (so you crush their pathetic souls).

[SpencerH]

While we've got you here hatcat, maybe you'd like to tell us what we were supposed get for taking on a protectorate i.e. do they pay tribute, perform like allies, allow us to recruit their troops?

[Orvis Tertia]

Nice. It is so gratifying to see the developers using this forum to communicate. Thanks!

The initial post hints at something that I have suspected since day one: There is a lot more depth to this game than we could possibly know, as evidenced by the dynamic that you describe about the Senate missions and the heirarchy of Senate positions. None of this is even hinted at in the game manual, nor is it in the Prima strategy guide. Now, I assume that you guys who developed this game were not heavily involved in writing the manual, but somebody should realize how much of a problem this really is! Because so many aspects of this game are undocumented, they are completely missed. Thus much of your work is going unappreciated, and much of the depth of the gaming experience is being missed, because there is no way for us to anticipate these dynamics. I don't know what can be done at this point, but a giant online FAQ or something like that would certainly be a start! Heck, I'd go spend another $20 on a strategy guide if one was available that was worth it. I'd have plenty of reason to gripe about, because the game manual is so poor, but I have enough goodwill toward CA that I would get over it.

[barocca]

Nice. It is so gratifying to see the developers using this forum to communicate. Thanks!

The initial post hints at something that I have suspected since day one: There is a lot more depth to this game than we could possibly know, as evidenced by the dynamic that you describe about the Senate missions and the heirarchy of Senate positions. None of this is even hinted at in the game manual, nor is it in the Prima strategy guide...[big snip]...

Post feedback and "gameplay depth" features you uncover in the Forum,
pm one of the staff (Soly or Catiline) that you have done so and they will attempt to collate them all into a Guide of sorts.
Cheers,
B.

[hatcat]

My original submission for the manual on the Senate was a few thousand words. Indeed, to completely cover every intricacy of the game would take a mammoth effort of writing, editing and costly printing. The best we can hope for is to design features whose subtleties emerge through continued exposure and discussion amongst other game players. Good features will reward the player with a sense of "ooh, that's clever" long into the gameplay cycle. It's hard to tell at this stage how well that's worked. It's under review for future products.

[denonkleo]

My original submission for the manual on the Senate was a few thousand words. Indeed, to completely cover every intricacy of the game would take a mammoth effort of writing, editing and costly printing. The best we can hope for is to design features whose subtleties emerge through continued exposure and discussion amongst other game players. Good features will reward the player with a sense of "ooh, that's clever" long into the gameplay cycle. It's hard to tell at this stage how well that's worked. It's under review for future products.
what speaks against posting your original submission? that would be helpfull... i guess its been nested somewhere on your harddrive :D

denon

[Orvis Tertia]

Indeed, to completely cover every intricacy of the game would take a mammoth effort of writing, editing and costly printing.

While I understand your sentiment here, I must disagree. I am an editor by trade (mostly magazines and newspapers), and I understand what is involved in putting together something like a game manual. It's certainly not necessary to "completely cover every intricacy of the game," which is a bit hyperbolic, but a much more comprehensive guide could have been produced without breaking the bank if it had been a priority.

The real disappointment to me was the Prima strategy guide, which I had expected (with good reason, I think) to be more comprehensive and full of insider knowledge. Sadly, the guide leaves one with the impression that the writer(s) had no contact with the developers at all. I have grown accustomed to the idea of paying extra to get the "complete" game manual, and this has been made more palatable in the past because strategy guides are often enjoyable to read in their own right (the one for MTW was pretty good). But the one for RTW was a downer.

Anyway, I don't mean to bust your chops about this. I hope it is taken as it is meant: constructive criticism from a fan who really appreciates the product you've produced. (And if you want a bid for the production of your next game manual, let me know! ~;) )

[warlordmb]

While I understand your sentiment here, I must disagree. I am an editor by trade (mostly magazines and newspapers), and I understand what is involved in putting together something like a game manual. It's certainly not necessary to "completely cover every intricacy of the game," which is a bit hyperbolic, but a much more comprehensive guide could have been produced without breaking the bank if it had been a priority.

The real disappointment to me was the Prima strategy guide, which I had expected (with good reason, I think) to be more comprehensive and full of insider knowledge. Sadly, the guide leaves one with the impression that the writer(s) had no contact with the developers at all. I have grown accustomed to the idea of paying extra to get the "complete" game manual, and this has been made more palatable in the past because strategy guides are often enjoyable to read in their own right (the one for MTW was pretty good). But the one for RTW was a downer.

Anyway, I don't mean to bust your chops about this. I hope it is taken as it is meant: constructive criticism from a fan who really appreciates the product you've produced. (And if you want a bid for the production of your next game manual, let me know! ~;) )

I totally agree anbout the Prima Strategy Guide. I still find it a useful reference for unit stats. But the rest is half finished. Where are all the stats for the Greek Temples. Other factions have the same prob. no stats for some of the buildings. Seems to me that maybe the writers had no contact with the developers.

[Tamur]

...Heck, I'd go spend another $20 on a strategy guide if one was available that was worth it....

I think anyone around here who has the extra $20 would, without a doubt. There's obviously tons of the game that is being missed. I'd spend that much for a manual-sized download if it had solid information straight from the developers.

[Orvis Tertia]

I think anyone around here who has the extra $20 would, without a doubt. There's obviously tons of the game that is being missed. I'd spend that much for a manual-sized download if it had solid information straight from the developers.

OK, CA, fly me to the UK, give me three days of Q&A chat about the game with you guys (and buy me a few pints and some fish and chips), and I'll write and design a PDF manual that you can sell online for $19.99 and split the profits with me 60/40. Whaddya say?
:deal:

[Orvis Tertia]

OK, to go back to the apparent reason that this post was stickied, I can think of two things in the realm of "undocumented features" that might benefit from further explanation.

One of these is what appears to be a natural affinity/natural enmity between factions. It's the dynamic that causes the cultural differences, but I get a sense that it affects diplomacy as well. For instance, Gauls and Spaniards seem to really dislike Romans and Carthaginians, making a lasting peace among these factions unlikely. I would be interested to know how far-reaching these dynamics are.

Another area where knowledge is lacking is in the effect of the capital city and the location of the faction leader. Is there any benefit to getting your faction leader to the capital, as there was, I think, in MTW? If you get a young faction leader who is a good manager but an inexperienced general, are there real advantages to going on a campaign with him to boost his command rating, or are you better off just letting him sit at home and... manage. These are all questions that I think people are feeling out to varying degrees of success, but I wonder if there is a whole layer of the onion that we are just not seeing.

[Vlad Tzepes]

Thank you very much, HatCat, I do appreciate (and pretty sure many others as well) your post here.

Still, there is that question which, pretty obvious, is not about any game depth but about basic information: what's the advantage (and disadvantage) of getting yourself a protectorate?

Some questions come naturally:

Do you get money from them guys? (That is theoretically, because right now several gamers say there's a drain from your bank, I suppose it's a bug; I myself couldn't force any other faction into becoming a protectorate yet, though I tried a lot ~:confused: ).

How much?

Do you get military access?

Can you ask them "protectorees" to perform specific actions? (attack x faction or something else?)

How can they leave the protectorate? Can you change your mind?

other questions are waiting in line, but this would help for now.

IMHO, this isn't about game depth, it's just info needed to understand one (supposedly) major feature of the game. Through diplomacy you've got clear options like sell map info, broker trade rights, accept or we will attack (quite self-explanatory, I believe ~:) ) but this protectorate gizmo remains a mystery. Maybe I'm not such a bright player and should spend more time investigating, but it seems the whole community couldn't figure out...

I belive RTW is a great game but somehow obvious matters where left aside. Some could be patched, but others simply explained in this kind of forums as well.

There is another reason for that (kind, I hope) request. Not all of your customers have access to "prima guides" and stuff. For me (living in Romania) this kind of extra-information, that should have been provided with the original game but has not, is basically inaccessible. I've noticed that the TW community has lots of members from other countries than UK, US, Canada etc. Maybe someone should think about this.

I'm a big fan of the Total War series. I own STW, STW-MI, MTW, MTW-VI and now RTW as original games, even if I always could get a pirate copy of them. Imagine that one original TW series game is something like 10% of the medium monthly income in Romania (would you guys spend 200-300 USD for a game?) while a pirate copy is about 3 bucks. So I was correct to CA. May I hope that CA will be correct towards me? I now that this part of the world isn't big market for you, but I hope game developers like CA care about their customers more than others. It's a matter of company ethics.
:bow:

PS - sorry guys for the long post... I felt like speaking up.

[bmolsson]

I agree..... Why not just invade them ? ~;)

[Mr Frost]

Not exactly on topic , but if you have trouble getting the target to submit and don't want to lose Senate approval , assasinate the targets family members . Not only does the mission become void , but you seem to get denyability enough that the Senate doesn't appear to blame you .
I did this the second time the Senate asked me to submit Dacia {I had made them protectorate _just conquered 2 of their three provinces , parked a big army outside their capital , sabotaged their buildings and said Protectorate +your two other provinces back or death ... they capitulated . Then a few turns later the Brutii beseiged them for apparantly no reason !} and I really wasn't interested so I just killed their last family member {he probably wasn't going to last long anyway} with the Assasin I had there and my Senate approval was as good as before .
I didn't notice a lot of money gone , but my ecconomy was close to the wire and I din't pay it too much attention .


A downloaded uber manual would be nice , if it gave indepth information that is missing .
It would make modding much easier . Though I imagine there are contractual barriers as far as this game is concerned . :sad:

[sapi]

Back on topic, what are the rules for a faction staying at war with you. I was playing as thrace, and had a long war going with the macedonians, then suddenly one turn, as i was about to attack them, it said 'do you want to declare war on this faction'. I had totally missed their neutrality. Then, the next turn, they broke the truce i had no idea existed. What's up with that!?! I even had a fort on their land!

The rules of war + peace need explaining!

[Morat]

Did you make an alliance with one of their allies? That can cause a ceasefire between the two of you.

[sapi]

Ok....that was it, i allied with the greeks.

Then, 5 turns later, i began a bribing campaign. 10 turns later, the macedonians were destroyed. lol

[Attalus]

Thanks for the scoop hatcat.

Seems to be a bit of an issue. I have never had a faction 'roll over and let me tickle it's tummy'...not matter how severe I threaten them.I tend to try the nice "but hey...we have ORGIES over here!!", approach first...rather than "assimilate or be butchered like worthless dogs!!" method.

Gauls...non merci merde!
British...no thanks chaps!..Tea?
Germainian...nein danke shwinehunde!
Spanish...erm...OLE!!

In fact, no matter what I ask for I am resoundingly told that they would rather have electrodes atached to their genitals and be flogged senseless with knotted ropes than give me the time of day!

Is this because the other Roman factions have soured my chances for negotiations?

I HAVE managed to bribe a few things though!

I don't mind...it IS supposed to be 'Total War' right?
But I really wanted to see some of that Roman intrigue...Rex Harrison, Richard Burton...'Et tu, Brute?'...great stuff.

I rather hoped that the 'intrigue' factor of the game was going to be more involved...Sulla Vs Marius, Octavian and Antony...you know what I mean.

Being able to force unpleasant Senators to commit suicide, publicly embarrass rival generals...using my natural cunning...(I am Australian after all).

Still, AWESOME game!! You guys rock.

-Attalus-
Fool me once...shame on you.
Fool me twice...prepare to die.

[sapi]

Being able to force unpleasant Senators to commit suicide, publicly embarrass rival generals...using my natural cunning...(I am Australian after all).

lol -so am i - pity you can't do that as the senate :(

[Servius]

Hatcat, I just wanted to say Thanks for coming and posting. This kind of dev interaction and timely response helps restore some hope that other issues will be dealt with as efficiently.

Thanks again, it's very nice to see.

[SigniferOne]

Hatcat, thanks for a very welcome post here.

I think the goal you described, of a very complicated system slowly revealing itself through responsive and interactive game system, *almost* works. In fact there's nothing terribly wrong with it. To fix it is almost nothing at all. Along with the primary step of fixing the bugs, which mess up the interactivity and the learning curve of this intricate system, the next best thing you can do is: improve the diplomacy dialogue. Right now the responses are limited to just a phrase or two, usually cryptic, always static, and almost always generic. Make it more intuitive, dynamic, and the system will work! All serious prerequisites seem to be there, just need to up the feedback and fix the bugs that mess up the feedback that does exist.

For example, if you demand a protectorate, the haughty British will reply, "We still have all our ports to bring us revenue, and your armies are not threatening our borders. Why should we obey your insolent request?" That will tell the player what to do as much as an entire essay on the Diplomacy system.

:)

PS I'm a little worried by your comment that serious improvements are to be left for future products. CA has a very devoted fan base - I hope you guys remember how that was acquired. I don't want to dwell on the fact that threads like these, although dearly welcome to me and others, and very dearly needed, feel like they belong to a Beta forum, befor the final release of the game, where the devs and the players clean up the few glitches left before the final release. I know that all of that is not up to you, but I hope you do realize the effect all this has had on the fan base. A quick glance over the three main RTW forums (.com, .org, and twcenter.net) is all you need to see the state of a pre-1.2 RTW. So I hope sufficient effort goes into making RTW what it was supposed to be, and an equally serious effort into the expansion to make it even more spectacular.

Anyway, back to my ":)". ~:cheers:

[Patricius]

Eh, having a faction say why it's refusing but saying why is like, 'I would rather we perish than grovel to you, but if you wish for us to give up, here's how....'

That said, certainly extra phrases and some obvious elements with diplomacy that do not seem to be WAD (working as designed) and should be fixed.

I am wondering if sub-faction cultures mean anything beyond the identity of rebels. For instance will a city with a Libyan sub-faction culture, Alexander, I am thinking of, be more like to rebel or be peacable, even if assimilated, on account of this sub-faction culture?

[Bartman]

Good features will reward the player with a sense of "ooh, that's clever" long into the gameplay cycle. It's hard to tell at this stage how well that's worked. It's under review for future products.

PS I'm a little worried by your comment that serious improvements are to be left for future products.
I believe that hatcat meant they are reviewing how well their design philosophy is doing at providing good replay value.

Lots of things in the history of the Total War series have suggested a certain "organizational immaturity" on the part of the development team. (Using the word immaturity in the sense of the "Capability Maturity Model" for measuring the quality of a software development organization.) A sign that this might be changing is the fact that Rome: Total War is a rewrite. This suggests that CA/Activision may have decided to jettison the baggage of a STW system which wasn't designed to be expandable, and endure some short term pain in order to get a better long term result. This comment by hatcat seems to affirm that belief. If they have a process to perform a serious review of the long term replay value of RTW, then it appears they are more concerned about generating a great product, rather than just making a quick buck. Definitely a positive situation!

(BTW, the actual programmers are almost always interested in generating a great product. But programmers almost never determine the final feature set, and they almost never get to decide when the code is good enough to ship.)

[Herodotus]

Protectorates costing money should not be considered a bug. Protectorates were buffer zones that allowed the Romans to occupy themselves in more profitable parts of the world. They payed the proctectorate to protect them from farther enemies. Knowing CA's record on realism with RTW I would expect they would consider this a bug :dizzy2: and will not be surprised when they 'fix' it.

[anti_strunt]

Protectorates costing money should not be considered a bug. Protectorates were buffer zones that allowed the Romans to occupy themselves in more profitable parts of the world. They payed the proctectorate to protect them from farther enemies. Knowing CA's record on realism with RTW I would expect they would consider this a bug :dizzy2: and will not be surprised when they 'fix' it.

Since there are already tribute/give money offers available for those you might want to use them, I'd say that Protectorates automatically receiving large sums of cash without the option of not doing giving them anything IS a bug.

[Orvis Tertia]

Protectorates costing money should not be considered a bug. Protectorates were buffer zones that allowed the Romans to occupy themselves in more profitable parts of the world. They payed the proctectorate to protect them from farther enemies. Knowing CA's record on realism with RTW I would expect they would consider this a bug :dizzy2: and will not be surprised when they 'fix' it.

Well, a bug is an aspect of the game that is not working as it was intended. It seems clear that the protectorate is not working as CA intended it to work, so...

Regarding realism, I think CA should be commended on the job they have done (with RTW and the previous games). After all, their number-one goal is to make a game that people will enjoy playing, and in doing so they have also created a strategy game that has more realism than most--and more than any other strategy game that covers these time periods.

[master of the puppets]

in my scipii campaign armenia was on the brink of extinction because all the other easter groups had allieds against them. they were down to two cities in the heart of the middle eastern empires when my diplomat aproached them and offered protectorate writes they gave in in a single turn and now it was up to me to save the asses. so then i go up to the spanish with hope of gaining another protectorate in the heart of the barbarians i wanted to destroy naturally i was the one who had driven them to the lowly state thats when i realised that if you are the one who didn't nearly kill them all they give in (who woulda guessed) well i just got tired of the spanish refusing me so i broke off all contact two turns later spain was no more. back to armenia, i marched 3 full stacked armies to there aid one with merc elephants best thing against cataphracts. well by the time i got there the had lost the one city and the other was under seige by parthians i rushed in a whooped persian ass. liberated two more once armenian towns gave one back to armenia kept the other and with the rest of my troops made the whole middle east look like combat innept retards a little later i rebeled i betrayed armenia sacked there towns to get money marched the best of my armies back west and the game went on


Naturally i have once more been completely grippped by the awsiome wrath of A.D.D. and have got side tracked ...oh well back to the forum

[sunsmountain]

Am i the only one who does not have any problems with diplomacy?

Perhaps, but i help the AI a lot. For example, when i offer a ceasefire, i make sure none of my spies or assassins are in their territories, and always add Trade Rights.

If i offer an alliance, i make sure i have a stronger military first. This also applies to protectorates, but then the most important insight into the game's Diplomacy is simply this:

Money.

Everything, from map information through to giving settlements, amounts to a certain amount of money. To help the AI tell you how much it wants, always consider adding: "Give 100 gold" to your proposal. If the AI disagrees it can give you a counter-offer, however if you dont, the AI unfortunately does not take the liberty. So make combined requests!

It seems the AI is stupid and only answers in 1 single way, is because most players only ask in 1 way. You can also go too far though, especially if they come to you: They're usually one interested in 1 thing ( say, map information), and turn down all combined requests.

As for the,

Senate,

yes the missions were enjoyable but some were all-or-nothing: If you have 1 assassin far away from home but within striking distance (up to 3 turns of walking) of an enemy general, you can get a murder-request with for example a 66% chance.
If your assassin fails, you fail, but it can be impossible to then complete the mission in any way, as new assassins are usually not good enough. Meanwhile, the senate persists and asks again, severe penalties for a chance process, especially on higher difficulties.

On a similar note, other players have reported some towns to be way outside striking distance, sometimes behind 2 or 3 others towns, for similar reasons.

But thanks for posting, Guy.

[Kraxis]

To blockade Bostra, Petra or Thebes is a bit hard if you are confined to the western Med.

[Oaty]

Also what was not mentioned is you actually have to protect a protectorate. Don't know the exact peramiters but heres an example.

Carthage became a protectorate with Palma and Carthago Nova, I threw in Corduba. I held off the Spanish miltitarily but they bribed both Carthago Nova and Corduba(bankrupting themselves in the process) well I retook both Corduba and Carthago Nova but unfortanately I could not give them back because I had no diplomat on Palma. So Carthage came and attacked Carthago Nova. I reloaded abandoned and let the city rebel. I finally got them back to Carthage.

So I think it's programmed you cannot own cities that they owned once the protectorate was made, otherwise they can reclaim them(breaking off the protectorate.

Playing as the Julii I only had Caralis and sacked Corduba from the Spanish to sweeten the deal. I was able to make the deal with only Corduba, but after many reloads I found out that you have to say accept or we will attack from the get go and they took the offer right away. Could have also been my record of sacking looting and making there babies little Romans on the Iberian peninsula and then giving back the city.

[Delwack]

just a note, I'm a relatively new TW player, and I was playing a game as parthia on M/M, and was had a few skirmishes with egpytian forces that I lost. the Egyptians offered that I become their protectorate; which I found interesting. Wanting to see the effect, and not knowing about the protectorate bug until just now, I accepted.

The immidate effect was that war the war with egypt was over, and my armies were free now (I didn't have any other wars going on at the time, I had attacked, captured, and still held a seleucid provence earlier, but had a ceasefire with them since my war with egpyt.) As a protectorate it seemed like I served no purpose. Egypt never asked me for anything. I redecalred war on the seleucids, and took most of provences. As my military was marching through egpyt toward the numidians, I noticed something strange, a number of the egyptian provences had rebelled, and the egyptians didn't appear to be growing at all. Finding this weird, I checked the ranking graphs, I saw that they were broke (finanacial ranking 0), their production ranking was down to 0 also, and well as pretty much powerless (military ranking stuck in a flat line). My guess would be the bug that afflicted protectorates was present. However, right after agreeing to become a protectorate, I recieved no "extra" income from egpyt (money was tight when I first became egpyt's protectorate, so I was watching my money management fairly cloesly) so apparently only the protecting nation appears to be losing money.

Seeing egypt so weak at that point, I decided to attack them, and nothing in the game stopped me, although it probably killed my diplomatic relations with foreign nations (even though I made sure to cancel all my treaties prior to attacking).

So in conclusion, being a protecotrate apparently doesn't do much right now. Perhaps it was partially becuase of the financial bug, but allowing a player to become a protectorate is an interesting feature, and I would like to understand a protectorate's role in the game more, especially since it doesn't appear to form an unbreakable alliance between the factions.

[Lord Ovaat]

In reference to the above posts concerning needed manual material, I think it would have been cost efficient to have just included everything (most) on one of the 4 disks that came with the game. One disk has nothing but the music, which I guess is pretty neat, but since I'm deaf, I can't say for sure, lol. The wife says it's OK. While a readme wouldn't appease the "casual player/grumbler", it certainly should satisfy the average game owner who reads the forums. Granted, we are a miniscle minority (which is something we should ALWAYS remember), but the community already spends millions (?) of man-hours hunting the various forums looking for info that is unavailable. Be simplier to put in a disk and read/copy it. Yes, it is too late for RTW, but not the inevitable expansion pack and future games.

[_Aetius_]

I got my first ever protectorate on the game earlier it wasnt a senate mission, I was greece and the thracians had two provinces left Tribus Getae and Scythia i destroyed there army until they literally had only 2 or 3 hundred left then demanded they become a protectorate they agreed if i gave them back Thrace I refused but instead offered them 10000 denarii and they accepted.

[Captain Cook]

I totally agree anbout the Prima Strategy Guide. I still find it a useful reference for unit stats. But the rest is half finished. Where are all the stats for the Greek Temples. Other factions have the same prob. no stats for some of the buildings. Seems to me that maybe the writers had no contact with the developers.

No kidding, that prima guide is a complete joke. At least Brady was able to make a halfway-decent one for Medieval: Total War.

[The Stranger]

just promise them a million denarii cause they shouldn't have the might to attack you
after the deal is done cancel the deal and you have an protectorate and your money
it works

ps: a million is most of the time not required but a large sum would help

[m4rt14n]

No need to cancel. Once they are your protectorates, they will give ANY extra lump of money by the end of the round. So you'll get ur full moneys worth albeit minus any constructions that they do by the start of the next turn as a tribute..

pretty stupid IMHO. If i get a million dinarii, ill make sure i spend and hide every bit of it lol.

[The Stranger]

yes but if you're paying a million you probably be broke so i would cancel and then give them a 1000 denarii as a gift to make it up.

[SwordsMaster]

AArhg!!! :furious3:

I had my 1st protectorating experience after 1.2, and I cant say it was good.

In general the AI is much more MTW like, as in it will backstab you as soon as you get your army off the border even if you are allied.

The thing is even worse if you are a protectorate. Yestarday in my Carthage campaign (H-H), I was warring with the gauls in spain when they offer me to become their protectorate. I was at war with pretty much everyone within myreach and I didnt mind freeing up an army or 2, and leaving a secured front, so I bargained for money, maps, women, etc and accepted.

That was during their turn. Can you guess what was their very next action the same turn? Blockading Carthage Nova port.

I thought: Ok, maybe the order was already issued a while ago and it didnt change it for whatever reason, so I turned back my retiring troops to reinforce my garrisons and keep the gauls busy....

A few turns later, same offer with same end result. Their next action: besieging Corduba.... :furious3:

At this point my whole diplomatic advisors together with my high military command and my priests of Baal feel like cursing and grabbing our testicles (each his own, that is), but I am able to defeat the gauls at Corduba although it costs me half of the garrison (free tip: dont put too many expectations on Town militias...)

So, to my point? please can someone tell me if this is inherent to the 1.2 version? To me being carthage? to me being so good-looking?

Is the diplomacy just supposed to be like this, maybe?

Thanks for your attention. :bow:

[Epistolary Richard]

Using v1.2 huge m/m Egyptians I've had some good success with protectorates.

Usually it's been a matter of beating them back to a single city and then offering them Protectorate, Map info, giving them back their starting provinces and (on sunsmountains' advice) offering 100d (which they would normally counter-offer at c.10,000d).

In this way, I've taken the Seleucids and Pontus in the first decade or so. They've been sending money back, keeping me in the black despite an overpowered army.

It's allowed me to keep my armies in the field rather than on garrison duties and I've not had to worry about the increasing distance to capital modifier.


Problems I've had,
- I wanted to try and rebuild the Seleucids quickly and tried to gift them 1000d. Big mistake, they broke the alliance -> reload.
_But_ all the provinces I returned to the Selecuids were left undefended for a couple of turns and the Armenians nipped into Hatra. I retook it and gifted it back to the Seleucids and this time they accepted.

Now, I'm trying the same thing with the Armenians; however, they are proving a bit thorny. I'm beseiging their last city of Artaxarta but they're still refusing the protectorate.

I'm thinking this could be for a few reasons:

1) Artaxarta has got a full stack - albeit of weak infantry.

2) They still have a half-stack army with a couple of characters in the field and so they're not feeling pummelled enough.

3) Ever since Hatra, the Armenians have been at war with the Seleucids and so this might be one of those "We won't ally with an ally of our enemy" kind of things. But, normally when that happens you don't get the Alliance option, whereas I'm still getting the Protectorate option.

4) I might have a low standing with them as I started the war after demanding the return of Hatra. But, this didn't stop Pontus from accepting the Protectorate, plus I'm not getting a 'dishonesty' rejection from them.

Anyone know which one of these four might be the stumbling block?

Or have any ideas for:
1) reducing a stack inside a town without taking the town?
3) arranging a ceasefire between two other factions?
4) improving my standing with the Armenians whilst still being at war?


I think I might have to take the old Asterix's village approach and build a couple of forts to block their roads, then come back in a few years to see if they've lightened up at bit.

[The Stranger]

never had i have 3 protectorates now and they never attacked me

i did find some bugs

1 they won't conquer countries anymore
2 you can't built forts in their territory
3 the money they give you is too much. i mean 3 PRotectorates are good for 100 million denarii

[Orvis Tertia]

Has there ever been any official word about how protectorate is supposed to work? I would like to see something from the developers saying "this is how protectorate is supposed to work, and this is how we envisioned people using it."

[The Stranger]

yes maybe but my method works fine

[SpencerH]

Without details from CA, its difficult to know if the protectorates are indeed working as envisioned. They are, however, at least working in 1.2 which is a step in the right direction. I now have two established. The first was fairly standard and logical. The most recent, with the Julii, triggered ceasefires with SPQR and the Brutii (Scipii are gone). While it cost me 27000 and the return of Segestae I gained more than 200000 immediately (which was a stunning surprise and seems a bit crazy since I just gave them money) and 30000/turn tribute (so far).

[The Stranger]

it's just unfair that they don't pay with their own money but with money of the box full of gold at the end of the rainbow.

[brutii_warrior]

hey listen to this....

alright, i was the brutti faction and i had that ah... purple army to the east down to one province.
i had three very skilled generals and i had most of the globe taken already(11 provinces to go)
they didn't have any allies and had no port.

i demanded multi times for them to be slaves and they kept giving me that damn freedom speech.

can i adjust this so they surrender their men as slaves?

[RollingWave]

My experience and analysis so far....

It seems odd but i find that the factions on the brink of annihiliation almost never accepts, which brings up the other end of hte problem... the factions that accept are often quiet stronger once o_O or ask for rather ridiculas deals.

In my First game as the Brutties the Egyptian were willing to accept... IF i gave them back 10+ provinces......... they had one city left in the desert between Babylon and Anitoch.... ok.... no thx i'll just kill you.

The next time i got a protectrate to really work was in my Carthage campaign, I had around 23 province and the Brits agreed to become my protectrate .... the thing is the Brits were the big winner in the Barbarian slugfest and since I took all the Roman heat they were free to take most of Gaul Germania and Dacia... they have 20 province when they accepted !!!!! they were in the top 4 in terms of power and probably the 3rd biggest in terms of number of province. and i really had nothing on them, my main army was still sluging away against the Romans on Italy while i had very little naval presence in the Atalantic, they were Seiging Numitia and i didn't even think I could relieft it not to meantion they turn down my offer of lots of goody then accepted a vanilla just become my protectrate deal.

As the Gauls I end up having the Germans and Bruttiis as my protectrate, both notablly happend right after I scored major victories against them. both still had a lot of fight in them but gave in never the less.

Now as the Selucides I got Egypt and Macedon as my protectrate (Macedon broke away after i took Thrace) Egypt had 8 province and Macedon had 7 when they accepted... The Eggies gave in really fast as my army took Sidon and massacered their attempt to retake it, then offer them to give Sidon back... The Macedonians gave in also after a disastorous defeat where they used 2000 men in 3 stacks to hit my 1 full stack of around 1000 but lost horriblly killing less than 50 of my men)

My conclusions so far:
1. They are most likely to accept after you defeat them in a big victory. this was true to me getting Macedon and Egypt, both accepted within 2 turns after a big X battle happend. same with the Germans and Brutties in my Gaul game, the only case where this wasn't true was the Brits when I was Carthage.

2. They are most likely to accept if they have somwhere else to expand to, so if you are surronding them they are less likely to give in, this might explain why the 1 city dieing factions rarely give in ...

3. I am not sure if this matters, but I usually ask first... if they dont agree i threaten, if they still don't agree i attack, then rinse and repeat, it seems to help.

4. As soon as they don't give you lectures and say things like "the gift is not heavy enough" or "we can't make this decision" things like that, they are on the verge of accepting so just change around ur offers a bit . usually i find that vanilla deals work out the best for some odd reason, only the Egyptians were more of an exception to the case.

[demon rob]

Should protectorates count as a cheat since they return ridiculous amounts of money? The amounts that people are receiving just sounds wrong in a competitive game sense.

[RollingWave]

Protectrate seems like a thing in the game that helps you to finish the game quicker, however it has some weird behaviours that often don't make sense.

[Divinus Arma]

[QUOTE=Epistolary Richard]
1) reducing a stack inside a town without taking the town?
3) arranging a ceasefire between two other factions?
4) improving my standing with the Armenians whilst still being at war?
[QUOTE]

I found the following two-step method of reducing a stack in a town to be useful:

1. Besiege. For as long as you are willing to wait. When the town is a turn or two from sallying or falling, lift the siege. Then siege again. Repeat as necessary.

2. While besieging, when you have the expendable resources, send in suicide squads to reduce the military population with futile assaults.

To provide an example: I wanted Gaul as a Protectorate and they were down to one city with a full stack and one loose general with no army. The faction leader was inside the city. I besieged the city and bribed the loose general. On my very next turn, I used the bribed general to hire several mercenaries, mostly warband and spanish precursers to Roman Legionaires. I also equipped the bribed general with one unit of seige equipment (a balista if I recall correctly). Using this newly formed army as a suicide squad, I besieged the city and immediately assaulted without waiting to build battering rams.

The objective of the bribed/mercenary suicide army was simple. Kill and die and avoid killing Gaul's general in the city (because if the faction leader died, then good bye Gaul). The suicide army killed half the enemy army and were destroyed in the process. Anytime a Gaul general would throw himself at my suicide army, I would undermine my army by making them run and fight a different unit of Gaul or by clicking "route" if absolutely necessary.

Yes, I lost the battle. But sometimes when you lose, you win. Their stack was cut in half. At the conclusion of the battle, I was able to turn Gaul into a protectorate by offering them one of their conquered territories back as well as a little cash.

As for your other questions, I have no clue.

Regards.

[mrdarklight]

---so if lower officials are killed somehow, say in a freak gardening accident---

The authorities said it's best just to leave it unsolved.

[brutii_warrior]

has anyone ever gained a protectorate as the romans?

i'm thinking that maybe the romans can't take protectorates but could become protectorates.

what do you guys think?
:duel:

[Dutch_guy]

I've had the Macedonians and Egyptians as protectorates as the Brutii( egypt in 1.1 for map information ~;) ) so it is definatley possible, also I've seen the AI Julii have Gaul as protectorate and thus not expanding, so yes Brutii_Warrior it's possible

[Malrubius]

has anyone ever gained a protectorate as the romans?



Just today I finished a 1.2 campaign as the Julii with several protectorates. The Britons became my protectorate after I took Londoninium and gave them a few thousand denarii. The Celtiberians accepted my offer of protection and 710 denarii after defeating them in a couple of major battles, even though I was outnumbered and surrounded on the peninsula. But I couldn't get the Gauls to accept because they wanted 4 provinces I took from them, and would take nothing else. The Greeks would refuse unless I gave Greece back to them (all they had left was Syracuse).

Today was the most unusual. With 48 provinces under my control, and 3 spies in Rome, Flavius the Cunning (my original faction leader, 68 years old and wanting to claim the title 'Imperator' before he died) and his son Quintus the Attacker led a small force to Rome, leaving most of the army behind to defend Ariminium from a substantial SPQR force just outside the city (but not beseiging--just biding their time until I became outlawed, I suppose).

My spies had a ~50% chance to open the gates, but failed, so Flavius was left between Rome and a huge army within striking distance, and was suddenly outlawed and at war with SPQR, Brutii, and Scipii, who outnumbered me greatly on the Italian peninsula. What to do in this situation but apply diplomacy?

Two of my top diplomats obtained ceasefires from the Brutii and Scipii, who grumbled but acknowledged my superior might. Then I approached the SPQR stack outside Ariminium and got them to accept Protectorate status right away. This put me back in the good graces of the Senate, at least as high as the other two factions, and they gave me another mission.

I conquered a province from the Seluecids, to get me to the magic 50 number. But I did not own Rome, so no victory march. The Senate disbanded their big stack outside Ariminium (kind of disappointing, since I was looking forward to a big fight with them) and sent most of their army in Rome towards the east, leaving only a general in Latium, who fell pretty quickly once I attacked Rome. Got the victory march this time. ~:)


This campaign also saw the Brutii lay seige to Thessalonica an uncountable number of times (because I would play an hour, save, shut off the game, and come back the next day or so to play another hour).

[General Carnage]

Protectorates are almost as buggy as Testudo.

[The Stranger]

are you using 1.2 patch

[brutii_warrior]

dude do you not like testudo?

cuz i think it's awsome. it's a nice addition to rome and that's part of the reason why rome is better (in my opion) than medieval totlawar.
:duel:

[WesW]

After receiving a mission to make Macedon a protectorate, I sent a diplomat to their only remaining city, only to find that there was no option available for proposing or demanding a protectorate. What do I need to do?
Everything here deals with gaining acceptance of the proposal, not how to make the option itself appear.

Thanks for your help, guys.

[Malrubius]

After receiving a mission to make Macedon a protectorate, I sent a diplomat to their only remaining city, only to find that there was no option available for proposing or demanding a protectorate. What do I need to do?
Everything here deals with gaining acceptance of the proposal, not how to make the option itself appear.


If you're at war with them, that should be enough to get the option. It will be last on the list of demands: "Become Protectorate".

[sheelba]

I never managed to gain a protectorate before the new patch. Since then it has all been different. Playing the Carthaginians, I payed no attention to Iberia at first. The Gauls then attacked me at sea and I sank all of his fleets in the next three turns. I then sent a diplomat and they became my protectorate. I then marched an army into Spanish lands, distroyed one spanish army and they became my protectorate.

Playing the Brutti, I fought three land engagements against the Macedonians. All on the Adriatic coast. They then became my protectorate.

I have found protecting my allies, to be the most challenging part of a game. When your nearst city is Cordoba and the Britons are besieging Narbo, then you have to move fast and hard to save your Gallic allies.

Like many others, I find that powers who have been beaten badly, lost many provinces to you and been humiliated in the field would rather die than surrender. My stategy for gain protectorates relies on making alliances with other powers soas to split them from my enemy. If I beat someone a few times and I am part of a league of allies aligned against that power, or if another big power declares war against them they are likely to agree.

As to money, I have found it a very enriching experience to have protectorates. I lost 20,000 p.a. when the Senate declared war on another protectorate who I sided with. However, this fluctuates, and sometimes I am bleeding to death. If you want to make money from you protectorates, I would say protect them.

I once contrlled 27 provinces but only ruled 8! This allows new gaols and plans. Now I want to rule the world. But I dont care how long it takes. I want to see how few provinces I can do it with.

[saddletank]

I'm at war with my own protectorate.

I am playing the Julii campaign and it's 186bc, v1.2. I have defeated the Gauls, Britons, part of Germania and Iberia and have moved down into Numidia. I have 32 provinces. This has brought me into contact with the Scipii who have taken Carthage. About 3 years ago the Senate outlawed me, then in the next 2 turns they went completely barking and outlawed both the other Roman families as well :) So technically all 4 Roman factions were at war with the other three :) :).

I took Rome about 2 years ago, and caught those nutty old senators just in time before they lost it completely and outlawed everybody on the planet. I attacked and defeated 2 large Scipii armies outside Carthage. I then offered the Scipii protectorate status which they accepted and my number of provinces jumped to 40. However the very next turn (last turn) the Scipii attacked me again, and I have counterattacked this turn. I am blockading all their ports and have spies and assassins causing mayhem in their 3 North African cities so they must be hurting financially but they are still my protectorate. I did a savegame and then sent a diplomat and offered a ceasefire. They accepted but I lost protectorate status over them. I'd rather stay at war with them and retain ownership of their 8 provinces than have peace and lose 8 so I went back to that savegame and am continuing on... It strikes me that if they go on the offensive in Numidia and take (say) Cirta I won't technically lose it as it'll become owned by my own protectorate.

Surely this can't be right and the game has got it's knickers in a twist somehow?

[HarunTaiwan]

I have a game where my protectorates break alliance with me when I attack a third country...I thought protectorates couldn't do that?

[player1]

How to get 100% guaranteed protectorates?

-Have the enemy, with no seiges currently active
-Save the game
-Load the game
-Ask for protectorate


The worst exploit I wittnessed.
Long live save/load bug.

[Folcumbane]

How to get 100% guaranteed protectorates?

-Have the enemy, with no seiges currently active
-Save the game
-Load the game
-Ask for protectorate


The worst exploit I wittnessed.
Long live save/load bug.


That doesn't work always. But, I'm playing RTR.

[player1]

I think you should not have active sieges against that faction too.

[imdWALRU5]

I never ask anybody to be my protectorate, its a huge financial burden and its mostly useless. I just wipe them off the face of the earth! ~D

[dismal]

Let me reiterate that it sure would be nice if we had some definitive answer as top what protectorate's are supposed to do.

In my last game, I got two of them with minimal effort. I was Scipii on VH/VH and contolled about 37 provinces. The Senate told me to blockade a German port, I did it. Next turn I sent an army into Germany for the first time. Never attacked a city, never had a battle. I then asked them to be a protectorate, and they accepted. I checked my financials and could see no change to my tributes, in or out. My province count went up to around 45.

Since this worked so painlessly, I tried the same deal with Pontus on the next turn. They basically owned all of Turkey. They had blockaded me at Rhodes so we were at war, but they had never attacked me. I had taken away Halicanarsus a few turns before just to get the wonder. So, anyway, they said give back Halicanarsus* and we'll be your protectorate. Now I'm at around 55 provinces.

Couple turns later I take Rome, game over.

Sure saved time in the endgame, which isn't a bad feature, but otherwise it seemed to have no detectable effect.

* I don't recall getting a "wonder lost" message when I gave away Halicanarsus. Nor do I recall getting a "wonder captured" message for that other wonder next door. I wonder if you get wonder credit for wonders in your protectorates. Probably not, I imagine.

[HarunTaiwan]

Wait until XP, then they might explain it.

I've gotten way too many easy protectorates...Egypt - all I had to do was give back the one city I took of theirs...and they were a powerhouse.

[brutii_warrior]

yeah, protectorate is wierd.

for the first time i got a protectorate(numidia) and it's been 50 years since then they are still my protectorate but i dont seem to be getting much out of the deal.

i had to pay them 315,000 of my 590,000 denari to get them as a protectorate and have seen no benifit.

every time they declare war on someone i feel obligated to pound the hell out of their enemy so they dont lose any men or waste any denari.

i thought protectorates were suposed to give you all their left over denari.

p.s. i have the game set for 3,000 years bc and 100 ad.
(i like a long powerful game.)

[bubbanator]

I have a question about protectorates...

Hypothetical Scenario: Say you own the city of Rome and nothing else. If you organize enough protectorates, can you win the game when holding only one city?

[Conqueror]

In my Seleucid campaign I've recently aquired Armenia as protectorate. I actually gave them more than just their old lands back, I also let them take over two formerly Parthian provinces that I was holding. That gave Armenia complete control over the Caucasus, creating a very nice and convenient buffer zone between my eastern lands and the Scythians (whom I'm at war with). Once Armenia gets their economy going again (should help that I'm giving them regular tribute) I might give them some territories in northern Balkans to further the buffer zone idea.

I only had to ask them two times to get them to agree, they were down to 1 city and surrounded from all sides, I killed their faction leader who was out patrolling with an army. I offered them 100000 denarii and 1000 for 15 turns as well as their lands + 2 Parthian provinces.

Maybe I'll try to get the SPQR to become protectorate too, that would be kinda funny if they'd be forced to tell Scipii and Julii to stop attacking me ~D

[Wishazu]

on my current greek campaign, the thracians are protectorates of both myself and dacia, is this normal?

[PseRamesses]

In general it seems to be a lot easier to get a protectorate in the initial phase of an conflict, just beat them a couple of turns and leave their lands and cities unspoiled will almost certainly gain you a protectorate. While when you go to great extent of reducing their empire by beating them over and over, raising their cities, killing off their family members will almost never get you a protectorate. This seems unlogical to say the least doesn´t it?

[bubbanator]

In general it seems to be a lot easier to get a protectorate in the initial phase of an conflict, just beat them a couple of turns and leave their lands and cities unspoiled will almost certainly gain you a protectorate. While when you go to great extent of reducing their empire by beating them over and over, raising their cities, killing off their family members will almost never get you a protectorate. This seems unlogical to say the least doesn´t it?


Not in the least does it seem unlogical. If someone has the ability to beat you but is not showing the intent to wipe you off the face of the Earth, you would be more willing to accept protectorate status than if they had killed your friends and family and had reduced your empire to single city.

And besides that, if you had already gone through all the trouble of annihalating their empire and they had one city left, just take it and burn it to the ground.

[sunsmountain]

The money disappearing bug with protectorates seems to have been fixed, i've seen a couple of protectorates so far and no dropping to 0 in the financial ranking.

The single most important ranking during diplomatic negotiations is your military, always check that. The initial post by Guy also reveals how to get a Protectorate:
"This mission is only issued if the target faction has < 4 settlements and < 5 family members"

In summary:
- No spies, no assassins in their territory (once you're done killing of family members and causing rebellions/unrest)
- Blockading their ports might help, it also may not
- Add in map information, trade rights, 100 gold & cities they used to have only to switch them for gold during negotiation
OR
- Threaten to attack with stacks in provinces next to their provinces (ie on but not inside their borders)
- Get one of them epic battle markers against them
- Check their military ranking in the graphs. It must be below you, and preferably the lowest.
- 3 settlements or less, 4 family members or less.

[Midnj]

I don't know about anyone else, but I get 10k a turn from Numidia as Carthage and they own dirt-poor provinces.

My only complaint about protectorates is that I'm getting _too_ much money... such that the AI doesn't seem to have any left for itself to do important things such as... oh I don't know... garrisoning their cities?

It would also be nice if the protected state would at least keep enough of its income (rather than passing it on) to build a small army to deal with rebels and such.

What is annoying about this is if you gift a protected state, it will return it all the next turn as tribute. Stupid.

[Muska Burnt]

for some reason protectorates come easy for me in my greece campaign i had around 3 or 4 but they always brake off since their allies make me mad so i attack their allies witch i think works out better since i would get like 5 settlements in the process

[nameless]

Some things I don't understand about the protectorate status. As the Scipii I managed to get the last Spanish city to surrender to me. Next turn I got like $200,000 added into my coffers which I quickly used up in constructions to avoid the 50,000 thingy. Now I only get like 400 - 800 Denaris from them. What dictates the amount of money they have to pay to you?

Another bad thing is that their allied to the last nations that are still standing, (The non-roman nations of course), I think there should be a command which you can use to tell them to break off their alliances.

[bubbanator]

I have found protectorates to be a nusiance for that very reason. They ally with the people you are planning on killing! I don't usualy take protectorates just because they hold me back, slow down my empire. The only time that I might take one is if I am playing as a faction with a slow starting economy and the jump-start that they give will speed up my military growth. After that, I just forget about them and continue with my plans. If this means killing them or their allies then so be it. I would rather have their cities to build me more troops than for them to be giving me a few hundred denarii per turn.

[sunsmountain]

Some things I don't understand about the protectorate status. As the Scipii I managed to get the last Spanish city to surrender to me. Next turn I got like $200,000 added into my coffers which I quickly used up in constructions to avoid the 50,000 thingy. Now I only get like 400 - 800 Denaris from them. What dictates the amount of money they have to pay to you?

I am not even sure if you're supposed to get money from them at all, except their faction's treasury of course (if they have one).

This is one for Guy (hatcat) to answer though.... we're clueless



Another bad thing is that their allied to the last nations that are still standing, (The non-roman nations of course), I think there should be a command which you can use to tell them to break off their alliances.

you can't send a diplomat to them and "break alliance", and you can't order one of your stacks to lay siege to one of their cities? I find that hard to believe.

Besides, those (3 max) regions already count as conquered. Why conquer them at all?

[gws226]

hmmmmmm....

first thanks for everyone posting their thoughts on this matter. I've encountered my first "make protectorate" issue from the senate.

Selucdia...... 1 territory left, decent army.

I have them surround, 4 huge armies sitting infront of their capital, port blockaded. and my best diplomate negociating...... 6 U's I think.

I've tried offering different combos to get them to bite..... but no love.

cash/map info/ their old territories back etc etc... no luck.

I've gone from one extreme to the other.... I just tried offering 10,000 per turn for 1000 turns, map info, and 38 territories to see if they would bite.... nothing.

is this senate mission a lost cause? I was thinking of sending in an army to soften them up, then withdrawing before I win the battle to weaken the forces a bit, but that seems almost as unrealistic as offering them 10,000,000 + 28 terrotires.

Advice appreciated

[rs2k2]

bah, if you cant get them to accept, kill them off and the senate will deem ur mission irrelevant or something along those lines

[Ciaran]

you can't send a diplomat to them and "break alliance", and you can't order one of your stacks to lay siege to one of their cities? I find that hard to believe.

Besides, those (3 max) regions already count as conquered. Why conquer them at all?

No, you can´t, which is a damned shame. You know, even Master of Magic, that really ancient game had that option, and it´s diplomacy was way less complex than Rome´s.
And another thing I noticed, playing with non-Romans for the first time: While I was playing the Romans, it didn´t matter whether a faction I had made my protectorate had alliances with one I wanted to go to war with, I got told I broke my alliance with my protectorate, but on the diplomacy screen it was still mine, as were the regions. Now, playing with the Seleucids, I got into the same situation, I wanted to go to war with Dacia, which was allied to my protectorates Parthia and Thrace, I got the same message (broken alliance and all) but this time, I really lost my protectorates :furious3:

[bubbanator]

No, you can´t, which is a damned shame. You know, even Master of Magic, that really ancient game had that option, and it´s diplomacy was way less complex than Rome´s.

Actualy, you can cancel alliances. In the diplomacy screen just hit, 'cancel alliance' and then hit the 'inform ally of changes' button that is right next to the 'give as a gift' button.

I know because I use it all the time. I just cancel an alliance and then attack them with several armies that I had built up in advance. Works like a charm...

Not sure about your other problem though, your protectorates should turn against you if you attack someone that they are allied with. That is one of the many reasons that I avoid them at all costs unless I am in desperate need. They usualy just backstab you anyways. Usualy I just crush the faction and take their land.

If I do actualy take them as my protectorate, I just forget about them and treat them as I would any other neutral faction. If they are in my way, I just take their land and finish them off. If I want their land I take it. They get no special treatment.

It is easier just to take their cities and finish them off than to let them rebuild and attack you again later...

[Ciaran]

I know I can cancel my own alliances, what I´m talking about is getting one faction to cancel its alliance with a third party.

[Kralizec]

In my last RTR campaign as the Romans, I launched a suprise blitzkrieg attack on Carthage and took Carthago and another big city nearby. Lilybaum plus the Sardinian and Corsican islands were already taken from them in a previous war.
In my negotiations I eventually offered them back Carthago and the other African city, plus 9000 cash and demanded them to become a protecorate. To my surprise they accepted. I then got like +11 provinces on the faction screen. They were apparently running in debt at first because I got no tribute, but later on they started getting their finances sorted and gave me about 3700 denarii each turn.

Having Carthage as a protectorate rather then just conquering all of it is handy because they'll rule those provinces for you. Some of their provinces are very far away from your capital and are of a different culture so will be hard to keep, and even harder to make them churn out a profit. Turning them into a protectorate brings me closer to the 50 provinces mark and assures that a get a nice profit from them too~:cheers:

Now I'm playing with the thought of sending something like 3 stacks of troops by navy to the Seleucids or Ptolemies (Egyptians) and turn them into a protectorate the same way...well, maybe after I finished those insolent Macedonians who just attacked me:devilish:

[JeromeGrasdyke]

Strijder has hit the nail on the head as far as the underlying reasoning for Protectorates is concerned. It's inherently more efficient in terms of overall cash generation and military resource usage because of reduced corruption and better public order in distant provinces... although you may not always see a net tribute surplus appear on your balance sheet, because that's highly dependent on the protectorate faction's own spending.

The key factors which determine whether a faction will accept a protectorate are:
* do you have territory which borders his (there must be at least one region-to-region border)
* superior overall faction vs faction military strength
* superior production capability (a combination of more settlements and a minimum amount of money)
* impending threat (enough force inside its provinces or in neighbouring provinces which you own)

Hopefully that clarifies matters a little. Engaging in sieges does not add to the decision and may cause the Protectorate to fail immediately when it's accepted (a substantial chance). As far as Tribute is concerned, each turn a Protectorate faction pays you in tribute the complete contents of its treasury above a certain maintenance amount for garrison armies and slow-but-steady city improvement. And yes, this means that small, rich nations are quite desireable as Protectorates...

[dismal]

Thanks, this the stuff it's great to know and is hard to figure out.

[SomeNick]

Thankyou for this HatCat and Jerome.

I have read many topics on this but they always seemed to lack the grit so to speak, due to not knowing all the factors.

Strategy games are funny. All of this makes sense, like having a large army sitting in the province etc when wheeling and dealing with another faction, which seems obvious, but unfortunately for me treating the Ai as Ai and not intuitively as RTW seems to have a bit of, I have blundered a lot!

Cheers ,

~:cheers:

[Kralizec]

My biggest beef with protectorates is that when you attack a faction wich is allied to your protectorate, the protectorate will fall. Very annoying.
Of course I can pound my former protecotrate into submission again and make them a protectorate again, but then I will ceasefire with the faction I declared war on earlier!
Personally I think that since I am the protectorate's master and because they exist only at my whim, I should have the last say in their diplomacy. Meaning, that if I chose to declare war on one of its allies, they will let that faction down and stick with me.

[gardibolt]

I don't know about that. They're not your robots or your slaves. They are still their own people, unconquered. When you attack their friends, how do you think they ought to react? It seems natural to me that they would reject your protectorateship in that circustance. Why would they put up with that? They are paying you after all, and would see this as you using their own money to betray their friends. I'd be ticked off in their position too.

[Arcanum]

I don't know about that. They're not your robots or your slaves. They are still their own people, unconquered. When you attack their friends, how do you think they ought to react? It seems natural to me that they would reject your protectorateship in that circustance. Why would they put up with that? They are paying you after all, and would see this as you using their own money to betray their friends. I'd be ticked off in their position too.

In the case of Rome, protectorates were actually their slaves. If I understand the meaning of protectorate translated in german correctly, the protectorates in the old times were actually puppets, not allowed to do anything without asking their masters.

[Brutal DLX]

The key factors which determine whether a faction will accept a protectorate are:
* do you have territory which borders his (there must be at least one region-to-region border)
* superior overall faction vs faction military strength
* superior production capability (a combination of more settlements and a minimum amount of money)
* impending threat (enough force inside its provinces or in neighbouring provinces which you own)

Hopefully that clarifies matters a little..

Jerome, it clarifies matters a little indeed, but could you expand on this in more specific detail? What is the superiority level required, as since the BI version came out, I have been unsuccessful to negotiate one single protectorate...

Also it seems to me that the factors the AI looks at are a bit insufficient, the numer of battles won recently against the would-be protector as well as the number of territories lost to them should factor in as well.
A strange example is the Western Roman Empire demanding of me to become a protectorate every 4 turns or so without any actual means to enforce their will upon my faction (for example the Alemanni), they have fought about 20 or 30 battles versus me and have not won a single one. Gameplay- as well as strategy-wise it looks rather weird to have the cheek to demand protectorate status if you cannot seem to win against that faction's army.
Another example that illustrates the problems I see with this part of the diplomacy would be in the original campaign, when I played as Macedonia, I allied with Greece and got backstabbed 2 turns later, they took one city, in turn I re-took it and took all their mainland settlements. One turn later, a Greek diplomat appears and wants my faction to become a protectorate.
Surely a strange occurance?
The final critic I have about the protectorates and the negotiation thereof is the fact that often, when you elect to bow to their demands and become a protectorate, the protector will attack again after some turns without any provocation from my side. This surely must be an overlooked issue in the AI coding, as I can't see any logic behind a protector attacking its protectorate if it behaved peacefully.

[Rilder]

heres a little guide i wrote to making a protectorship

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=57330