Protectorates

[Sun Tzui]

I was thinking of gathering any useful info on getting other factions to become your protectorates in this thread.

Now for starters, as far as i know both in BI and RTW, any faction will become your protectorate for 1 Million denarii, their provinces count as your own for victory purposes, you get their money surplus every turn besides military access.

As far i know they can stop being your protectorate if they agree to become protectorate for another faction or if you attack them.

I believe the only other way to getting them to agree to being your protectorate is to be bigger than them, and they can only have 1 general, and therefore cannot risk losing him in battle and face extinction.

Hope i could be of use, i will welcome any input you might have on this subject.

~:grouphug: ~:cheers:

[Ludens]

Hatcat explained some of the requirements for a protectore in this thread (https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=39287). I find that I can get them to become protectorate after offering back one or two cities and a bag of cash. Still, they always break protectorate-status when you attack one of their allies, and since you get auto-cease-fire with all their allies upon gaining the protectorate this can really curb your conquering plans.

[Ciaran]

From my experience, to make a protectorate you´ve got to be both strong and fast, the AI won´t agree to a protectorate after a thirty years war. Gather up a couple of large armies, besiege a couple of settlements at the same time and keep some cash ready, that should increase your chances.

[Mooks]

I created a thread a while ago where I got 7 protectorates. The diplomacy system is flawed though so it gets lame. The one thing I advise though...Dont share a border with your protectorate, they will attack you if they have the chance.

(Im going to make a thread in the forums about this)

[Zalmoxis]

Diplomacy is such a mess in RTW, the only way to win is to kill everyone.

[Avicenna]

Holy, what version are you playing? I've never had a protectorate attack me (admittedly I've only ever had 2 protectorates) on RTW 1.2 I think. Always shared a border with them, and had a long war with the Greeks. I was at war with them since the 3rd turn in RTR, after asking for a ceasefire on turn 1. I took all of Carthage's starting cities before even going over the sea to fight the Greeks on Greece itself. So, it was a very long war, and I destroyed a few stacks and took something like 1 or 2 settlements from them on Greece. Had them as a protectorate for ages, they never attacked me.

[Ciaran]

Me neither, and I think in order to get a protectorate you have to share a border, according to the Ludus Magna thread concerning protectorates.
However, Protectorates do break away if you attack their allies, the same way as you´ll seemingly always lose your allies when one faction is allied both to you and a faction you´re attacking.

Allies, on the other hand, have a nasty habit of backstabbing you, they keep doing that all the time. In my Egypt campaign a while back, the Seleucids even proposed an alliance to me only to attack me in the following turn. About that, however I complain much less than about the whole protectorate mess-up.
Oh, here´s a few quotes from the ancient "Lords of Magic" which fit pretty well here:

In this wretched world never underestimate the power of an enemy or the potential treachery of a friend

and

Treat allies as you would a fickle lover: Pursue gently, handle carefully, watch them constantly and never forget that they can turn on you in the blink of an eye