RTW: Protectorate?

I was wondering what the benefit of having a protectorate in RTW is. I recently had the Gauls become my protectorate (Brutii), even though they had a large empire already. Firstly, are protectorates just the one city/region, or is it the whole of the group (ie. in this case, just Ariminium/Umbria, or all of the Gauls?), and secondly, is there any real benefit? The Gauls recently attacked my back door so the whole point is moot at the moment, but for future reference it would be nice to know. Thanks in advance.

Somebody wrote a good guide on diplomacy. Think it's in the guide section.

It says: There's plenty of advantage to being a protectorate, but none from extending that to anyone else.

I've considered making some Barbarian kingdoms protectorates, on the theory that it might make rival Roman factions less likely to attack them.

What happens when another faction becomes a protectorate?

I've tried many times to make it happen but they always give me a speech about freedom and refuse. I once had the English down to one city, I had a full army of post-Marius monsters parked outside their capital, and I offered them almost 50,000 bucks plus my world map and still they refused.

I'm just curious what exactly having a protectorate means in game terms. Does it mean you are simply allies? Can the peace be broken in the future? Do you control and govern their cities? Can you build their troops?

Well, one "advantage" is that it can be a bottomless pit. Someone posted recently about the AI taking all of their money on the turn following them being made a protectorate for 12,000. I think he lost 1 million denarii. Seems to be some sort of bug.

Ouch. Heh. Not fun.

But bugs aside, assume it was working as intended, why would I want to make someone my protectorate as opposed to conquering their heathen lands and slaughtering all who oppose (which is much more fun btw ~:cool: )

Historically protectorates were lands which could be taxed heavily in exchange for military protection. They had no standing armies of their own, only town militias as police forces. So Rome created them all over the Mediterranean as a big (but eventually dwindling) source of income.

In RTW it doesn't seem to work that way. You make someone a protectorate, and either 1) they take ALL your money (the buggy version), or 2) they take nothing, but give you nothing in return for your military protection.

Without someone coming forward with a "I found out how Protectorates are supposed to work!" thread (or on the rare chance that CA find and answer one of these questions), I'd say simply ignore the Protectorate option for now. The only thing it does as far as anyone can tell is either rob you blind, or give your protectorate a nice environment to recover from your attacks in.