Forming a Empire, where to start

So obviously several nations will have a few provinces here or there starting out,that's not what this poll is about.

At the start lots of territory is up for grabs. From maps I have seen in videos and screens it seems that Africa, America, Carribean and India seem the major areas to set up colonies. Obviously colonization is a big part, and as resources are not infinite you will probably have to focus in one theatre starting off.

So this poll is to discuss those options. Where would you start your imperial colonization and why?

Again no right or wrong, just a poll to kill some boredom.


As Austria I plan to try for North Africa starting off, then work my way over and hopefully get in some conflicts and form some alliances. I think it's good cause it's close and has useful trades.

Why put all your eggs in one basket? I intend to simply cherrypick the best provinces wherever they are found and not waste resources on the unproductive ones until later.

My thus well-funded navy's total dominance of the seas will ensure no rival can threaten my trade empire whilst I can prevent them doing the same, keeping them away from the lucrative regions and forcing them to scrabble among themselves over the barren territories remaining.

I will build the British Empire the way it was originally envisaged: A loose trade empire, rather than a vast land empire. The mucky business of actually ruling can be left to the natives, I'm just here to sell guns.

To go to Africa with Austria seems logical, although the historical answer for us Austrians would be "I'll attack my next door neighbor" ;)

I dont know... I guess I'll try colonizing in different spots...

Depends on which Faction I am playing of course, but if I am not Britain, I will probably go after any low hanging fruit in the Carribean. Those Sugar islands are prime real estate. Spain will simply need to hold on to what they start with. If Britain, I will concentrate on the riches of India with some small forays into the Carribean. Prussia, Austria, Sweden, Russia, and The Ottomans will mean making life difficult for my continental neighbors for the most part. Not sure what the Dutch will be able to accomplish.

I will be establishing some kind of trading and naval presence in every lucrative little spot in every trade theatre.

Southward ho!
India's my target ;)

Can't vote in the poll yet :sweatdrop:


I'll grab the Dutch East-Indies (if they are in the game) and try to expand it :whip:

There; I added in a "Gah!" option. Much better. ~;p

For me, it really will depend on who I'm playing -- obviously factions like the Dutch and British better lend themselves to a naval/trade empire stratagem, while nations like Austria and Russia will more heavily favor large land empires. (I can't wait to colonize Florida as the Ottomans, though. ~D ) I'll also be keeping an eye on what everyone else is doing, and plan accordingly.

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Originally Posted by Wausser

I'll grab the Dutch East-Indies (if they are in the game) and try to expand it :whip:

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CA has said the East Indies are in as a "trade theater", but you can't actually colonize/conquer them. I'm afraid you'll have to plant your flag somewhere else. :sweatdrop:

I'll probably go for ye olde 'attack my neighbour'. At could actually be more fun in ETW if diplomacy is improved, then it'll finally be possible to be the one gang-beating on a faction instead of being on the recieving end of (usually poor attempt at) a gang-beating.

This is something to ask me on about the 10th of Feb…

I’ll need to get a feel for the possibilities first…but as India, North America, and the Caribbean Islands can have land units, and as I understand it , Africa is a trade theater I will likely want to play with sending troops and worry about Africa when I have spare ships.

India! most definatley, that tasty bit will be a nice attachment to the Republic of Great Britain.

Gah! i will decide while i am installing the game...:shrug:

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Originally Posted by Martok

There; I added in a "Gah!" option. Much better. ~;p

CA has said the East Indies are in as a "trade theater", but you can't actually colonize/conquer them. I'm afraid you'll have to plant your flag somewhere else. :sweatdrop:

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Then the West Indies :smash:


And yeah I'm gonna grab Nieuw Amsterdam(New York) back from the Red Coats

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I’ll need to get a feel for the possibilities first…but as India, North America, and the Caribbean Islands can have land units, and as I understand it , Africa is a trade theater I will likely want to play with sending troops and worry about Africa when I have spare ships.

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Why would Africa be a trade theatre? :inquisitive: Only the southern portion is cut off, you get the whole northern half...

Anyways, for myself, I'll insignificantly plant my little flag here and there. My main concern will be playing around with European politics and allying with various native nations to keep the European scourge off their lands(exception made for myself, of course).

Also, once I get down to playing as a Native American faction, I'll be colonizing Scotland! :wacko:

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Originally Posted by Methuselah

Why would Africa be a trade theatre? :inquisitive: Only the southern portion is cut off, you get the whole northern half...

Anyways, for myself, I'll insignificantly plant my little flag here and there. My main concern will be playing around with European politics and allying with various native nations to keep the European scourge off their lands(exception made for myself, of course).

Also, once I get down to playing as a Native American faction, I'll be colonizing Scotland! :wacko:

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From what we have seen of the map so far I don't think half of Africa is in the game. It seems to be the very Northenmost areas, those North of the Sahara. CA themselves have stated Africa will mainly appear as a naval only trade theatre. It sucks, but that seems to be the truth.

Well, that's too bad. Nonetheless, those Scots will be beaten like beetles beneat the NA boots... er... moccasins, I suppose? :laugh4:

Russia in North America, ruling over the Americans...hows that for counter-factual history!

hmm, I guess I don't understand.

What exactly is a "Trade theatre"? I mean obviously you can't set up colonies but if I can't see it on the map, how is it a trade theatre?

To be honest, I'm not really clear on this myself. Other than that we'll need to devote naval resources to securing its riches, CA hasn't released many details on this aspect of the game yet.

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devote naval resources to securing its riches

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Ugh, I hope this isn't like other games where I have to send my ships off the map for a odd number of turns to return with money. Aka: Tropico 2: Pirate Cove. Ship leaves, when it gets back you get certain amount of money.

"Oh hey, this admiral just got awesome wonderful, oh now you and your fleet have to vanish for the next 30 turns"

That would upset me, hopefully it's just tradeships or something.

Since I am playing as Sweden I will simply defend myself against the aggressive neighboring countries. Maybe expand a little. I will do so by building the largest naval fleet the Baltic Sea has ever seen and smash all resistance consequently not allowing anyone else in the Baltics having more than en arme av typ barkbåtar :inquisitive:

I am going to take control of key navel chokepoints such as the Leeward Islands (let the enmey come to me) and slowly and surley dominate world trade(as my sig would suggest).

nb: i hope that you can't just sail your ship over the atlantic like a motor boat with out taking into account the trade winds, otherwise this won't work

Why bother choosing? Everyone!

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Originally Posted by Methuselah

Well, that's too bad. Nonetheless, those Scots will be beaten like beetles beneat the NA boots... er... moccasins, I suppose? :laugh4:

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Is this an insult!? (look at my location)

Well I have chosen Africa as my spot, I h8 Indian & Indies locations as I h8 jungle warfare &
I just personally h8 America. To answer a question b4, they said they'd be including the Ivory
coast, which was known to have supplies of slaves & of course, Ivory among other goods. I
would have preferred it though if they had included South Africa. I noticed on the campaign
trailer that when they were looking at the Indies, the map was still looking at Europe. This
is quite puzzling, there is a possibility that they hadn't made the map yet for the Indies yet
for some strange reason.

It would be nice to know if you could take control of the Suez & Panama canal in Egypt &
prevent other countries getting through without military access, going to war or they have
to pay a toll to pass through, I believe the latter was what the British control when they
were in puppet rule over Egypt, though my mind is always quite flimsy..

EDIT: http://images.yuku.com/image/pjpeg/a...b29cd6309.pjpg
I found this picture on another forum, the map has North America but I also read an interesting
thing that some1 there has been told by CA that it is going to be a completely seperate
campaign from the rest that you have to unlock. That would be pretty :daisy: but I find it
unlikely.

I am going to focus on a world scale really. Hold smal colonys here and there. Though my main stage if you like, for Major land Conquest inevitably....will probs be North America. And then India. I'v little interest in Africa, and the Spanish can keep the carribbean! As long as they are decent neighbours that is...

Bah. Why go out of my way all the waaaaaaaaaaay over the Ocean there's a massacre to be had when everyone else sends their forces across the sea?

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Originally Posted by Pantsalot

Well I have chosen Africa as my spot, I h8 Indian & Indies locations as I h8 jungle warfare & I just personally h8 America. To answer a question b4, they said they'd be including the Ivory coast, which was known to have supplies of slaves & of course, Ivory among other goods.

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I believe the Ivory Coast is simply another "trade theater" (like the East Indies) and cannot be conquered or colonized. I'll see if I can find the actual quote from CA, but I'm reasonably certain that's the case.

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Originally Posted by Pantsalot

It would be nice to know if you could take control of the Suez & Panama canal in Egypt &
prevent other countries getting through without military access, going to war or they have
to pay a toll to pass through, I believe the latter was what the British control when they
were in puppet rule over Egypt, though my mind is always quite flimsy..

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Actually, neither canal existed at any point during the time period covered by Empire. The Suez didn't open until the late 1850's, and the Panama wasn't finished until 1914 or 1915 (I forget which). So unfortunately that will not be a factor in ETW.

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Originally Posted by Pantsalot

I found this picture on another forum, the map has North America but I also read an interesting
thing that some1 there has been told by CA that it is going to be a completely seperate
campaign from the rest that you have to unlock. That would be pretty :daisy: but I find it
unlikely.

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There's going to be a separate "Road to Independence" campaign (starting with the English founding colonies in North America and eventually leading to America's rebellion against Britain), but you don't have to unlock it. It will be playable from the beginning. ~:)

Gah! Trade everywhere, landgrab in Africa and simultaneously invade two of my neighbors! And I don't autoresolve my battles...

Annie

So I take it you're going to be playing as Prussia first, then?

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

:creep:

well. It is starting to sound like almost everything is a "trade theatre"

Obviously America, Carribean and India can be conquered as I have seen screens...tho don't remeber where.

Other then that I guess africa is up in the air, but I would assume they would include the north african strip they included in RTW, and MTW2, of course I could be wrong.

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Originally Posted by Martok

Actually, neither canal existed at any point during the time period covered by Empire. The Suez didn't open until the late 1850's, and the Panama wasn't finished until 1914 or 1915 (I forget which). So unfortunately that will not be a factor in ETW.

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They'll probably make it an event you have to unlock by researching specific technologies
As I don't think to get to India we would have to go around Africa every single time.

It's still a mystery on how the travel to the next area will be, like the current thought
brought up is that you put your ship to the edge of the sea in the direction of which
continent you're going for, so if they don't ever have the suez canal then that would
be far more likely. But the thing is that if Africa is going to be another trade theatre
than that is really dull the fact that all you can do with it is have trade rights..
It's included in the map of Europe without them slicing off the bottom so I hope you're
wrong as it's just next to Ottomans who would probably be allowed to attack the
tribes down South, & how we Brit's fought the Benin people who also had a good bit
of gold for trade, though I can't really tell if Benin is on the map, probably not really.

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Originally Posted by Pantsalot

They'll probably make it an event you have to unlock by researching specific technologies
As I don't think to get to India we would have to go around Africa every single time.

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I don't know. While it would certainly be convenient if it were possible to "unlock" the Suez, I'll be fairly surprised if that's an option in the game. Of course, one can always hope that that's one of the things CA hasn't told us about yet.... ~:)

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Originally Posted by Pantsalot

It's still a mystery on how the travel to the next area will be, like the current thought
brought up is that you put your ship to the edge of the sea in the direction of which
continent you're going for, so if they don't ever have the suez canal then that would
be far more likely.

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Yeah, so far there's not been much information on how ship travel between "theatres" works. I know CA did say something to the effect that apparently you can view the entire game map at once, and that the three separate maps (Europe, Americas, & India) are merely there for convenience's sake. If that is in fact the case (and I'm remembering the details correctly), then I'd suppose that the player can simply use the large overview map to facilitate ship/fleet movement between the 3 sub-maps.

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Originally Posted by Pantsalot

But the thing is that if Africa is going to be another trade theatre
than that is really dull the fact that all you can do with it is have trade rights..
It's included in the map of Europe without them slicing off the bottom so I hope you're
wrong [snip]

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That makes two of us. ~;)

Personally, I would really like to see the entire continent open to European exploitation. ~D From what CA has said, though, it sounds as if only the lands along Africa's Mediterranean coast can be colonized/conquered. :shrug:

I'll be sending small forces all over the map right from the start. There are so many areas in the world never covered in the TW series before.. I am desperate to try them out!

Actually, I think trades theaters will be normal expanses of the map that will be unconquerable but will have things like ports which require a naval battle to take, so therefore it will only take a bit of modding to throw a few settlements in there.

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Originally Posted by Martok

So I take it you're going to be playing as Prussia first, then?

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As England, I could go to war with Holland and Spain simultaneously. As Russia: war with Sweden and Ottoman at the same time and still could grab Africa, trade in America and India. As French, have war with England in America, grab Africa and attack the rest of Europe.

Everything I said happened in history, just not at the same time :)

Annie

i will go for north America and the Caribbean and maybe south africa with tid bit of India and most of france as Spain

I'd go for the Caribbean, it would give the Ottomans an easily defensible foothold in America, from which we can launch attacks on New Spain and North America

:indian_chief::whip: :sultan:

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Originally Posted by Pantsalot
But the thing is that if Africa is going to be another trade theatre
than that is really dull the fact that all you can do with it is have trade rights..
It's included in the map of Europe without them slicing off the bottom so I hope you're
wrong [snip]

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What?!?! How can you have a game set in the 18th and early 19th centuries and not include Africa!! That was like thee place to conquer and colonize in that time period! I really wanted to raise that American flag in Tripoli if you know what I mean:laugh4:. Oh well, I guess I just have to plant the flag in the heart of the British Empire and squash the Brits, who doesn't like that?

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Originally Posted by Pontius Pilate

What?!?! How can you have a game set in the 18th and early 19th centuries and not include Africa!! That was like thee place to conquer and colonize in that time period! I really wanted to raise that American flag in Tripoli if you know what I mean. Oh well, I guess I just have to plant the flag in the heart of the British Empire and squash the Brits, who doesn't like that?

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It does appear that most of the continent won't be in the game. However, the northern coast of Africa is in (just like in the past three Total War titles) -- you'll still be able to take Tripoli, never fear. ~;)

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Originally Posted by Martok

It does appear that most of the continent won't be in the game. However, the northern coast of Africa is in (just like in the past three Total War titles) -- you'll still be able to take Tripoli, never fear. ~;)

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Still though, I'm greedy for more!:laugh4:

I'd go for India or the Carribean. India has rich developed places to simply take over, while the Carribean sugar colonies are the great moneymakers of the era.

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Originally Posted by Pontius Pilate

What?!?! How can you have a game set in the 18th and early 19th centuries and not include Africa!! That was like thee place to conquer and colonize in that time period! I really wanted to raise that American flag in Tripoli if you know what I mean. Oh well, I guess I just have to plant the flag in the heart of the British Empire and squash the Brits, who doesn't like
that?

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Not in the games timeframe. Africa was mostly untouched until 1860 or so.

It would make a lot of sense to make it a trade theatre. Except for South Africa it has a pretty hostile climate and nasty diseases. Europeans only built trading stations on the coasts and generally died like flies. Inland trade was almost exclusively handled by locals. The scramble for Africa only came almost 100 years after the game when the Europeans had better medicine.

Tripoli should be reachable though. The corsair states of North Africa were a major nuisance and are very close to Europe. But their land should be rather useless, there are barely any resources in the area:p

Depending on how privateering/piracy works in ETW, I might be tempted to just take the British merchants treasures and trade at sea, instead of bothering to colonize the west indies:yes:

I'm not a huge fan of colonizing, better to be strong at home and focus on expanding your own borders... unless of course you're on an island with nowhere to expand.

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Originally Posted by Zaleukos

I'd go for India or the Carribean. India has rich developed places to simply take over, while the Carribean sugar colonies are the great moneymakers of the era.



Not in the games timeframe. Africa was mostly untouched until 1860 or so.

It would make a lot of sense to make it a trade theatre. Except for South Africa it has a pretty hostile climate and nasty diseases. Europeans only built trading stations on the coasts and generally died like flies. Inland trade was almost exclusively handled by locals. The scramble for Africa only came almost 100 years after the game when the Europeans had better medicine.

Tripoli should be reachable though. The corsair states of North Africa were a major nuisance and are very close to Europe. But their land should be rather useless, there are barely any resources in the area:p

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Yeah, about the Tripoli thing, I was just joking. Anyway, they should still have put the whole of Africa in the game because it would be something new, we already have seen enough of North Africa in the Rome and MTW2. Even though it might be a little bit out of the time frame we should be able to rewrite history.

And the slave trade was big during this time too, but then again the Europeans didn't actually go into the continent to get the slaves, that was done by other Africans. So I guess I can understand Africa just be a trade theater.

All the other countries can split apart the world. I just want New Zealand.

Caribbean.






Everyone loves sugar.

It depends on what faction I'm playing. I'm planning to start as Sweden and will kick some Russian and Dano-Norwegian ass. I'll probably go for North America after that just cuz. I might go for a huge navy and try to gain control of the Mediterranean.