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Thread: Is slavery as an economic thing worth it?

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  1. #1
    Member Member Sp4's Avatar
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    Default Is slavery as an economic thing worth it?

    I tried turning a province of mine into a slave.. uh.. I dunno... cage? Pen? Anyways, my goal was to get the most out of them and to see if it is useful to replace some other economy with it or just as something to bolster the already in place one and I wasn't very amazed about the results.

    To me, it seems a little gimmicky at the moment, kind of like having client states that pay you 30 gold a turn while you could have 300 from just taking their town/s.

  2. #2

    Default Re: Is slavery as an economic thing worth it?

    One characteristic of slavery is that, as far as I can tell, its effects cannot be localized to just one province. If you loot a settlement or enslave captives from a field battle, then the slave population increases across all the provinces of your empire, although closer provinces will get more of a bump than farther ones.

    The overall economic boost isn't insignificant. The public order penalties, however, are substantial...and lingering. If you do get into public order problems due to too high a slave pop, you can't merely correct it by freeing some slaves. The slave population does slowly decay over time if one stops enslaving and looting, but it takes a while (kinda like provincial unrest).

    Like you, I went on a tear of enslaving all captives when I invaded Africa, topped off by looting first two settlements in Libya. The treasury folks enjoyed it, but public order started dropping across all my provinces. Africa was most affected, but slave populations had markedly risen in places like Provincia and Cisalpina as well. I stopped taking slaves right at that point (about 180 turns ago maybe?), haven't taken a slave since, and have quite a robust economy with a total absence of slave pop (i.e., I could pretty much win an economic victory at any point right now simply by bumping taxes from "Low" to "Normal". And that's with 15 20-unit armies).

    I do think that with some prudence, slavery can juice the economy a bit without becoming a problem if one keeps an eye on it. But it's certainly not necessary, and economic management is streamlined by simply not including it. Public order surplus, I think, can be spent in better ways.

  3. #3
    Member Member Jarmam's Avatar
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    Default Re: Is slavery as an economic thing worth it?

    It doesn't seem to be worth it in any situation, because the ROI on the public order is way too low compared to higher tech structures. Slaves are a % increase, so theoretically they are worth it as the game progresses, but even 175 turns into the campaign they are still not worth the public order penalty. Maybe as Sparta? Haven't tried a Sparta-campaign, but even with their faction trait I still dont see how it can be worth it in the game's current state.

    Sadly this has lead me to kill off pretty much every single survivor of my battles since turn 10. What a waste of resources.

  4. #4
    Member Member Sp4's Avatar
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    Default Re: Is slavery as an economic thing worth it?

    Quote Originally Posted by Jarmam View Post
    It doesn't seem to be worth it in any situation, because the ROI on the public order is way too low compared to higher tech structures. Slaves are a % increase, so theoretically they are worth it as the game progresses, but even 175 turns into the campaign they are still not worth the public order penalty. Maybe as Sparta? Haven't tried a Sparta-campaign, but even with their faction trait I still dont see how it can be worth it in the game's current state.

    Sadly this has lead me to kill off pretty much every single survivor of my battles since turn 10. What a waste of resources.
    You can free them for diplomatic bonuses. They wont return to their armies anyways.

  5. #5

    Default Re: Is slavery as an economic thing worth it?

    Quote Originally Posted by Sp4 View Post
    You can free them for diplomatic bonuses. They wont return to their armies anyways.
    True, but it's no free lunch. You get a diplo bonus with the enemy and its allies, but take a diplo hit with its enemies (who are often your own allies). Killing off captives, somewhat unfortunately, I've found to be the most logical choice in most cases. Sometimes I might free captives after a battle if the war in question is mainly because I want a specific region, and would be happy to make peace with the faction once I've gained it.

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  6. #6
    Member Member Sp4's Avatar
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    Default Re: Is slavery as an economic thing worth it?

    http://cloud-3.steampowered.com/ugc/...FF53DD91547B7/

    Here it is what it is looking like at the moment. It's not too bad an income but I have been enslaving everything in the last 15 or 20 turns (everything I captured while conquering Spain). I can't say I am having public order problems because of it, at least no more than I would have anyways by building silly things =P

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