Famine. Famine is everywhere.

[dabanhfreak]

Hello

I'm playing through the Romani campaign, thoroughly enjoying myself.

However, there's something that keeps bugging me. Every single province I have is affected by famine. In Rome it contributes -3% population growth. In some places I have to put low tax rates just so I can have 0.5% population growth.

Okay, so is this a bug, or a historically accurate famine? Or is it by design? What on earth is going on.

[Ibrahim]

Hello

I'm playing through the Romani campaign, thoroughly enjoying myself.

However, there's something that keeps bugging me. Every single province I have is affected by famine. In Rome it contributes -3% population growth. In some places I have to put low tax rates just so I can have 0.5% population growth.

Okay, so is this a bug, or a historically accurate famine? Or is it by design? What on earth is going on.

via Imgflip Meme Maker

[dabanhfreak]

:) :(

[bisthebis]

Famine is in fact squalor, so you just have to imrpove your walls or reduce population

[Harkon]

"Reduce population"... Build better farms OP, up until Praedis Magna they all come with +0.5% settlement growth rate per upgrade. I also recommend temples of Fertility in your central cities, they also give bonus settlement growth starting at the third level of upgrade. Good counters for the "Famine" malus and let you set taxes higher than Normal without 0 growth when combined.

[IrishHitman]

I noticed fairly early on that I had to prioritise food production and lower taxes were necessary for many many years to keep population growth up.

It's pretty much accurate to what it was like. Population growth in this period was not significant, infant mortality was massive, and life expectancy was at 40 tops. Rome had continual problems with supplying itself with grain as it expanded. Not sure how bad it is as Rome yet, as I'm starting my first Romani campagin today, but I certainly had problems with this as Makedonia. You have to manage the problem as a priority for construction, particularly in the early game.

Harkon's suggestion about temples of fertility is a good one as well, they can really give you a leg up on the opposition in terms of getting up your population to levels that you can get top tier government/recruitment at.