Occupy / Sack / Exterminate a settlement.

[maestro]

Hi guys. I can't find anything in the manual about this. When you take a settlement, you get three choices as to what to do with it.

1) Occupy settlement. This way you get no extra money but you have a large population to grow your city with. What are the bonuses or penalties associated with this

2) Sack Settlement. This way you get tonnes of money and kill a percentage of the populous so there's a quick pay-off and only a slight slow-down in growth. What are the bonuses or penalties associated with this

3) Exterminate populous. This way you get a bit of money and kill everyone. You get some money, but not anywhere near as much as sacking and you have to grow the town from scratch. What are the bonuses or penalties associated with this

it seems to me that you'd always want to sack a settlement cause the population hit isn't that bad and you get loads of cash. there has to be a balance somewhere but i don't know what it is

Can anyone help? Pointing to the right page on the manual will do But I can't find it anywhere!

[Monarch]

Sacking also destroys some buildings,

Early game I occupy, cities are smaller and need all the population they can get. Then I exterminate.

[Jambo]

Are you sure about that Monarch? I've looked at the buildings a settlement had before I sacked, then I sacked and they were exactly the same...

[maestro]

Does anyone know if there is anything on this in the manual or do CA assume we'll just guess!?

[Lord Condormanius]

Does anyone know if there is anything on this in the manual or do CA assume we'll just guess!?

The strategy guide says this:

...you can choose to Occupy the Settlement, leaving the buildings and populace intact. You can Sack the city, generating a large amount of gold, but destroying infrastructure. Or you can exterminate the populace, instilling order through fear. Exterminating also generates a lot of money, and it raises the Dread of your General.

[IrishArmenian]

Occupy: Population strong, a lot of unrest though
Sack: Population decreases about 1/5 or so, get a lot of money
Exterminate: 3/4 of Population are put to sword, get about 1/4 of the Florins one would gain if sacking.

[Quillan]

That seems to be a conglomeration of the rules from RTW with the Barbarian Invasion horde mechanic thrown in. In RTW, occupying the city got you about 1 gold for every 100 population. The population was left intact, which could cause public order penalties if the population was high (there's no penalty for different culture in M2TW, is there?). Exterminating killed off 3/4 the population, but got you 10 times as much gold: 1 gold for every 10 population. In M2TW, it'll lower your relations with the faction that owned the settlement before you took it, and with the Papal States if the previous owner was Catholic. Sacking was possible to hordes in BI. In BI, sacking a city killed off about 80-90% of the population, brought in a little more money than extermiting, and had a chance (not automatic, just a random chance) of damaging buildings in the city. I don't know how closely that's followed in M2.

[Prodigal]

The 3 options really have a pretty easy application when you consider the results you'll get.

Occupy settlement. As mentioned previously good in the early stages of the game, you simply move in retain the current population & don't damage any buildings. This is really applicable to cities that you take where your faction & the "populace" are compatible, for example a catholic faction taking a muslim city would not be compatible so to avoid unrest you would need a large garrison, & it would take longer to convert the city itself.

Sack Settlement. You need cash, sack the settlement, you get alot of money but do not drastically decrease the populace so it will recover faster. The building damage may or may not be a concern dependent once again on the peoples that you are taking over, obviously a city with the wrong religion will require you to knock down their places of worship & build your own anyway but you have no guarntee that the sacking will damage those or other buildings. In a small city the population loss maybe sufficient for you to quickly convert & gain control over the populace, in a larger city it may not be sufficient for you to comfortably convert everyone, before the unrest gets unreasonable. This option is also very useful if you're not looking to consolidate but just raid or put an enemy on the back foot, you make a mint of money & lose them the cities wealth for a while.

Exterminate populous. You move into a hugh city of an opposite religion, or a city revolts due to unrest, move in & kill 'em all. You'll get less money for doing this but you'll make extra cash knocking down the religious buildings which you may want to get rid of anyway, & in the case of unrest, well you just killed everyone so that & squalor should be radically decreased.

[46852]

City conquering styles also affect your commanding general's traits: occupying is a chivalrious act, sacking is considered neutral and exterminating makes your general more feared.

In game terms, you get chivalry/dread points sometimes if you choose occupation/extermination.

[Lorenzo_H]

Are you sure about that Monarch? I've looked at the buildings a settlement had before I sacked, then I sacked and they were exactly the same...

They seem to receive some damage...

[HoreTore]

Regarding sacking and damage:

Yes, you DO damage buildings when sacking. But it's not a given. It's a random chance(can probably be found in a data file).

I'm playing my moorish campaign now, and I captured Pamplona. I saved the game, then sacked. The fortress and barracks was damaged. I reloaded, and sacked again. This time, the fortess, bowyer and blacksmith was damaged. I reloaded and occupied, and only the fortress was damaged, but that's because I crushed it in the siege.

[locked_thread]

Sacking and exterminating settlements will hurt your global reputation!

BINGO. And then all your neighbors will declare war on you. Unless you want to be at war with everyone all the time, "occupy" should be the rule not the exception. Except when taking large cities of different religion in which case you may be forced to exterminate.

[TheImp]

Personaly, i always sack settlements. Cause war needs money, especially at the beginning of a campaign.

[Kraxis]

Sacking large cities is extremely profitable...

Sacking Milan and Genoa generated more than 30k florins each. The same with Budapest. And with the heartland of the HRE being highly developed I don't mind if there are few buildings lost. After all the HRE is Nothern European while the other two are Southern, which cause some unrest due to cultural differences (as in Rome).

But those money are always great for heling me to keep my heartlands producing buildings. The sack of Milan even paid for three cathedrals the Pope liked very much (6 crosses to full).

[Oaty]

After all the HRE is Nothern European while the other two are Southern, which cause some unrest due to cultural differences (as in Rome).

Not quite sure how that works, but I occupied an Egyptian castle as England and had no unrest. My guess was in beta they looked into keeping cultural penalties but left it out. But it is still used in sieges for what the castle/cities looks like.

Also I noticed it appears sacking a castle seems to keep everything in tact, but sacking a castle with 10,000 population is a lot less profitable than sacking a city with 10,000 population. by 2 to 3 times.

[kercool]

if not a christian city n im playing christian i exterminate it so no hostilities

[Kraxis]

Ah well... even without the cultural penalty the sacks aer more than just worth it when you have a nice empire going.

[Lord Condormanius]

Also I noticed it appears sacking a castle seems to keep everything in tact, but sacking a castle with 10,000 population is a lot less profitable than sacking a city with 10,000 population. by 2 to 3 times.

Sacking castles and cities does some damage to buildings. I'm not sure if it happens every time, but it definitely happens. I have also noticed that sacking a city generates more money than doing the same to a castle. Probably because cities tend to have more money laying around than castles. There is more economic acticvity and the people are likley better off than the poor peasant farmers you would find in a castle.

Just a guess.

[SirGrotius]

Wow, I've been exterminating constantly because of my longstanding dread of squalor but now it seems that I have damaged my relations with the pope and missed out on a lot of cash, which I'm always in need of.

How does population affect unit recruitment or retraining though? If I exterminate the population, am I limited in soldier numbers or unit numbers? Are you unit numbers based on buildings (i.e., 2 feudal knights per x building) or poopulation or both?

Sorry if this is too much a tangent.

[yankeefan32]

Seems to me that the only option is to sack. I've taken settlements, saved the game, and compared after both occupation and sacking. Both decisions revealed the same results. I checked buildings and finances and not a single stone or cent was changed.

A note on the Pope: In the game at least, he's not so righteous as he ought to be. Station a Diplomat outside Rome to gift him with 100 Florin and maybe map information. He'll forget all about any misdeeds as fast as the money hits his pockets.

[PseRamesses]

Sacking and exterminating settlements will hurt your global reputation! In my Polish campaign a while back HRE´s last king was assasinated and some 8-9 settlements went rebel. I swiftly moved in and secured all of them sacking everyone and my global reputation went from trustworthy to dubious.