Hi Guys,
I've recently played Broken Crescent and got to think about many issues. One is what do to with a conquered settlement.
In the SSHIP (and other mods) I'd always occupy; for 6 reasons:
1. It pays off fast. This is now my province and I want it to be productive. Long term gains overtake the short term benefits after just few turns. Sacking/exterminating gives simply little money, it doesn't pay off to kill population.
2. Usually I want my generals to get Chivalry so that they can 'shepherd' settlements to upgrade. Occupying usually gives some points toward higher Chivalry.
3. I care about reputation in diplomacy and extermination is bad for it - other factions start hating you.
4. I'd take with me a good order-keeping general, so the unrest considerations were not present.
5. This is simply my style, I couldn't see benefits of behaving differently.
6. Historicality - the past times were not like 20th century: atrocities were rarer than we think, usually there's some sacking but most of the population would come unscathed. Exterminations were exceptional.
However, in the Broken Crescent I discovered that sacking, and even extermination are often useful. This is for 3 reasons:
1. big settlements have negative growth rates after being taken, even if I've got a very Chivalrous general. So the population would diminish in due course even without extermination (well, I think it's a faulty solution in the BC, but it is).
2. it's extremely difficult to control big settlements after taking them. Your generals don't have enough traits.
3. the amount of money from sacking/extermination can be huge. Eg. extermination of a city with 18k population can give you 54k florins while your seasonal budget can be 20k. Given that there's little budget surplus possible, getting this money means many investment in your core settlements. This can prompt your economy to jump.
All in all, short term gains are huge, while long term little (or rather problems).
Thus I've learnt to sack/exterminate in the BC. However, in SSHIP I would stick to occupying.
My questions to the players are:
1. what are the experience with this feature? Do you think that the numbers in the SSHIP are right? (or should they be increased?)
2. what is actually possible to mod as cost of sacking/exterminationg? I think 3 issues are already there:
-- diplomatic and reputation penalties,
-- generals' traits (Dread, traits)
-- destruction of some buildings
However, I don't know if it's possible
- to get some buildings destroyed totally (you cannot repair them, you need to build them from scratch)?
- to lower the level of a settlement (eg. a minor city becomes large town)?
cheers
JoC