Areuakoi reform requirements too unclear in guide

[nvm]

Hello, I've read the player guide for Areaukoi reform requirements, and one that struck me as confusing is "Iberian homelands {inner coast of the penisula} has either Kar Areakum or Area of Mercenary Recruitment. Now, while the building requirement is clear enough, I actually have no idea what is meant by "Inner coast of the penisula", since English is not my first language, although otherwise I would say I have an outstanding grasp of it.

Then, there's the gameplay dilemma of governments. Most Areaukoi governments provide some recruitment on their own, but the Migration government {one that leads to Area of Mercenary Recruitment} is unique in that it actually allows you to construct more buildings which will increase the recruitment even more, unlike any other of their governments. Is this intended? Because at this rate it sounds conveinent to establish Migration first in any city you can regardless of already present culture, construct the specified building, then demolish it and replace with a more fitting government if you feel like it.

[QuintusSertorius]

It means Mastia, Iltirta or Arse should either be Allied Governments or have an Area of Merc Recruitment colony.

Yes, colonies are only for the Migration government. Note if you try the game-y approach of using the Migration government to get a colony, then demolish and build something else, you won't be able to upgrade it and the the non-recruitment benefits will disappear. They're all linked to the government building. We can't link recruitment to the government, otherwise we would have done.

[Genghis Skahn]

The area of merc recruitment is for the Southern, Southeastern and Eastern coasts, where the non-Lusitanian and non-Celtiberian, "pure" Iberian peoples lived.

Yes it's intended. The migration government also comes with order penalties and what have you AFAIK, it's unit refresh rates aren't so high either AFAIK.

Except that won't work, because the recruitment of the colony is tied to the migration gov's presence AFAIK. The migration gov also can't be built anywhere: only in Iberia and Sicily/Sardinia can it be built. Head to Gaul or North Africa, and you won't have any of those options. Just client kingdoms, allied states and coalitions.

[rhavviepoodle]

My understanding is that most colonial factions accrue batches of colonists every 16 turns (the in-game equivalent of 4 years). Areuakoi, on the other hand, accrues colonists at about half that rate. I would guess this is because they don't have the option of using a stand-in (much like how Greek factions were using hellenized Thracians or Galatians to settle provinces far from Old Hellas). The other problem with Areuakoi's colonies is they may have a maximum of two provinces producing them at a time.

That said, I -highly- recommend you spend your colonists very conservatively. I have botched at least two campaigns with them before it really got drilled into my head exactly how Spartan your colonist usage should be.

You should siege Kontrebia immediately, and storm the next turn. While sacking is often worth it for the immediate gold and public order bonus, Kontrebia's culture is such that you can easily occupy it with a skeleton Garrison, which will help you get large town (and league of cities) faster. The gold and public order is simply not worth the extra time before you build up its walls.

Generally, it is not particularly worth installing colonies in Leusitane and Areuakoi homelands (perhaps not until late game when you happen to be drowning in colonists). Your priorities for colonies are the provinces with low culture (Brakara especially, but to a lesser extent Moroika, Iltirta, Emporion, and Arse. Mastia and Gader, too, if you're brash enough to start that war!).

I find that the reform requirements have something of a trap option. Which is to say, my opinion is that the Area of Mercenary Recruitment is not particularly worth it. Colonist for colonist, Band of Raiders is the most efficient colony building for pushing urbanized tribal states and it should always be your go-to colony of choice (only within the Iberian peninsula, sadly). If you upgrade Arse, Iltirta, or Emporion to Area of Mercenary Recruitment too soon, you miss out on all the culture that BoR would have yielded. This is mainly a problem because AoMR doesn't upgrade. And if you destroyed the colony after the reform and build a different option, that would be even less colonist-efficient!

So I might suggest that once the other requirements are met (say you're in the middle of building the city walls around Sekeiza), temporarily destroy the gubmints in the three provinces and build allied gubmints in their place. Once you get the reform, switch back to migration. It is not exactly elegant, and it is fairly game-y, but as far as I can tell, it's the most colonist-efficient option available.

[Genghis Skahn]

Kontrebia and Sekeiza are the only areas where the Celtiberian League gov can be built, which acts as a source of colonists.

Myself, I always fight the rovers to the east of Celtiberia, then take Iltirta, Arse and Emporion in that order. After that you have a few "safe" provinces which won't border any other faction for a while(unlike how Celtiberian-Carpetania and Cantabria border the Lusitanians), and really help you climb out of debt. You can't colonize without cash, after all. I then use my colony points on those first 3 settlements.

I have to agree that I'm confused as to the utility of the AoMR, besides giving more coastal Iberians than Celtiberians like the Band of Raiders(but BoR gives culture, as was previously mentioned, so it's very tempting). Coastal Iberians aren't as tough as most of the Celtiberian counterparts, but they are VERY cost-effective. The Caetrati spearmen are great bang-for-your-buck line infantry. The Scutarii units are goddamn amazing though, I will say that--but they don't come till later.

[rhavviepoodle]

Generally, I am the type of player who will shoot for an end-game of "colonize all of iberia," which has the upside of being a real, tangible goal. While it may not be historically accurate that there were Celtiberians city-states through the entire peninsula, I'm clearly doing them all a favor by spreading the Celtiberian way of life to them. Severed hands for everybody! :-)

And as I mentioned previously, AoMR is mutually exclusive with the city-states. One might could make the case for building AoMR after BoR has done it's job and pushed culture to 70%, but that's something of a tough sell when the alternative is being a legitimate Celtiberian city-state.

This is neither here nor there, but would the most authentic Celtiberian setup throughout Iberia be city-state colonies and confederations? Obviously without migration, the colonies lose some of their benefits, but I would have guessed that there was a point at which they could stop shipping oodles of Celtiberians into the province and call it good enough.

[bendsley]

One might could make the case for building AoMR after BoR has done it's job and pushed culture to 70%, but that's something of a tough sell when the alternative is being a legitimate Celtiberian city-state.

But, unless I'm wildly misunderstanding how things work in my Areuakoi campaign, that's not an option, right? Every province which can have either Area of Mercenary Recruitment, Established Community, or Reward in the Form of Lands can only one of those. And not in the sense that you choose which you want, but that hidden_resources restrict each province to only one valid choice.

So all that provinces you can make into mercenary hubs cannot be made into City-States, unless there is some overlap that I've completely missed?

[bendsley]

Also, sorry for the double post, but I forgot to include this: with regards to the OP, I'm a native English speaker and agree that "Inner coast of the peninsula" was unclear when I read it. I had to actually dig into the script to figure out which provinces were meant. Obviously this a low priority change, but if it could be changed to say something like "Mediterranean coast of the peninsula" or "Eastern coast of the peninsula", it would be much clearer, in my opinion.

[rhavviepoodle]

Hidden resources factor into which provinces allow you to build certain buildings, yes. In this case I believe there's a tag for Iberia, Celtiberia, and Leusitania. My understanding is that the Established Community (and by extension the Celtiberian city-state) is constructible in all of the Iberian peninsula. You are right that Established Community and Area of Mercenary Recruitment are mutually exclusive, but I'm fairly sure that you are allowed to build either in some of the Iberian provinces (Iltirta, Emporion, Arse, Mastia, and Gader). If the Established Community option isn't showing up, perhaps it's because you don't have settlers right now.

[bendsley]

Okay, so I dug through the EDB; there are indeed three tags, but the Established Community is only buildable in Celtiberia and Lusitania, not Iberia (though the City State lists Iberia, that's moot since Established Community is a prerequisite). This conforms with my experience of playing them. Have you actually been able to build Established Community on the Eastern or Southern coasts? Because if so something funky is going on.

[YourMadDoc]

I can confirm that. I cant build established community colonies on the east coast. I can build established community on Sardin, but it is another kind. In guide island colony is named "Reward in the form of lands".

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

EDIT It was a while back when I tried to build established colony on the east coast and idk if I had colonist or not.

[Trarco]

Established communities and city-states can't be built in the eastern coast because of historical reasons , so, in our campaigns, Celtiberians prefer to move to the east (where the non-Indo-European Iberians inhabit) in order to fight as mercenaries while in the west (inhabited by Indo-Europeans or Hispano-Celtic peoples), the Celtiberians (or other similar Hispano-Celtic groups if you want to roleplay) can move in order to establish themselves in new settlements. In the same way, Celtiberians won't found areas to be recruited as mercenaries by the Mediterranean states in the west of the Iberian Peninsula, because they need the well urbanised eastern settlements that work as basis of recruitment.


Just in terms of roleplay in combination with a bit of historical information, the Celtiberian migration would represent the sum of different small hispano-celtic displacements in the area, being the main causes, economic, demographic, technological, political or cultural. They can be the result of exiguous movements of trasterminant shepherd-warriors, miners, or other nomadic groups. Other possibilities include ritual migrations of young warriors similar to the ver sacrum, expeditions in search of loot leaded by a chief who is followed by his clients or displacements of mercenaries who will fight in foreign lands. Finally, peaceful migrations either of family nature or more numerous in order to found a temporary or permanent urban centre in foreign soil can also be one of the main reasons of these migrations.


The Celtiberian city-state would represent the existence of certain degree of Hispano-Celtic influence in an Indo-European area (western Iberia) thanks to some small human movements of diverse nature and also because of the existence of various cultural and economic contacts. Here, the countryside is controlled by the local city-states, be they western hillforts or bigger oppida which manage their environs where there are secondary, politically dependent settlements. Additionally, this area has experienced some Hispano-Celtic colonization movements that have lead to the foundation of a new settlement. Probably, the new inhabitants will name it with the suffix -briga, a symbol of the Hispano-Celtic language that is spoken by the population and the elites of this city located between this province and the Celtiberian borders.


The idea is that the Celtiberians weren't the only ones who had city-states, instead, their Celtic neighbours of other "provinces" also lived in city-states. So both groups co-exist and have similar institutions.


BTW, it has been said that the area of mercenary recruitment is not worth it, I could be wrong, but I designed it as an interesting option that allows you to have some Celtiberian units and all the eastern Iberian roster (really useful IMHO after the Iberian panoply reform that allows you to recruit the Iberians with thureoi).

[myarta]

I think some people may not appreciate what units they can eventually get from a building since the engine leaves us no way to show the interesting units that will come after the panoply reform until the reform has actually happened. Thanks for the explanation of the purpose of the different migration types.

[rhavviepoodle]

I try not to be a munchkin (and I would say that I am much less so than when I was younger), but I will admit I can be somewhat game-y at times. Let's see if I can explain the game-y perspective a bit. So with regards to the Area of Mercenary Recruitment, the main problem is that its culture push stops so much lower than that of Band of Raiders. While BoR (a tier 2 colony) will push culture to 70% (which puts a province within range to eventually have a Confederation built), AoMR (a tier 3 colony) doesn't seem to push culture at all! So while perhaps a new player's first inclination is to immediately upgrade to AoMR (especially if they have the player's guide and know that at some point they'll need AoMR to get the reform), they shoot themselves in doing so by missing out on all the potential culture push that they would have gotten by keeping BoR. Moreover, since AoMR doesn't upgrade at all, the only way to push culture in a region you've built AoMR is destroying the colony and rebuilding it. The main problem with that is Areuakoi accrue colonists so slowly that they really can't afford to destroy a colony, even if it really only cost them one batch of colonists. In the early Areuakoi campaign, that is a lot.

[myarta]

EDIT: removed. Accidental duplicate post.

[Berg-i-dum]

I only could built the celtiberian city-state in Turgi. It seems like it is the only affordable place to build it, other it would be Kontrebia itself but you will prefer the Confederation that can only be built there and in Segeda. I don't know if you can really build these oppidas in other places like Nertobriga or Brakara, I am afraid you can't.

[Trarco]

I only could built the celtiberian city-state in Turgi. It seems like it is the only affordable place to build it, other it would be Kontrebia itself but you will prefer the Confederation that can only be built there and in Segeda. I don't know if you can really build these oppidas in other places like Nertobriga or Brakara, I am afraid you can't.

Yes, you can build the city-state in Nertobriga and Brakara

[Berg-i-dum]

Yes, you can build the city-state in Nertobriga and Brakara

Thank you with some delay. I just tried it and yeah it works

Good job with the faction, not a proper reform system but it is something.