Antaeus
Squire
So I've been experimenting with the art of denying food to Calradia's fair citizens. Playing as an independent trader, with no kingdom. In previous game iterations rebellions were common, so a player could pounce on them to become an independent land-owner with no obligations to any king. But recently rebellions have become more rare... so maybe we can accelerate them?
There's two scenarios where you might want to consider using food as a weapon.
I mentioned above that this is a brute force economic action. And you'll use a lot of money that you'll struggle to recoup.
After the city rebels, you - as an independent - will be able to raid a village to declare war and siege the city to capture it. It will already be starving, so this shouldn't be too much of a problem.
I've done this 4 times in the last couple of days to see how much cost there is. A city with 300 food and 30 loyalty will take about a year to starve into rebellion. And it will cost you about 1 million in gold to keep their food out of their mouths. I've managed it for a lot less in a city already near rebellion, but I haven't been able to afford to starve a healthy city with more than 50 loyalty - I've run out of money.
Broader impacts on the economy - when you starve a city, the price of food will go through the roof. This will attract every caravan in Calradia. The city you're starving will attract a constant stream of dozens and dozens of caravans per day. I tried to catch them before they enter the city, but in the end the flow is overwhelming. I'm going to assume this will impact on the whole Calradian economy - trade caravans all accumulating around you for a long period of time.
Positive outcomes - for one year of stubborn shopping, you can obtain a city, without declaring yourself a kingdom, or warring with a main faction. You are then free to grow that city and your gold indefinitely. At a million gold, you're still paying less for the city than if you have the top trade perk.
Negative outcomes - It's really hard to get rid of a million gold worth of food. As a non-kingdom, with luck and timing, you could just declare war and capture a city in a few days game time.
If anyone has any shortcuts to offer for this technique, I'd love to know them. Otherwise... don't do what I did. Just take the city the old way - through war, or wait for a rebellion to occur on it's own. But for the record, with enough money and plenty of game time (and about 2 hours real time), you can starve any city into rebellion, and defeat the rebels to own the city.
There's two scenarios where you might want to consider using food as a weapon.
- Firstly, when you're about to declare war, you might want to empty a city of food immediately before declaring war and laying siege. Over a few days, defenders will become wounded through starvation. Even better if you blockade an army in there, as they'll accelerate the process. When you take the city, you can then sell them back their food, and it will be a profitable sale.
- Secondly, you might want to prompt a city falling through domination of their marketplace. This is more complicated, but can be done with great expense. This is a financial brute force affair that I've done several times, so you don't have to.
I mentioned above that this is a brute force economic action. And you'll use a lot of money that you'll struggle to recoup.
- Step 1. Empty the target city's market of food items.
- Step 2. Leave the city but stay outside the gates (your presence in the city can be a security modifier if you have security perks)
- Step 3. Press play to start the clock.
- Step 4. Intermittently re-enter the city and empty the market of food - try to do this before the day changes so that every day ends with negative food.
- Step 5. Leave the city and restart the clock.
- Step 6. Repeat until the city has used it's food stockpile and is starving. If a city has 300 food, and consuming 30 per day, you'll need to have their food at -30 for 10 days till they starve.
- Step 7. Repeat until the starvation drives loyalty into the ground. Starvation drops loyalty by -1 per day. So if their loyalty is at 30, you'll likely need 10 days to bring the risk of rebellion.
- Step 8. Repeat until there are enough militia to overthrow the garrison: Once the rebellion risk goes under 15, militia will start to grow by 2 per day. You'll need the militia to outnumber the garrison by two to one for there to be a rebellion.
- Step 9. Repeat until the city rebels.
After the city rebels, you - as an independent - will be able to raid a village to declare war and siege the city to capture it. It will already be starving, so this shouldn't be too much of a problem.
I've done this 4 times in the last couple of days to see how much cost there is. A city with 300 food and 30 loyalty will take about a year to starve into rebellion. And it will cost you about 1 million in gold to keep their food out of their mouths. I've managed it for a lot less in a city already near rebellion, but I haven't been able to afford to starve a healthy city with more than 50 loyalty - I've run out of money.
Broader impacts on the economy - when you starve a city, the price of food will go through the roof. This will attract every caravan in Calradia. The city you're starving will attract a constant stream of dozens and dozens of caravans per day. I tried to catch them before they enter the city, but in the end the flow is overwhelming. I'm going to assume this will impact on the whole Calradian economy - trade caravans all accumulating around you for a long period of time.
Positive outcomes - for one year of stubborn shopping, you can obtain a city, without declaring yourself a kingdom, or warring with a main faction. You are then free to grow that city and your gold indefinitely. At a million gold, you're still paying less for the city than if you have the top trade perk.
Negative outcomes - It's really hard to get rid of a million gold worth of food. As a non-kingdom, with luck and timing, you could just declare war and capture a city in a few days game time.
If anyone has any shortcuts to offer for this technique, I'd love to know them. Otherwise... don't do what I did. Just take the city the old way - through war, or wait for a rebellion to occur on it's own. But for the record, with enough money and plenty of game time (and about 2 hours real time), you can starve any city into rebellion, and defeat the rebels to own the city.
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