COLONIZATION STRATEGY GUIDE
This is my first attempt at a "strategy guide", and I'd welcome any
comments or suggestions. I'll probably revise and expand this as I play more
and get more input from others. I do think that this guide will be helpful
even now, since I've been fairly successful at the game so far (I've won the
first two games that I've played, fairly easily (revolution succeeded in
first half of 1700's), once at "conquistador" level and once at "explorer"
level), and am well on my way to winning my third game, this time at
"viceroy." The strategies outlined here are designed to win the revolution
AND achieve a high score. Other strategies (such as building only 1 or 2
cities) MAY make winning the revolution easier (though I haven't tried the
one city strategy yet), but they won't give you a high score.
I. GETTING STARTED
Colony site selection is always important, but is especially so for
your first few colonies. The square that you actually build on should be
cleared and plowed before you build. At least one of your initial colonies
should be built near a good ore site. A decent size for a colony in the
beginning is 3-5 colonists; try to build about 5 colonies of that size to
start with. Build your colonies fairly close together (but 2 squares apart;
you don't want them to overlap.) A good rule of thumb is to start with 3
coastal colonies and 2 inland colonies. You don't want to go crazy building
a lot of colonies at first. Scouts are quite important early on; you'll want
to speak with the chief at Indian settlements and investigate lost city
rumors. You should try to get the following founding fathers early (though it
is a matter of luck who you can choose from): Sieur de La Salle, Ben
Franklin, Peter Minuit, and William Brewster. Try to have at least one
pioneer building roads, clearing land, or plowing fields all of the time.
Don't worry about generating a big food surplus early on; you'll get
colonists from Europe. Concentrate on constructing your buildings, creating
items to trade, and Liberty Bell production. Get someone in the Town Hall of
each colony fairly early. There are several reasons for this - the most
important is that you want the production bonus for hitting 50% Sons of
Liberty (SOL) as early as possible.
II. COLONY DEVELOPEMENT
(a) Construction: Construct your buildings in each colony in the following
order: lumber mill, dock, printing press, church, warehouse. After that, each
colony will be different. You build the lumber mill first to speed other
construction. Build the printing press early to speed you on your way to the
50% SOL bonus (but remember, the printing press is useless without a colonist
in the town Hall). Obviously you can skip the dock if you're not next to the
ocean or a lake. If your colony will be producing tools, build a Blacksmith's
Shop fairly early, and an iron works when they become available. Forget about
a stockade; you'll get one for free when you get de La Salle. Eventually,
every coastal colony should have a fortress, but that won't be necessary till
late in the game. Your inland colonies can get by with their free stockcade.
(b) Colonists: Important specialists in the beginning are master carpenters,
lumberjacks and expert farmers or fishermen. Statesmen are great, but are
expensive at first. Eventually you'll want a statesmen in every colony. If
you have a good source of ore, get an expert ore miner. Tool production is
vital; once you start producing tools, you'll want a master blacksmith.
Remember, tools are needed for pioneers, for construction, and for muskets.
You should try to make colonies as self sufficient as possible. Examples:
build tools in colonies that produce ore; produce cloth in colonies that
grows cotton. Try to minimize the need to move commodities around.
(c) Colony Size: Eventually you should develop large colonies (15 to 20
plus.) I recomend slow growth, however; you want to get the production
bonuses ASAP (50% and 100% SOL), and you'll get them more quickly if you
build population slowly.
(d) Number of Colonies: I've won with 19 and with 16. There is no optimal
number of colonies; more colonies, all else being equal, mean a higher score,
but a more difficult revolution.
(e) Schools: A couple of colonies should specialize in schooling. Build
schools, then colleges, in a couple colonies, and a university in at least
one colony. Train specialists as needed, but concentrate on training veteran
soldiers; you'll need a ton of them. Also train elder statesmen, because they
are so expensive.
III. TRADE
The key to trade is micromanagement. Keep your eye on the economic advisor
report; adjust production accordingly. If you are producing alot of a raw
material such as cotton in a colony, construct the appropriate factory;
you'll the be able to produce 3 finished products (eg cloth) for every 2
units of raw materials (the manual is ambiguous on this point, but that is
how it works). It may go without saying, but if your warehouse is full of a
commodity, reassign the colonist producing that commodity till you can empty
the warehouse. You can't afford idle colonists. Build Custom Houses as soon
as you can, partly to make trading less tedious, but also to circumvent
boycotts. Forget about setting up trade routes; too inefficient. It's best
to handle trade yourself, till you get custom houses.
IV. INDIANS
I haven't tried an aggressive approach to the Indians yet. It might be a good
strategy against the Aztecs or Incans, especially if you play the Spanish,
but I think that most of the time a peacful strategy works best. Keep your
colonies somewhat small at first, placate them with food, send missionaries,
and trade with them. Trading also can earn you some money. Your scouts can
find out what goods the Indians need by talking to the chief. Once you get
stockades and artillery in every settlement, the Indians will be less of a
danger, but they can still ambush colonists outside your colonies.
V. OTHER POWERS
(a) Early on - sometimes it pays to be aggressive; one strategy is to pick on
one power, capturing all of their early colonies before you start one of your
own. The one soldier that you get early in the game may be enough to do this,
as colonies early on are usually undefended. You can really get a good head
start this way.
(b) Defense - I've been lucky so far; the other nations have pretty much left
me alone. A few thoughts: (1) If they establish a colony near you, try to
capture it; (2) Get Ben Franklin early on, so you can make peace when you
want to; (3) Don't appease them with money; (4) Don't be shy about attacking
units if they get in your way.(If I do a revised version of this file, this
section will be expanded).
(c) Offense - Attacking other nations is usually a losing proposition.
Captured cities will usually be very difficult to defend come the
revolution. However, there is one situation in which you almost have to
attack (if you want to maximize your score): when any other nation approaches
independence. That point will vary, depending on the difficulty level. At
Viceroy, they achieve independence when they reach 40 rebel colonists; at
Conquistador they achieve independence at 60 rebels. You'll need to cut them
down to size by killing or capturing their colonists. I go after soldiers and
colonists outside the colonies for reasons which should be obvious.
VI. REVOLUTION
The keys to winning the revolution: (1) All coastal cities should be
fortified; (2) All coastal cities should be at or near 100% SOL; (3) Have
lots of cannon, at least one in every city and 3-5 in every coastal city; (4)
Your colonies should be close to each other, connected by roads, and mutually
supporting: (5) Avoid Island colonies; (6) Try to have more inland colonies
than coastal colonies; (7) All soldiers should have horses; (8) Have reserves
of horses and muskets in every city; (9) Non-veteran soldiers are useless;
(10) When you declare the revolution, make sure that most of your soldiers
are in colonies at or near 100% SOL so they will become Continentals; (11)
Keep your cannon fortified inside your colonies.
V. SCORING
Winning early doesn't help your scoring that much; to maximize your score,
you should probably wait till the late 1700's and continue to build your
colonies. Of course, you don't want to let another nation beat you to
independence (see above); the BEST way to maximize your score is to get the
100% bonus for achieving independence first. Since it is hard to prevent
other nations from achieving independence at the harder difficulty levels, my
guess is that the highest scores will be achieved at the lower difficulty
level (my high score so far is 2656, 66%, at Explorer level.)
