Settlements and Outposts

Settlements and Outposts are the two ways an empire physically occupies the map beyond raw, unclaimed territory. A settlement is a true city — population, workshops, walls, a garrison, a Governor — the seat of everything covered on the Population and Production and Equipment pages. An outpost is something smaller and more specialised: a single-purpose structure built on a controlled hex that boosts resource output, expands storage capacity, or serves some other narrow function, without ever growing into a city in its own right.

The two behave very differently when an enemy army arrives. Settlements can be besieged and captured — see Sieges for the full mechanics of organisation, walls, and what happens when a city actually falls. Outposts cannot be captured at all. An enemy army simply destroys an outpost the moment it enters the hex — there's no siege, no garrison to overcome, just an instant loss of whatever that outpost was providing. This makes outposts cheap to build but genuinely vulnerable, especially the further they sit from the protection of a defended settlement.

This page introduces both. For the full detail, see:

• Settlement Types and Founding — the difference between a Capital and an ordinary settlement, how new cities are founded, and the option to let a Governor manage a city automatically
• Outposts — all ten outpost types and exactly what each one does

How It All Connects

Settlements are where nearly everything else in the empire actually happens. Population grows there, workshops turn raw resources into equipment there, loyalty and crime are tracked there, and a city's Province Development Level determines how much of all of this it can actually support.

Outposts exist to extend what a settlement can reach without the overhead of founding an entirely new city. A Mine or Quarry pulls extra resources from terrain a city couldn't otherwise fully exploit. A Stable or Warehouse expands how much the Global Equipment Stock can hold. A Marketplace, Small Village, or Village quietly grows into more population and more manpower over time, all without ever needing its own Governor or garrison.