This is an attempt to explain colonization, suzerain, and uprising.

Things in italics are

subjects that I don’t have a full understanding.

Unlike NPC cities, where you overwhelm defenses and take all the resources, when you
attack players, you fight to control the city and force tribute to be paid to you.

Throughout this discussion, Attacker is the aggressor, a member of the BADDUDE

alliance attacking the player Victim of the GOODGUYS alliance.

The attack begins when Attacker sends forces from DETHSTAR to colonize Victim’s
city ALDERAN. He wins the initial battle and now we begin the 8 hour suppression
period. When the suppression ends, a second battle determines control of the city. If
Attacker wins, he gets control of ALDERAN.

During the 8-hour suppression period, the Attacker can reinforce it with more troops. At
the same time, both Victim and the alliance GOODGUYS can reinforce ALDERAN in an
attempt to determine colonization. The best hero (highest attack) available from both
Victim and reinforcing forces from alliance members is the lead and gets the benefit of
the combat. The Attacker presumably gets the best attacker of any reinforcements.

If the Attacker’s armies prevail, you then become a Colony. Attacker becomes the
Suzerain to ALDERAN. As such the city DETHSTAR receives tribute, about 15% of
production, and can take away population, military forces, or try to drive away heroes in
ALDERAN’s feasting hall. In game parlance, you are “suzed.” The surviving troops
return at this time.

The picture below shows the choices available to the suzerain. Population deployment
gets 10% of the available troops, Draft allows you to steal away forces from the colony,
10% of a random force. Disarmament gets rid of some troops. Sow Discord reduces
hero’s loyalty, inciting them to run away.

If you are suzed, you need to keep troops out. Send troops to a free city as soon as they
are made, because your Suzerain will take them away. Any heroes that remain should be
monitored for loyalty and spend the gold to keep them high. You can reward heroes every
15 minutes. The maximum loyalty is 100.

With the city successfully conquered, the troops and heroes return to DETHSTAR.
ALDERAN is now a colony of DETHSTAR. They are connected, even if the cities
teleport to another province. If another player attempts to attack ALDERAN, in addition
to any forces kept by Victim in ALDERAN, forces in DETHSTAR also defend.
The suzerain has more choices. When you take over a city, you need to set its
suppression setting, by switching tabs.
You’ll note that the suzerain city defends against attackers with 100% of everything in it.
You should set the scout percentage of resistance to 0%. A successful attack against a
colony kills troops of the suzerain proportional to its commitment. Again, this is 100% by
default. This makes a possibility to create a “honey pot” attack: An attractive vulnerable
city is created, so that it will be conquered, then immediately reinforced so that it kills the
army. This is possible, but difficult to execute. The suzerain’s scouts also defend so that
it may be possible to kill them by hitting a colony. If done properly, you could wipe out
the troops via the colony, leaving the suzerain city defending only with its wall defenses.

At this point you can try to regain control via uprising. The longer you wait to do an
uprising the harder it is. The suzerain is getting some of your production, and certainly
can continue building more forces. When you attempt to uprise, an 8-hour clock starts.
Then the ownership battle is re-contested. During this time, GOODGUYS can reinforce
ALDERAN and members of BADDUDE can reinforce DETHSTAR. This can
drastically increase the size of the forces. An example is at the end.

Figure 1: An unsuccessful uprise attempt

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were originally written by John Thompson. Permission is granted to freely reproduce this
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