As long as all your subjects lived in the shadow of your glorious tower you managed to keep an eye on them. But as your population grows the wooden palisade around your magnificent city is moved farther and farther away from your tower. Speaking of towers, perhaps it’s time to build a real castle? And even worse, with the new town settled just a few seasons ago, you have no control at all. What are they doing with your precious gold? How much disappears in your advisers own pockets before they reach the barracks?
The corruption level in your settlements and your empire will increase as your borders reach farther away from your capital. With larger, richer and a more complex society your advisors and servants will start to look at their own interest instead of the empires best. You will need to keep a tight control on them or you’ll start loosing both money and valuable research.
Base corruption
The base corruption in your empire solely depend on the number and type of settlements in your empire:
| Settlement type: | Base corruption value: | Base corruption cap: |
| Small town | 5 | 20 |
| Large town | 10 | 40 |
| City | 15 | 60 |
| Province capital | 20 | 80 |
| Capital | 0 | 100 |
Each settlement add its base corruption value to the base corruption in your empire. When calculating the corruption level in each individual settlement there is a cap for each settlement type on how much base corruption that affects the settlement. This makes the effect of heavy corruption less influential on smaller settlements that has less capacity to construct buildings that decrease corruption.
Corruption level
The corruption level is tracked for each settlement as well as the empire as a whole.
The corruption level of a settlement can range from 0 (no corruption) to 100 (heavy corruption). Base corruption has a major impact on the corruption level of a settlement but there are other factors that influence your advisors ability to stay away from your treasury as well.
- Wealth: If the settlement generate
much more income than it has expenses it will is declared a rich settlement.
Expenses are the total cost of armies in the settlement, building maintenance
and the cost of any leaders.
- If income > 2 x expenses corruption increases with 3
- If income > 3 x expenses corruption increases with 5
- If income > 4 x expenses corruption increases with 7
- Buildings: Constructing courthouses is one of the most effective way to fight corruption. But there are buildings that increase the corruption as well, especially some of the trading buildings. Where money flows, corruption tend to follow…
- Race: A greenskin is naturally less
picky with following the Warlords instructions than an elf with orders from the
High king. The racial effects on corruption is decided by what race is dominant
in the settlement:
- Ende/Greenskin +2
- Dwarf +1
- Human 0
- Elf -2
- Krant -5
As the situation in your glorious empire changes the target corruption level can change quite a bit, for example when capturing a province capital which will see the base corruption increase with 20. But your settlements might adjust to thi new situation over several turns. The maximum adjustment of the corruption level each turn in a settlement depend on the settlement type:
| Settlement type | Maximum adjustment each turn |
| Small town | 1 |
| Large town | 2 |
| City | 3 |
| Province capital | 4 |
| Capital | 5 |
The total corruption level in your empire depends on the average corruption level in your settlements. It can range from 0 (no corruption) to 100 (heavy corruption). Handling the empire wide corruption must be done by fighting the corruption level in each settlement.
Of course, a high corruption level in your capital is much worse than a high corruption level in a small town…
Accumulated corruption
Over time the corruption will accumulate in each settlement as well as in your empire until it reaches a critical value and it triggers an event. The accumulated corruption is presented as a percentage value informing of how far towards the critical value your loyal subjects are. The more corruption that is accumulated the faster the value will rise. Basically this means that even if the corruption level in a settlement is unchanged, the last 50% of the critical value will pass faster then the first 50%.
Corruption events
Each time the critical value is reached in a settlement a corruption event i prepared. This event can fall within three categories; improve terrain, constructing buildings and training companies. The first time the settlement start a new project within the same category as the prepared corruption event the event will trigger, most likely resulting in a loss if wealth in that settlement.
If no project is started within the same category as the prepared corruption event the event will be removed the next time the settlement reaches the critical value. It’s replaced with a new corruption event. It’s easy to avoid corruption events in settlement, just keep from starting any projects. Of course, this will probably not be a happy, rich and well-fed settlement.
The empire wide corruption work a bit differently. When the critical value is reached a corruption event is prepared just as in a settlement. But this event is triggered automatically the next time your empire goes through the end of turn adjustments. There are two categories for empire wide corruption events; gold and research. Both of these events might result in massive losses and a wise Emperor (or King) is well advised to keep the corruption as low as possible.
As your empire grows and newly conquered towns and cities increases your strength it will become hard to control all your advisors and officials. Some corruption will occur, just don’t let it strangle your empire making it all fall apart.