Map sites

Neutral village

A neutral village is a small city sitting on the map — a settlement that belongs to nobody and can be taken. It is not a threat like a bandit camp and not a one-off reward like ruins: it is an opportunity.

The map holds 2–4 villages, and every one of them sits at least 6 hexes from a starting city and at least 4 hexes from another village. That second number is the same minimum distance your own cities must keep (Cities and population): a village is a settlement too, and the board never shows two of them closer than you could ever build them.

A village's tile has to be terrain a city can be founded on — Plains or Forest; Mountain and Water never carry one. Neither does the tile of a resource node, a ruin or a bandit camp.

Villages are shared out between the seats — each village counts toward the nearest start — and the gap between those shares is held tighter than it is for camps, because one village is a measurable advantage for a seat. Even so, nothing is guaranteed: in a match with few villages some seats get none. A village is not a guaranteed share but a contested reward.

What a village looks like

Population 1, no queue, no buildings, not a capital. Its health is 8 — an ordinary population-1 city has 17, so a village is markedly soft.

A village has a name, drawn from the same pool as your own cities: take it and it joins your city list under that name rather than getting a new one.

A village is static. It does not heal at the start of a turn, its population never grows, it runs no queue and it produces no income. The neutral side runs no turn-start steps at all, so a village stays exactly as you left it — the health you ground off it never comes back.

A village has no territory. While neutral, the tiles around it belong to nobody: a resource node there pays no one, and it does not block tiles you want to buy for your own territory. The territory appears the moment the village becomes yours — your border growing is the reward itself (Territory and score).

Two ways to take it

By war. Exactly today's conquest rule, no new verb: reduce its health to zero, then move in. The city does not strike back, but the unit that zeroes it has spent its turn — walking in is another unit's job, or next turn's (Combat). With 8 health a Spearman or an Raider brings it down in a few turns; a Siege finishes it in one blow.

With gold. If you have a unit next to the village you can invite it to join: you pay the price and the village becomes your city immediately. The price is 30 gold at full health and scales with the health it has left — a battered village comes cheap. So the two paths do not exclude each other: soften it a little, then buy it.

A village whose health has reached zero cannot be bought. What you do there is walk in, and that is free.

Choosing between the two is a trade: war costs turns (several turns of one unit), buying costs gold. What you pay is time — the same logic as rushing production and hiring a bandit camp (Economy).

It counts toward your city cap

A captured village counts toward your city cap just like a city you founded (6 cities). This is the village's most important cost: take one and you can found one fewer.

The rule is deliberate. Otherwise the cap — the most important constraint in the game — would lose its meaning and "collect villages" would be the best opening in every match: a player who takes two villages never builds two Settlers and never makes the settling decision at all.

A village also counts for the founding distance: you cannot found a city within 4 hexes of a village, even one that is not yours. A village near your start narrows your building room; that is not a side effect but what a settlement costs its neighbours.

What you get

A captured village becomes an ordinary city: its health rises to the normal city ceiling, its territory appears, its queue starts running and it produces income. Its population is 1, so it has room to grow.

On the scoreboard a village brings the same items a founded city does: the city score, territory tiles and population (Territory and score). While it is still neutral it appears on no scoreboard — the neutral side does not compete for points.

The numbers on this page are read from the game’s balance tables.