User Guide

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diplomatic components of Europa Universalis
III, there are other definite advantages for a
country to try to acquire provinces that it holds
claims against, so it can be fairly important to
know whether other countries have claims on
your provinces, or whether you have a claim
on theirs.
There is one absolutely critical effect of a
province being considered a core: you can only
recruit new regiments and build new ships
in core provinces, although the province does
not necessarily have to be your core province.
The ability to recruit units -- and the type of
units available -- is determined exclusively by
which country (or countries) considers the
province to be a core. If you own a province
that is not considered a core of any country,
you will be unable to recruit any type of mili-
tary unit there. You will have to wait until you
have owned the province long enough for it to
become one of your cores. This is due to the
way that regiments and ships are created and
is something we will touch on again when we
look at “preferred unit types” in the Domestic
Management chapter, and then again in more
detail in the chapter on the Military.
Province Improvements
During the Europa Universalis III time period,
provinces and countries underwent drastic
changes. New cathedrals and universities were
built, tax collection and many other national
programs became somewhat more centralized,
fortifications were enlarged, military power
slowly made the transition from periodic re-
gional levies to permanent standing armies of
conscripts, ships gradually become larger and
both more seaworthy and powerful, and a host
of other movements towards modernization.
While most of these advances are handled by
the game’s approach to the research of tech-
nologies, some will result in the availability of
special new provincial improvements.
There are two different types of province
improvements: buildings and manufactories.
Each will become “unlocked” when you have
reached the necessary technology level to make
it available. When that happens, you may
spend money from your treasury and order a
province to begin constructing the improve-
ment. You can usually have as many different
buildings as you like in a province, but a prov-
ince is only allowed to construct one manufac-
tory. As you might imagine, the benefits de-
rived from the latter are usually much greater
than the former.
City View
You can review the improvements that have al-
ready been built in your province by looking at
the left side of the Province Management inter-
face. You cannot see the improvements in an-
other country’s provinces, although the Main
Map will display a special symbol in any prov-
ince that contains a manufactory, correspond-
ing to the type of manufactory that’s there.
When you open the Province Management
interface, the left half of the display will show
a picture of the provincial capital. Early in the
game, it will probably look fairly sparse, as is
the case with the upper of the two adjacent
graphics. The only province improvement that
has been built here is a basic fortification (the
wall at the rear of the city). As the city grows
and you build new province improvements, the
corresponding buildings will be added to the
city view. The lower graphic shows the same
city about 300 years later. The population has
grown, a number of new buildings have been
added, and the size of the fortifications has ex-
panded.
Hovering your mouse over a building will
display a tool tip that shows what benefits it
contributes to your province. The effects vary
depending on the type of building and can
include such things as higher tax revenues, in-
creased provincial production, reduced risk of
revolt, better siege defence, and more. If you
click on a building, the city view will zoom in
on it and give you more historical details about
the structure.