A Beginner's Guide to EU5: Why You're Building Towns All Wrong
If you just booted up Europa Universalis 5, you’ve probably discovered the "Build Town" button and immediately smashed it like a rat pressing a lever for pellets
I’m here to tell you to stop. You are accidentally strangling your own nation. The new population and building system is a massive trap, and if you don’t understand the specific building effects and costs, you’re going to end up with a starving, bankrupt empire that is 100% under your control but has 0% chance of survival.
The Great Rural vs. Urban Lie
Here is the central problem you need to understand: Rural and Urban locations do two totally different jobs.
A Rural Settlement is your food and raw-material powerhouse. It is efficient at things like farming and mining, with huge bonuses to raw resource production.
A Town (or City) is a population and tax hub. It’s where you build advanced "urban" buildings, support higher social classes like Clerics and Burghers, and exert Control.
When you upgrade a Rural Settlement to a Town, you are killing its raw food and resource efficiency. If you do this everywhere, your entire nation will suddenly be unable to feed itself.
The Mechanics: Costs & Effects Breakdown
You want to know why you're broke? It's because you aren't looking at the stats. Here is the breakdown of what actually happens when you mess with your settlement types.
The Golden Rule: One City, Many Rurals
This is the most important strategy I’ve learned. Do not build a town in every location in a province.
Your goal for an entire province should be one central town (which you’ll eventually upgrade to a city) supported by a ring of rural locations. Why? Because I’ve done the math, and the math hurts:
Bad Strategy (1 City, 4 Towns): You have 100% control, but your province has negative food production. You make 10 ducats in tax, but you spend 35 ducats importing food. You are losing 25 ducats a month.
Good Strategy (1 City, 4 Rurals): You make 3 ducats in tax, but only spend 0.3 on food because you produce it locally. You are profiting 2.7 ducats.
You want to centralize your population in one heavily defended, well-supplied spot, and use the surrounding countryside to feed it.
Where to Click the Button (The RGO Dilemma)
This is the part that will make or break your economy. Pay attention to the RGO (Resource Gathering Operation) you are building on.
Here is the pro-tip: It is almost always better to build your one city on an industrial resource like Gold, Iron, or Silver.
Defense: You can build a Castle to protect your priceless Gold mine.
Market Manipulation: It keeps the supply of that luxury resource low, which keeps the demand and price high.
Conversely: NEVER build a city on a food RGO like Fish or Grain. You want your food supply to be high and the price to be low to keep your pops fed and happy.
Upgrade Requirements & Costs
"Where is the button?" It's not obvious. Click on a location, look at the top-left of the panel for a small circle/star icon next to the shield. That is your upgrade toggle.
But you can't just spam it. You need to meet the Upgrade Requirements:
Population Threshold: The location generally needs a minimum number of inhabitants (e.g., 5,000 pops) to upgrade from Rural to Town.
Market Resources: You must have the necessary construction materials (Stone, Wood) available in your local market.
The rules
One city per province. Build it on gold, not wheat. Surround it with rural farms. If you follow that rule, you might actually survive until the Age of Reformation. If you don't, enjoy your bankruptcy.
