- [p]Increase the productivity of all sheep farms within a certain radius[/p][/*]
- [p]Increase the happiness of all residence buildings near a market building[/p][/*]
- [p]Increase the sailing speed of a ship[/p][/*]
- [p]And many similar effects[/p][/*]
Hiring Specialists
[p]Let’s take a look at how we’re tackling the topic in Anno 117: Pax Romana then.[/p][p]Firstly, we did a small renaming: “items” are called “specialists” in Anno 117: Pax Romana. The reason is that all items are now people who you invite to work for you and who provide their services and special skills to your cities – therefore: specialists![/p][p]The specialists can mainly be obtained via quests or by visiting traders – they usually have some specialists visiting who you can hire for a certain sum. Additionally, the Discovery Tree and the Hall of Fame also offer ways to obtain specialists.[/p][p]These specialists can then be slotted into either your villa and officia or your ships.[/p][p][img src="https://www.anno-union.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/officium_EN.jpg"][/img][/p][p]There are a total of 4 rarity categories for items. Higher rarity specialists have stronger effects but are – as their name suggests – harder to obtain. Specialists can affect residences, production buildings, public service buildings and ships.[/p][p][/p]Employing specialists
[p]We acquired a few specialists, let’s put them to good use and take a look at where you can employ them.[/p]Villa
[p]As probably the first places you will slot a specialist in, your governor villa is your home as a governor and – especially in Albion – a symbol of Roman power and prestige. It has a large effect radius for items slotted here and provides other benefits, for example allowing you to recruit some personal guard units to defend your city in case of war.[/p][p]It’s important to protect your own villa on each island, since capturing the villa is the way to overtake other player’s islands.[/p][p]A villa comes with several slots to put specialists in. The higher your Prestige attribute, the more slots you unlock. Prestige is earned via certain needs and public buildings, as well as your city status and ornaments (incl. the beautiful marble roads).[/p][p]If we look at two examples of specialists that you may want to employ in your villa, we’d have:[/p]- [p]The Vesseler: Reduces the needed workforce (-25%) and upkeep cost (-50%) of taverns in range[/p][/*]
- [p]Iain Thespis, Brightener of Days: Increases the Happiness of all residences in range by 1.8[/p][/*]
Officia
[p]With the villa having a large but limited radius, the way to affect other parts of your islands with the buffs from specialists is by building Officia.[/p][p]An Officium is a smaller administrative building with a smaller radius and just two item slots (later three, when you've progressed far enough in the Discovery Tree). The radius of a villa and officium, or multiple officia, cannot overlap.[/p][p]How many officia you can build per island depends on how many “permits” you have acquired. Additional permits are unlocked via your island prestige, as well as the Discovery Tree.[/p][p][/p]Ships
[p]Some specialists are experts at guiding ships. These captains can only be slotted in naval vessel, with each ship having exactly one slot for such a specialist. Things are rather straightforward here, so, let’s also check out two such captains:[/p]- [p]Thunderous Bolter: Increases the accuracy of ship scorpiones (+15%) and their attack speed (+20%)[/p][/*]
- [p]Unburdener: Decreases trade prices (-5%) and reduces cargo weight slowdown (-25%)[/p][/*]
