There is also Kymai to consider. If we are successful in relocating them, we could also settle them on Pharos. The Lykai problem, if it ever was a problem, will be drowned in a sea of refugees we just saved from certain death.
To be honest, I want to offer Kymai the chance to resettle at the head of the Adriatic. Potentially on those islands off the coast near the Enetoi (IRL Venice).
We have to remember that, above all, Kymai is
proud and we need to heed their pride. If we don't respect it, people are going to refuse our aid and walk to their deaths.
What we need to do is instead to appeal to their pride. By giving them their own colony to found, they're adventurous refugees, just like Eretria was when we carved our city out of the Iapyges. They're not victims hiding behind their mother's skirts, they're trailblazers. By giving them the head of the Adriatic, we also give them a fair degree of perceived independence. They're not dependent on the Epulian League (though they will be part of it). They also have nearby neighbours in the Northern Etruscans; a culture they know relatively well. If they set up on the Venetian islands, then they also have significant new defenses protecting them from barbaroi invaders. Their city will be a trade city, just like Kymai was.
I feel that his package is significantly more attractive and will be an easier sell. More people can likely be talked into taking this deal than settling them on Pharos. I believe that we don't want to settle the people of Lykai (who
we forced out of their homes) alongside a people who just lost their homes. I feel that natural immigration will fill Pharos sufficiently on its own over the next few years.
I also like the fact that a Venetian colony settled by a large population will grow into a mercantile powerhouse more readily and begin contributing Triremes, Taxes, and Trade much sooner. We also have recently fought a war alongside the Enetoi so we should be able to strike while the iron is hot and get permission for another colony. We've been friends with them and now we're war buddies.
It entirely reverts the stability bonus from pushing out unhappy metics to the colonies by replacing them with more and unhappier metics, and in the case of Ankon which is already unhappy about some of our policy choices we're just dumping in 100 of these guys when that's not a negligible part of their population.
To echo on this:
@Cetashwayo commented a little while ago that the population of the Epulian League was less than 20,000.
The largest city of the lot is Pylona with 7,092 free residents, including women and children. The overall free population of the league is 18,746, as compared to 79,732 for Eretria Eskhata.
We're resettling 800 Metics. That
actually means we're actually resettling ~2,400 people. For every adult male (both Metic and Citizen); Eretria has a roughly 1:3 ratio to the total free population. These Metics we take from Lykai are going to be bringing wives and children with them, but the latter are effectively invisible due to cultural misogyny and for age-related reasons.
This means that if we resettle Lykai's residents across the entire Epulian League,
15% of each city will be disloyal, on average. Given how 1 of the now 9 League cities makes up ~40% of the population (Pylona), it's going to be
much higher in many cities.
That's going to be substantially more disruptive than us packing Lykai into one convenient package. Sure, they can rebel more easily as a single unit, but if they do, they're isolated. We can pick them off when we have time or simply let the Liburni exact their revenge. Stamping out widespread and relatively popular grudges would be much harder, especially as splitting the Lykiians up disenfranchises them.
Spreading out the Lykiians is also dangerous because of the League Veto. If they're all stuck in one city, it's only one vote out of nine against us (six votes are needed for a Veto). If we disperse them across all of our League cities, it means that
every city suddenly has a significant population base that wants to screw with us.
