rime is a direct result of a really ugly mood in some parts of your city. When you are warned about crime, or about the worsening mood in your city, take it seriously, and try to cure the causes before crime breaks out.

Remember the distinction between the city's overall mood, and that of each individual house. People are influenced by their neighbors, so that the overall mood of a city limits the effects of even very extreme anger within individual houses. The crime overlay shows how likely any one house is to commit a crime; the angrier they are, the worse crime they want to commit.

When a house's inhabitants do grow angry enough to turn to crime, they plan their crime based on how angry they are – but they will adjust their crime based on their neighbors' mood. Specifically, if the city's overall mood is very good, the worst crime you will suffer in your city is a mugging, even if the individual house was angry enough to riot. If the overall city mood is merely average to good, you might also s u ffer some thefts. The overall mood of the city needs to be quite poor before riots actually break out.

The most minor crimes are personal assaults, or what the people call “muggings.” Muggings are unfortunate, but they don't affect the city itself. If the occasional mugging is the worst that your people have to contend with, your city has no serious crime problem. Your advisors will not even notify you of these crimes, deeming them too petty and a waste of your precious time. You might notice a citizen standing on the s t reet, waving a torch, angry and about to commit a mugging. Take this as a warn i n g that the people's mood could be better, though there is no real damage caused d i rectly to your city by these assaults. If a p refect is near one of these angry torc h wavers, he will immediately approach the criminal, and persuade him – with force if need be – not to commit the crime.

If conditions don't improve, though, the mood of your people may worsen. Theft is the next step in a criminal career, and is a clear sign of greater anger at the poor quality of city life. Theft strikes right at your treasury, as thieves rob your tax collectors or break into the treasure vaults beneath your Senate and forums, stealing some or all of the money stored there. You will be told of any thefts that occur, and you should react swiftly to improve people's mood before things worsen.

Should you ignore the warnings, or your actions take too long to improve things, you may encounter riots. Riots are the worst kind of crime, and can be ugly. This is one of the worst threats a governor can face, and I will tell you momentarily how to deal with riots. The best way to deal with crime, as I have said, is to improve the city's mood. A happy city is a crime-free city, as my Greek tutor used to say. But, even with the best intentions, governors sometimes must make difficult decisions which on occasion may allow a certain level of crime to arise. In these situations, the city's own watchmen, the prefects, are needed.