Pioneers of Pagonia tasks you with setting up a sprawling, successful settlement, and in order to do that you need territory. When you start off the borders of your new settlement will be relatively small, and you'll need to take steps to grow further. The process is pretty simple - if you know what you're doing.
This guide will help you expand the borders of your settlements in Pioneers of Pagonia. Setting up your expansion efforts is one of the first things you'll want to do when you start a new game, as it takes a while to grab large swathes of land.
Step 1: Build Guard Towers or Garrisons
The main thing you need to do to expand your territory in Pioneers of Pagonia is construct Guard Towers. They're one of the simplest buildings in the game, and cost a mere six Stone. Guard Towers are manned by, you guessed it, Guards, and you'll have a handful available whenever you begin a game.
Guards are useful for defense of your settlement against foreign powers, but they serve another purpose as well: Expanding your borders. Once you have a Guard Tower in place your Guards will begin the process of expanding your borders, which appear on the map as a line of stones, topped by colored dots. The Guards will head to the borders and add more stones, expanding your territory with each addition. Garrisons also serve this purpose, though they cost more (16 Cut Stones) to construct, so you may want to save them for later.
It's important to note that Guard Towers and Garrisons get progressively and further away from the borders as your Guards grow your little empire. Eventually you'll want to destroy your current Guard Tower / Garrison and make some new ones closer to the borders, so your Guards don't have as far to walk.
Step 2: Set up a Stone Mason
Whenever a Guard expands the borders of your settlement they will use up Border Stones. Once you run out of Border Stones you can no longer expand your territory. In order to create more Border Stones you'll need to set up a Stone Mason. The Masons working at the Stone Mason will create more Border Stones for you.
Your starting supply of Stone is only so large, so you'll probably want to supplement the Stone Mason with a Quarry. Set it up near a heap of rocks (usually in hilly territory) and the workers will go out to collect more Stone. Place these buildings close together to expedite the Border Stone-making process.
Step 3: Explore
At this point you've figured out the general process for expanding your borders. Only one step remains: Unveiling new lands to claim. If you take a moment to observe your Pioneers you'll soon notice that none of them will set foot outside the confines of your settlement, remaining safely within your borders at all times.
The only exception to this rule are Explorers. Working out of an Explorer's Hut, Explorers will roam the unclaimed areas of the island, slowly dispelling the fog that covers areas you haven't checked. It takes a while, but your Explorers will eventually uncover the entirety of the island, giving you room to branch out and claim everything that hasn't already been claimed by someone else. (Yes, you can run into enemies.)
As with Guards and Guard Towers, you'll probably want to move your Explorer's Hut closer to the borders of your territory, so your Explorers don't have to trudge across quite as much known territory to get to their destination.
One final note. If you look in the top-left corner of the screen you'll see the Island tab. If you click this you can activate two percentiles: Claimed Area (how much of the island is within your borders) and Explored Area (how much of the island your Explorers have investigated). These two numbers will give you a good idea of how well your efforts are going, and how far you still have to go.
For the most part - at first, anyway - you probably won't decide which parts of the landscape you want to conquer. If that's the case then your Guards will spread out and slowly expand your borders in an even fashion. There's a way to specify which chunks of the land you want to claim, however, and you should learn how to do it before you missing out on something good.
Click on one of your Guard Towers / Garrisons. On the right side of the menu that appears is a small icon with an arrow, pointing down at a circle. This button allows you to set the Claim Focus Point. A function available for many buildings, this option in conjunction with land grabbing allows you to specify which area you want Guards to claim. This will encourage any Guards assigned to that posting to spread out until they've captured the spot you indicate on the map.
Claim Focus Point is a handy method for 'capturing' resources or odd landmarks that you want to keep for yourself. You will run into competitors for land as you play, and you don't want to miss out on any good stuff. Try not to forget that it exists. Happy expanding!