I was in a hazy nap the other day. and was thinking about the economic system in MTW.
Its a dynamic, well developed, closed economic system.
Doing a little system anaylsis in my head, I realized that it is somewhat flawed:
Observe:
In the entire map:
Yearly:
Total Income = farm + trade. (I = F + T)
Expense = Support + build (E = S + B)
Assume the system reach equalibrium when total income (I) = total expense (E)
So where is the equilibrium point?
I played alot of factions, English, Italian, Egyption, Byzatium, German, Almohead etc... all ran into a little bit of money trouble during middle of the game. where u are one of 3-4 remaining factions.usually dominating over a region, Western Europe. Mediterrianing, Asia minor+middleeast+balkans. and have a income of usually 20k a year and a expense of 1k less than that, and build up a nice reserve of 20k-80k.
But soon after that, as u or comp try to expand...the income sag below expense (deficit) and soon you are looking at a shrinking reserve of florine.
This is with all farm maxed out and all high acument with fleet dominating sea!
So after a brief 10 years reserve dwindle to negative. and you are dead in the water.
So why?
Balance of budget with in ENTIRE system:
I = E or Farm + trade = Support + build,
At first Farm and trade both increase. expecially trade. support and build cost increase too but Support cost is small at first and build cost is a one time expense.
so you are running positive account balance.
And as smaller faction got taken over, the efficiency of the garrisoning and building increased and saw a lowering of over all support cost effeciency
But as empire expand, farms reached all 80%
but the number of foreign provinces to trade is at best held steady and decreasing.
But at sametime the burgeoning empire bought about rebellions and silly stuff like resurfacing of Factions. so Large garrisons is needed again.
System is in a precarious balance.
tipped over by war.
But now if you find yourself in a war with another major faction. No trade even you got sealanes.
So F < S and so the system is head towards recession. At this point you have reached the point of no return in Florinomics, the system collapses, with each nation trying to reduce expense but unwilling to demilitrize borders. and hoping that the solution is to conquer land.
Bad choice, because it will further dampen the trade capacity of the system and damage farm income as well! basically the whole system collapese due to crunch in income and increase in expense. i.e. no $$ and you are F**ked
So What to do.
Solution 1) when you reach thatmid game equilibrium, do not linger and make sure that you plan and have the resources to conqer all land in the next 20 turns before the money ran out.
2) A patch will do
specifically, allow normal trade with own provinces. that will boast income only on late stages and allow for a positive balance.
Sincerely,
Thank you all for reading my well thought out rant.
[This message has been edited by Kelvar_Mongol (edited 09-07-2002).]
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