what should i do?

[trader/warrior]

on my current campaign as the byz i do now own all the east of the map i have borders with france in europe and with almos in afrika. the year is only 1160. i grew fast because in the east about 25000 peasants and fanatics rebelled to my side. because of this i was loosing money fast. i did not want to disband so many people so i decided to make a mass invasion on the HRE and the polish. after hard fighting both of my enemies were destroyed and there were only about 5000 of the peasents left plus 5000 of my trained army. but i am still loosing money and now people are rebelling allover turkey and afrika where i only have about 800 men but with 1500 coming but still there are about 9000 rebels and most are trained desert soliders.


this is a really hard situation. please help.

EDIT: i am probably going to my doom though, because when the golden horde arrives i wont have enough men

[Teutonic Knight]

well, if I were you I would try to concentrate most/all of my forces at some central location (i.e. Constantinople). Then I would counterattack the rebels, so in other words, retreat and regroup, then counterattack.
then if you have enough money you are probably gonna wana set up some trade routes to the rest of Europe to get some money flowing into those coffers (this may be one of the reasons for the rebellion).

that's just my 2 cents

[trader/warrior]

i dont have any money thats the biggest problem. i am on -8000 florins and loosing still so i had to invade italy to not llose so much money that its impossible to recover

[Teutonic Knight]

ok then you definitly need to regroup to Constantinople and hold off the rebels for awhile.....one more thing stop building stuff

maybe you could post a screenie so I can see where you are exactly?

[NateEngle]

I agree with the comment about setting up trade routes.

Sending an army of peasants into an attack to get them off your payroll is a start (although personally I'd just disband them for all the good they're liable to be on the battlefield), but eventually you'll need to have a healthy surplus in order to afford the professional troops you're going to need to replace all those lost peasants.

[trader/warrior]

the thing is that i need those peasents to keep the provinces in the newly qonquered land from rebelling. i cant make trade routes because the scisillians have destroyed every single one

[Portuguese Rebel]

Send your peasants to plunder and glory... Let me explain...

You are in the red because of upkeep right? so you need to gain money and reduce upkeep. Don't disband your peasants, send them to the other factions lands, choosing the least defended provinces to atack. You are not gonna keep those provinces, all you want is the loot. Send your peasants deep into enemy lands (you will eventually lose them all but thats not bad) to loot. This will acomplish two things, get you a lot of money (wich you can then use to build a merchant/war fleet, since you cannot afford that right now), plus you will set the AI factions back in the dark ages.
About those rebels... where do you have your king? is he isolated from some parts of his kingdom? He must be in contact with his provinces to control them fully. Anyway it may be to late for preventing revolts and you said you dont have enough troops to deal with them. As Teutonic said, you must regroup somewhere. Be carefull and choose your most valuable provinces, even if this means to lose some of the others. But if you leech on the lands of others (some of Sun Tzu's "Art of War" in this) with your armys of peasants then you will have enough money to build a decent army and retake the rebels, with plans to stay for a long time, this time...
After this, well... you are gonna piss some people off by looting their lands and have a few wars on your hands, but with your new army of Byz troops (built with loot money) there is not much they can do to stop you, since a human player when in crontrol of a major power can take on all the AI factions (not advisable though). But remember that if you decide to have trade, you need to have some peace so, perhaps, while dealing with the rebels, you can try some peace arrangements with good trading nations and blow out of the water all the other ships.
Hope this helps, its hard cause i don't know your exact position... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

[Teutonic Knight]

once again....please post a screenie, I'd like to see where you are..........

[Lord Of Storms]

I agree with Pr take your peasants on a good old raid and pillage to help with your cash flow problem leave enough to safely garrison where you can and go pillaging it works http://www.emotipad.com/emoticons/Viking.gif

[Lord Romulous]

i would remember that if you invade a province capture and destroy it and then leave the next turn, then their is a very strong chance that provience will rebel with a loyalist army of it previous owners. all of these high tech loyalist rebels are going to be very pissed at you and may invade you.

it has been my experience that you need to leave a large army of atleast 700 troops +priests and spies in a provence for about 10+ years before you can safely abandon with out getting a loyalist rebellion of previous owner.

so be aware that raping and pillaging gives a good amount of cash but also gives your enemies lots of high tech armies with which they can use against you.

[Brutal DLX]

Disband all peasants, or go on raid with them until they are vanquished. Take the remains of your real forces, go back to Constantinople and take back all the Near Eastern provinces, one by one. Try to get to Egypt, or if that is occupied by Almohads, try to make Syria and Tripoli/Palestine your border provinces. Even destroy buildings in your own provinces, you have to get out of the red as soon as possible. Check the economy parchment often, so you see when you are starting to make surplus cash. Have at least a garrison of 100 men in each province. When you actually have money to spend again, use it wisely, keep your main army in good condition, and spend the rest on building basic agrarian upgrades.
Meanwhile the enemy should be advancing on Constantinople, stand fast and keep that at any cost Granted, you made a big mistake when you started such a war with your peasant armies, you should have disbanded all but a few for garrison purposes...but it's not too late yet..

Try to follow the tips given here and try to make peace with your enemies, so you will have time to stabilise your Eastern provinces, build upgrades and get up armies again to prepare for the Golden Horde. Don't spread too far out before they appear. Georgia should be your border province in that section...

[trader/warrior]

now the rebels in africa and turkey have turned to my side and most of them are trained soliders. now i can either disband the peasants or let them raid someone. i choose (drum roll) DISBAND HALF AND USE THE OTHER HALF TO RAID if thats okay with u guys. things are looking brighter, but im still on -8000

[Brutal DLX]

Then I strongly suggest to either start plundering NOW or disband as many until you actually start gaininh money instead of losing. Being in red is the worst thing that can happen to you, since it limits you in each and every way.

[NateEngle]

It sounds to me like this is a classic case of expanding too fast and getting over-extended. The cost of the peasants needed to keep rebellions under control drastically exceeds the revenue that comes from the provinces being held.

Much as it might pain you to do so, I would contract the lines to the point where I could keep order and still have at least a couple florins of profit. Having ownership of land is more a curse than a blessing if holding onto it drives you bankrupt.