Financial and Strategic Woes of Empire

[RenartRegal]

Hello,

New guy here, and just reinstalled RTW when I both discovered this mod and found out that it's gone up to 1.0. Excellent job on it so far, I'm loving the new varied units and government types, but I am having something of a financial problem whenever I play a faction (Until I get better, I think I'm also going to stay away from the Greeks; bloody Macedonians!). Don't get me wrong, I like the idea that maintaining a standing army requires one heck of a maintenance fee, but juggling that with the strategic realities and needs (ie, I need something resembling an army LAST YEAR) of any given situation, I'm looking at increased debt and the inability to recruit armies in a swift enough fashion. Any help for this hapless n00b to EB would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[konny]

In EB the upkeep is about 1/4 of the recruitement costs. That means you will have hughe differences in upkeep from unit to unit. Some, like elephants or ships , might be responsible for 1/2 of your entire dept. So, check every army and every unit and dispand the over-expensive units as long as you can't afford them.

Another sullotion would be to conquer as many provinces as possible in the first turns of your game to make your empire matching your army.


Anyway, I would adwise you to start in EB with Rome and to disband the ships in the first turn, to get acustomed to the game, the economic aspect in particular.

[Underhand]

Try Carthage or Rome first, as they are the easiest to make solvent. I think Rome's the easiest for a new player, because it has fewer cities, is fully contiguous and has a comparatively easy immediate source of cash: sacking Taras. Disband your fleet (Rome doesn't need one until it wants to expand beyond the peninsular/Sicily) and take your army in Arpi and besiege Taras. Either starve them out and defeat their last desperate sally or, if you think you can, commit a small enough force to make them sally immediately and defeat that by pinning it at the gate. Exterminate the city for a cool 3,000 or so mnai (don't worry, Taras' population will grow back quite quickly). For a regular income, your best bets are sea trade and mining. Build and upgrade ports whenever you can to increase your trade income (excepting those ruinously expensive 'extensive' upgrades available in some provinces), and grab provinces with precious metals and build mines in them. Rhegion is one, and the Dalmatian coast down to Macedonia is replete with precious metals. Pella and Dalminion are exceptionally productive, with three times the output of most other mining provinces. If you do go for Greece and Macedonia first (which I recommend), build yourself one small ship to cross the Adriatic. In theory you could use the one you start with, but getting it to the Adriatic without first building a port in Messana is slightly tricky, and financially it is no better than disbanding and replacing it, because you end up paying upkeep for a few turns when you're not using it.

Remember: ports and mines, and modest armies unless you're about to go on a conquering spree.

[johnhughthom]

Rome has a much easier surce of cash than sacking Taras, the Celts. Get your diplomat to ask for money for a ceasefire and you can get over 20000 in total from the Aedui and Arverni in the first few turns.

[Underhand]

Rome has a much easier surce of cash than sacking Taras, the Celts. Get your diplomat to ask for money for a ceasefire and you can get over 20000 in total from the Aedui and Arverni in the first few turns.
I'm afraid I regard that as cheating ~;) Not that I'm bothered if other people do it. I don't even sell my maps to other factions, although now that wonders are worth Brazilians I'm awfully tempted to destroy them. Haven't yet though.

[Fearless Samnite]

there is multiple approaches to everything

one of the more nicer and efficient ones IMHO

is to stack all your generals together since they are cool exclusive infantry
and leave one unit in each of your cities as a garrison. This unit would be The cheapest possible, the Hellenic skirmishers 240 men on huge setting

then focus on trade and domestic concerns while you make war

this can include dismissing all the troops you start with from turn one to....using them to capture cities along with your generals

:gah2: but i have a problem with my kh generals skin..so im playing as the arverni right now

:duel:

[bovi]

stack all your generals together
All your eggs in one basket is unwise. You might end up in a situation they can't retreat from.

[tapanojum]

Not to mention that n army of generals doesn't seem very realistic.

[Cheexsta]

Get mines. Lots of them. Spain, Dalmatia, Greece and Asia Minor are richest in mines IIRC, so focus your expansion on them. Ports come second in generating a ridiculous amount of income - at the very least build a second-tier port (the one after coastal clearing) in every coastal province.

Also, be careful in your distribution of governors and garrisons. Figure out how much income each city is making with certain governors. Is it better to have higher Management but lower Influence (and therefore lower taxes) or lower Management and higher Influence (and therefore higher taxes)? Is it better to have low taxes and a small garrison, or high taxes and a moderate (but slightly more expensive) garrison? Also take note of special traits, like Miners and put them in the appropriate city.

As for taxes, in desperate times I tend to go with the policy of "If they're happy, I'm not taxing them enough," where I keep raising taxes until they become disillusioned (blue faces). If anything bad happens to affect public order, such as a governor dying or gaining a negative trait, or if the city is infiltrated by enemy spies, taxes can always be lowered again until they're barely happy enough.

If you need a standing army in times of peace, go with the cheapest possible troops that are sufficient to get a basic defense job done. Would you rather have expensive Pezhetairoi and Hetairoi or cheaper Deuteroi Phalangitai and Prodromoi for border defense? It may be easier to go with the cheaper option and raise an army of the more expensive troops when needed. Sometimes the cheapest option is better anyway, like with horse archer armies. Always maintain a minimal fleet: keep enough to ward away pirates and enemy invasions, but not too much. For my Romani, a single unit of Quinquiremes is more than enough for this, but I have enough cash to build a new fleet when necessary.

Anyway, those are just a few ideas. Economy is one of the first things I think about when entering a campaign, and following these basic principles gets me out of debt fairly easily and reliably.

[tapanojum]

Ignore

[RenartRegal]

The advice is much appreciated. Thank you, all! I'll give these all a shot as soon as I've got the time to boot up this mod again. The new changes were just a little overwhelming to someone who's had nothing but vanilla in terms of gameplay experience.