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I would like your thoughts on running a huge empire, preferably in BI. What I mean is, do all empires end up like the Western Romans, and if not, why not?
The Westerns are my favourite faction because after 20 turns of anti-insurrection policites their cities are earning and the mighty roman army is on the march again. Does the Eastern Empire, because it is smaller, hve the same potential?
I don't exactly understand the question, but the ERE certainly are richer than the west despite having lesser land. Plus it is easier to control once you get rid of the false gods. It also faces less enemy than the West, with only the Sanssanids to contend with in the east and also able to block enemy expansion in Europe with the constraction of a several forts in key positions.
From my personal experience before i stopped playing was the Western Romans were always unstable more than the East and a lot of external enemies doesnt help matters either. The East kinda experiences something similar though the Persians (Sassanids) doesnt help the East that much either. In the East there naturally rich with resources while in the West its mostly taxes they have to rely on for income if you have the time and army to keep it going.
The Eastern Empire enjoys a much easier start but the West can be brought down to control very quickly. destroy all barracks except Rome and Ravenna, and then let all the settlements rebel as they pleases (not all at once). Without barracks the best troops they could train is merely peasants and should be dead easy to recover you lands. Exterminate population brings income and stability. Then you could face external dangers. The Western Empire gave me a fright at first but after reading a couple of guides I gradually learnt how to deal with it. It's not that scary after all.
Empires hardly ever end up in the WRE situation. Any mass of land can be sustained as long as it can uphold itself financially and has enough support from its people. This is easy enough to do
In the case of empires which are undergoing construction, creating financial stability and popular support is easy enough to do as you go along the path of conquest. When you capture a settlement you can develop it to its needs as you go along.
The WRE is only as it is because the developers have set it up to be like that, if you know what I mean. Esentially no settlement has ever had much development beyond the very basics and the population stagnated at a low level. If the land had really been treated like that when it was conquered, then the faction would not have made it past three provinces without total economic collapse.
Hope you understood all that - I didn't quite know how to explain it ~:)
I Understand. Thanks