More hints on how to improve the economy?

Whatzzzz up, RTW gamers? I love this game too as you do. I'm playing it the second week already. ~:) I've read a RTW beginner's guide by froggy (thanks to him very much!) also gamespy RTW strategy guide was also very interesting. I'm currently playing my first campaign as the House of Julii on hard/hard (I was quite experienced on MTW). From the beginning everything went right: I quickly qonquered some 5 Galic settlements (oh how I hate these barbarians!), after enslaving each town (as actually romans did in history!) to boost my home cities' growth. To get more cash I put taxes to very high in my best-producing cities, did quite good diplomacy and spying (gained much profit from it!), assigned governorns with good managment skills and influence in economically strong towns (those generals only with stars were immidiatly sent to the front), built economic buildings first (my building order ruoghly is this: roads, farms, mines barracks, port, trade bldgs, etc.). So I did everything that was written in guides and it really helped me! Cause at the beginning I had much extra money, but the war really tired my economy, because maybe I've produced too many soldiers or maybe I've started war too early? My budget decreased from about 15000 D to nothing and now I've almost got money on each turn to build needed bldgs. Maybe I should maintain the territories and stop qonquering for a bit? I hope my economy will improve in the near future. If anybody has got additional hints, please let me know. Your knowledge is appreciated :bow: ROMA VICTA!

P.S. I just love Gladiator movie!

1. Froggy is a girl, really.
2. Build the economic buildings, such as Trader, Ports and Roads. You could build farms as well, but you'll end up with a fuckload of squalor. Not good. Raise the taxes. Exterminate the people in the cities you conquer. Loads of money guaranteed. And don't keep like 12 units of Hastati (or whatever) in garrison. Keep just about enough to handle the public order and nothing more.

You can also check the Financial table (just to see where your money goes) if you click the Faction icon, the one to the left of the "End turn button".

Good luck

I don't know if it helps, but what I did was send a diplomat on a boat to cruise round the Med, negotiating trade rights with all factions and identifying their cities (can you only trade with a city you have uncovered on the map?). In MTW, sea trade was the big money-maker - not sure if it is in RTW, so I played safe.

As Julii, I found I could fight a light, Rumsfeldesque, style of warfare against the barbarians that kept costs down. Very few combat stacks - pretty much one per enemy faction. Each only 12 units eg 4-5 heavy infantry, 3 missile, 2 dogs, 2 cav + general in a stack. Then just 1-3 town watch for garrison. I would prioritise buildings over units.

Morning,

I read your post because I too was haveing Econ problems at first, and I too was very Expirenced in MTW. I also started with The House of Julii and yes my first target was Gaul, it almost has to be your first priority. Here is what I found to work for my Econemy.

First of all, yes you may need to hault your conquests for a while and get all your cities in order. Tax them as much as you can till their happiness drops lower then 90 - 95%, but if you do that watch closely because after you end turn it may drop to 60-75% and a revolt is right around the corner.

Ports and Trade rights are important. Also sea lanes. If you don't plan on takeing Spain right away, send a diplomat and get some trade rights. Also, just because The Brutii and Scipii may be at war with someone like Egypt this may not mean you are. Go get some trade rights down there as well if you can. The other Roman factions may goto War with other factions that YOU are at War with, but then again, the comp's AI can be dumb at times.

Dont pile a bunch of troops into your city as a Garrison, this will break you as fast as invadeing armies and it will happen fast. You could be all good one turn but if you have 12 or more cities pumping out troops suddonly your next turn your a few thousand in the hole. As the Julii, I found that a good Governor with just 2 Town Watch and 1 or 2 Missle troops in all of the towns in Northern Italy is just fine, and that is with High or Very High Tax Rates in every city and their happiness was still in the Green.

Finally, I too played MTW for a long time, (I think I played every faction at least once) and I found that makeing and maintaining War in that game is a bit different. With RTW you dont want a bunch of small armies and half strength troops in your cities. Ill admit I got careless some of the time in MTW. What you do want is 1 or 2 and depending on your war plan mabey 3 or 4 Large armies (if you can afford this that is) in an area. Say Northern Italy, or North Western Gaul, and keep their stregnth near full if you can and try to get Generals with Drillmasters and Explorers for the longer movemnt to get where you need to be fast. And yes... you can and will hit a point where your Full Army will cost more money in output then you have coming in. At this point Decimation is in order. Stop the Conquest, build up some better classed Troops (After Marius I mean) and disband the older outclassed troops. I had found even the expirienced Veteren troops arent worth keeping around late in the game if they are too out classed. And one mistake my friend did.... Dont try to make a full army of Urban and Pratorian Cohorts and Cavalry, its way too expensive. I found that Legionary Cohorts with Support from those types of troops are great.

Hope some of this is helpful and not just the samething told differently.

Here comes a hairpin...

The only thing I can think of is you have to feed way too many soldiers, so their salary is dragging you down.

Before that happens you can use only peasants for garrison - they are very cost effective. You only need enough of them to keep the order 75%+. Then you only need 1 or 2 serious army for invasion early on.

If you expand fast you should be able to support yourself with more population and tax. Many players report they went after the Greeks on Balkan for more cash. ~:)

Actually.... Spain has a few mines and its Sea Lanes are great for Trade. North Africa near Egypt and the Near East is really where the money is...

One weird thing is that a city will have a negative revenue when huge, you slaughter 75% and you suddenly have a positive revenue. Strange, must be corruption or something. I always thought that more people would mean more revenue. Maybe I am to "chinese".... ~;)

Bmolsson, are you aware that cities are assigned a share of your faction's total military support costs in proportion to their share of your faction's total population?[1] So exterminating a population reduces that city's share of your total population and hence reduces the share of military costs assigned to it.

[1] I know it's a really dumb idea (makes the city profits uninformative) - I hope it goes with the patch.