A Newcomer's Questions on Prices

Howdy, all. I'm quite the Europa Barbarorum neophyte (as in, I found it/downloaded it yesterday), and since I wasn't able to find a thread resembling "Why we did what we did," I was hoping I could throw a question or two out there and that somebody would be able to provide the answers.

(1) Primarily, I've noticed that everything is awfully expensive, both in terms of recruitment cost (or building cost for structures) and in terms of upkeep. As far as I can tell, there weren't any modifications made to the economic model for the game, so the player's ability to make money hasn't increased alongside these prices. Given the extreme attention to detail in the game, I'm sure there's an excellent reason for all of this--I just have no idea what it is.

(2) I've noticed a couple of mentions, while puttering around here, that EB is only balanced for Medium battle difficulty level. Given my ignorance of the effects of changing the difficulty levels (both for battle and for the campaign map), I don't really know what to make of this. Does increasing battle difficulty do nothing more than increase the statistical abilities of the AI units, or does it have any effect on the use of sound tactics during the battle? Parallel to that, although hardly restricted to EB, does changing the campaign map difficulty only affect AI finances and belligerence, or does it also impact strategy?

(3) Finally, I've seen a couple of questions about triggering reforms and the like, but they were clearly being asked by people with a greater working knowledge of what was (or might be) required than I am. Is there anything resembling a "manual" for the game where this and other such information might be found? If not, would anybody be willing to explain to me to requirements for the Polybian, Marian, and Augustan reforms?

Cheers.

1. This helps to balance the game and make it more challenging. In vanilla, it was far too easy to make heaps of money, and the spend it on stacks and stacks of units, in EB, you have to work for this.

2. Increasing battle difficulty gives the enemy units bonuses (something like +4 attack and defense, although I can't remember exactly), thus if you increase difficulty, the game becomes un-balanced and un-historical.

3.:faq:

2) The tactics of the AI are not affected by battle difficulty, no.

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Originally Posted by Landwalker

Does increasing battle difficulty do nothing more than increase the statistical abilities of the AI units, or does it have any effect on the use of sound tactics during the battle?

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Unfortuantly, the battle stupidity of the AI is hardcoded.

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Originally Posted by Landwalker

Is there anything resembling a "manual" for the game where this and other such information might be found?

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There will be, although it is likely still a few months off. (considering 1.0 hasn't even come out yet :laugh4:)

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Originally Posted by Bootsiuv

There will be, although it is likely still a few months off. (considering 1.0 hasn't even come out yet :laugh4:)

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Heh, yes, I noticed that yesterday. An awfully inconvenient time for someone to get newly interested in a mod, isn't it? What with a new, overhauled, non-beta version right around the corner (and yet, infuriatingly, without a definite date), it's a constant battle between putting it off until the new release which could be anywhere between this evening and at some indefinite future point, and diving into the beta version, risking making just enough progress to be horribly frustrated at starting over when the new release is out.

Oh, the quandaries.

Cheers.

EB hasn't been a beta since the release of 0.80. Thats exactly the reason the new release is name 1.0 instead of 0.9, people thinking its still a beta and not trying it out. I find the current version to be the most stable mod I've played.

Ah, I see. A bit of misinformation gleaned from my wanders around the forums, incomplete unit cards, and the like. Thanks for the correction.

Which in turn makes me wonder what the differences will be with 1.0, but I'm sure I will encounter those in their own time.

Cheers.

Do a forum search for "all previews in one thread". There you can see the previews leading up to the release of 1.0, and any other preview for that matter, that aren't stickied at the moment. This should show you the improvement.

Which is vast, to say the least!! :2thumbsup:

Not that I don't encourage playing .8x....it's an excellent mod, even without all of the great new features this latest release will add.

If you've got hi-speed it only takes a little while to DL, although you may want to reinstall R:TW and start fresh when 1.0 comes out.

In the end, the choice is yours, but .8x is very fun....

Indeed--I've already downloaded .81somethingorother, but I haven't had much time with it yet due to course requirements and the whole writing-a-one-hundred-page-paper thing. Hopefully in a day or two I'll be able to get at it for more than thirty minutes, hence why I wanted to clear up my earlier questions (sparked not just by unit costs, but by the "extensive port upgrades" ringing in at several tens of thousands of minae, for example). Once I'm able to tackle it more extensively, though, it looks like it should be very enjoyable.

Cheers.

Well, some port upgrades are extensively expensive because no natural harbor existed in these regions, so, if the inhabitants wanted a large port facility, it would have been man made.

Regions with natural harbors offer much more affordable ports.

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Originally Posted by Landwalker

...but by the "extensive port upgrades" ringing in at several tens of thousands of minae, for example.

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Oh, those just represent the completely crazy amounts of work and expenses incurred - since you're pretty much "landscaping" a major portage into existence where Momma Nature and Daddy Geology hadn't seen fit make one.

AFAIK historically such projects were something only Emperors and similar seriously powerful people started on, somewhere along the lines of the Great Wall of China or the Red Sea canals.

Ah, I see. I just remember seeing the "Extensive Small Port Upgrade" (or some such) in Ariminum (or Arretium, I don't remember... the one on the coast of the Tyrrhenian, not Adriatic, Sea), and the "Extensive Large Port Upgrade" in Capua, which were something on the order of 36,000 and 96,000 minae, respectively, and take approximately forever (rounded to the nearest eon) to build. Obviously, playing for only a half hour, I didn't have the money for this, so I don't know how much of an impact these have on the province's trade income, but it certainly... jarred me, to say the least. I haven't quite caught on to evaluating the suitability of a particular province for a port (or anything else it might need to be suitable for), so things like this still catch me off guard.

Cheers.

One of the several delightful, although at first confusing, surprises that await you in the world of EB (hence my plan to do a manual for new players).

I hope you like looking at your computer screen, because your going to be doing it A LOT over the next few weeks. This, I assure you. :laugh4: :2thumbsup:

Some of the various messages gained when building these upgrades:

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We have upgraded our trading port. It cost a freaking ton of money to do it though. It better be worth the wait too. But it's not like we had something better to do, sitting around the seashore all day, counting rocks.

We have spent an enormous amount of time and money in upgrading this port. With the amount of silver we spent to upgrade this place, you could have bought a lot of soldiers. We hope you have made a wise decision, because if don't have enough men to defend this city, I'm not going to be the one to take the blame.

I thought spending that amount of money on these port improvements was daft, but it's finally finished. If some more money doesn't start flowing through those nice new port harbor gates, someone's going to be in big trouble. And it ain't going to be me.

Oh gods! When will the hubris of man end?! We have spent unholy amounts of gold on building this new port upgrade. I only hope our people are still alive by the time we should be expected to make up the money on this project. I'll probably be dead by then though. And my son will probably be paying off his gambling debts as a slave in some Roman leathermaking shop. Woe is me!

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This might give a perspective on the costs involved.

LOL....I must admit, I've never built the man made ports, the natural ones are just sooo much more affordable....

Those are some entertaining mssgs, to say the least! :laugh4:

:laugh4:

I believe it. Unfortunately I have a strange compulsion to gain as much money as possible (not so I can spend it on soldiers, though, which is why it is strange. I routinely have hundreds of thousands of denarii within 20-30 turns in Rome: Total Realism, because I do virtually nothing but build up economic infrastructure and hoard my gold. Thankfully, it means I can, and do, bribe any rebel army that happens to stir up trouble.), which eventually means the ridiculous port upgrades are going to get built. Once I get the hang of spending money, rather than amassing vast wealth and only spending it for the purposes of amassing more wealth, I'm sure I'll be fine and have the willpower to resist the urge to build those outrageous upgrades.

Cheers.

I don't know about R:TR, but you won't have several 100,000 mnai in the first 30 turns in EB....no way in hell.

The enemy factions also have monetary boni, so there going to come at you quicker and stronger than you might be used to, and they don't let up until you take or destroy their core.

EB runs on scripts, and this can change many things.

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Originally Posted by Bootsiuv

I don't know about R:TR, but you won't have several 100,000 mnai in the first 30 turns in EB....no way in hell.
...
EB runs on scripts, and this can change many things.

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Indeed...my limited experience so far has definitely proven that amassing vast wealth will be, if not utterly impossible, certainly extremely difficult and probably far slower to achieve. Hopefully that will break my preoccupation with purely economic development and encourage me to build some armies. And raid and pillage and all that good stuff.

I'm not familiar with the script-based running of, well, anything, let alone EB. Aside from things like seasonal penalties, armies getting bored while laying siege, and the like, what does this change in terms of the fundamental experiences? (Note: If this has an obvious or easily-located answer, just slap me. I'm in the middle of reading Procopius and am frankly too lazy to wander around the rest of the forums, so I'll freely admit I'm just hoping you folks will be generous enough to offer the answers.)

Cheers.

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Originally Posted by Landwalker

Indeed...my limited experience so far has definitely proven that amassing vast wealth will be, if not utterly impossible, certainly extremely difficult and probably far slower to achieve. Hopefully that will break my preoccupation with purely economic development and encourage me to build some armies. And raid and pillage and all that good stuff.

I'm not familiar with the script-based running of, well, anything, let alone EB. Aside from things like seasonal penalties, armies getting bored while laying siege, and the like, what does this change in terms of the fundamental experiences? (Note: If this has an obvious or easily-located answer, just slap me. I'm in the middle of reading Procopius and am frankly too lazy to wander around the rest of the forums, so I'll freely admit I'm just hoping you folks will be generous enough to offer the answers.)

Cheers.

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Its definitely possible with the larger factions. I'm running a Carthage campaign right now and have 100,000+ in the treasury in the year 232

If you want to get used to EB's pricing system without immediately risking the loss of your campaign by gambling to much on some improvement; you could start as:
a) The Romani
b) Qartadastim
c) Ptolemaioi

With a through c listed by difficulty. (Ptolemaioi will require you to wage war to one of the larges and most powerful factions of the world; the others don't and the Romani have the benefit of a coherent state rather than some tidbits here and there. Plus the unique way in which the Romani governemnt system works means that you don't have to understand that very much for the first 30 turns or so.)

If you've acquired some more familiarity with the pricing side it's a good thing to look at some weaker startin positions.
Your best bet would be KH, Makedonia; or Epeiros.

When you think those are almost too easy, you could make the leap for some of the virtually/competely landlocked factions (land-trade yields far less income than sea-trade; and that's hardcoded nothing we can do about it really); finally if you've mastered the art of surviving with factions such as Aedui or Arverni; or Getai you could go up to factions such as Casse, Pontos, Baktria or Hayasdan who are in an even thougher position.

And when you think --wow I can make serious money in EB, no matter what!; we have the Saka and Sauromatae to disprove you. ~;)

Carthage is easier IMO if you want to win the campaign the Romans have to conquer a lot more territory and fight a lot more battles so they're not that easy...

Oh, but this was merely about getting a firm economy established. And I think that a coherent border makes such things a tad easier. And of course the Romans can immediately recruit their elite most units; Carthage has a bit more building from scratch to do.

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Originally Posted by Landwalker

Indeed...my limited experience so far has definitely proven that amassing vast wealth will be, if not utterly impossible, certainly extremely difficult and probably far slower to achieve. Hopefully that will break my preoccupation with purely economic development and encourage me to build some armies. And raid and pillage and all that good stuff.

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Maybe, maybe not. My Aedui campaign took forever (about 15 years ~ 60 turns) to get out of the red and start making a decent profit. It turns out sacking Greece as the Aedui is quite profitable. My barbarian bean-counters even razed the Acropolis :laugh4:

More recently as Pontos, I've been swimming in cash since conquering Anatolia and the Levant, despite the upkeep costs of several full stack armies and battalions of spies. If I recall correctly, I was only in debt from 271-269. Those mines and ports really rake in the dough.

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Originally Posted by Tellos Athenaios

And when you think --wow I can make serious money in EB, no matter what!; we have the Saka and Sauromatae to disprove you.

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I'm going to have to take up the Saka gauntlet in 1.0

@Redmeth

Yes, but the war with the Romani is going to be tough for the Carthaginian player, no matter when the '1st Punic War' begins. The Romani's unit roster, while (arguably) lacking the punch of Qarthadastim elite forces, is overall much better IMO.

@Landwalker

Don't take my statemenst to mean that you can never amass wealth in EB. It is indeed quite possible to become wealthy, it just isn't going to happen right away.

Most factions place you in a position where your forced to disband most of your troops or begin conquering straight away to avoid falling majorly in debt.

Once the economic hurdle is overcome, however, you can amass great wealth if you so choose.

Personally I think that money is better spent than just sitting there, but that's just me.

Oh, I agree that the money is better spent than sitting around. But I'm crazy. I don't spend it, or spend very little of it except to get more of it. Maybe in the back of my head I think that once I have a virtually unlimited amount of money, I can simply snap my fingers, create a super-army, and roll over the remainder of my foes. I generally take a very minimalist approach to all strategy games--ensure a bustling economy and then accomplish my objectives with the absolute least amount of expenditures (fewest possible units, etc.). Even when rolling in dough, I counterintuitively only train the smallest number of soldiers I think I can get by with, occasionally with a small "buffer" supplement. I'm crazy.

Cheers.

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Originally Posted by Tellos Athenaios

If you've acquired some more familiarity with the pricing side it's a good thing to look at some weaker startin positions.
Your best bet would be KH, Makedonia; or Epeiros.

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It took me for freaking ever to get out of debt as Epeiros.

Sweboz also start off beginning a plummet into massive debt.

Also when compared to vanilla, the mines in EB are much much more profitiable.

and much much more expensive. :beam:

:inquisitive:

Amassing money does nothing for human players in EB except corrupt your family members. Put your money to some use, like formenting strife between other factions or buying map information. Better yet, improve your infrastructure. Bribes are ludicrously high - why pay off an army when you could raise 5 armies with the same amount of money?

The only use I see for large cash reserves is wholesale mercenary levies. Put your money into military forces. If they prevail, good things happen. If they are destroyed, the reduction in expenditure means you'll make more money.

How much more profitable? I know in RTR, an upgraded mine generally nets you around 750 denarii per turn, but even that seems like it would be relatively insubstantial in EB, given the high upkeep costs of many soldiers.

Do most EB players only recruit troops when they need them, then disband them at the end of a campaign? Wouldn't this hamper veterancy progression?

Cheers.

I seem to recall it's about 2000 mnai.

1st level = 2000

2nd level = 5000?

I don't know if these will change for 1.0.

As for your other question, I keep veteran units, only disbanding obsolete or overly expensive units that I feel are superfluous, and therefore, unnecessary.

Several units stay around for many, many, many years though.

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Originally Posted by Landwalker

How much more profitable? I know in RTR, an upgraded mine generally nets you around 750 denarii per turn, but even that seems like it would be relatively insubstantial in EB, given the high upkeep costs of many soldiers.

Do most EB players only recruit troops when they need them, then disband them at the end of a campaign? Wouldn't this hamper veterancy progression?

Cheers.

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2000 is what I've seen.

I know that Baktria can get insane income from mines.

Also it depends on the faction. Sometimes I keep a standard army and rampage through cities, exterminating the population and that can pay for the upkeep until they all die. Also in EB when attacking another faction's city you get a little extra gold from destroying goverment and maybe military buildings.

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Originally Posted by Landwalker

How much more profitable? I know in RTR, an upgraded mine generally nets you around 750 denarii per turn, but even that seems like it would be relatively insubstantial in EB, given the high upkeep costs of many soldiers.

Do most EB players only recruit troops when they need them, then disband them at the end of a campaign? Wouldn't this hamper veterancy progression?

Cheers.

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Mines typically net around 600 IIRC; 1500 if improved. Considerably more with a good governor.

I have a core of veterans. Light troops, generals, and mercs take the brunt of the losses when necessary. "Ah, the Bodyguards. They are numerous, but at least they're good for something" :laugh4:

That's quite a good bit of income. That makes me happy. :yes: Of course, then there's the question of how astronomically expensive building the mines in the first place are...

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Originally Posted by Primus Inter Duces

:inquisitive:

Amassing money does nothing for human players in EB except corrupt your family members. Put your money to some use, like formenting strife between other factions or buying map information. Better yet, improve your infrastructure. Bribes are ludicrously high - why pay off an army when you could raise 5 armies with the same amount of money?

The only use I see for large cash reserves is wholesale mercenary levies. Put your money into military forces. If they prevail, good things happen. If they are destroyed, the reduction in expenditure means you'll make more money.

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That is true, but much of it hinges on laziness. Bribery solves the problem instantly, improves my diplomat's skill (which is always rotten from unsuccessfully trying to negotiate peace with the stubborn AI factions), and doesn't require me to build up an army, wait around for it, fight the battle, and so forth. Almost certainly not the ideal approach, but I have all this money lying around--I may as well pay off the enemies (but not by building armies of my own, apparently). :dizzy2:

Cheers.

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Originally Posted by Primus Inter Duces

Mines typically net around 600 IIRC; 1500 if improved. Considerably more with a good governor.

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:inquisitive: I think it's 2k and 5k respectively, but I may be wrong about the level 2...

And yes, level 2 mine is something like 14k IIRC, so it isn't cheap.

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Originally Posted by Bootsiuv

:inquisitive: I think it's 2k and 5k respectively, but I may be wrong about the level 2...

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Either I'm wrong or ripped off. Go easy on me :clown: I sure don't make 5K with upgraded mines in Nikaia (at least without governor mining traits).

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Originally Posted by Primus Inter Duces

Mines typically net around 600 IIRC; 1500 if improved. Considerably more with a good governor.

I have a core of veterans. Light troops, generals, and mercs take the brunt of the losses when necessary. "Ah, the Bodyguards. They are numerous, but at least they're good for something" :laugh4:

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Ah, yes, I love those regenerating bodyguards... I also am a fan of the "mercenaries take the worst of it" approach. As far as light troops, that leads me to a completely non-EB-related question, and one that has no place in my own thread here, but a more general and tactical related one: How in the name of God are you supposed to use skirmisher infantry? The AI closes too fast for them to get off more than a volley most of the time. Is there some "trick" to using them, or am I simply not using them correctly to begin with?

Cheers.

The trick is to keep them out of harm, and either call their shots or preferable wheel them around the enemy army to throw into their unshielded side. Carnage. Also, they are essential to kill enemy elephants.

Get the AI to chase something other than your skirmishers, then shred their flank/rear

Yes, after using skirmishers extensively in the past week, due to curiosity and interest in the 'javelin v phalanx' thread where I argued skirmishers were underpowered, I would like to retract those statements.

Having paid more attention to exactly what their capable, skirmishers will devestate any non-phalanx troops from the rear and side, and most won't like it from the front much either.

Slingers are still far deadlier IMO.

@Primus Inter Duces

Relating to mining income: The income is distributed throughout all your cities. I'm quite sure that it is hard-coded about how income is not based on your most profitable cities, but actually on population. That's why you'll find that your most populated cities might be making no profit, while your small villages will be giving you good, solid cash.

A lot of people complained about this confusion way back in my vanilla days.

:tired:

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Originally Posted by Methuselah

@Primus Inter Duces

Relating to mining income: The income is distributed throughout all your cities. I'm quite sure that it is hard-coded about how income is not based on your most profitable cities, but actually on population. That's why you'll find that your most populated cities might be making no profit, while your small villages will be giving you good, solid cash.

A lot of people complained about this confusion way back in my vanilla days.

:tired:

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:inquisitive: Income or expenditure distribution? I'm aware of the latter. In looking at the settlement scrolls, the gross mining income for a given settlement is generally 600 for a mine and 1500 for a mining center, regardless of settlement size.

Edit - I wasn't very clear. I know the income displayed for the province on the strategy map is influenced by population in paying for a percent of army/agent expenditures.

Then the EB descriptions are innacurate....

And it is indeed, expenditure distribution. Income is on a city-by-city basis.

I never understood why they did it that way....it was very confusing to newer players (myself included).

Find out which provinces have gold or silver mines and try and grab them fast then build the first tier of mine which costs 14000 and takes 8 turns to build.

In my latest campaign (Baktria) I managed to never start to lose money through careful saving and tribute to AS to keep em off my back untill I had all of the Indus plus my starting zones then I started making inroads into AS.

I think its up to like 230ish or so, havent played in a few days, but im making around 20-25k a turn by just making armies big enough to take the town im looking at and having the smallest garrisons of the crappest troops avaliable. (Holding the Indus is so easy once you get stone walls and longbowmen ah)

The mining provinces are great. For Rome go for Rhegion, I dont know of the north ones. Corsica is another good one. And Dalmatia (Dalminion)

hope that helps.

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Then the EB descriptions are innacurate....

And it is indeed, expenditure distribution. Income is on a city-by-city basis.

I never understood why they did it that way....it was very confusing to newer players (myself included).

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OMG! I've been confused my whole life!!! :drama1:

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Income or expenditure distribution? I'm aware of the latter. In looking at the settlement scrolls, the gross mining income for a given settlement is generally 600 for a mine and 1500 for a mining center, regardless of settlement size.

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After already being confused my whole life, this'll probably confuse me in my afterlife... We need an EB member to settle this!

@bootsiuv
you dang old lady... :goofy:

You wouldn't be calling me an old lady if you saw my package....

















...of razors, they clearly say 'for men' on the bag. :dizzy2:

hahahaa... :beam:

PS: I think i'll come over and write down a "W" and an "O" in front of "men" for you... At least it'll set things straight...
:wink2:

Is that cool 20-25K per turn net or gross?

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Originally Posted by Bootsiuv

Then the EB descriptions are innacurate....

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Correct. Primus Inter Duces has posted the mining income you actually get. I seem to recall that the mine descriptions list those bogus 2000/5000 numbers because those are the settings that cause the game to give you 600/1500 per mine in the province.

Back to the subject of accumulating vast sums of money - it can be tricky to find things to spend it on, in my experience. Recruiting more and more troops will tempt me to use them. It's already hard enough to make it to the Marian reforms without satisfying Rome's victory conditions, let alone Imperial... My late-game pattern has been a slow cycle, gradually increasing to about 200k in treasury, then bribing off a small stack of rebels or enemy troops leaving 30-50k left. Substantial gifts to weak AI factions can often keep me below the 100k or 150k threshold for a time, but I'm almost never below 50k for more than that one turn of the bribe. Perhaps I should be more generous, but after seeing the massive expansion of Pontus (see faction progression thread, if anyone cares) after quite modest gifts I'm reluctant to give out truly large sums of money quickly.

A word of advice for Landwalker on EB ports: the RTW engine only allows three trade fleets from a city, so those higher level ports do little (expanding from 2 to 4 fleets) or nothing (expanding from 4 to 6 fleets). In particular, this means that the Large Port Upgrade is completely, utterly useless. Except for soaking off 64k or whatever they cost. If you do that, make sure to keep putting new buildings in front of the build queue - no point actually finishing such a port upgrade, after all.

And related new player advice - don't believe the Large Granary building description when it says it increases trade. Look closely at your trade projections when you put the granary into the build queue - it does alter your trade, but in a negative direction. I built one of these in Rome before I learned of my mistake. Unfortunately granaries can't be destroyed. :no:

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Originally Posted by jhhowell

A word of advice for Landwalker on EB ports: the RTW engine only allows three trade fleets from a city, so those higher level ports do little (expanding from 2 to 4 fleets) or nothing (expanding from 4 to 6 fleets). In particular, this means that the Large Port Upgrade is completely, utterly useless. Except for soaking off 64k or whatever they cost. If you do that, make sure to keep putting new buildings in front of the build queue - no point actually finishing such a port upgrade, after all.

And related new player advice - don't believe the Large Granary building description when it says it increases trade. Look closely at your trade projections when you put the granary into the build queue - it does alter your trade, but in a negative direction. I built one of these in Rome before I learned of my mistake. Unfortunately granaries can't be destroyed. :no:

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Hopefully that granary problem will be fixed with 1.0, then?

I'm guessing the thing with ports and trade fleets is hard-coded and not something the mod can work around--a shame indeed. Of course, buildings that actually injure your trade revenue are equally... shameful...

I haven't gotten nearly far enough in to worry about triggering the Marian reforms, let alone the imperial reforms, but I'm sure once I pay enough attention to what's required for those, I'll realize how imperative it is to keep churning out the armies as fast as I can support them. Of course, I have to get to the point where I'm actually making enough money to recruit armies, first...

Cheers.

Thanks for the clarification jhhowell....I wasn't aware of that. :2thumbsup:

On a side note, why include those large port upgrades if they have no point? Roleplaying purposes? :inquisitive:

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Originally Posted by Bootsiuv

On a side note, why include those large port upgrades if they have no point? Roleplaying purposes? :inquisitive:

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My assumption is that the EB folks didn't discover that trade fleets are hard coded until they tried to make these 2/4/6 ports instead of the vanilla 1/2/3 port progression. FATW 1.9 also had buildings that attempted to give a few cities extra trade fleets; that went away in their latest release. So I expect ports to work somewhat like vanilla again in EB 1.0. Unless it's not hardcoded and they did figure a way around it... That would be neat. ~:)

Landwalker - I believe the large granary works as intended, it's just the building description that's misleading. The reasoning as best I recall is that the city is importing so much food that the ships and/or merchant caravans don't have as much room for actual trade goods. They can be worth building, primarily in the inland desert provinces in Africa (Cydaus, Garama, that one south of Kyrene, Ammonion, and Hibis). Such provinces cannot build sewers (and thus can't build healers), so as partial compensation the granary series has three buildings instead of the normal two. The successor to the large granary is Desert Irrigation, expensive and time consuming but you get an extra farm level and a bit of public health. And it's not like inland desert cities are worth a damn for trade income anyway. :beam:

having heaps of money actually helps your family members in traits if you ask me, they almost always get 'tastes' and vices that dramatically improve their influence, allowing one to control far-away provinces more effectively. the command penalties are pretty redundant, ive never had a morale problem with my troops when led by any half-decent general. this is while playing as the romans.

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Originally Posted by jhhowell

My assumption is that the EB folks didn't discover that trade fleets are hard coded until they tried to make these 2/4/6 ports instead of the vanilla 1/2/3 port progression.

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Actually I discovered that right now by reading your post. Thanks for the info.

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Originally Posted by Primus Inter Duces

Is that cool 20-25K per turn net or gross?

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It was net, its gone down a bit now seeing as i started the offensive. Around 15k now.

The 25k turns were like with no standing army, only garrisons and mostly large mines in all settlements avaliable. 25k only lasted 5 turns or so while I built an army up after I took like 3 towns in 1 turn. I also dont build many elites as you can win with lesser troops easily enough. Also its so annoying retraining all those Pheraspidai in one town :wall: Haha.

Watch out for corruption especially early on.

The Seleucids for example get nice early income but half the profit disappears in corruption.

Is it me or do the honourable men of Rome suffer less from this. In my current game 210BC 500K in the bank making about 30-40K profit and corruption is about 3K per month and that has only gone up since taking Spain?

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Originally Posted by jhhowell

Landwalker - I believe the large granary works as intended, it's just the building description that's misleading. The reasoning as best I recall is that the city is importing so much food that the ships and/or merchant caravans don't have as much room for actual trade goods. They can be worth building, primarily in the inland desert provinces in Africa (Cydaus, Garama, that one south of Kyrene, Ammonion, and Hibis). Such provinces cannot build sewers (and thus can't build healers), so as partial compensation the granary series has three buildings instead of the normal two. The successor to the large granary is Desert Irrigation, expensive and time consuming but you get an extra farm level and a bit of public health. And it's not like inland desert cities are worth a damn for trade income anyway. :beam:

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IIRC the problem is that the game engine is flatly incapable of displaying penalties to trade goods as such, and insists on calling it "increase in tradeable goods". It's actually a bigger issue with many of the governement types that give sometimes quite hefty trade penalties, while the stupid game tries to insist the opposite.
Although the actual governement-building descriptions usually tell you clearly enough which way the matter actually is. Still, it's actually easy enough to check the actual game effects from export_descr_building.txt.

Also, I'm pretty sure Desert Irrigation was independent of the Granary chain; a kind of "special farm" that you can only build in provinces tagged "desert", if you will.

You could mod it to say "Affects trade income" instead. But you can't make it different for bonus and penalty, true.

Maybe you could just add a minor note about it to the actual description text ? Clunky, but better than nothing. I do that with assorted secondary melee weapons with AP as a reminder.

I've often wondered why nearly every single gov appears to give an increase in tradeable goods.

So actually, some of them really give a decrease in tradeable goods? Perhaps I should review export_descr_buildings to figure out what gives what exactly. Damn hardcoded limitations....:sad:

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Originally Posted by Watchman

Also, I'm pretty sure Desert Irrigation was independent of the Granary chain; a kind of "special farm" that you can only build in provinces tagged "desert", if you will.

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At least for Rome, Desert Irrigation overwrites the Large Granary. That's a nice bonus for reducing the culture penalty, since the AI is very fond of building granaries. Sometimes the AI gets all the way to the Desert Irrigation before I take over, though... You'd think putting it in the farm building chain would make sense, replacing the regular Irrigation top-level farm in desert provinces.

Bovi: glad I could help! I guess I should have read the bugs thread more carefully to see if the ports had been mentioned.