making honest money

[Vercingetorix17]

I am a complete EB addict as proved by the fact that I should be looking for a job but I'm more concerned about my current Epirote campaign.
This campaign got me thinking because now that I've conquered greater Greece and the italian peninsula I'm making butt tons of mnai. THis going to make my eastward expansion much more manageable especially since it looks like I'm going to be facing a unified ptolemaic faction and a very strong pontic faction.

Anyway having all this money made me realize that I don't know how to get some of the weaker factions like the Sweboz or Getai or Hai to make money. I can usually get one good stack going but my cities are completely unprotected. I can't protect all the edges of my empire with one stack and I don't know how to get their economies goin better.

What are your strategies, how do you overcome shi##y economies.

oh and how do you force diplomacy?

thanks

[J.R.M]

Well, first of all WELCOME TO THE FORUMS! hope you enjoy.
Now about money: usually when i play with those crapy economy factions the first thing i do is disband all the troops to low upkeep, then build roads, markets, ports, all those buldings that help gaining money.
Or if you want you could just blitzz the nearest eleutheroi citys with your initial troops, that would be faster. It depends on your style of play.

About force diplomacy, click here https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=80763
Hope this was usefull. Enjoy EB!

[Watchman]

Mines and trade, pretty much. And at least the Hai and Pontics pretty much *have* to go on a blitz on the nearby Eleutheroi due to the necessity of securing a power base before the Seles decide to try renegotiating your relationship at spear-point, as they will sooner or later ("...reduce your title to satrap and your height by the neck", as the Hai intro succintly puts it). Usually sooner. Even if they by rights should have better things to do. Pontos should also consider taking the initiative and grabbing the Sele city right to the south ASAP and then ejecting them from Asia Minor entirely as soon as the budget permits; this way their closest recruitement areas will be in Syria (where the Ptolies are wont to keep them a bit preoccupied) and Mesopotamia, and judicious use of spies gives you ample warning of approaching major armies allowing you to secure greater territory with fewer actual combat armies.
The Hai similarly need to make use of sheer distance, good intel and strategically based "fast response forces" to fend the Seles off on the shoelace budget they spend much of the early game working with.

[Ibrahim]

I am a complete EB addict as proved by the fact that I should be looking for a job but I'm more concerned about my current Epirote campaign.
This campaign got me thinking because now that I've conquered greater Greece and the italian peninsula I'm making butt tons of mnai. THis going to make my eastward expansion much more manageable especially since it looks like I'm going to be facing a unified ptolemaic faction and a very strong pontic faction.

Anyway having all this money made me realize that I don't know how to get some of the weaker factions like the Sweboz or Getai or Hai to make money. I can usually get one good stack going but my cities are completely unprotected. I can't protect all the edges of my empire with one stack and I don't know how to get their economies goin better.

What are your strategies, how do you overcome shi##y economies.

oh and how do you force diplomacy?

thanks

what I do is spike the taxes, conquer a city or two, then disband the remaining army. then build mines, farms, and roads. it works with saba, so why no sweboz.

[athanaric]

what I do is spike the taxes, conquer a city or two, then disband the remaining army. then build mines, farms, and roads. it works with saba, so why no sweboz.

It works with both factions. However, you have to blitz only two settlements as Saba, while as Swêboz you need four (unless you want to disband your army right at the start, that is).

[Irishmafia2020]

One option is to maintain flexible garrison forces in each city that can be combined to make a field army, for example 4 units in each city plus a governor, means that you can combine your garrison troops into a field army when needed. As far as money is concerned, I would suggest a blitz of as many nearby cities as your starting forces can take, and then use the survivors as garrison troops. I am playing Armenia right now though, and the game is simply ugly. I have a little money, but the Selucids won't let me breathe. Maybe i should have just disbanded my army entirely in the beginning, but instead I blitzed two cities, although the second one required a lengthy siege. That meant that, while I was not far in debt, I had spent longer than normal being in debt, and so I had not built up my cities at all when the AS decided to pay me a visit. Usually blitzing and building works though...

Good luck finding a job!