So, what else is new in v1.5?

[Northnovas]

The economics appear to be an issue. Testing an Austrian campaign and into 1735 with trade and farm upgrades and I can't get past 4,000 per turn. Slow way to build infrastructure and an army.

[rvg]

The economics appear to be an issue. Testing an Austrian campaign and into 1735 with trade and farm upgrades and I can't get past 4,000 per turn. Slow way to build infrastructure and an army.

The tech race is now of paramount importance. All those unhappy enlightenment techs do wonder for ramping up province wealth. Getting an early university really pays off.

[Boohugh]

I agree the economy does start off slowly but it can certainly pick up later in the game and, as in the past, the trade nodes seem to be the key. I've been playing a fresh 1.5 Swedish campaign and for a long time I was only just making ends meat (I conquered all Russian and Poland-Lithuanian territory) so I branched out and sent a very significant fleet of trade ships around the world. I now control 12 trade spots and have 5 Indiamen on each and went from making 7-8k a turn profit (with taxes on the 2nd of the 4 slider positions from the left) to 40k just from that, which does wonders to the old treasury balance. It means I'm now in a position where I have been able to upgrade every single thing in every territory just for the fun of it, although I've basically won the game by this point (about 1750) as nothing is able to stop me. This is all playing on normal campaign difficulty.

I don't think the economics are in that bad a position. You get just enough money to do what you need to earlier in the game to make it challenging, but you get more later on to have some fun with when you've basically won anyway. If you don't take advantage of the trade nodes you'll really struggle though, so perhaps there could be a small shift to slightly less trade income and slightly more tax income. As it currently stands, you can't really make a decent empire without hogging the trade nodes.

[Fisherking]

The tech race is now of paramount importance. All those unhappy enlightenment techs do wonder for ramping up province wealth. Getting an early university really pays off.

That is a problem too, if you haven’t noticed.

Perhaps it is not effecting other factions, but as GB I can not get more than 6 Gentlemen.

Usually I don’t go crazy building schools but in this campaign I went a little overboard. I have 9 schools and 7 Observatories.

That is more than enough to spawn the 12 maximum Gentlemen, wouldn’t you think?

Research goes as a snails pace when you only have a school without Gentlemen you know. Something like 26 turns to research farming techs and so on.

But then again, with the economy the way it is you can’t afford to build more than one improvement to go on to the next tech level.

If you couple that with the fact that the game is going to take some action to keep your economy in the tank it can be VERY FRUSTRATING.

I tried GB on short campaign to get a feel for 1.5.

I am not saying that I won’t win. I have one region to acquire, but that is in India and is an inland region so there is a big war to fight to get there and I have neither the troops nor the ships for that endeavor at this time. Nor do I have the means to do it quickly.

If I strip my global garrisons and fleets, just what do you think is going to happen?

[Kantalla]

If I strip my global garrisons and fleets, just what do you think is going to happen?

I know! The AI will peacefully continue to trade with you to allow you to support massive armies while you send three quarters of your military prowess to the far flung corners of the globe.

All this talk of problems with the economy makes me think it's time to share some of my observations about how to manage the economic machine. I'll start a thread to start putting some of those ideas together.

In my most recent game as Russia, I have stayed peaceful with Sweden, so haven't picked up a port on the Baltic and have been unable to get any naval trade from Crimea because of superior Ottoman navies in the Black Sea. However, this hasn't kept me poor, with a reasonable per turn profit of ~8k despite reasonably significant military expansion. The economy doesn't seem to be too much different to 1.4 to me.

[loony]

Weird. I found economy very much ok in my Austrian campaign (h/h). Not too easy to take off the ground, but after it takes off - you just can't stop it.

Yes, i did research 2 farm techs and 3 enlightnment before researching any military (even bayonets). Had no problem with cash. Could field 2 full stacks in the beginning and 3 full stacks by 1710.
Afterwards, killed prussia off and went eco-crazy.

It is now 1770 and I rake 40 000 per turn :-)

[AussieGiant]

So I just conceeded a H/H UP Prestige Campaign.

I'm actually quite happy about it.

The economic situation is far tougher on the high campaign difficulty, which is well balanced in my view.

It was a real ding dong affair, which started with me being very aggressive and taking Flanders from the Spanish. I was wholey unprepared for war and spent the following 22 years locked in a struggle with the French. All alliance's held, i.e. GB, Prussia, Hannover and the other nation bordering UP.

Finally I lost Flanders but took Paris, I then brokered a peace deal with France, amazing considering I took their home province. I got dragged into a war with Sweden when they declared against Prussia, the main issue was Sweden sending 2nd raters to block my home trade port. I simply could not keep up with that.

Finally the Maratha Conf piled on and GB refused to help me in naval engagements so I conceeded in 1724 after Sweden parked a brand new 2nd rate right on my port for the 3rd time in 5 years.

Good fun, well balanced and no insanity from the AI on the campaign level.

I'm now starting again on N/N Presitge and will give it a second shot. I will certainly NOT attack Spain in Flanders until I'm ready. Of course the AI could take that away from me.