The RTW II Economy - Research, Tips and Strategies

[Bramborough]

Why is so difficult to get trade agreements with every one, even is its attitude is very friendly?
No one wants to trade, no one wants to have an alliance, no one wants nothing exept from defencive alliances in exchange to huge amounts of money....

I believe a trade agreement is good for both parties, so why a one province or two province faction doesnt want to trade with a super power??

How many turns into the campaign are you?

Early on, I had same experience; it was pulling teeth to get a trade agreement out of anyone. After a while, however, as my empire size grew a bit, it got a lot easier.

[Oleander Ardens]

How many turns into the campaign are you?

Early on, I had same experience; it was pulling teeth to get a trade agreement out of anyone. After a while, however, as my empire size grew a bit, it got a lot easier.

Indeed. It seems that you need to get a a couple of trade ressources to look attractive in the eye of potential partners. In my Macedon campaign in which I've learned a great deal about the RTW II economy I started to get lots of offers after 4 ressources but I could easily conclude some deals a bit earlier with 2-3 after I upgraded the wine and olive oil cities of Epirus and Larissa. A similar thing happened in my Suebi one. So it should be a combination of quantity and diversity as a trade partner does only import so much of a single ressource. It is likely that exportable ressources of potential trade partners also help a bit but so far I did not verify it. The amount of imports per faction should depend on the number of provinces, with each province bringing less and less import capability.

[ReluctantSamurai]

It occurred to me that the discussion has been focused on how the player handles the economy and research, and so it should. But....

....in reading through a lot of campaign descriptions it seem apparent the the AI hasn't a clue for doing either very well. Factions rise then fall because they run out of food or get crushed by squalor. While this may mimic reality in some small sense (the ebb and rise of empires), it doesn't really present the player with that one faction that's going to be able to kick your ass (for Shogun 1 it was the Hojo Horde; for MTW the Golden Horde; for RTW it was the Romans if you were playing a non-Roman faction, and Egypt for just about everyone else; etc).

So how would you simplify development to where the AI could conceivably handle it, and yet keep it interesting for a player? or would you just have a script for an AI faction to follow?

[Quillan]

I don't really know about programming, and nothing about AI, but I suspect you'd need a script of sorts. Before deciding what to build, make sure the new construction won't put you into negative food or public order. If it's below a certain threshold, built a new or increase an old source, then upgrade the other building.

[andrewt]

I don't really know about programming, and nothing about AI, but I suspect you'd need a script of sorts. Before deciding what to build, make sure the new construction won't put you into negative food or public order. If it's below a certain threshold, built a new or increase an old source, then upgrade the other building.

Problem is that almost all sources of food and public order have a penalty to the other once you upgrade to level 3 and 4. The AI doesn't seem to know how to upgrade one without killing the other. I suspect that's the problem.

[Bramborough]

It occurred to me that the discussion has been focused on how the player handles the economy and research, and so it should. But....

....in reading through a lot of campaign descriptions it seem apparent the the AI hasn't a clue for doing either very well. Factions rise then fall because they run out of food or get crushed by squalor. While this may mimic reality in some small sense (the ebb and rise of empires), it doesn't really present the player with that one faction that's going to be able to kick your ass (for Shogun 1 it was the Hojo Horde; for MTW the Golden Horde; for RTW it was the Romans if you were playing a non-Roman faction, and Egypt for just about everyone else; etc).

So how would you simplify development to where the AI could conceivably handle it, and yet keep it interesting for a player? or would you just have a script for an AI faction to follow?

This is pretty simplistic, but one approach might be to just limit its development. Say, AI cannot build past Level III in in provincial capital slots, and cannot build minor settlements past level II. Moreover, limit AI factions to only one or two military buildilngs overall, and no more than one temple per settlement. With something like this, the AI economy would still be quite suboptimal, but could probably maintain some reasonable level of public order and support some decent-sized army stacks. When I take over enemy settlements, I usually find that the AI has way overbuilt in temples or military buildings, and/or has built a Level IV town & temples without remotely enough food to support.

[ReluctantSamurai]

This is pretty simplistic

Agreed. I was simply fishing for comments on how to balance the players handling of development (which will always be more sophisticated and long-term) and the AI's. Certainly any factions development should favor units in which it has the advantage, or that makes countering by the player more difficult, and certainly some attention has to be paid to the AI being able to keep its head above water in terms of cash flow and loyalty.

[nearchos]

Indeed. It seems that you need to get a a couple of trade ressources to look attractive in the eye of potential partners. In my Macedon campaign in which I've learned a great deal about the RTW II economy I started to get lots of offers after 4 ressources but I could easily conclude some deals a bit earlier with 2-3 after I upgraded the wine and olive oil cities of Epirus and Larissa. A similar thing happened in my Suebi one. So it should be a combination of quantity and diversity as a trade partner does only import so much of a single ressource. It is likely that exportable ressources of potential trade partners also help a bit but so far I did not verify it. The amount of imports per faction should depend on the number of provinces, with each province bringing less and less import capability.

Im in 60 BC and i own every trade resource, allmost all my cities are upgrated, i have 10 trade agreements, some of them since early game.
I have achieved the objectives for an economic victory, but since turn 120 if im not wrong the most of my trade parteners broke the aggrements with me and since then i bleed for a trade pact in axchange for a lot of money.
I think there is something there that needs to be fixed.
Best example are the client states, i have client states that do not want nothing, it is a client state for gods sake, you own it, at least a trade aggrement with them sould be de facto.
And an other example, the one province faction of egypt, a client state of Macedon for a very long time and very friendly, +204, didnt want to trade even with the ofer of 240.000 dinarii!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
So i think CA must see it, i believe thats basics.

[Quillan]

Im in 60 BC and i own every trade resource, allmost all my cities are upgrated, i have 10 trade agreements, some of them since early game.
I have achieved the objectives for an economic victory, but since turn 120 if im not wrong the most of my trade parteners broke the aggrements with me and since then i bleed for a trade pact in axchange for a lot of money.
I think there is something there that needs to be fixed.
Best example are the client states, i have client states that do not want nothing, it is a client state for gods sake, you own it, at least a trade aggrement with them sould be de facto.
And an other example, the one province faction of egypt, a client state of Macedon for a very long time and very friendly, +204, didnt want to trade even with the ofer of 240.000 dinarii!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
So i think CA must see it, i believe thats basics.

Two questions: first, what is the campaign difficulty level? Second, what is your diplomatic reputation? I'm at "steadfast", mainly because I don't attack anyone with whom I have an active treaty, and I always side with an ally. I've currently got 18 trade partners, down from 22 only because one of those attacked an ally and thus had to die and the others were eliminated in the course of their ongoing wars. There are two factions currently who don't want to trade with me (Caledones and Armenia), and both have horrible reputations (one is devious, the other treacherous). Perhaps one of those is the cause.

[Myth]

While playing on Legendary with patch 3 on, I noticed the AI supporting around 2.5 stacks in total troop numbers with a high mix of strong infantry in there. It builds units that are favoured in AR so if you want to AR your way to victory you typically have to bring an extra fullstack to even the odds. By leading however, you can make minced meat out of them.

Patch 3 reduced the killing speed of most infantry, which means that battles are 10-20 minutes long. However the AI doesn't have the luxury of my very experienced elite troops which have north of 75 morale. They basically never break unless they are up against something like 6 units of Royal Spartans (because those guys never break but also don't die and have haed their killing chance improved as per patch 3).

So while Ar technically shows you a Phyrric victory or even a Clear Defeat, especially in siege assaults, you can turn the tides around because when you clump up your elites and focus in your cav/damage dealing infantry in simple (yet effective) flanking maneuvers or taking out the masses of ranged units, you can win.

Funny thing - you can't afford to sit and ignore slingers and javelin troops. Not like in Rome 1 when at some point the armour values became so high that they virtually did nothing. Pretorians still die to slings if left unattended. Hence at least 3 units of cav per fullstack are mandatory.

Province development for the AI seems to have improved somewhat, though I still see bad choices like temples in minor settlements or 4 city centre buildings in Athens.

[andrewt]

I build temples in minor settlements all the time. There's really nothing else to build there. I build 1 farm and 1 temple to offset the public order. I'm playing Carthage and one of the temples has food as well.

[Bramborough]

I build temples in minor settlements all the time. There's really nothing else to build there. I build 1 farm and 1 temple to offset the public order. I'm playing Carthage and one of the temples has food as well.

Yep, that's what I was doing as well. Over time, however, this developed provinces with large public-order surpluses, but food-deficient. I've shifted to a philosophy of building food in both minor-settlement slots (i.e., 1 farm and 1 cattle). The temple and circus in provincial capital usually keeps public order still comfortably in the green.

This is, however, from Rome perspective. With different building types and attributes, might work out quite differently for Carthage (or any other playable faction).