SMZ, don't get me wrong, I wrote a bit of a guide on the Turkish campaign, and you're right in so far as slow and steady does NOT translate to success early. I find with the Turks there are certain moves that have to be made, at certain times to build up a solid empire and economy, and forestalling the Byzantines is one of my chief early concerns. The situation I was relating, with Hungary involved me with all of Asia Minor north to Tibilisi, Rhodes, Cyprus, all of the Levant, plus Sinai. I wasn't hurting economically, but it took me time to focus on Europe as at that moment my only foothold was Constantinople.

At the same time as I dealt with the Hungarians I was conquering Egypt and fighting off stack after stack from Russia at Tibilisi, albeit at a much slower pace than Hungary, obviously since they were coming in from Sarkel and it took them longer to get there.

Your right about Italy too, in so far as with Milan if I move quickly and take Florence, Ajaccio and Cagliari quickly I'll be pretty much good to go from then on. It's quite a different scenario from say the Portuguese who really have to blitz Spain and take care of the Moors before they can even think about consolidating their gains. Personally I have a hard time keeping taxes above normal, and I never have a treasury with more than 5-6,000 florins per turn. Most of my big building has to be funded by city conquests. I do make use of merchants though the agressive AI always seems to have much better merchants from day 1 than I do. I make use of spies as well to protect cities.

The point is, and I don't see how this is disputable, is the AI gets all sorts of special treatment and benefits. Obviously to make the game harder. For me it simply makes things more annoying, but that's another story. If someone here can show me how they can hold down huge cities with one generals unit and high taxes, then perhaps I'll change my stand on that point. Anyway great conversation, cheers!