ETW SO SO EASY

[TinCow]

He has a modified version of the game for sure. Especially when he says he "bought" provinces and every single game I played the AI wants over 50,000 for the crappiest of provinces.

Trade is never ever that profitable either.

I agree that something isn't right about this, particularly in the Turn 25 (1712) screenshot. He's only got 8 trading partners in that screenshot, several of them minor factions, and his naval upkeep is 7257. That doesn't correlate to a massive number of trade ships, which would be required to properly milk the trade theaters. His tax income (64778) also seems absurdly high for that date, considering he only has 2 European provinces.

[anweRU]

After the first purchase, the prices will also go up. Happened to me in my semi-peaceful Swedish game. My first purchase was for 60K, then 90K, then ~150K, then went up to 300K, 600K, and then no one would sell me any territory for even 1.5M!

[Beskar]

I agree that something isn't right about this, particularly in the Turn 25 (1712) screenshot. He's only got 8 trading partners in that screenshot, several of them minor factions, and his naval upkeep is 7257. That doesn't correlate to a massive number of trade ships, which would be required to properly milk the trade theaters. His tax income (64778) also seems absurdly high for that date, considering he only has 2 European provinces.

It is. it is obviously false as he has cheated around with trade income numbers as his figures are impossible.

My tax income in my USA game (date 1794) is 72536. However, that is from owning 34 provinces and being late game, so all my areas have high population and good factories, etc.

[hathanhson]

have 2 saved game for UP campaigns. cant open the trade details, only the gov details. nothing i can do. CTD. the pix is huge. on 1920-1080. 5mb something each. on my wife flickr. :).

1. Turn 25, income 400.000, exp 50.000. profit 350000=350k

europe: bough flander, another port but dont last long. france soon attacked, and i have nothing inn europe at that time. so about to die ... and no other saved game. I think and I think, and i decided to give it back to Spain. wowla, perfect buffer, france can not move to Amtersdam.

India: bad investment, have bought the entire right-hand side provinces of subcontinent, but very few income.

America. got all the caribe, all central and south america.

Have I said not plainly.

That how it stand at turn 25. i have provinces everywhere.
Seriously, no one have that much money ?? cant be true. it just plain obivous for me.

I will write a detail report of how to do it and all can see.

[TinCow]

Have I said not plainly.

That how it stand at turn 25. i have provinces everywhere.
Seriously, no one have that much money ?? cant be true. it just plain obivous for me.

I will write a detail report of how to do it and all can see.

If this is so easy to do, you should be able to do it again in a new game. Do so and take screenshots of your trade screen and other pertinent stats every 1-2 turns.

[Beskar]

I am almost all of America, Half of Europe and Half of India and pretty much everyone else is my protectorate except for Ottoman and Russia. I am only getting +148595 per turn at the moment profit and that is end game with everything tech and large populations/etc. If you are getting 400,000+ profit in trade alone at turn 25? You obviously got some sort of cheat, it is impossible.

[hathanhson]

ah, it will be hard-labour

i will see what i can do.

[Dayve]

Are you playing on.... Very easy campaign difficulty?

[Chimpyang]

Send us the savegame - an alternative is if you post the trading screen tab we can see each individual searoute and landroute and see if the numbers add up.

It may seem like everyone is ganging up on you, but the numbers do seem extraordinarily large for so early in the game.

However, it also depends on how much you were able to protect the sea routes from east india - I've never had the time or inclination to bother with those routes - but they may be very profitable!

[hathanhson]

I understand why people think like that ? I'm just suprise that these many veterans and no one knew.

So i just played the GC as UP again. screenshot will be up, when i wake up, going to bed now. because timezone is 11h30pm now. still g2g to work early 2morrow.

the detail is like this.

1st turn: research the tech to build college (i always do that). send europe fleet to caribe (not important). upgrade what you can. important, recruit 2 unit at your island on caribe. also, upgrade the gold and gem mind on Dutch gyuana something (hehe, cant spell).

2nd turn: recruit 2 more unit again at the island. and 1 fluyt and i just sit around do nothing.

3rd turn: enough money to buy cuba. spain sell for me at 58800. i also hit trinidad pirate island. Go for the port so your amry can march right in

4th turn: my europe feel arrive this turn or the previous, i send them to the 2nd pirate island. send the fluyt with 2 more units to trinidad.

5th turn: got 80.000, Spain sell me the hispana something island (right hand side of cuba), thank you your majesty.

6th turn: with 5 unit, easily captured the 2nd pirate island. always go for the port if possible. i was lucky to destroy the pirate fleet on the sea. so it is easy for me. Buy Bahamas from England for 60.000. Income show that i make profit of 100k already. quit game and go to here to post. try it at home.

[anweRU]

Excuse me, but your starting amount as UP is 8K IIRC, and your income is not good enough to build the improvements & recruit the units you mention and have 58.8K in turn 3!

[Beskar]

Excuse me, but your starting amount as UP is 8K IIRC, and your income is not good enough to build the improvements & recruit the units you mention and have 58.8K in turn 3!

Indeed, that is correct.

[Subotan]

ETW WAS SO CASH

[Dayve]

He has enough to build the gold and gem mine upgrades, 2,000 each, recruit 2 units of militia or whatever he recruited and a Fluyt (or floating fortress as i like to call them) on turn 1, but even with taxes turned up to absolute max for every theatre i'm suspicious about the 58k he has in the treasury on turn 3. Even if you take the pirate islands on turn 2 and have their plantations and ports fully functioning and have trade with the max amount of factions and none of your trade routes are being blockaded i just don't see how you can get 58k at turn 3, it seems impossible to me.

[Beskar]

Hahaha, just for reference.

In my USA game, I own everything bar Morroco, Algiers and Caracas and I am at max tech and basically everything is fully upgraded.

Putting my taxes on absolute only gets me +805,684 in money, that guy is using a cheat or something for certain, especially since trade never gives you a big income like that.

Edit: I actually owned all of them now, I will post a screenshot for you.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[anweRU]

So I did what the OP said he did. Played on VH.

In order to maximize trade profit, I divided the trade fleet in the East Indies into three, and assigned one IM to each trade spot (to get 60 spices instead of 54).

I left the taxes at 3/3, which gave 1424 in Europe, 346 in the Americas and 214 in Ceylon. Maxing to 5/5 gives 2176, 554 & 352 for the first turn.

Starting cash: 7500. Construction costs: farm in Holland 300, gold mine (2 turns): 1600, gem mine (2 turns) 1800.
Cash on hand at end of turn 1: 3800
Turn 2: Cash on hand 5857. Two pirate fleets (Ivory Coast and Madagascar straits) raid the trade routes.
Turn 3: Cash on hand 8719.

No where near 58.8K claimed by hathanhson. The Spanish essentially told me they would bury me when I offered them all 8719 gp for Cuba.

Alternative: Use military access exploit. Can get 400 to 500 gp from each European power; 400-500 each from the three Indian powers, and may be 1000 each from the 9 Colonial / Native American factions. An optimistic estimate is 23K.

23K + 9K = 34K, without recruiting any military units, so avoiding their recruitment costs and upkeep.

Even with that exploit, the funds come up short.

[Dayve]

I tried what he said with a UP campaign. Turn 1, i got trade rights with the only 2 other nations i could, Westphalia and some other, had to pay 1300 for each trade right though. I upgrade all gem and gold mines in America and India, didn't recruit or disband any land units and disbanded worthless naval units like sloops and brigs. I set all taxes to max in all 3 theatres without making unrest go into the minuses.

On the second turn my treasury sat at 5,538. There was nothing else i could have done here that would have given me anymore profit on turn 3 because all my upgrades, like plantations, would take 3 turns, so i simply ended turn. Turn 3, my treasury sat at 11,567, and this was without even recruiting any units, which you said you did on turn 1 and 2.

The only way you could have gotten in excess of 50,000 on turn 3 is if you exploited the AI by selling military access, in which case you have no ground for claiming the game is too easy, because you used exploits.

[hathanhson]

can u post your screen shot for the gov details of turn 1, 2 and 3.

[Dayve]

Since i didn't take screenshots the first time, i just did another 3 turns as UP on VH/M.

The following screenshot was taken just before i hit end turn on the very first turn of a UP campaign. I upgraded all gem and gold mines, a logging camp in Dutch Guyan(?), disbanded all units except for 3 units of militia and 1 unit of company linemen to keep the peace in each city, disbanded all navy except for the 3 trade ships and 3 escort ships in Sri Lanka, and raised taxes as high as i could without public order going negative.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

The next screenshot was taken once again before i hit end turn on my next turn. Here i upgraded the farm in Amsterdam which i could not afford to upload on the first turn, and there was nothing else i could do here other than hit end turn again.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

The following screenshot shows my third and final turn, what was upgraded and my treasury balance on turn 3, after disbanding all land and naval military units and upgrading everything that could be upgraded.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Following screenshot shows income, expenditure and projected treasury total for next turn.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Short of playing on easy/easy or exploiting the hell out of the AI, there is absolutely no way to do what you are claiming you did, absolutely no way at all. At that rate of growth, it would take me around another 4, maybe 5 turns to reach a treasury of 50,000, and that is without recruiting or building any more upgrades.

[AussieGiant]

The key point he makes which may not be clear is:

"3rd turn: enough money to buy cuba. spain sell for me at 58800."

How much money do you need to buy Cuba? Because it looks like he sells it back to Spain for 58800, and that is where he makes his massive profit.

[Dayve]

I interpreted as follows...

3rd turn, enough money to buy Cuba, Spain sells it, for me, for 58,000...

No AI nation has 58,000 on turn 3, not even GB. They spend too much money recruiting armies and navies. Especially Spain, whose empire, despite being the largest after Russia, is extremely backward, under-developed and poor.

[AussieGiant]

I interpreted as follows...

3rd turn, enough money to buy Cuba, Spain sells it, for me, for 58,000...

No AI nation has 58,000 on turn 3, not even GB. They spend too much money recruiting armies and navies. Especially Spain, whose empire, despite being the largest after Russia, is extremely backward, under-developed and poor.

Good point.

[anweRU]

The least I could get Cuba for as Sweden in VH was 120K around 1730s, but I chose to buy another province at the time (I think New Foundland for 90K from France). I ended up buying Cuba anyway at a later time, for 600K (~1743-1745).

The very first purchase I made in that game was Ceylon for 60K around 1718 or so (after I had my two revolutions to get to CM, and didn't need my rainy day fund anymore as I went on a central-eastern Europe conquest spree). So buying Cuba for 58.8K on turn 3 should be possible, while it is still underdeveloped. However, how did he get the money without cheating?

AFAIK, you will make less money on Easy compared to Very Hard, not more. That has been the case for my games, as I progressed from E->M->H->VH, which is why I play strategy on VH now. Which IMHO makes the strategy VH setting easier even than Easy!

As for what funds the AI has available, I concur with the above point that the AI doesn't have much cash on hand. In my Hard GB campaign, I captured Flanders on turn 2 and sold it to UP for 6K. That was the maximum I could get out of any country. The AI may have significant amounts of money by mid-century, once it manages to develop its holdings, but even then, it has a massive military that I doubt it could match a semi-peaceful player with only 4 full army stacks and 2 full naval stacks.

[Nelson]

hathanhson,

Where did you get your E:TW? Was it purchased boxed from a store or downloaded via Steam?

Did you get any additional units?

[Beskar]

Alright, I started a UP game in the name of a trade empire with my way of doing things, but just for reference.

> I own every trade point bar the two portugal start with.
> I have seven trade partners.
> I own South America and majority of the islands bar the British and Spanish islands.
> I have 4 Classic Universities (Netherlands and Flanders) pumping out technology for economical and social, allowing me to upgrade all my plantations and docks.
> I have 12 Protectorates.

This is my current incomes (taxes are set at the middle of the slider).

Tax Income: +10922
Trade: +14845
Other: +6834

Army Upkeep: -6906
Navy Upkeep: -4040 (Trade points only have 1 flyte on them at the moment)

Income: 21646

I am getting nothing like the trade you are getting, as that trade is completely rigged. I have very good trade for my current situation, but according to you, I should be getting near +300,000 not around +15,000. I think you are talking out of your behind in any claims saying you are getting otherwise, especially at turn 15.

[Beskar]

Here is later on, as I said, this is a trade Empire so I am not blitzing, but just for information, I will list my incomings.

> I own all trade areas, 3 flyets on each point.
> I own Central, South and Islands of America.
> I own Ceylon and Goa in India.
> Flanders and Corisa in Europe.
> 15 Protectorates.
> 10 Trading Partners.

Tax Income: +30738
Trade Income: +37855
Other: +8386
Total: +76979

I am no where near touching that +300,000 you apparently had in turn 15 even though I own all the trading points and have a big trade Empire.

Something isn't adding up right, and it is on your side. Your figure is impossible.

[Beskar]

Here is the last update on that game I been playing and proof those screen shots are fake.

> I own all trade areas, with 10 fluyts on each.
> I own all South, Central and West America. Don't own Canada/East Coast above Georgia.
> I own Ceylon and Goa in India.
> I own Flander, Corisa and Rhineland in Europe.
> 12 Protectorates.
> 13 Trading Partners.

Currently, I put Taxes on lowest just to spur up population growth and it is far easier to manage. Last game, it was on the middle.

Tax Income: +39746
Trade Income: +61426
Other: +10054
Total: +111226

I can safety say, OP is rubbish at this game, simply because he has to cheat and even fakes his screenshots with the impossible. Enough said really. If this game is "So Easy" why don't you play it for free without false screen shots and if they are inaltered, play without a modified version of the game on VH/VH and lets see you get that far so fast.

On a side note: Never trust a person with the gimp-mask avatar, they all talk rubbish.