Budget Problems

[traiano]

In the last few games that I've played I've had problems making money. I'm squeaking by each turn with 2000 or so extra florins which don't buy enough of an army to roll over my enemies. I've tried taking my time and building up money-making cities before but that path ultimately leaves me about halfway to the campaign's objectives by only having conquered half the territories I need.

Has anyone got any hints on money management? I usually buy the best troops and wonder if I should be garrisoning safe cities with cheaper troops. I always have every city building some building (but I make some cities "military" cities and some "money-making" cities). I tried and max out my trade agreements.

Are there any FAQs or guides out there that will help me start turning out some money?

[Ged]

Aye, there is. Look here, laddy.

Edit; I guess you gave that rep point (2 circles FTW!) so I'll say this:
Always a pleasure.

[Emperor Tom]

Well did you try uping the taxes on settlement?

How about building markets, roads, and trade ports before a massive army. I made my empire rich that way.

Also buy a small amount of heavy units. Stick with cheaper units and take territory that is not heavily fortified or with many men gaurding it.

Retrain units you have instead of recruiting new ones.

Put the a massive army together by combining units from all of your local settlements instead of constantly buying new units.

Get trade rights from as many factions as possible.

When a faction is weak maybe lets say from a current or previous war, than stike violently and don't let up. Each time you take a settlement retrain your units and buy some mercenares and continue. When you conquer the settlement disband mercinaries and retrain and build new units.


Or just play dirty and use the add_money 40000 cheat

[zeuxis the mighty]

raising taxes always helps.

roads and especially ports work well.

trade rights increase income adequately.

Remember ALL MERCENARIES are EXTREMLY EXPENSIVE compared to other units that do the same thing. Only get them if your short on man power.

Crusades and Jihads allow the army to have free upkeep.

good governors make more money.

[Monsieur Alphonse]

Use militia as garrison in cities because they have free upkeep.

[loquar]

As monsieur alphonse said use garrisons in your cities made up of militia units. Not all cities will upkeep all militia units free, it depends on their size.

Look at what militia units your city can build, these type of units will be able to be upkept free up to your settlements free upkeep limit. For example with russia first level towns will be able to upkeep militia archers for free but not towm militia, they require the second level of the garrison building to be built.

When you are in the settlement window looking at its army the units that are shaded blue rather than grey are getting free upkeep.

Try to form your kingdom (where possible) in a blob rather than stretched out. Then you can have a relatively safe "soft centre" where all the cities have garrison only apart from a small fast response unit for dealing with rebels.

Tune your taxes every turn. Keep the smiley face at yellow or green with the highest taxes you can as long as happiness is over 80% (blue) Build garrison and council buildings when your happines starts to get low.

As for attacking forces i too like to have small forces made up of the best units available but its all down to play style. I personally am more at home with factions that use missile cavalry and struggle with those that dont because they suit my play style so make sure the faction you play suits you. The same tactics wont necessarily work in the field for all factions nor against all factions.

Concentrate on ports, warehouses etc as naval trade/coastal cities seem to rake in more money than landlocked ones. If you have coastal castles change them to cities early on and use landlocked areas for your castles so that you can max trade that way.

There are loads of other ways to sort money and everything is interlinked but thats a start. talking of things being interlinked always keep an eye on the level of religion in your regions. poor religion makes citizens upset, upset citizens cant be taxed as much as happy ones.

Hope this helped

[nosjo78]

Economy
1. Ports, Roads, Marketplaces, These should be your first buildings after a church in every settlement. (Only exception is if you public order is dangerously low)
2. Trade- Send some merchants on the long run down to Timbuktu (its gonna take some serious time depending on your faction but its worth it once they arrive. (maybe fill a ship with merchants and 2 younger generals and a medium size army to take and hold Timbuktu, then Arguin.
3. Disband any armys your not currently using. Only garrison your cities with as many troops that can be freely supported. Use militia troops so it costs you no upkeep.
4. Army Makeup- Do not use the most expensive troops when half asses or poor troops will do. If your an Italian faction nearly half your army should comprise of Italian Spear Militia. If your not Italian you should still have plenty of those cheap spear militia units.
5. Get our there and get trade rights. (If you loose them try to get them back)
6. Castle VS City- Convert all castles you have that are on the coastline into cities. You wont need nearly as many castles as you will be provided with once you get rolling through the enemies territory. I would recommend keeping some castles that are well developed and near the front lines though. But once your front lines move too far from those castles change them to cities if you can.
7. Ceasefires/Alliance Trick- This one is VERY RARELY ever talked about. If you do as I do and make alliances with everyone that you can at the beginning of the game alot of times you can waring factions to ceasefire on each other by becomming one of their allies. Example: Spain goes to war with the Moors. You were allied with both. You choose to support Spain and your alliance with the Moors are canceled. Get your diplomat to the Moors quickly and offer an alliance with them again. If their not really wanting this war they will pay dearly for your alliance (which forces a ceasefire for at least 1 turn with Spain). I have done this before and made 10k a turn for nearly 50 turns getting cease fires between Spain and the Moors. Eventually this gets old and feels like cheating but if you only do it a few times I guess it isnt really cheating.

[Legion12]

Go on a rampage and sack, sack, and sack then give the province back; wait few turns then sack, sack, sack.