Money Tips for the Kypchaks?

[Kennylz]

I knew, right from the beginning, if the Kypchaks would be anything like the Russians I would need to blitz all that rebel territory as soon as possible. Well, they are even harder financially thanks to a lack of merchants. So, I take all of the steppes within 15 turns or less. I suddenly get a huge arrival of stacks. Well, I wasn't going to just disband all those beautiful units. I gather them together with a couple stacks I already had leftover from the conquest of the Steppes and run them down into Byzantium. So I conquered all of the ERE except for those islands and Trebizond. All in about 25 turns. I reached about 28 grand in the red before I started gaining it back through sacking. I realized I had to let go of those lancers and noble archers. I disband enough that I start getting 6 grand a turn. Sadly enough, I haven't been able to barely develope anything thanks to my costly, but wildly successful Horde migration. Still, 6 grand a turn is not doing it for me. Too many settlements to develope on such a meager income.

Any tips for me? I think I could muster another one or two stacks and conquer somewhere, as long as it is fast and I don't get dragged into a prolonged war.

I'm a money hound, so it is pretty important to me. As it is, I'm way ahead. I have nearly as many settlements as turns.

Btw, rivveting invasion into ERE. I really feel like some kind of glorious Tamerlane esque figure to of rallied the steppes and Russia so quickly, and then conquered my own version of China.

Edit: Oooh, I also have way more Generals than I probably need. My family tree is the largest I've ever seen this early in game.

[Kara Kolyo]

Well if you are looking for big income teritories, than the lands of your previous campaign are a nice place to go. Plus you'll be able to see the mongols in action from the first row.
In my Cumman campaign i had different strategy - gradually taking settlements, while disbanding the more useless units and investing in all trade and farms i could. This way the economy was on a steady growth. When the extra stacks arrived, most of the units were disbanded so i ended up with 3 armies in total. This allowed me to come clear two turns later, while still having enough men.

[Mega Tortas de Bodemloze]

Keep it low budget. Lean and Mean. Think about it, didn't Nomads posses basically what they traveled with season to season? All that Viking infantry stuff is basically out of reach eye candy. God fobid you stumble into conquering the Steppes. Financial Catastrophe!!!!!!!!!!

[Anduin1]

whats weird is in my game the kypchaks are the richest faction in the game with only 4-5 territories in the north west of the map, atm theyre hovering around 700k >.>

[Nikator]

Same here. In my campaign, the Kypchaks rule some 5 or 6 provinces, but are by far the richest faction. Maybe you should ask the AI how it's doing that.

[Kennylz]

Money scripts.

[frontier-auxilia]

Me, i personally take a trip down south after acquring that big stack of powerful stuff after unifying the steppe then proceed to the good old sack n pillage. In the beginning i just keep it plain and simple with tribesman. Sure the elite stuff are great at the start but they are such a financial burden to my economy.

[teh.frickin.pope]

Anyone tried uniting the steppe and immediately after receiving the stacks, causing your cities to rebel and go all horde on the south?

[anaztazioch]

make 2 worst levies you have and send them to constantinopole to camp on silk, than send merchanst there.

[Aurion]

make 2 worst levies you have and send them to constantinopole to camp on silk, than send merchanst there.

There's also Dyes and I think Marble near Constantinople.

Hm, I've only played a couple of Kypchak campaigns, but when the steppes were united, I remember that I disbanded around 90% of the troops that spawned..

The problem with what you did was that the ERE is kinda a dead end, as the Turks aren't the richest guys in the world.

If you can get to them the Georgian cities of Ani and Tiblisi are usually fairly far along by now. You could raid from the sea, sack them both, and destroy all the buildings.

Or, you could always try to do that to Alexandria or Antioch or Tarsus or something...there are plenty of cities that can be quick-raided due to the fact that they border the sea, and acting like Vikings in the Mediterannean or the Black Sea is pretty fun!

Don't do it too much, though, or you'll end up at war with just about everyone. Well, that and since your diplomatic rep will quickly hit "Despicable", no AI factions will ally with you.

I was dumb enough to try that at Constantinople in my most recent Kypchak campaign...THAT was fun.

[anaztazioch]

Aim for 2 same resources in 1 region.
As Ayybids, single silk gives arround 250, while 2 silks in Damascus gievs over 400 to same merchant.