Campaign,some tips?

[timdedarter]

Hello everybody
When i start a campaign i'm in the first 20 turns succes because i have only italia
but when i become bigger .. all my italian regions become -3000 denari because the auto-manage makes to many soldiers..
How do you guys rule your empire so everybody is happy and making much money???

[CaesarVincens]

Number one, don't auto-manage. As you have seen, it doesn't work out well. Two, don't make too many soldiers. This drains your treasury really fast. Three, trade, trade, trade, especially by sea. Trade is your main source of income after the very beginning, and sea trade is almost always more profitable than land trade. Four, if your higher population cities are "losing" money, don't worry. Unit upkeep is distributed throughout your empire, and each city pay based on it population. This means large cities often appear to lose money, while small towns don't; in reality, your large cities pull in more, but have to pay more. Use the financial advisor to see if your faction is making or losing money as a whole. Finally, don't overextend, try not to fight more than one faction at a time, and make sure to build up your economy.

[Lobo Solitario]

Farms are also a good investment now - since growth rates are a lot lower in XGM, the food bonuses are a benefit rather than a liability like they were in vanilla RTW. The income bonus is always handy as well.

[Scutarii]

Gah, never automanage! Its definitely worth the small amount of time (if you use the construction scroll to keep your cities up to date) that you need to queue your own buildings and recruit your own troops. With Rome, I would advise not moving into high conflict low money areas like Gaul until getting a decent empire. Try moving securing Italy, giving you an easily defensible chokepoint, and then either seizing Africa + Iberia, or move into Greece. Both are rich. Greece opens a lot more borders, but Africa and Iberia require some colonizing.

[Sextus Molestus]

I had the same misconception as you, OP, when I first started playing. I strived to get all my cities to "make money" to no avail, without realizing that overall I was making a hefty profit. Do as CV said: use the Financial scroll rather than the individual city profits to assess that subject.

Don't auto-manage. This shouldn't have even been included in the game...okay, perhaps that's a stretch, but still, it's an absolutely terrible system. Manage everything yourself. Scutarii gave a very valuable tip: use the construction scroll that appears on the left-hand side of your screen to manage construction - as your empire gets bigger and your money increases, you will likely be building something in most cities at all times. So that you don't have to look from city to city yourself, just click the magnifying glass by each newly constructed building in the scroll and it will take you to that city, where you can choose another. You'll get used to this, and it will save you a lot of time in the long-run.

Remember that if you go to war with another faction, you no longer trade with them. If you're at war with all bordering factions, your finances will be drained tremendously, so be rational. Try to get ceasefires and reestablish trade rights with factions when you're done taking their lands.

Lastly, only recruit troops you need. Use vigiles for garrisons of cities that won't be attacked.

[timdedarter]

okay thx for your replay's
i always auto managed it and my empire turned into a mess.
i never tried the construction scroll
i'm now on school but when i come home i will try it
i will tell you tonight if it worked :p