MONEY

[damnmap]

This mod makes the game challenging by giving you a trickle of cash... however perhaps it's too unforgiving? I am playing a georgia campaign atm and have to keep hoovering up settlements in dangerous areas (right next to seljuks and the abbasids) just to stay afloat. Each time a general joins my faction i usually end up in the red again. I think that after conquering about 5 or 6 settlements I deserve enough cash to support one stack If the seljuks attack I am screwed (unlike me they have np wondering around with 2-3 stacks of elite units) my army is scattered everywhere as garrisons of my blitzkrieg empire. Other factions I have tried seem to have it far easier, my playing difficulty is vh/vh is this appropriate? What is the recommended difficulty.

[Neige]

Recommended difficulty is the one you think is the best for you. And about the elite units... AI usually gets bonus money and bonus troops as I have noticed. That is supposed to fill the gap of the poor AI performance. (No offence to the modders of corse. BC AI is still one of the best to date. )

[damnmap]

just tried an abbasid campaign... they are rolling in money after taking a few settlements near baghdad. Up to 8k a turn until I put together a stack of quality horse units

[wudang_clown]

Recommended difficulty is the one you think is the best for you.

Words of wisdom.

Well, some factions are harder and some factions are easier. If you can't deal with budget problems try other faction and after that come back to the first one.

[Colos1987]

I'd recommend The Ayyubids for training, as they are good in both financial and military point of view, plus, they have a good starting location.

Colos

[damnmap]

how does campaign difficulty affect your money? It just seems unfair to me that a faction like the abbasids can become wealthy very easily whilst the georgians are struggling with border line destitution no matter how many rebel settlements I take

also perhaps a peasant unit is needed for garrison purposes? just to stop the damn settlement rebelling without me having to hire expensive mercs to fill it up so I can move to the next one

[wudang_clown]

Maybe you should slow down and build up the base before you go on with the conquest? Conquering one settlement after another isn't good strategy for Georgians.

Peasants as garrison troops - that's definitely not good idea.

[Colos1987]

The Abbasids get wealthy becouse of Baghdad. I play as Seljuks now, took Baghdad like 15 turns ago, and now it gives my 14.4k per turn. I can tell you that most factions who do not start with a large city such as Baghdad or Constantinople are kinda low at the beginning when it comes to money. I haven't played as Georgians so far, but I think their starting location seems really poor.

I think you should first build up your economy, try to get some trade rights from the Abbasids for example, and use as many merchants as you can. And then, build armies.

Just my 2 cents

Colos

[Iguanaonastick]

Also, mercenaries cost far more money than regular troops. Use cheap levies as garrison troops. Unfortunately, Georgia does not get many of those but their lowest level archers have a reasonably low upkeep and Northern Axemen Militia, which I think you can recruit in some nearby settlements at least, are very cheap at 75 or something a turn and have a lot of men to keep order too.

[BeingOwned:)SPQR]

Or you can just change settlement_mechanics.xml but that would also make the AI get more money and it would also count as cheating

[damnmap]

I cannot build up my economy... at the start I am -3300 in the red and have to quickly absorb as many settlements as possible just to break even. As for merchants I can only build one and also have no idea where the best place is for him It just seems to me that the georgians have an unfair economic situation... many factions have a tight economy yet are nowhere near as bad as the georgians. Actually the rajputs start with a strong negative as well but they only have a fort and elephant troops so that is understandable

[San]

I found the start to be the easiest part of playing the Georgians. Basically what you want to do is split your armies up and siege cities with armies small enough to make the garrison sally forth the first turn. Abuse horse archers and make sure every army has some heavy cavalry (generals will do fine). Believe it or not, I've taken Ani with nothing more than the units in Kutaisi.
Now, you can either go for all the nearby settlements (including all those wooden castles / towns) or go straight for the richer ones (Ani, Majar, Derbent, Shamakha, maybe even Tabriz) and take the surrounding settlements after that. The most important thing is just not to spend more than one turn besieging a settlement - you can not afford this.

[damnmap]

That is what I do, or rather what I have to do It just seems unfair on the georgians that they are pressured so heavily to expand close to the seljuks, abbasids and turks so soon. If one delcares war I am toast. Might try and blitz baghdad for the huge amount of money it generates

[Vaz]

Capture enemy territories, loot, then demolish all their buildings, and sell back to the former owners for cash. Give it about 20 turns, rinse and repeat.

[damnmap]

I tried georgia again today it was pretty easy actually... I think I overestimated their diffculty. I put campaign difficulty on hard though I doubt that would have made a significant difference to the economy. I think last time I hired alot of merc horse archers and they crippled the inital economy I
took baghdad easily the abbasids seem kind of weedy at least on this campaign

[wudang_clown]

You've reached Baghdad in two hours? Wow.

[damnmap]

I think it took that long... I quickly took all the rebel settlements leading up to it (avoiding the heavily garrisoned ones) then starved them into submission (cannot be bothered to attack the walls)

I looked around the rest of their settlements they were all poorly defended, usually I lose interest when it comes to faction battles as it becomes a grind but the abbasids were really weak, not a single decent stack to be seen... probably had most of their men slaughtered in crappy auto-resolves against rebs