A good, safe cash cow?

[PotentSchraphlon]

Hi. I'm looking for a territory that I can capture early on in the campaign, that will produce a lot of money but that no one will invade so I won't have to worry about a massive garrison or ruining my relations with other factions. In case you're curious, this is because I want to play as Scotland but spend the first 50 turns out so more or less turtling to give everyone including myself a chance to develop before the fun starts, and I think I'll need an income so that I can defend myself and whatnot.

I thought maybe one of the two Eastern Mediterranean islands, Crete and the other one (sorry I'm no good at remembering names). I know that the ones just west of Italy always provoke war with more or less everyone and Sweden/Norway don't produce enough money and risk war with Denmark, I tried that.

[painter]

Other than taking control of the British Isles, perhaps spamming merchants would be your best bet at getting a large income while not stepping on too many toes. There are the gold at Timbuktu, the spices at the Levants and other scattered valuable resources. I wouldn't be surprised if your income from them, once your merchants are suitably strong enough, will be in excess of 10,000 florins; much more than any single region will give.

[PotentSchraphlon]

Never had any luck at all with merchants. Even when I can find a decent trade resource to stand them on, rival merchants come along and seize their assets, even if they dont actually want the resource, and they never ever fail.

[Silverheart]

Can´t you place a merchant in an "army" of one unit, and place that army on the resource?
Doesn´t that make the merchant impervious to foreign merchants?

Oh, and you should claim the the british isles, and then take Norway and Sweden.
If the Danes are messy, place a strong fleet at the gap between Sweden and Denmark so they can´t cross over.

[FootSoldier]

That's an interesting challenge. I'm assuming you're playing vanilla.

Did you want just a single other place for income? With no war with neighbours? The trouble is that you're so dependent on the development of neighbours to maximize trade, so nowhere looks that brilliant to start with.

Norwary (Oslo) and especially Sweden (Stockholm) are considerable cash cows if you've got trade rights with your neighbours, and they have ports/markets/wharves. Early on they don't, which is why the income takes quite a while to kick in. You just get land trade with one or two others.

Oslo should be turned into a city. I've had Sweden up to 9000 per turn. Oslo will go to 5000+.

The issue there is obviously the Danes. Is it possible to take Scandinavia without having a war with them? I'd be interested to hear of anyone who managed it through diplomacy - you obviously found it difficult.

On the other hand, if you knocked the Danes out by taking Arhus you could turtle up there, trading with yourself. Maybe the Poles and the Russians would leave you alone. Would the HRE bother Arhus? It wasn't ever part of the empire ... but I'm wondering how long the English will leave a turtling Scotland while you're doing this.

In that area Finland is a cash cow too, once the port/market/wharves of neighbours kick in. I think it has 4 trade resources, and also gets to 5000 per turn if turned into a city. Otherwise it's just one trading partner by land, Novgorod, and I think a couple of the trade resources are shared, so it's crap to begin with. I've bought it off the Russians a few times, so they're not that attached to it. I'd expect them to be more manageable than the Danes diplomatically, though.

However, developing these to those levels will take longer than 50 turns. Stockholm has good farming and will grow fast if you push farms early. The mines bring income, and corruption can be eliminated with a half decent governor and building and the town halls and barracks. Helsinki grows quickly too, but it's still a long way up from a population of 800 or so. High chivalry generals will help.

I'm doubtful of the far eastern islands for Scotland. You'll suffer the "distance from capital" effect, and corruption will be an issue. Both will eat into the potential income. Cyprus is the island that performs best - again, turning the castle into a city, and trading the marble. Cyprus is Byzantine, and they might sell it. Iraklion belongs to Venice, but I don't know how attached they are to it.

If you went to war with either of them to take the islands you'd be in for a protracted naval campaign, which would obviously ruin trade.

In short, I can't think of any rich places just lying about unwanted. If you wanted to turtle as Scotland the British Isles are the obvious choice but I guess you've rejected that. Other possibles would be Rennes (not rich) and Bruges - perhaps Antwerp if you've really locked the Danes in.

If it were me I'd expect war with someone, but your diplomatic skills would easily be superior to mine :d.

[The Source]

take a cursade to egypt and sack damascus,antioch,cario,alexander, and jeruslam

[painter]

Can´t you place a merchant in an "army" of one unit, and place that army on the resource?

But then you would have many armies all over the world deep in enemy territory. Not only will you anger everybody, you risk losing your merchants to rebelling troops.

Iraklion belongs to Venice, but I don't know how attached they are to it.

From my short experience, they seem to be unreasonably attached to it. Once I had managed to buy it off them for 19,000 florins for 20 turns, which I could only afford because they attacked me immediately when it was their turn to move.

[PotentSchraphlon]

Regarding merchants, I've found that they usually don't produce enough income to justify the upkeep of even a peasant unit standing over them, and as painter says, I'd be afraid of rebellions.

Good idea taking out Arhus early, I might give that a go and then station a ship on the land bridge to stop rival merchants getting across to Sweden.

I don't mind being at war with England, in fact I welcome it, I just don't want to start taking land from them in the early game.

PS, I am playing vanilla but with a slight tweak to give highland nobles an upgrade for partial plate

[FootSoldier]

I wouldn't use merchants as a cash cow in vanilla. I've tended to use them as cheap spies (no upkeep), as, I think the other factions do. In vanilla they never make enough money to justify their cost otherwise, except maybe for the muslim factions. I understand the mods changed that.

In the original release you could place multiple merchants with a unit and they would all trade the same resource. You could do the same with a fort. I don't know if it was patched, but most regarded it as an exploit, since the merchants couldn't be acquired. I haven't checked that for a long time.

I'm not surprised the Venetians are attached to Iraklion. I was surprised you could buy Toulouse from the French!

[shikaka]

I wouldn't use merchants as a cash cow in vanilla. In vanilla they never make enough money to justify their cost otherwise, except maybe for the muslim factions. I understand the mods changed that.

Regarding merchants, I've found that they usually don't produce enough income to justify the upkeep of even a peasant unit standing over them

This is false.
Of course it is tough to make profit of merchants in regions crowded with agents like Northern Italy or Constantinopolis (you will lost your merchants too often).
However, there are regions even in vanilla, which are usually free of enemy agents (no other merchants killing yours!) and very lucrative. Two prime examples are the north Nubia region (south of mamluk egypt starting position) and the Timbuktu-Arguín region. You can take a settlement and train all your merchants there (to get merchant guild) and if you have merchants on nearby resources you can make a fortune. With the Moors in vanilla, I made about 10k with the merchants in the Timbuktu region.

Of course as Scotland, I wouldn't bother managing my merchants all the way down to Timbuktu. But as certain factions (Egypt, ottos, Byzzies, portuguese, spanish, moors, sicilian normanns) it is not tiring and very worthy.

[painter]

I was surprised you could buy Toulouse from the French!

I think it was because I bought it very early in the game and even then it was only after I made an alliance with the French. I prefer a marriage alliance as it takes Princess Constance out of France's diplomatic arsenal and that they can start a family sooner.

I've added extra diplomatic detail on what I needed to do to buy both Angers and Toulouse to my post, so that you may be able to repeat my experience if you would like to try. I avoided diplomatic talks with Princess Constance to buy Angers as she is more than Laurence Bidell can handle to give me a good deal.

[shikaka]

I think it was because I bought it very early in the game and even then it was only after I made an alliance with the French. I prefer a marriage alliance as it takes Princess Constance out of France's diplomatic arsenal and that they can start a family sooner.

I've added extra diplomatic detail on what I needed to do to buy both Angers and Toulouse to my post, so that you may be able to repeat my experience if you would like to try. I avoided diplomatic talks with Princess Constance to buy Angers as she is more than Laurence Bidell can handle to give me a good deal.

It is sometimes possible to buy provinces.
Usually when
- relations are good
- you have not bad reputation
- the faction you buy from is close to bankrupt
- and they have enough settlements

The usualy early targets who may sell are HRE, France and Byzantium.

[HeroSK]

Agree with FootSoldier. Recently, I did a Danish campaign. At first turns, I rushed and captured Oslo, Hamburg and Stocholm then built some forts at the river Elbe and some forest passeges. HRE and her allies attacked me but I was able to push them back.

Later, I bought Timbuktu from Moors and put some merchants on gold mines and here the result,

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[The Source]

if you didnt own moors and america, that would make an awsome 'who am i' map

[Chad29]

Timbuktu and Arguin are always good. The only problem there is rebels, but then rebels are everywhere. That's what I like about having an Empire around Iberia. Lots of port cities, along with Timbuktu and Arguin, and eventually close to the New World.

The British Isles are ok as well, mainly because your cities will be easier to defend. England and Scotland don't exactly have the best navy on the map, though.

Italy is good because you can trade with everyone around the Mediterranian. Then of course there is the settlements from Antioch to Baghdad, as well as Dongola in the south east, and Constantinople and Nicaea north west of that.