Holy **** I'm in trouble

[Angmar_nite]

I'm France and overextended a bit. I took bern and Rheims to the East although that settlement east of the english one got taken by the danes. Then I expanded all the way to the alp border near Iberia and the HRE border. I fought my way and took the top island of the two and Milan via crusade. However I do not have much armored units and am relying more and more on mercs after the Danes, and HRE invaded with many stacks. I have secured a peace with the them after I traded Paris and Rheims to the papalcy for full favor and reconciliation. I "declared" a crusade on london only realizing that I was in debt and could not afford ships . My armies are weakening. I am hoping to sell some stuff for money and sack London and invade Potugal which is excommunicated.

But what do you reccomend.

[Ambrosius]

long term, mercs are a bad idea. they are OK for quick emergency military boosts, and then to disband... but most mercenary units have quite high upkeep, are not garrisonable, and are difficult or impossible to retrain. the only time i really use mercs is if im in the field and need a fast army for a one-time attack, or if an enemy army catches me with my pants down and i either recruit some mercs or die/lose a city.

that, and i use them in the beginning of the game to overpower quickly destroy an enemy faction (like if im playing with an italian faction ill recruit some right at the beginning to crush one of my neighbors). but to rely on them long term? as garrison and your field armies? no wonder you have money problems.

the key to this game isnt taking every town and building it up into a metropolis. i used to do that: conquest like crazy, and then try to micro every city into a huge one. i always had money problems.. you simply cannot afford to properly build up and garrison 15 cities in the beginning of the game into profitable cities. i use a different strategy of late.. i take a core clump of adjacent cities which i defend and quickly growth-build up into economic powerhouses.. then i go steamroll everyone with my more advanced troops backed by a powerful economy -- so replacing losses, and even throwing militia/mercs at hard targets to soften them up is peanuts to me. pick a direction and move out with a couple of solid armies in a single 'front', exterminating and killing everything as you go. place watchtowers or spies in key approaches - you should have at least 1 turn warning before someone attacks.

the little dinky towns and castles i take i exterminate and put on automanage with a few cheap upgrades. when i find another clump of profitable cities, i might devote some time into properly garrisoning them and building them up to economic centres... but for little crappy ones - especially those way far away from other towns, i dont bother. i just keep enough of a garrison to put down any unrest and move on.

when you realise that you can make more, and faster, with ONE properly upgraded economic city like Palermo than you can with 5 crappy little villages, it will change your playstyle. sure you can, eventually, build up every single little village into an economic centre, but you will be spending so much on buildings, garrisoning and defending them that its hardly worth it. build up one massive core of economy - like milan, genoa, bologna, venice, florence, grab some islands for trade, and exterminate all the rest. otherwise youll drive yourself crazy trying to micromanage every dinky little rebel village into a huge city.

[Angmar_nite]

I use mercs because the feudal guys are kinda expensive and the militia are kinda weak. Still at the rate of 300 profit each turn, and the papal states acting as a buffer to the east, all I have to do is try to get a crusade going against Portugal and take their biggest cities. I got way to many castles that are too big to convert. Although are merchant cavalry any good in battle. I use them for free garrisons.

[Ambrosius]

on average mercs are nearly 1.4x the cost of comparable units you can build. if you dont have enough money it may be because you have overexpanded. bide your time until you have enough of an economy to support your warmongering -- let the enemy build up all those upgrades in the cities, and THEN take them

especially in the beginning, building up every dinky little rebel and starting town you take is a huge money sink. choose your conquests wisely... capturing a dinky little castle that will bring you 300 florins per turn but costs you 725 a turn to garrison, plus a small fortune in building upgrades, is hardly worth it.

[Angmar_nite]

most of my castles are now big troop producing area though. I still make some profit with them as well... Now the game is a matter of patience me thinks. Do you think the danes and HRE would dare attack the papal cities? If only they went to war...

[lawngnome]

I disagree a bit with the 'economic centre' thing. I mean, it works, but I mega-build my capital (always producing in capital, e.g. Paris even if it means not building in every other city) and all other cities are equal. With free-upkeep militia, what's the problem? Even a village is insta-profit because the militia defending it are free... that's quite different from RTW where cities could easily cost more than they made for you.

[Ambrosius]

oh, im not saying dont bother making them profitable...

just that i would rather build up a strong economic centre, like italy, and then just sweep across the land, exterminating, leaving only cheap militia garrisons, and setting the settlements to automanage.

i dont have the patience to micromanage 45 different dinky little villages all into huge towns. the game becomes more like civilization then, rather than a tactical strategy game. and you dont *need* to... a lot of people think that in order to do well you need to capture and nurture every dinky little town into a metropolis... you dont. one strong economic cluster is more than enough to support your warmongering. its just a different way to play i guess.

[flashmax]

Sounds to me like you over reached abit and your economy is not up to speed. I would build up economy ASAP, and if thats not possible, take as many men as possible and take a powerful city that has economic buildings.

But, I hate to tell you the news, if the economy is not build up and you got too many enemies, and your treasury is empty cause of too many merc and soldiers, this sounds like a very bad kingdom to me.

I would radical change things, even if that means loosing cities. Then burn the city to the ground and let the enemy have it and start building a few core provinces that can support your war machine.

Good Luck

[Duke_of_Bavaria]

That sholdn't be a problem. I'm in war with every nation that borders me.. Generaly thats a bad idea but since I'm the military and economic master of the world I really don't care.
Just pull back and gather a full army with a good general and then take back what you lost and more from HRE.
As for the mercenary thing, I'm also relying on them in my Africa and mid-east campaigns. Just as your plan was, sack alot of tows. Im going -1000 or something atm but since I sack a couple of towns every few turns I'm on a steady 10-20'000 +.

[Shaba Wangy]

Then I expanded all the way to the alp border near Iberia and the HRE border.

Those are the Pyrenees buddy. Not the Alps.

[MasterAdnin]

I'm France and overextended a bit. I took bern and Rheims to the East although that settlement east of the english one got taken by the danes. Then I expanded all the way to the alp border near Iberia and the HRE border. I fought my way and took the top island of the two and Milan via crusade. However I do not have much armored units and am relying more and more on mercs after the Danes, and HRE invaded with many stacks. I have secured a peace with the them after I traded Paris and Rheims to the papalcy for full favor and reconciliation. I "declared" a crusade on london only realizing that I was in debt and could not afford ships . My armies are weakening. I am hoping to sell some stuff for money and sack London and invade Potugal which is excommunicated.

But what do you reccomend.

Alright dude, listen closely, both me and you share a very similar problem. In my Poland game, I did basically the same thing. I expanded a lot in the beginning, but got screwed because I didn't have a good infrastructure. I was in debt. I sold buildings for quick cash and built only buildings for the economy. I got screwed again as squalor was way up. So my settlements were rebelling, but I had a lot of money, so I bought a bunch of mercenaries. I got my cities again and got them back under control when I realized the mercenaries had now screwed my cash flow over. So point, first focus on infrastructure, not conquering.

Salaam,
Adnan

[Lavastein]

i will stress this point. Archers. Archers my friend make everything go right. forget mercenaries. if your france you will have cheap and decent sargents in the beginning. focus your defencive efforts on certain aries. for example, toulouse is a good way point to stop a spanish invasion. metz good for hre and rheims could easily kep the danes off balance with spear milita. Also you may want to concider trying to make fortresses in choke hold areas. Around bridges, river crossings and such. you have to use the ai's stupidity against them. you know they will likely attack a buffer fortress giving you time to form up. Now I also think you need to concider having an army always on the field. Recall as many troops from the castles as you can, the castles are jesus as they both give you troops and are very good in keeping order. If you can paste a picture of your current map i can tell you how to garison your troops. also, in what level you are playing? ex (h/h) (vh/vh)



very important to do, ALWAYS SAVE YOUR GAME EVERY TURN. If you like you can ensure that the inquisitors stay away for outragous acts of heresy claims with a click of a load game.

[Delexit]

hehe, Lavastein is indeed right!

Archers. Archers my friend make everything go right

and this is why i enjoy plaing as UK 6 units of marksmen behind stakes + 6 upgraded spear units behind & 2 cav can put down any incoming army in 5 min
I expand slow keeping an eye on dangerous points and having a decent force in a castle to jump in. playing H/H is ok for now. the coolest thing was when rebels actually attacked the Caen fortres with rams and all seige equimpement. and it was at like the 5th turn me with spearmen in shorts & the guys with chivalerc nights , armoured sordsmen. got it right but it was a pain on my pckets to retrain & repaire and wait 2 turn to recomence the expanion

& indeed have 2 groups or more of 3 cities close to each other to boost economy is more than enough with a castle near though to reinforce when nec.
i usually attack a town with main spear militia & a castle with levyspearmen so i can retrain them in max 2 turns & move on. But something like this might become borring so sometimes i asault citadels with packed armoured sordsmen and expensive troops for fun & to be sure take it .
my main problem is allways Antwerp - after i take it in max 10 turns Danns will trow wave after wave of their best troops on it catching me busy soth or est thus having to rely on local forces; Bruge is near Antverp thus i rotate trops for faster retraing.
also despise Danns attaking me 1st all the time & me being cool with the Pope, never exterminating , & trying to be the nice guy , i recive those missions " if attack Danns ill be excomunicated,etc" then make peace with the guys they pay me for it some 5k florins & 3 turns later another storm of Danns invasion over and over.
its funny & annoying in the same time but with the cash for peace i get from Danns every 5 turns or so i can go on upgrating & expanding elswere
however i play a mod with low pop boom at 1 y/t & its ok couse im now like in turn 150 & stil have to go some 300 (till 1630) & once the ecconomy is ok and just ocasional local wars the money / turn is some 10k minimum