Opening rounds: Conquer or Disband?

[The First]

We all know that with many (most?) factions in EBII, your finances are often insufficient to pay for your starting armies. To remedy this, you usually have two options (not mutually exclusive):

-Disband your expensive troops, and slowly build your economy until you can afford a new army. This has the disadvantage of leaving you vulnerable to the AI, which may attack you with rebels or other factions.

-Conquer neighbouring town(s) to generate enough income to support your starting army. This is often (I feel -please correct me if I'm wrong) the most intuitive option to go with, and it's the one I've used on every occasion. You gain greater security, a bigger kickstart to your economy, and you can obviously still choose to "turtle" afterwards and wait for your economy to grow.

The problem is, I've grown a bit tired of the "conquer" option: the "blitz" during the opening rounds to destroy encroaching armies and conquer several settlements, before finally being able to sit back and slowly build my empire at my own pace.

How viable therefore is it to disband right from the start and wait? Are there certain factions that are better suited for this option (Saba springs to mind, maybe the Pritanoi, though I know that rebel stacks are pretty abundant for Saba). Have you disbanded your troops right from the beginning? Did you use forced diplomacy to try and avoid agressive AI manoeuvres? How do you begin your opening rounds?

I was thinking of diving into a Koinon Helenon campaign, focusing on capturing greek cities across the mediteranean instead of pushing inland. But I don't want it to devolve into a standard struggle against Macedonia and Epeiros either (which happened when I first played Koinon Helenon, back with version 2.2b). Any thought?

Thanks!

[phylosopher stoned]

I think it depends on the faction, are there any immediate threats? are you surrounded by rebel settlements? are you at war with any neighbors? Some factions must conquer, how developed is your starting city(ies)? If it's a small tribal town, conquering is probably a must, starting generals cost money too (iifc), so if you have generals you can't disband, will there expense be covered and will there be any money left for development? I say conquer a couple surrounding settlements and then when all is clear, disband and turtle up. So in other words, you seem to be doing it right, however if you are just looking for new challenges maybe try some house rules or maybe a migration campaign or something.

[Hummer]

I think the devastation is bad enough in most places, you need to deal with it right away. I tried Pritanoi and I had to get rid of 2 stacks so my economy wasn't being eaten by devastation.

[QuintusSertorius]

3 provinces is enough to have a stable economy if you choose the disband option. If you have less than that, you don't really have much choice but to conquer until you reach that number. What you don't need to do is blitz your way to 10 provinces.

[rovert]

KH is fun to play that way , don't go past Athens & with Athens Korinth Sparta Rhodes & Kydonia you make tons of coin , I usually just hold those towns till I get the congress & by that time you can afford a navy you don't crap your pants putting a real army into .

[NosPortatArma]

conquer, of course. the reason you want money in the first place is in order to get troops, so if you already have troops it makes no sense to disband them in order to get money. If you want to get rid of some troops, it makes more sense to get rid of them by fighting a stack or taking a settlement, so that you also get some value out of them, otherwise it's just a complete waste. Only reason you'd disband is perhaps for some role playing reason.

[The First]

conquer, of course. the reason you want money in the first place is in order to get troops, so if you already have troops it makes no sense to disband them in order to get money. If you want to get rid of some troops, it makes more sense to get rid of them by fighting a stack or taking a settlement, so that you also get some value out of them, otherwise it's just a complete waste. Only reason you'd disband is perhaps for some role playing reason.

I mean, this is probably one of the most compelling reasons to "conquer": getting rid of them by using them against your enemies is definitely the most efficient way of solving the relatively huge army upkeep (compared to your starting economy).

I have heard of people talking about "just disbanding some the starting army", though I've never heard of how successful it is compared to conquering and clearing the surrounding settlements. (or did I misread/misremember those posts?)

I agree with Quintus that 3 settlements does seem like the minimum benchmark of a stablish economy. 2 settlements have never been enough for me to be perfectly comfortable with (with the factions I've playe).

I guess, in the end, the answer is that you do need to attack and expand a bit at the beginning, if only to get rid of the devastation (as Hummer pointed out). Are there any factions that have a such a good economy that you actually gain money in the beginning? I seem to recall that Baktria is one of them, but I don't know if any others are.

KH is fun to play that way , don't go past Athens & with Athens Korinth Sparta Rhodes & Kydonia you make tons of coin , I usually just hold those towns till I get the congress & by that time you can afford a navy you don't crap your pants putting a real army into .

Thanks, glad to know that that idea is feasible and fun! I do love the style of KH with its independant cities, and I feel like it loses its charm if you end up conquering a whole bunch of cities inland away from their poleis.

[NosPortatArma]

I have heard of people talking about "just disbanding some the starting army", though I've never heard of how successful it is compared to conquering and clearing the surrounding settlements. (or did I misread/misremember those posts?)

in purely gameplay terms, ie completely ignoring role play or historical accuracy, i don't think anyone can argue it is a better strategy to disband units.

Are there any factions that have a such a good economy that you actually gain money in the beginning?

Rome? maybe seleucids and egypt, don't remember.

[Rad]

conquer, of course. the reason you want money in the first place is in order to get troops, so if you already have troops it makes no sense to disband them in order to get money. If you want to get rid of some troops, it makes more sense to get rid of them by fighting a stack or taking a settlement, so that you also get some value out of them, otherwise it's just a complete waste. Only reason you'd disband is perhaps for some role playing reason.

Amen

[QuintusSertorius]

Seleukids, Carthage and Rome are in surplus at the start of the game without any disbanding.

[NosPortatArma]

Seleukids, Carthage and Rome are in surplus at the start of the game without any disbanding.

since EB2 tries to 'set the stage' at 272BC, and as a mod also seeks to be as historically accurate as possible, what is the team's thoughts on that the situation at the start of the game (with army upkeep that dwarfs income) is not a situation which could be repeated when actually played the mod? id est, the starting situation is one which is not possible to achieve by the rules of the game, and those rules to try to realistic, thus leading to contradition that either the rules or the starting situation is not realistic, but EB presumably claims both are realistic.

[QuintusSertorius]

It's impossible to design an economic system is balanced at the start of the game and in the mid-game. Equally it's pretty much impossible to design something that is equally well-balanced with one province as with ten.

[Jurand of Cracow]

It's impossible to design an economic system is balanced at the start of the game and in the mid-game. Equally it's pretty much impossible to design something that is equally well-balanced with one province as with ten.

I'm sorry if I'd be slightly off topic, but I have a question on this matter.
Namely, after a faction gains a number of provinces (goes from one or three up to ten or fifteen) there're might be other mechanism kicking in to keep that balance, ie: to provide a faction with additional obstacles to further snow-ball growth. In M2TW mods these are mainly Loyalty issues - big empire means long distances from capitals, and Loyalty of generals goes down so that the generals rebel unless staying whole time a settlement. In SSHIP there's also a usurper mechanism which make break up of big empires likely (well, it's not perfect, but still). Another mechanism is corruption - additional settlements don't add resources to the central budget.
What mechanisms in the EB desing create problems for a player as factions grow big and for what size of empires are they balanced? I know loyalty, corruption and unrest, but are there other scripted?

[QuintusSertorius]

I'm sorry if I'd be slightly off topic, but I have a question on this matter.
Namely, after a faction gains a number of provinces (goes from one or three up to ten or fifteen) there're might be other mechanism kicking in to keep that balance, ie: to provide a faction with additional obstacles to further snow-ball growth. In M2TW mods these are mainly Loyalty issues - big empire means long distances from capitals, and Loyalty of generals goes down so that the generals rebel unless staying whole time a settlement. In SSHIP there's also a usurper mechanism which make break up of big empires likely (well, it's not perfect, but still). Another mechanism is corruption - additional settlements don't add resources to the central budget.
What mechanisms in the EB desing create problems for a player as factions grow big and for what size of empires are they balanced? I know loyalty, corruption and unrest, but are there other scripted?

There's already a gradual withdrawal of financial assistance as an AI faction increases in size. Distance (with associated corruption) and varying culture create order problems that afflict the AI same as the player. It's handled primarily through the descr_settlement_mechanics and availability of governments, rather than scripting. And if I were to write scripts, they'd apply to the AI as well, overly-large empires are just as tedious when the AI does it as the player.

None of this can change the fact that there are certain regions (Italy, Greece, Anatolia, etc) with clusters of well-developed provinces which can make for an easy core generating a lot of money with little trouble of distance or culture.

[BHL 20]

It's impossible to design an economic system is balanced at the start of the game and in the mid-game. Equally it's pretty much impossible to design something that is equally well-balanced with one province as with ten.

What about a system where the starting capital of a faction makes a disproportionately large amount of money but every other settlement, whether owned or later conquered, only very marginally increases income. Something like the treasury building in RS could be used to achieve this, along with severely slashing the economy of all other settlements. Capitals have the garrison script, which could even be further buffed, so taking them would not be easy.

[Jurand of Cracow]

What about a system where the starting capital of a faction makes a disproportionately large amount of money but every other settlement, whether owned or later conquered, only very marginally increases income. Something like the treasury building in RS could be used to achieve this, along with severely slashing the economy of all other settlements. Capitals have the garrison script, which could even be further buffed, so taking them would not be easy.

I don't see much of a benefit of such a solution. The factions already have their lump-sum income what produces exactly the same ends as the above described building.
I think through corruption one may effectively slash the pecunary benefits of far-away cities, that's also not a problem.
I'm more interested in the "historicity" of the political solutions. i think in history the main problem with creating big empires were the risks of rebellions with your own faction/territory. In a small country one king could effectively exert his rule while in a big one there're always the fringes which would revolt. So after certain number of provinces it was very difficult to expand as the whole time of a ruler was consumed by efforts to control the currently held ones.
The best example are the Hettite empire or the Persian one.

[BHL 20]

I don't see much of a benefit of such a solution. The factions already have their lump-sum income what produces exactly the same ends as the above described building.

No it doesn't. The system now results in factions making losses in the early game, being stable in the middle game, and making huge profits in the late game (which may not necessarily be that late in terms of years depending on the player's speed of conquest). The purpose of the system I described would be to allow factions to start off with somewhat stable economies but not blow up later.

[Brihentin13]

What about a system where the starting capital of a faction makes a disproportionately large amount of money but every other settlement, whether owned or later conquered, only very marginally increases income. Something like the treasury building in RS could be used to achieve this, along with severely slashing the economy of all other settlements. Capitals have the garrison script, which could even be further buffed, so taking them would not be easy.

IMO this is an absolutely terrible idea. This game already has all these little things to get in your way of just steamrolling the map(such as capital unrest, hordes, faction re-emergence, etc). This just sounds like something that would artificially induce difficulty and make the game less fun. Pointlessly making things harder is not always the answer, in fact, IMO, it seldom is. Even if we assume this idea doesn't increase difficulty, it still unbalances things in that we're now playing "Capture the capitals" and making all of these other wonderful, fleshed-out regions nearly worthless.

[BHL 20]

IMO this is an absolutely terrible idea. This game already has all these little things to get in your way of just steamrolling the map(such as capital unrest, hordes, faction re-emergence, etc).

This is an obstacle of a different nature then unrest and re-emergence. Those mechanics make it difficult to keep settlements you already captured, this makes conquering new settlements slower. You would probably be limited to just one field army and if it got destroyed it might take a while to regenerate it.

This just sounds like something that would artificially induce difficulty and make the game less fun. Pointlessly making things harder is not always the answer, in fact, IMO, it seldom is. Even if we assume this idea doesn't increase difficulty, it still unbalances things in that we're now playing "Capture the capitals" and making all of these other wonderful, fleshed-out regions nearly worthless.

They're only worthless if your only measure of a region's worth is how much it adds to your profit margins. They would all still recruit their own of units (in many cases units that you can't get in any capital) and serve strategic purposes like blocking another factions route for expansion. And I'm not proposing for them not to make any money at all, but just about enough to garrison them, give or take. The game only becomes about capturing capitals if your main goal is to completely and quickly cripple other factions. But if that's your goal, going after capitals is best strategy even in the current game.

Anyway, I don't even think the EB II team is going to consider this idea.

[Hellenikon]

As of 2.2q, there is no reason to disband any unit early game, even as the seleucids you're better off using your starting units to deal with rebels, rather than disbanding and then eventually recruiting more. The main reason why this strategy works is because there is no downside to being in debt, unlike say in attila total war, so if you are the red for several turns it isn't a big deal.

The only exception i can think of are elephants, given how crippling they are to the economy, as well as being quite subpar on the battlefield.