KingJohn's Economic manual

[kingjohn]

This advice is only good for realm 1-4.

Note: Use this as a guide only and it has not yet completed. This is very rough. I will refine it until it's perfect.
General hints: University lvl should always be one two two lvls above all research lvl.

Stage 1 for your first province.
1. Get University Lvl 2
2. Get range attack 1.
3. Build lvl 3 archers barracks.
4. Research colonization.
Stage 1 for your 2 province.
1. Get University Lvl 4
2. Research colonization.
Stage 1 for your 3 province.
1. Get University Lvl 5
2. Research colonization.

After the 3 prov:
arquitecture lvl3 / granarys lvl6 / bure. lvl 4 and medicine lvl 2

when you made farm lvl 8 research TRADE lvl1 because is necessary

After seven province, if the cost  of gold for medicine is less than province 8, get medicine, if it is the same as province 8, get the province. I am referring to the amount of gold needed for the research.

Credits to Zepovinho King of Farmers as this information is contributed by him.

Note: For farmers only, if you want to play networth, buildings and research must never stop, if you got money just keep researching and building buildings only especially granaries.

Before you hit 15k points, it's possible to have 8 provinces, hints for optimum growth,

Granaries lvl 11 everywhere. Do not exceed lvl 11 granaries, do not exceed lvl 4 fortress to keep you networth low.
And have university lvl 14 for province 8 under 15k points, granaries 11 is important once you have 5-6 provinces for optimal growth.

Research   Level
Range attack   1
Melee attack   4
0:08
War horses   0
Armor   0
University   14
Centralization   6
Bureaucracy   12
Architecture   12
Medicine   11
Trade   1
Tactics   0
Fortification   1
Military Academy   4
Military Architecture   3
Military Medicine   0
Spying   0
Border outposts   10
Cartography   5

This is my research at 10k points, few of the alliance members have the same research minus the melee and cartography because I am doing 10X farming, they all have the same with me in research and only difference is the 8th province. I make mistake in investing in the lvl 5 fortress. LvL 4 fortress is optimum. My advise is strictly eco way, if you are doing military way, please do not follow my advice. The best is to have one to two uni lvls above all researches.

After 15k points, use your own imagination.

Further hints, after 15k point the best resource production is 85%-90% wood, 10-15% iron, you will need to sell lots of wood for stones, the best province to colonize for wood is plains with forests, +10% wood and +10% population, u get extra 10% wood without building those mines, however if you are a victim of pillages, it's hard to destroy a province with plains +20%, really believe me I am always pillaged, it's hard to destroy population of plains.

Try your best to get university lvl 21-22 before the second month of the realm, if you run out of resources build beureaucracy, research university whenever you can. Research university till breaking point if you have to.

[kingjohn]

Sidenote advice: I noticed when the realm is new, I notice people get medals for pillaging, if you can afford it before you hit 50 points, just build about 1,000-1500 spearsman and pillage non stop till -96 points for easy medal and easy gold and keep gold in depots and quickly build your third and fourth province. Pillaging is a must to get your third and fourth province fast.

[DJtomy]

so I was probably a source of inspiration for you're last post  too bad for the X-mas break...

[Radooo]

Sidenote advice: I noticed when the realm is new, I notice people get medals for pillaging, if you can afford it before you hit 50 points, just build about 1,000-1500 spearsman and pillage non stop till -96 points for easy medal and easy gold and keep gold in depots and quickly build your third and fourth province. Pillaging is a must to get your third and fourth province fast.

Easy medals from pillaging?

[DJtomy]

Sidenote advice: I noticed when the realm is new, I notice people get medals for pillaging, if you can afford it before you hit 50 points, just build about 1,000-1500 spearsman and pillage non stop till -96 points for easy medal and easy gold and keep gold in depots and quickly build your third and fourth province. Pillaging is a must to get your third and fourth province fast.

ok... lemme come with something useful  first, if you are not a great warrior, the don't do something like this... all the people that you've pillaged will hunt you all the era (or even more  )
second, don't use spears for pillage... if the defender has 300 archers, you will lose all you're army... use archers they are faster and better for pillages on the first 1-2 days
third, don't hire just 1000 archers, if you will lose just 1 soldier in one of the pillages, you won't attack again at least 8 hours... hire at least 1100...

and the last, after you get your precious medals, after you are made a cheater in a unknown language by a bunch of turks only because by their math it is impossible to attack under 80 points, after all the top 100 (ok, maybe just a part of them  ) asks you why your flag has changed once and do all the possible that you won't get away with it (yea, right... like it was something illegal in it  ), after some of the guys that you though they were cool blames you 'couse you take an opportunity (and says that the medals are fake and got because of a bug ), then is time for you to put the vacation mode and never came back... Good Luck!

ooo and something else... get a printscreen first

[Radooo]

ok... lemme come with something useful  first, if you are not a great warrior, the don't do something like this... all the people that you've pillaged will hunt you all the era (or even more  )
second, don't use spears for pillage... if the defender has 300 archers, you will lose all you're army... use archers they are faster and better for pillages on the first 1-2 days
third, don't hire just 1000 archers, if you will lose just 1 soldier in one of the pillages, you won't attack again at least 8 hours... hire at least 1100...

and the last, after you get your precious medals, after you are made a cheater in a unknown language by a bunch of turks only because by their math it is impossible to attack under 80 points, after all the top 100 (ok, maybe just a part of them  ) asks you why your flag has changed once and do all the possible that you won't get away with it (yea, right... like it was something illegal in it  ), after some of the guys that you though they were cool blames you 'couse you take an opportunity (and says that the medals are fake and got because of a bug ), then is time for you to put the vacation mode and never came back... Good Luck!

Hehe... I took my first medal last era with a pillage with 1000 spearmen and to get it I had to lose about 70 spearmen . And this era with a pillage with 1000 archers. So, you can pillage and take a medal in other ways too

[Foundation]

How do you get medals in the middle of an era? It sure looks cool. 

Foundation

[kingjohn]

Hehe... I took my first medal last era with a pillage with 1000 spearmen and to get it I had to lose about 70 spearmen . And this era with a pillage with 1000 archers. So, you can pillage and take a medal in other ways too

hehehe, you got one medal from pillaging. I have no medal, sometime I lose hundreads and thousands of elites still no medal.

[tiger]

King, what is hundreds and thousands elites?? when you get to elite army, armies are huge so you surely wont get medal for loosing 1000 soldiers. then medals are granted for battles with huge losses. And you must be lucky that there wasnt biger battle that day. on the begining simple pilllage with 1k soldiers will do. And its possible to pillage under 75 points. 66 points army and 9 points is enough for fort, uni, working spaces, barracks, range attack and even farm.

[citral]

Try to get 3 plains provinces, B4 u  hit 100 points. And after u get 4th plains, work on medicine. Go to med 3 in the mean while.Always upgrade your granary's to lvl 6 right away, and spend all excess wood on more granary's. When u get 4 plains, work on medicine. Get it to lvl 6/8. After that get buro up to lvl 8.If u aroe on a noob server, like me on the dutch realm, Ull see that ull get out of anybody's 2x range in 1 week. Try to get 3 colonised plains, b4 u colonize the mountain, u are going to box. If u are going to farm, its good enough, that b\YOu get ur boxed mountain, with centr8/9.

 I got my second colonised plains, in the 3rd day of the era, I only concentrate on colonizing, in the beginning. Granary's 7/7/7, and no forts, only in P8 lvl 1. Its most important to concentrate on population growth, and colonising. Me with 3 plains, let the 2 colonised provinces create gold, for use of med and centralisation. And try not to trade. Produce that what u need. Need gold? Dissband workers. Need stone? Put much workers in stone. And always make sure, u have room in ur farm. NEVER/EVER LET YOUR FARM RUN OUT OF ROOM. IF FARM RUNS OUT OF ROOM, ITS NO USE TO HAVE HIGH MEDS/GRANARY'S.

[kingjohn]

Try to get 3 plains provinces, B4 u  hit 100 points. And after u get 4th plains, work on medicine. Go to med 3 in the mean while.Always upgrade your granary's to lvl 6 right away, and spend all excess wood on more granary's. When u get 4 plains, work on medicine. Get it to lvl 6/8. After that get buro up to lvl 8.If u aroe on a noob server, like me on the dutch realm, Ull see that ull get out of anybody's 2x range in 1 week. Try to get 3 colonised plains, b4 u colonize the mountain, u are going to box. If u are going to farm, its good enough, that b\YOu get ur boxed mountain, with centr8/9.

 I got my second colonised plains, in the 3rd day of the era, I only concentrate on colonizing, in the beginning. Granary's 7/7/7, and no forts, only in P8 lvl 1. Its most important to concentrate on population growth, and colonising. Me with 3 plains, let the 2 colonised provinces create gold, for use of med and centralisation. And try not to trade. Produce that what u need. Need gold? Dissband workers. Need stone? Put much workers in stone. And always make sure, u have room in ur farm. NEVER/EVER LET YOUR FARM RUN OUT OF ROOM. IF FARM RUNS OUT OF ROOM, ITS NO USE TO HAVE HIGH MEDS/GRANARY'S.

I agree with your strategy, but high meds it makes you run out of room faster so you still can build farms when you see your farms run out, but best don't make it run out, ocassionally you can even run out of resources for farms, of course when you have trade lvl 5, start making your own resources with trade lvl 5 when wood prices is equal or higher than 0.57. Once prices start to rise to that lvl, I stop making gold at all costs, if I run out of money and exceed 15k points, I will try to get trade lvl 6 as fast as possible, I borrowed a small loan for trade lvl 6. I am not suggesting anyone take a loan, I financed my trade lvl 6 loan by hitting gold coins

[citral]

Yea, making gold by dissbanding workers, is only for the beginning, when prices are normal, and trade lvl <4. After prices rize, its better to produce recources, and trade that on the market.

I even had 1 era, where I had 9 provinces, and produced ONLY iron. Over 150K iron per hour, selling at 8 gold per 1 iron, made me a very rich, and happy gamer

[citral]

And I would never recomment to take even a small loan. I took a large loan 1ce, and had to miss my P8 production, and troops training, for almost 2 weeks. It was not worth it, I build fort 7 from it. Now I totally rely on my own economy, and sometimes a goldmine or 2. If I play a farm era, I only attack goldmines, to pay for the upkeep, of my army. No more. Untill I think I have3 noithing more to build/research. Then I smash Army's. My neighbours will not love me for that.

[kingjohn]

Further hints, after 15k points, build nothing but wood mines. and after two and a half months only start building iron mines. At trade lvl 6 it is usually cheaper to sell wood and buy iron and stones. Wood is the engine for growth for the first 2 and a half months. Because having to produce so much lumber it's harder to move resources so you may consider having larger depots when you are producing a lot of wood so moving resources won't be such a pain.

[V-Bramm]

hehe i always take a loan, but thats not for economic but low point strat...i have one province making gold to repay and fits perfectly, its very good to buy a lot army at small time when you Really need it...or if you ''just dont have enough'' for an upgrade