Re: Some humble Tips and Advice for beginners
 

Cost of 10 PD (ten units + a leader, not 10%) is 55.

Cost of 20 PD (20 units + 2 leaders) is 210.

Type of units in your PD is explained in detail on page 9 of the user manual. You get one of the unit type in table #2 per PD point from 1 to 19, and 1 of the type in table #3 per PD point 20 and higher.

So, if you are C'tis and have 25 PD (in your capital), then you have 1 Commander, 1 Task Master, 38 militia, and 6 slave warrior. Arco's capital would have 1 Hoplite Commander, 1 Mounted Commander, 19 cardaces, and 6 light cavalry.

[ March 03, 2004, 00:45: Message edited by: Arryn ]

Re: Some humble Tips and Advice for beginners
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">More precisely: cost of going from (n-1) to (n) is always n gold, so that buying (n) PD from scratch costs (n+1)*n/2 gold.

Also, one should keep in mind that PD always start dead center on the battlefield, with no special orders (so that defaults to Attack Closest for non-archers, and Fire Closes for archers, I believe). It might be important if, say, you are Abysia and have PD commanders with a fire aura: if you have non-Abysian troops stationed there, they will typically get burned by the PD commander's aura. So if you're building indie units in a province that might get attacked, it may be a good idea to have a commander and set them apart from the center. (I've lost a good number of troops to this)

Re: Some humble Tips and Advice for beginners
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I always take my automatic Province Defense army into consideration. For many of them you can turn a mediocre PD force into something powerful by adding shooters. If any province can make any shooters I try to add the same number as the PD I put there.

Some nations can use more commanders, some gain alot of boost by adding flyers. Its different for each one but definetly worth thinking about.

Re: Some humble Tips and Advice for beginners
 

Hey thanks for all these helpful comments and additional information.

PhilD asked whether I made a boo-boo in saying that a fortress is also useful for taxation purposes: not just raking in resources from surrounding neihbors but also in improving their taxation structure. Nobody commented on this. Just wondering: does that mean I spread nonsense or I got it right?

And on Phil's helpful comments on Empowerment: Yes, sorry, you are right. I was actually thinking of a different situation, one I hadnt spelled out: When you want to forge an item with TWO path requirements, say: water3 and earth3; you have a water3 mage, but no earth, and you dont see a chance of recruiting both somewhere else.

Re: Some humble Tips and Advice for beginners
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I was under the impression that there was extra income generated in provinces with fortresses based upon Saber Cherry's "Newbies and Confused People ..." thread that you cited in your original post. Under "Section VIII: How to Choose a Castle" he states:
<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">So is Saber Cherry right or wrong?

Re: Some humble Tips and Advice for beginners
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">I believe this is the of the nonsense variety. Having a fortress doesn't do anythign to the 'taxation' portion, only increased Gold from Admin.

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">So is Saber Cherry right or wrong?</font><hr /></blockquote><font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">It is Admin / 2 %. So Fortified City with 50 Admin gives 25% increase in Gold in the province it is built.

Re: Some humble Tips and Advice for beginners
 

But has nothing to do with surrounding provinces? (E.g.: this income increase is not affected by the fact that you own 0 or own all of the surrounding provinces?)

Re: Some humble Tips and Advice for beginners
 

The income of the province with the fort does not increase due to the ownership of adjacent provinces. The resource and supply level of the province with the fort, OTOH, does increase as nearby lands come under your ownership.

[ March 06, 2004, 09:20: Message edited by: Arryn ]

Re: Some humble Tips and Advice for beginners
 

Excuse me for digging this out of the basement, but I wanted to add one thing which may seem obvious.

- hitting the f-1 button will give you a "nation overview", which becomes much less confusing for a newbie when you then hit the "tab" button (which then does not display your troops). This is an invaluable tool once you have more than a dozen provinces or so. Check the columns "taxation" and "unrest", for example: see any problems? Forget where you had those nasty brigands and lowered the tax rate to douse the unrest? F1 will help you. Not sure which provinces have what province defense? F1 lists them all. Which provinces do you still need to search for those desperately needed earth gems? F1 shows you where you searched and which results you got.
Forgot where Dingbat the Commander with the Summer Sword is? Hit "tab" again, and you can find your commanders quickly.
The task of micromanaging your empire becomes *that* much less confusing with f1.
I found this out way too late.

Re: Some humble Tips and Advice for beginners
 

Another note for fortresses.

If you play Rl'yeh, you automatically generate (nigh useless) units in all coastal forts. They make very good arrow catchers, and they autobuild. I don't know if they have upkeep or anything (you do have to feed them), but at the same time they are no build cost fodder troops. You can also build Star Children and Hybrid Commanders at coastal forts.

Just an FYI (and I'm sure the more experienced Rl'yeh players can give more informed opinions as to the usefulness of these guys)

Wyatt