Early Game Maximizing income vs long term growth.
 

Anybody willing to share ideas on how to balance funding an early army to expand with what the unrest will do to you later?

I know there are other nations with similar units, but specifically I'm looking at MA Pythium and the Hydras. An army of 5 of those beasts will take out any of non heavy cavalry independents and be ready to do the same thing again next turn (and the turn after and...) There is no real resource cost, but you're looking at stashing 1250 of gold in order to field such a force.

If I jack up taxes to 200...that money comes quickly, but I'm doing some long term damage to my starting home. Clearly one such force is a great asset. Why not hold out for two? Double the expansion rate should bring great late game rewards...well, if I can hold the ground.

How can/should I go about balancing the tradeoff?

Re: Early Game Maximizing income vs long term grow
 

You have perfect infantry with MA Pythium which will do the same job for you for much lower price. And that is the answer to you question.
And generally I am not a fan of making gold-costly armies of "uber"-units if you don't take very good scales and are not aiming for rush or early war. That's just because you almost always can do the same with cheaper troops and upkeep will come for you shortly. And it is the main thing you should be worried about. Wise player will watch his upkeep thoroughly.

Re: Early Game Maximizing income vs long term grow
 

As for patrolling in the capital, if you plan to patrol and raise taxes, you should take growth. With growth 3 150% tax will do almost no harm to your populace and generally it is a not very wise to use heavy taxation with death.

Re: Early Game Maximizing income vs long term grow
 

Thanks for the thoughts.
Upkeep is tied to unit size?

I just ran a quick test. I took out 25 provinces of indies in 25 turns with a 5 hydra army with no loses. While Pythium's regular infantry is good, there's no way they could do that. Attrition would whittle such a force down.

with growth 3 and a 150% tax rate, you lose about 1% of your population each turn. Setting the initial force to patrol keeps unrest at 0. I think you may be right that this is where the sweet spot lies for good scales.

More later.

Re: Early Game Maximizing income vs long term grow
 

Upkeep is tied to sacred status and gold cost. Sacred units cost 1 upkeep for 30 gold cost, non-sacred units cost 1 for 15.

Re: Early Game Maximizing income vs long term grow
 

Upkeep is tied to unit price. Every 15 gold causes 1 upkeep, so a unit with a price of 150 has upkeep of 10. Sacred units have half upkeep.

Re: Early Game Maximizing income vs long term grow
 

Depends on who i play. With Pythium, i took 2 growth and in start raised taxes to get some quick hydras. That because my pretender, while an sc, was sleeping, and on turn 1 you have no idea who your neighbors are.

As Pythium, 5 hydras is a great deterrent to being rushed. And they can clear provinces even if your are not rushed. Expensive though. If I had an awake sc pretender i would just expand with infantry.

Re: Early Game Maximizing income vs long term grow
 

Making the money intensive 5 Hydra army even more expensive. Thanks. I had not seen that. Still, for initial growth, these creatures are extraordinary, but at that kind of expense you sure don't want to field any more than 2 forces like that to eat up indies and scare off rushes.

With ord-3 gr-3 It looks like I can certainly recover from 4-5 turns of 150% taxation to start with. I can probably even jump it to 200% for a turn without hurting things too much in the long term.

Looks like I'll adjust tax rates to match my build forces, trying to get one hydra army up and going as job #1.

Re: Early Game Maximizing income vs long term grow
 

no it still makes hydra's cheap since else you'd probably still expand with armys for the same amount of cash only you'd loose troops and the hydra is sacred right?

Re: Early Game Maximizing income vs long term grow
 

Not in MA.

Re: Early Game Maximizing income vs long term grow
 

Certainly, they need more micro than hydras, but if you don't use micro then this discussion has no sense)
Properly placed and scripted, 40 Alae legionnaires will take off 10 not _extremely tough_ indy provinces in 10 turns with almost no losses.
And even your starting army with units recruited on turn 0 can capture indies with minimal losses. Still MUCH cheaper than 1250 gold. Pythium and Ermor both have perfect infantry, really.

Re: Early Game Maximizing income vs long term grow
 

You have made me a Evil Despot.

I tried your Ma Pyth with 3 order, 3 growth, 2 bad luck, 2 drain. It seemed wrong but works good. 140% taxes seemed the best trade off as pop flight seemed to kick in bad at 150. I was using Vestals under a Serpent Lord for patrols cause of speed and holy savings.

The extra money to kick in gladiators to take the edge off strong indies worked nice.

The army of 5 Hydras is a hot knife in butter. With the massive amounts of money I am thinking of fielding two or three more. Then condensing them into large armies backed by archers for other pretenders. It is a matter of choosing the right battles for them.

THE DOWN SIDE.

I did good for awhile. Then the attacks started. A Hero with 40+ knights hit my capital to end my unjust rule. I barely won thanks to patrols. Bogus took the province next to my capital. The knights not accepting loss hit my capital again. Some water Hero took the Sea of Woe. Three turns after my first city started to produce the Knights crushed it with a army of 46 HC's. I sent in 80 gladiators backed by two armies to end the siege.

Then it dawned on me. These are HEROS trying to free the people from a Evil Despot who has death squads patroling his lands to keep the people reduce to poverty by my ruinous taxes from rising up against me.

You made me George Bush. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/evil.gif

Re: Early Game Maximizing income vs long term grow
 

awesome!

The Hydra's are a fun early expansion tool, but you still need to diversify. They can't be the only tool in your box or an observant foe is going to smack you. Getting a decent communion going is job 2. If you can get to that point, MA pyth does well.

I like the notion of purchasing the vestals to patrol. Cheap upkeep because of the bless and good speed makes them decent at the job.